Mexico & New Zealand - 2019/20

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Mexico & New Zealand - 2019/20 Ladyandtramp
Houses in Grey Lynn, Auckland
31 januari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 26 °C
I read that staying in the Grey Lynn area or Ponsonby would be a good choice. Houses, or villas as they are called, in both districts were mostly built in the 1890s. Low rents in the 1950s attracted many immigrant workers who quickly made this neighbourhood their home. Now, these cute houses are being renovated and Grey Lynn has become a much sought after trendy place to live, 3 km from downtown Auckland.

We are staying on a very quiet, tree-lined street called Selbourne Street. No cobblestones here or fishermen going to work at 5 in the morning. It is extremely quiet, even with all the windows open.

The lady who owns the house has owned the house for 23 years and did some big renovations. Originally the houses didn’t have plumbing or hydro so a lot of work had to be done to modernize them.

Wikipedia has this to say about these house -

“Most of the houses in the area were built between the 1890s and the beginning of the First World War. They were constructed quickly and with little variation in layout. Their façades were differentiated by the application of mass-produced items; wooden fretwork, stained-glass panels, turned balusters and pressed tin (intended for interior ceilings – this "new" product occasionally appears on the gable ends of some villas). The most important feature was the bay window—hence the name "Bay Villa"—an important feature which marked the owner as middle class. The new inhabitants tended to be young couples, mostly white-collar workers such as clerks and office workers, teachers or skilled crafts-people.”

Most of these wooden houses have a similar floor plan with a central hallway. The parlour was located directly off the corridor, near the front entry. This room was reserved for entertaining guests. The bay window (when fitted to the protruding gable) was reserved for this room, and the best furniture and family treasures would be displayed here. In our house, this room has been made into the guest bedroom.

In most villas, the main bedroom was typically across the corridor from the parlour, facing the street. A second bedroom and any other bedrooms typically faced the side or back of the house. Our hostess and her sister occupy these two rooms.

The kitchen, pantry and scullery – were always at the rear of the house, away from the street. Typically, they were located in a lean-to, with a floor at ground level. The kitchen was for cooking and eating. Early villas would have had a coal range as the sole means of cooking. Later, a wetback provided water heating.

Larger villas sometimes had a separate dining room and a pantry for food storage. A common feature was a safe. This house has a dining and a living area at the back, as well as the kitchen and a deck.

Early villas did not have bathrooms. Long-drop toilets were located in separate buildings in the rear yard. Two bathrooms were added to this house.

The laundry was typically in a separate building behind the main house. Laundries would have contained timber (kauri) tubs and possibly a copper, for boiling water for the washing. There is a little renovated house at the back of the property that our hostess rents out. It may have been the original laundry building...

We took some photos of some of the houses on this street. Most of them have fretwork and stained glass, and a front veranda. They are very cute houses.Meer informatie
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A Walking Trip around Auckland
1 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 24 °C
Today was a day that we felt we needed to stretch our legs out after the flight and explore Auckland. I tore out a page from our Lonely Planet guidebook that had a City Walk Ramble and we followed that guide. We started and ended the walk from our Air BnB house in Grey Lynn, so walked a total of 14 km.

I am just going to touch on some of the highlights and places that we walked though.

1. St. Kevin’s Arcade - a 1924 shopping arcade. We bought a delicious Green Gorilla smoothie here and walked down the stairs to pretty Myer’s Park that s in a ravine.

2. Moses Statue - a reproduction of Michelangelo’s Moses made from marble from the same quarry as the original.

3. We walked up some stairs to Queen Street and passed the Auckland Town Hall (1911, the Aotea Square and the Civic Theatre. The theatre was built in 1927 and is one of only 7 ‘atmospheric theatres’ left in the world. It was closed when we went by but we peeked in the windows and saw a little of its lavish decorations. We would have loved seeing its Moorish auditorium with a night sky and projected clouds and shooting stars on the ceiling.

4. We went up some more stairs in the little Khartoum plaza which had tiles on the walls celebrating NZ women’s historic victory of becoming the first in the world to win voting rights.

5. At the top of the stairs is the Auckland Art Gallery. We went in but entrance fees were too expensive for foreigners. We have to pick and choose the places we want to see or we will be broke!

6. Behind the Art Gallery, and on top of a hill, is the Albert Park. Now it has formal Victorian gardens but during the New Zealand Wars (1847) it was part of the Albert Barracks. University students enjoy hanging out here.

7. At the far end of the park, the beautiful University Clock Tower (1926) can be seen through the foliage. It is white and covered with carvings of flowers and animals.

8. Walking through the lush gardens of the university, we came to a building that was made of wood but looked like stone - the old Government House (1856).

9. Now we started to walk down towards the harbour. It was getting hotter and hotter outside and we were starting to get hungry. The plan was to eat fish and chips at the Fish Market but we still had a ways to go .We passed shopping areas on High Street, historic pubs on Vulcan Lane and ended up in front of the Britomart Train Station.

10. Now we started walking on a flatter area, Quay Street, beside the Viaduct harbour. It is all reclaimed land and under a lot, and I mean a lot, of construction. Bars, restaurants, wharfs with cruise ships, and docked millionaire’s yachts lined this area.

11. We crossed a (bascule) bridge that rises like a seesaw to let boats pass and went into the Wynward Quarter where the Fish Market is located, and our lunch.

12. The Fish Market has several restaurants and all meals are fairly expensive. We settled on eating a shared plate with a mixture of beer battered fish, coconut shrimp and octopus and of course french fries. It was tasty and cost $35 and one beer that cost $10!! Our first, of probably many fish and chips in NZ.

