Farewell Spit - part 2

We took the opportunity to have a good walk along the beach, until the bus came and collected us for the return journey. The driver pointed out a colony of gannets at the end of the Spit which he said was started with about 60 birds and now numbers more than 10,000.
The sand dunes are constantly traveling, at about 300m per year, as sand is blown off the windward side and lands on the leeward side. On the way back, we stopped to climb the highest sand dune (and run down the other side) from where we could see across the Spit to the inside beach somewhere between 7-10km away depending on the tides. This shallow bay is sadly the place where pilot whales are regularly stranded, and the community comes out in droves to try and refloat them.
Before heading back across to the inside beach we stopped at the bottom of the beach, Fossil Point, where we saw 25million year old fossilized shells in the rocks. From here we could also look further along to some of the cliffs at Cape Farewell. Then it was back over the bumpy track to the inside beach, and on to Cape Farewell itself, the northern-most point of the South Island. The layers of conglomerate rock that make up the cliffs are most impressive – these are 50 million years old. Here we climbed to the top of the cliffs and looked out over the vast expanse of the Tasman Sea.
We were back at Pakawau by midday, and ready for a wee nap, after one of the most brilliant of days.Read more