D41 –- Northland

We ate breakfast on a deck overlooking 90-mile beach – beautiful! After a quick walk through the dunes to check out the water (chilly) we drove toward the north end of the island. Our first stop was Ancient Kauri Kingdom, a workshop that makes furniture and decorative items from the enormous and once abundant Kauri tree. Apparently there was some meteorological event that occurred 30,000-50,000 years ago that felled lots of trees in the area.



They’ve been buried in swamp land ever since. Because logging has wiped out much of the Kauri forests, the ancient trees are now being unearthed and used instead of live Kauri. To give you an idea of the size of these ancient trees, we climbed a staircase that was carved out of one of them.

Our second stop was the highlight of the day. Cape Reinga, the northernmost accessible part of NZ, is where the Tasman Sea and the South Pacific Ocean meet. Besides the breathtaking beauty, it is special because it is the place where the Maori believe their souls go after death to return to their ancestral land. There was an 800 year-old pohutukawa tree that sat alone on the side of the cliff, and it is from that point that the Maori believe their spirits leave this earth.

We decided to go to some sand dunes on the way back from Cape Reinga. On our way we drove though farmland full of cows, horses, and sheep. Neither of us had been this close to sheep before, so we were quite amazed to see this…

I don't know how they walk with those things!

The size of the sand dunes was just as impressive; Thomas said the dunes were bigger than the ones in White Sands. We climbed a couple of them, which was not easy because you sink into the sand so much. The second one we climbed must have been about three stories tall and was really steep. At the top we got a cool view of the other dunes, a sand-rock formation, and the ocean. Getting down was much easier than going up – it was almost like walking in quick sand.

Unfortunately, we didn’t end our wonderful day on a high note. Whereas in Argentina you can’t eat dinner before 8 p.m., here in NZ you can’t really eat dinner past 8 p.m. Many towns are small and things can shut down quite early. We had only one choice for dinner – Sea Dragon Chinese. If you are ever in Kaitaia, skip it!

-Elva