13. The day was getting hotter and hotter and many of the streets do not have a lot of shade. We started the 3.5 km walk home, up and down big hills and around construction. It certainly felt longer than 3.5 km! We stopped at the big Victoria Park to rest and to watch a cricket game. Then, through another park and watched kids flying through the air and going over little hills in a scooter park. What fun.

Anywhere that we went to in Auckland, we could see the Sky Tower. Someone here called it a giant hypodermic needle. It is 328 m tall and has restaurants on top. You can Sky Walk or Sky Jump from the observation deck. We didn’t see anyone doing this though.

Finally, we hot back to peaceful Grey Lynn and had a restful, late afternoon siesta.Meer informatie
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Grey Lynn Sunday Organic Market
2 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☁️ 23 °C
The Grey Lynn market is a 100% community owned and operated food market – a local alternative to grocery stores. Since it is only a 5 minute walk away, off we went and we were pleasantly surprised.

Besides fruits, vegetables, meats, milk, coffee, cheeses, honey and breads there is also a community trading table, where community gardens and backyard growers sell their garden surplus.

We spoke to several of the wonderful people who grow and make the nutritious and delicious foods that were being offered. We are surprised by the high prices of food and gas here. Kids played in the playground and local musicians played music in the shade.

We bought a box of a variety of local fruits and a baguette to take on our trip north. Limes are expensive here so we also bought a jar of fresh lime juice. We were told that it would last for a month.

What we have learned in the past 2 days is that NZ is noticeably committed to becoming zero-waste and this community market is working hard to follow suite to reduce people’s impact on the environment.

It is very common to see people carrying fabric bags and shop keepers have paper bags for packaging. Bottles and jars are reused. Reminds me of the 1950s. What goes around, comes around.Meer informatie
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ReizigerGlad you arrived safe and sound. Enjoy
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Mount Eden
2 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☁️ 23 °C
Volcanos...there is something about volcanoes that we like... NZ is full of volcanoes, and just around Auckland, there are 48 of them. We will have fun here!

Mt. Eden is Auckland’s highest volcanic cone (196m) and the crater is 50m deep. To us it looks like a smaller, yet deeper, version of the volcanic crater we walked up to in Chacala. The walk here was easier as the trails are used a lot by the people who live here, as well as the many visitors who come to see the view.

And the views were amazing. We had asked someone in the grocery store about the views from the Tower and he told us that the views from Mt. Eden were better, and it was free. We could stand in one spot and do a 360 degree turn around and see for miles and miles. It was great.

An interesting fact - In the late 19th century, much of one side of the mountain was quarried to build some of Auckland’s earliest homes, prisons and other structures in the region, as well as the platform at the top the peak. The laborers were mostly Maori men and prisoners, but one was a royal elephant.

Prince Alfred, the Duke of Edinburgh, was about to finish his 1870s tour of the Royal Navy in Auckland. When passing through Nepal, the prince was given a three-year-old elephant by Sir Jung Bahadoor. Alfred named the elephant Tom, and took him along to New Zealand, much to the delight of Auckland residents who had most likely never seen such a creature before.

Over the course of the prince’s stay the elephant was kept in the royal barracks. But his strength and size weren’t put to waste. While on board the ship from Sri Lanka to New Zealand, Tom carried 300 tons of coal across the vessel, much to the delight of the sailors. He was put to similar work on Mt. Eden’s platform, hauling heavy basalt up the mountainside. The royal pachyderm was rewarded for his labor with candy and beer.Meer informatie
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The Northland & 1200 Stairs
3 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ⛅ 21 °C
Way back in July, when we planned the trip, we thought that we would suffer from jet lag from such a long trip, but luckily for us, it was not bad. We thought that a quiet weekend in Auckland would help us get over the time difference but we really didn’t need it.

Anyways, after 3 nights in the big city, we happily got in the car and headed north to a small town in the Northland called Pakaraka, very close to Kerikeri and Russell in the Bay of Islands, 226 km away.

We knew that it would take us about 3 hours, so we just took our time and meandered north. The plan was to see as many of the following cool places as possible. What we didn’t have time to see, we would try to see on our way back.

Here’s the list. The stars * indicate that we stopped there.

* 1. Warkworth - * a hike in the Dome Forest to the Dome Valley Lookout (336m). We found the start to the trail, which was just off Hwy 1, and walked up 600 stairs through a beautiful forest to the Dome summit. From there, we could see the Sky Tower in Auckland! This stop took about 2 hours, so we got our exercise for the day - 600 stairs up and then down.
- Parry Kaure Park - loop walk and museum - we didn’t do this as one hike was enough but it sounds beautiful!

*2. Wellsford - Champion Bakery - someone recommended their meat pies so we stopped here to buy a couple of their bacon and egg pies and a couple of steak and cheese pies. Inexpensive and tasty.

*3. Kaiwaka - La Nonna Italian Bakery was recommended as a good place to stop for coffee and a treat but it was closed on Mondays, so we didn’t go there.
- *Cheese store - There were more than fiftytwo cheeses, most of which are cut to order from the ‘wheel’, an old fashioned way. Many of the cheeses are organic and there are several vegetarian options. We bought some excellent cheddar and thick yogurt.

4. Waipu - Uretiti Beach and Waipu Caves to see glow worms at no cost. We were running out of time so only stopped in Waipu for a late lunch and craft beer at *McLeod’s Pizza Barn. The food was good.

5. Kawakawa - Hundertwasser Toilets - colourful and artistic public toilets very close to our BnB. We’ll save this for another day.

At some point, we turned off the highway and got ‘lost’ on a gravel road in the lovely hilly countryside, near Pakiri.

We arrived in Pakaraka at around 4:30 p.m. and were pleasantly pleased with our new accommodations! Stay tuned...Meer informatie
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Our Pakaraka Air BnB Farmhouse
3 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 30 °C
Oh did we luck out! We are staying in a great self-contained apartment on a lovely small farm not far from Kerikeri. Our hostess and host are interesting people who have committed to living off the land and they are extremely interesting people with kind hearts.

The little farm has about 16 acres with a milking cow, beef cattle, 3 calves, free range chickens, and a black lab named Jas. There are several gardens with the usual vegetables as well as herbs, sunflowers, and all sorts of ‘experimental ‘vegetables. The orchard was full of an assortment of plum, peach, avocado and nut trees.

Our hostess was a busy lady who enjoyed experimenting while making jams and baked goods. While we were there, she was making kombucha. She had a job preparing a tea for visitors in a local tourist spot. She worked as a taxidermist before she moved to the farm!

Her husband is a creative man who has a real interest in all things natural. He has a wealth of information about the flora and fauna of the area and loves the outdoors. Our daily evening chats with these two amazing people was always exciting. I guess that the four of us just clicked. Nice when that happens.

Well, we are happy to be here and anticipate a wonderful stay.Meer informatie
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ReizigerThat’s what traveling is all about- connecting with strangers to make the world seem smaller!
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Where to go? So many cool things to do!
4 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ⛅ 19 °C
The Bay of Islands and the Northland area of the North Island feels like ‘cottage’ country to us. In some ways, I wish that I had planned more time in this area. And it is not just the nature with its beaches and big old trees that interest us, it’s the history of the area that is intriguing. This is the birthplace of the nation where some of the earliest settlements of both the Maori and the Europeans were situated.

The climate is subtropical and the forests are full of ferns, flowers and many varieties of trees.

The Lonely Planet guidebook highlighted 7 areas - Cape Reinga at the very top of the island and the 90 mile beach, the Waipoua Forest where the oldest Kauri trees are located, the Bay of Islands where we are, the Waitangi Treaty Grounds for history and the Manguawhai Heads for surfing. So many places to visit and really only 3 full days.

We decided against the very long trip north to Cape Reinga. It sounds like it would be a great place to visit but we would not be able to drive our car all the way up the 90 km of sand dunes, according to our car rental agreement. We would have to go with a tour group and it is a full day and very expensive.

So, we are happy to see some of the numerous sights around pretty Pakaraka, while we are here. Even just staying on the farm is a wonderful experience.Meer informatie
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Whangarei Falls and Hatea River Walk
4 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☁️ 23 °C
We passed Whangarei on our way up to Takaraka and it seemed so interesting that we decided spend a day exploring it (even though it is a hour’s drive south of here).

Almost every brochure that I read, mentioned the trails around a beautiful waterfall which hooked up to another trail to see the big Kauri trees in the AH Reed Memorial Park.

The Whangarei (Fan-gar-ee) Waterfalls are curtain waterfalls that fall 26 m. You can take a 45 minute walk around the falls and even go swimming in the pond formed below.

We parked the car and took a short path that cut through an open grassy area. It didn’t take long before the path quickly led us to a lookout where we could look over the edge of the waterfall and have a birds-eye view of the picnic area and pool below.

The trail continued over the Hatea river and down and around to the pool below. It reminded us a bit, but on a bigger scale, of the basalt petroglyph area we visited near Chacala, Mexico. Very picturesque.

We wanted to do the Sands Road Loop but somehow ended up on the Hatea River trail that led to the AH Reed Memorial Park. It was a beautiful shady trail though wild flowers and native forest. It wasn’t quiet though.There were lots of bird and buzzing and clicking insect sounds as well as the sound of the river water bubbling over rocks.

This area is known as Otuihau to local Maori and was traditionally a good eeling (fishing) spot. The trail was marked with eel-like figures.

We continued to the AH Reed park which has a canopy walk through a remnant of the original Northland Kauri forest. These trees are huge and several are over 500 years old.Meer informatie
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Reiziger Looks beautiful!
05-02-2020Reageren
LadyandtrampWe have been here for 5 days and could have spent 5 weeks here doing wonderful walks and seeing beautiful places. So many waterfalls and rivers and wonderful forests.
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A.H. Reed Memorial Kauri Park
4 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☁️ 26 °C
This park is named after A H Reed, a well-known New Zealand author, publisher and long distance walker. His parents home is close to the park and he was a significant player in protecting the falls from quarrying and retaining the kauri trees in the forest.

The Kauri is a conifer that is found at the top of the New Zealand's North Island. The tree has small narrow leaves and smooth bark. Kauri forests are some of the world's oldest trees and its ancestors date back to the Jurassic period, 190 million years ago. The timber is very strong and was used for boat-building and house constructions. The gum for the trees has also been dug up from swamps and exported for use in linoleum and varnishes. Kauri forests, now protected, were extensively logged from the mid-1800s onwards and by 1900 the majority of the forests had been cut down. D

We have been to a few Kauri forests and have noticed signs that inform people about Kauri Dieback disease. Stations are set up so that people can clean the soil from their shoes before entering a kauri forest. The posters read -

“Stop kauri dieback and protect kauri.
Kauri dieback disease is spread through soil.
Scrub soil off shoes and gear and check it's all removed before you go.
Use a hygiene station when you enter and leave.
Always stay on the track.”

From the forest, we took a path upwards to the top of another 23 m high waterfall, Paranui. We were surprised that it had hardly any water in it.. It is the end of summer so maybe the water levels are low?

We eventually backtracked through the forest to our car and went on to the Whangarei city centre for a coffee.Meer informatie
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Clapham’s National Clock Museum
4 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ⛅ 30 °C
The clock museum in Whangarei is home to over 1800 clocks and timepieces, which makes it one of the largest collections of clocks in the Southern Hemisphere. It sounded interested so we paid a $7 entrance fee to visit this unique display.

This unusual museum owes itself to a man from Yorkshire called Archie Clapham. He emigrated to Wellington, New Zealand in 1903. Trained as an engineer, he oversaw the power plant that kept the Wellington tram system going. But outside of work, he had another passion – clocks. He was an avid collector of timepieces of all shapes and sizes and by the time he left Wellington for Whangarei, he had amassed around four hundred of them.

Archie had come into an inheritance, so he bought a farmhouse and some land and then spent his money and time indulging in his passion. He travelled the country to visit auction houses in search of new timepieces. Archie was a born entertainer and loved to have fun. Many of his favourite pieces reflected that sense of fun in their quirky appearance or by doing something unexpected. There were dancing dolls, barking dogs and Highlanders in kilts.

Archie left the collection to the local council, selling it to them in 1961 for a small sum. As the years went on, people donated more clocks to the collection and a museum was built to house all of the pieces.

When we walked in, we had a lot of fun looking at all of the displays which filled every inch of the walls and shelves. There are clocks and timepieces of every imaginable shape and size, and age. It made us remember the clocks that our families had when we were younger - pocket watches, a cat with moving eyes and tail, a grandfather clock, a mantle clock, Mickey Mouse watch and more.

By the way, none of the clocks in the museum are set to the same time, so we heard chimes, music and bird calls throughout our whole visit.

Boring this is not.Meer informatie
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Kerikeri
5 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 21 °C
Kerikeri is small town, about 20 km from where we are, with a population of about 7,000. It’s been labelled the ‘fruit bowl of the north’ as just about everything grows here. As it’s located in one of New Zealand’s geothermal zones, the soil is very fertile. All types of citrus fruits, avocados, macadamias nuts, blueberries, strawberries, persimmons, tamarillos, apples, and all three types and colours of kiwifruit can be found growing in orchards.

Kerikeri in Maori means “digging”, which fits with what the first missionaries would have seen when they arrived – local Maori out digging and turning the soil for replanting.

Our first stop before Kerikeri was at the Makana chocolate factory. Once inside the shop the staff greet you with samples of their signature best-sellers. The shop itself is next to the factory with glass windows so you can see the chocolatiers at work creating more delicious handmade goodies. It is a week before Valentine’s Day, so all sorts of Valentine treats were being made.

From here, we walked across the carpark to the Kauri Workshop, a functional wood carving shop. Visiting this shop was the highlight of our day! Petrified kauri timber is crafted into tables, toys and even pens. The owner and his assistant were happy to chat about how and why they use this highly sought-after protected native timber. They had several old photos that showed loggers cutting down and moving the huge trees. We could see the workshop through the store window and the owner invited Chris our back to see his tools and the huge slab of wood that he had.

We stopped in Kerikeri to pick up some postcards and to have a coffee in the old movie theatre. Tomorrow is a holiday, so it was pretty busy in town!

From there, we made our way down the main street of Kerikeri and on to the Kororipo Pa, the site of an important Maori pa (fortress) and village. Little remains aside from the terracing that once supported the palisades. Huge war parties once departed from here, terrorizing most places on the North Island and slaughtering thousands during the Musket Wars.

Just down from the pa, is the Mission House and the Stone Store, New Zealand’s oldest European building (1836). It was incredible to see and hear what went on here in this very spot in the early days of colonial New Zealand.

There is a tour which we didn’t take that gives details about the first settlers and the missionaries who came and how they lived alongside the local Maori tribes in the area but we had some info about the history so we didn’t take go on it. The tourist brochure says, “ the guides share stories of fierce warriors, drunken sailors and earnest missionaries.” Can you imagine what life was like for the women?

The gardens surrounding both the Kemp House, a wooden house built in 1822, and the Stone Store are heritage cottage gardens and full of fruit trees. The first fruit tree ever planted on New Zealand soil at the ripe old age of 199 years old sits and still grows on the other side of the pavement. We loved the giant magnolia tree that still had some of its flowers on the branches.

No hiking today, but as always, there was a river track to the Rainbow Falls, that is supposed to be lovely. Instead, we drove to the neighbouring town of Paihia, close to the birthplace of New Zealand - Waitangi. It was a busy place, preparing for the big festival tomorrow. We still haven’t decided if we will go to it or not... but we will check out the schedule.

We went home, made sandwiches and had a cold Gold Beer. Debbie, our hostess picked some corn for us and gave us some fresh creamy cow milk. This farm life is great!Meer informatie
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Waitangi Day - February 6
5 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ⛅ 18 °C
Waitangi Day is New Zealand's national day. It is a holiday held annually on February 6th to commemorate the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi - New Zealand's founding document - on February 6th 1840.

The Treaty made New Zealand a part of the British Empire, guaranteed Māori rights to their land and gave Māori the rights of British citizens.

In February 1840, the Ngāpuhi, the largest Maori tribe, hosted around 10,000 Maori to debate the agreement for several days. On February 6th, a treaty was signed by around 40 Maori chiefs and representatives of the British Crown at the Treaty House on the Waitangi grounds.The treaty was subsequently signed by another 500 Māori chiefs in various locations throughout the country.

The ceremonies started at daybreak ( 5 a.m.), with the Prime Minister of New Zealand, Jacinda Arden, serving breakfast at 6 a.m.

We didn’t go at daybreak, but got to the Treaty Grounds at around 9 a.m., the perfect time before the crowds started to arrive. We parked in a farmer’s field and then a shuttle bus took us to the historic site.

We especially liked the meeting house. In Māori culture, meeting houses are symbols of tribal prestige and are often named after, and seen as the embodiment of, a tribal ancestor. This structure is seen an an outstretched body, with the roof’s v shape at the front of the house representing the ancestor’s head. The main ridge beam represents the backbone, the diagonal boards that lead out from the roof are the arms and the lower ends of the boards divide to represent fingers. Inside, the centre pole is seen as the heart, the rafters reflect the ancestor’s ribs, and the interior is the ancestor’s chest and stomach. Neat!

The carvings in the house were amazing and a little frightening.

I wouldn’t go into all the details about what we did but it was a very pleasant morning. A flypast of fighter jets thrilled us, followed by a 21 gun salute by the HMNZS WELLINGTON marking the 68th Anniversary of the Queen’s Accession to the throne.

A woman told us to head to the harbour where Maori war canoes would circle the harbour in a whirlpool formation. We watched a huge waka taua (war canoe), 35 m and 6 tons, make its annual outing. It was carved from a giant Kauri logs and can hold about 100 people, 80 of whom are rowers!!!!

The food/craft tents were awesome and so were the performances (songs and haka, fierce war dances, on the main stage. A bit scary...

All in all, it was a great morning and we had a lot of fun in the sun!Meer informatie
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Kawakawa’s Public Toilets
6 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ⛅ 24 °C
Kawakawa has a population of about only 1,500 people but we found it to be unusual. It has an architecturally significant public washroom and a steam train that runs down the Main Street of the town!

What town do you know of that is known for its public washrooms? Haha. Kawakawa’s were designed by an Austrian-born artist and eco-architect Friedensreich Hundertwasser, who lived near Kawakawa in a house without electricity from 1973 until his death in 2000. His work focused firmly on opposing the concept of a straight line, and the washroom is a cobbled example of this.

The designs in the washrooms are typical of his work with wavy lines decorated with ceramic mosaics and coloured bottles. The roof is covered with grass and plants. It all is very interesting and very quirky.Meer informatie
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On to the Coromandel Peninsula
7 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 18 °C
Well, after a week of exploring the lovely Bay of Lakes area, we are heading back down to Auckland and up to Thames on the Coromandel Peninsula. The driving will take about 4 hours + with it being a Friday and having to drive through Auckland, so we are just making it a driving day.

We did stop a few times though. Once at the Brynderwyns Scenic Lookout where the hills are covered with old sheep trails and we could see for miles. A man was filming using a drone and because Kiwis love their coffee, there was conveniently a coffee truck at the base of the trail!

Just north of Auckland, there is a town called Warkworth, just like the town in Ontario. I had read that there was a lovely trail and a museum full of interesting information about the town, just off the highway. And what I read was right on!

The Warkworth and District Museum is located in the beautiful Parry Kauri Park. The walk was not long, about 1/2 hour, but it was on boardwalks and wound its way through the native bush to a lookout and a kauri tree grove. A good break from our drive.

We could have spent hours in the pioneer museum, but we rushed through it in half an hour. Whoever put the displays (clocks, clothes, china, lamps, buttons, cameras) together, obviously did it with love. As the brochure says, “Displaying the past for the present. Preserving the past for the future.”

Auckland was only a 45 minute drive ahead and then on to Thames, another 1 1/2 hours.

We are looking forward to our stay on the Coromandel Peninsula. It is an area that juts into the Pacific , east of Auckland and its mountain our spine divides it into two distinct areas. The west coast where Thames is located, is full of wetlands and stony bays. Several historic gold mining towns are found on this side. The east side has beautiful white sand beaches and this is where Aucklanders go for holidays.

We plan to use Thames as a home base for 5 nights and drive around the Peninsula to see the different areas.Meer informatie
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Thames & its Saturday Market and Museum
8 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 14 °C
Our Lonely Planet Guidebook says that there is still architectural evidence of the 19th Century gold rush in Thames but grizzly prospectors have been replaced by alternative lifestyles. We have noticed this! Sometimes we feel like we are on a different planet. There seem to be many odd or unusual things/people in this town. Haha.

We walked around the town, just to get a feel for it and noticed a few interesting places near the shoreline where there is a park with a sidewalk. A Small Gauge Railway takes kids for a fun 900m ride around the park. From the sidewalk, there is a walkway going through a mangrove to a hut that you can sit in to observe some of the many seabirds.

Surprisingly there is also a Carnegie library.

On Saturday morning, we walked down the steep track to the market which is set up on the Main Street. Our hosts had mentioned a stand with delicious red peppers so our goal was to drop by the market for a minute or two to buy some. But, the market was a lot more interesting than we thought it would be.

Yes, there were fruit and vegetable stands as well as crafts, but there were also musicians and people selling ‘antique’ junk and used clothing. It was a hodge podge of activities, some quite amusing. We had fun finding our red peppers.

At the end of the market, the museum was having a Fun Day with old-fashioned games and activities and people dressed in flapper costumes.

We also discovered that Thames has many used clothing stores. Apparently, because of the big ‘ageing population’ here, older people tend to clear out their old clothes and items quite often in the downsizing process and donate them to the op shops. I’m not sure if any young people would be interested in the larger sized clothing ...

By 11 a.m., we were ready to visit the School of Mining Museum.Meer informatie
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ReizigerDoggie cafe....made me laugh. Someone with a great sense of humour or a lot of time or maybe both.
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Karangahake Gorge
8 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ⛅ 21 °C
Today we walked 14 km. A good workout.

The Karangahake Gorge is the beautiful location for a busy gold mining site in the 1870s. More than half of the country's entire gold production came from around here and now all that is left are the remains of stamper batteries that crushed the rock to extract the ore. The gold that was found in this gorge was very hard to get it.

Extracting the gold was no simple matter of scooping up a few shovelfuls of sand and gravel and swirling it about in a pan. The miners, using basic tools, had to undo what the awesome forces of nature had taken aeons to do by breaking the rock, extracting the quartz and then crushing it to get at the gold.

The gold-bearing quartz in the hills through which the river cuts its way had to be blasted and chipped out using pick and shovel. It was then conveyed to stamping batteries which, as their name suggests, were great steam-powered hammers designed to pulverise rock to dust.

The remains of three of these can be seen in the Karangahake Gorge. Access to them is by a 4.5-km walkway, which follows the same route as the railway that once ran from Paeroa to the Waihī goldmine.

At Karangahake, there are several walks and tracks ranging anywhere from 30 minutes to over 2 hours starting at the Karangahake Reserve car park and picnic area. It was a hot, yet overcast day, so it was a perfect day to walk.

We have found that any signage giving information in NZ has been very sparse and often confusing, and this was definitely the case in the Gorge. We would follow arrows and directions regarding several walks and we never knew where we were going! Always a surprise.

One of the most spectacular walks in the area is called the "Windows Walk", a loop walk that leads through the old gold mining tunnels of the Talisman Mine. In areas, windows had been cut through the rock to allow a little light into the tunnels. The views of the gorge from these windows were great. We walked for about 1/2 hour in the long, dark tunnels and even saw glow worms at one point. We had our flashlight and our cell phone with us and they were necessary. Often the tunnel floors were wet and slippery, and at times, the ceiling was pretty low. Chris bumped his head in one spot.

When we exited, another trail followed the river and 1/2 hour later we ended at a waterfall and swimming hole with holidayers having picnics and swimming. Once again, we saw and took a long tunnel that took us to a camp ground. Now, that was as far as we were going to go and we wanted to be back to the parking lot by 5 p.m. So we turned around and walked briskly back to the exit of the first set of tunnels.

There we were able to cross the Waitawheta River over a suspension bridge, and take the old Crown Tramway Track back along the cliffs of the Waitawheta Gorge. The path follows the route of a bush tramway and passes by more "windows" in the cliff face at the end of mining tunnels. These were used to tip tailings down into the Waitawheta Gorge. Two of the mining tunnels, which are about 2 metres (7 ft) tall and wide, are safe to enter. They home to glowworms and ugly cave weta (crickets?)

Touring the School of Mining before our walk was a good idea as it gave us a good base of information for our hike. We would have loved to have seen and heard those miners in action. Being a miner here was not an easy job.

After all of our walking, we drove back to Thames, ate a light dinner, took a hot shower and slept like babies!Meer informatie
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Thames School of Mining and Museum
8 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ⛅ 22 °C
We weren’t sure if we would be able to visit this historic school, due to its limited visiting hours but we did. It opened at 11 a.m. and we were there. Chris and I were the only ones on the tour so we could ask Steve, the guide, lots of questions which he was happy to answer.

The buildings contain an extensive collection of rocks, mineral and fossils. The oldest building (1868) was part of a Methodist Sunday school, situated on a Maori burial ground.

In 1867, a gold rush to Thames, one of the richest goldfields in the world, attracted prospectors from around the world. At that time, Thames became NZ’s largest town. Once all the “free” gold was extracted, the government set up this school to develop and teach methods of extracting less accessible gold. It ran until 1954.

In the museum, we saw a framed 1926 certificate re the gold from Thames from the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto.

What we learned from this tour, was that the hills behind Thames were filled with miners trying to make their fortunes. The town grew very quickly from 1867, as miners flooded the Thames goldfields. But the problem was that the gold was very difficult to extract from the quartz that it was embedded in. That meant that a lot of money was needed and a lot of science was required to get the gold out.

Soon, the hills were filled with mine entrances. Stamper batteries (giant crushing machines) were all over the hills, crushing the quartz to get the gold. The batteries made a huge thumping sound 6 days a week for 24 hours a day. Sunday’s were a day of rest and it was so quiet that kids had trouble sleeping.

Our tour gave us a good understanding of why and how Thames grew and declined. Kudos to Steve who did a good job explaining the history of Thames to us.Meer informatie
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ReizigerSure he was very pleased to have two very attentive students!
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Rapauwa Water Gardens
9 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 17 °C
Driving to Coromandel Town on the last day of a 4 day holiday weekend was a test of Chris’ driving skills. Even though he has become quite good with driving on the other side on wiggly, narrow roads, I have some anxious moments as vehicles with big boat trailers and huge trucks carrying mussels whiz by in the opposite direction, taking up too much space.

Thankfully, we saw a sign on the highway advertising the “Rapaura Watergardens. Experience the tranquil beauty”. The perfect time for a calming stop.

Rapaura is a 64-acre private estate nestled in the middle of the Coromandel Forest Park, 30 minutes north of Thames.

It is a lovely, mature property, which has evolved over more than 40 years. In the early 1960’s, Fritz and Josephine Loennig bought 64 acres of scrub and grazing land in the Tapu Valley and had a dream of creating a Garden of Eden - native trees and ferns, seasonal exotics, birds in their natural environment, lily ponds, water features, meandering walks over bridges and streams. They added sculptures made by an award winning artist and added a relaxing bush walk to a cascading waterfall, 'The Seven Stairs to Heaven'.

This garden is presently owned by Sally Sank who believes that ‘...in any society, owning land is no more than becoming a temporary caretaker, and care we must, or the earth will cease to support our needs.’ Isn’t that right...

We ended our visit by stopping in at the on-site tea house for a good coffee and a slice of orange/almond cake. New Zealanders love their coffee and we can always be guaranteed to have a good cup of Flat White coffee (coffee with milk).

Then ... back into the car and onto that wiggly, narrow road heading north, trying avoid contact with all the speedy people heading south.Meer informatie
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Visiting the Eye-Full Tower
9 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 23 °C
Coromandel Town is on the west coast of the Coromandel Peninsula of New Zealand's North Island. On a good day, the drive from Thames takes about 1 1/2 hours. The road snakes along the coast past pretty bays and rocky beaches filled with sea birds.

At one time Coromandel Harbour was a major port serving the region's gold mining and kauri industries. Today, the town's main industries are tourism and mussel farming. Just before entering the town, we saw the enormous mussel farms and a sign for the Coromandel Oyster Company. We heard that the mussel chowder there was excellent so we made plans to go there later for a late lunch on our way back home.

Coromandel town is filled with heritage houses. Gold was discovered there in 1852. The local Maori kept their land and collected money from digging licenses, until they went into debt and had to sell off a huge portion of their land. There is a small Mining Museum in the town.

We actually drove to this town to experience the Driving Creek Railway. We had read that we could ride on a narrow-gauge train through mountain forests and past pottery sculptures, for an hour.

The story behind this railway is quite interesting. The late Barry Brickell, a renowned New Zealand potter, initially began building train tracks to transport clay, from one area of his property to his pottery workshop. As clay ran out in one spot Barry would extend the track to source more, until eventually it was long enough that friends were invited for train rides. The tracks grew and grew and the train has become quite a popular visitor attraction. It has hosted well over 1 million passengers.

The Driving Creek Railway climbs 2.7 km from the base station that is 55 metres above sea level to the Eye-full Tower that is 167 metres above sea level, a total climb of 115 metres. With an average gradient of 1-in-24.1, or 1 vertical metre for every 24.1 metres of length, the Driving Creek Railway is New Zealand’s steepest railway.

We got there shortly after 2 p.m. and were able to board the train for the 3:15 p.m. ride. As we slowly travelled through the forests, the conductor gave a brief history of the train and facts about the ride. We went across 4 trestle bridges, along 2 spirals and a double-switchback, through 2 tunnels and reached the highest point, an observation deck called the “Eye-full Tower. We were able to enjoy the views for a few minutes before heading back down again through native forests with artworks and vermin traps lining sections of the tracks.

Unlike most other tourist railways, this railway is newly-built rather than being an old line that has been restored. It is New Zealand’s only narrow-gauge mountain railway.

Barry died 4 years ago, at 80, and was buried on a little bit of flat land on a hill beside his railway track.

We wandered around a bit and then started the wiggly trip back to Thames, but not before stopping in for a bowl of delicious mussel chowder. It was worth the wait!Meer informatie
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Up to a Hot Water Beach
10 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 19 °C
We took our bathing suits and headed to a beach where we could dig ‘hot tubs’ on the beach at low tide. Fun!

From Thames, we drove west and then north to Ferry Landing. Thames is the biggest town on the Peninsula and we wanted to visit the second biggest town (5,000). Whitianga. At a certain spot, there is a choice of getting to the town by either taking a 2 minute smooth ferry ride across the strait or a 45 minute drive around the point on windy roads. You can probably guess which option we took.

In November, 1769 Captain James Cook arrived in the area in his ship The Endeavour, to observe the transit of the planet Mercury. He stayed for about 12 days in the pretty harbour, later called Mercury Bay, and made friends with the natives living there.

The whole area is known for its beautiful white sandy beaches and people come here for holidays. There is a lot to do if you enjoy being on the water - kayaking, diving, boating and game-fishing.

When native forests were being harvested on the peninsula in the 1800s and early 1900s, Whitianga was a timber port. Ships from Europe sailed in to Whitianga's deepwater harbour to load up with valuable kauri logs. Today, the town depends on fishing, farming and tourism.

We went over to the town just to check it out and have lunch there. There are a lot of cool little shops and bookstores and it is a pretty town.

Low tide was at 2:15, and that’s when we had a date on a famous Hot Water Beach.

Every day, for 2 hours on either side of low tide, in one small area in front of a rocky outlet, hot water oozes up from beneath the sand. People get little shovels and dig ‘hot tubs’ to sit in. In some places, the water is so hot that it is steaming! We had a lot of fun sharing our tub with an elderly mom from England who was visiting her son. When we got too hot, we jumped into the cold ocean water. It was great!

When we got tired of relaxing, haha, we drove to the very touristy Hahei Beach for a walk towards the equally famous Cathedral Cove. Everything touristy is this area is expensive but the beach and the view of the offshore islands is lovely.

The weather here has been so great and the days are long. It is so wonderful being in the sunshine from 6 a.m. to 9:30 at night. We are so fortunate.Meer informatie
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Interesting Facts about Where We Are
11 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 14 °C
Grocery store PAC and Save, Countdown

Gasoline prices varied between roughly $2.10 and $2.16 per liter.

you need data, like we did, your best bet is to go with the local SIM card there. The 2 largest operators that offer SIM cards for travelers, starting at roughly 50 NZD (for 3 GB of data with Vodafone), are Vodafone and Spark.
general, the coverage throughout the country is patchy, especially in the non-inhabited places, which there are many. You may easily camp without any connectivity. But as soon as you are in a small town, there will be connectivity – no worries about that!Meer informatie
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Waihi Beach and Whaihi Gold Mine
11 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 20 °C
Today is our last day on the Cormandel Peninsula and we have been a little ‘beached out’ from our 3 weeks in Chacala, Mexico and our time here but ... we wanted to visit a quiet, non touristy beach area that our Air BnB host had recommended, near the Bay of Plenty, Waihi Beach.

It took us about 1 hour to drive to the Pacific Coast from Thames. There aren’t many roads that cross the peninsula and we drove on the same road that we took to the Karangahake Gorge, but further.

The long, sandy Waihi Beach stretches 9 km along a narrow peninsula to Bowentown. There are lots of campsites and the beach is non-touristy and quiet. It is a lovely place to visit.

It was a very intense sunny day, so we didn’t linger there, but drove up the coast to see the views and have a light lunch.

In the afternoon, we slowly wound our way back to Thames and decided to stop off in the town of Waihi, which is only 11 km away from the beach. Waihi Beach and Waihi are completely different! a surfing town vs a mining town.

At the entrance to the town, there is a lovely little park with a lake, Gilmour Lake, where we took a peaceful walk upstream to a mill stream and then around Union Hill which is a historic mining area. When the miners left, all the old equipment and cyanide (for separating the gold from the quartz) tanks were just left, creating a very eerie scene. There were several signs telling us to not walk off the paths as it was dangerous - open mine entrances and holes. We really enjoyed this walk! You won’t find anything about this area in guidebooks.

It was the lure of gold that brought people to Waihi in 1878. Gold was found in quartz on a Maori burial ground and that soon became the site of the famous Martha Mine, NZ’s richest mine.

We were able to park the car and walk up to the rim of the open pit mine which is 300 meters deep and 5 km in diameter. What a sight we had. It is huge! In its heyday, between 600 to 1500 men worked in the 175 km network of tunnels on 15 levels. The deepest vertical shaft goes down 600 m.

We didn’t have time to walk the Pit Rim Walkway but we did get a few photos from the top. Runners come here on the weekends to do a run around the rim.

An interesting old building (1904) is a skeleton of a derelict Cornish Pumphouse. We read that the pump house was moved a few years ago from a site 300 meters away, as the land was unstable and the town wanted to keep the iconic building for historical reasons.

We found out that a few years ago, Donna almost bought property in this cool old town. If she had, we would have been visiting her there. Funny.Meer informatie
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Leaving Thames & Going to Hamilton
12 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 18 °C
So after 5 nights in a typical old-fashioned NZ house, we left our base town of Thames to meet up with our Elora friend, Donna, in the landlocked city of Hamilton.

On the way, we stopped in to the Matatoki Cheese factory to buy an assortment of NZ cheese, and for a delicious coffee. Boy, New Zealanders love their organic coffee and can make a good cuppa of flat whites, as well as delicious scones.

We passed Paeroa, where we bought a can of their famous lemonade called Lemon & Paeroa, or L&P, which is a sweet soft drink manufactured in New Zealand. Created in 1907, it was traditionally made by combining lemon juice with carbonated mineral water from the town of Paeroa, but it is now owned and manufactured by Coca-Cola.

On we went to Morrinsville, where we tried to find Chris kiwi wide brimmed hat. The sun here is so intense, not really super hot, but intense that his baseball cap wasn’t doing a good enough job. No luck, but we went into a bakery to get a sandwich and had a picnic lunch in the park.

Morrinsville has a quirky and colourful ‘herd of cows’ art installation that are located around town. It was fun to see this collection of life-sized cow sculptures which highlighted the history of dairy farming in the town. We thought of the Plunkett family, especially since we saw a variation of their name throughout the area!

Eventually, we arrived at our rendezvous point in the Hamilton Gardens with Donna. Our directions to each were not so clear so we ended up in more or less the same area at the right times but without seeing each other. It was a joyful reunion when we made the connection.

After a short sit in the sun by the lake, we continued on to Anita and Bob’s beautiful Double Bay Villa in Te Miro, near Cambridge. More about the house in another footprint.Meer informatie
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Anita & Bob’s Amazing House in Cambridge
12 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ☀️ 27 °C
Anita and Bob used to live in Guelph. Bob worked at the university and Anita was a teacher and worked with Donna. Bob was offered a job in New Zealand and moved with his family there. Eventually they decided to settle there and bought a lovely property in the tiny area known as Te Miro.

The land here is made up of gently rolling hills, and is primarily used for pastures and dairy farming. There are some areas of native bush and reserves, and also a few small pine forestry plantations. There are many streams that twist through the hills of the area, thus the name Te Miro which means The Twist.

An interesting story in a nutshell. After Bob and Anita bought the property, they had a decision to make - build a new house or buy an old character house, move it and renovate it. Well, Bob is an engineer so you have already guessed what he decided to do. And what a gorgeous house on a hill it is.

The amazing part to this story is that the house had to be cut in half before it could be loaded on a flatbed truck and moved to its new site. And then, they had the incredible job of bringing the halves up a very, very long and steep dirt road to the top of the hill and finally, put the house back together again. Can you imagine!!!

We saw the three photo books full of photos from this endeavour and it was mind blowing.

Donna, Chris and I stayed in their “cottage”, a holiday home that can sleep at least 20 people. We were so

Donna, Anita, Bob and the McQueen family were all super kind to us and we had a wonderful 5 nights in this beautiful part of New Zealand. We won’t be forgetting much about our stay here. It was awesome!Meer informatie
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Hamilton’s Waikato Museum
13 februari 2020, Nieuw-Zeeland ⛅ 18 °C
We had promised Anita and Bob’s homeschooled grandkids that we would do a little sock puppet show with them on Sunday. We needed a few materials and to buy some food, so we headed into Hamilton.

But Hamilton, NZ, like Hamilton, Ontario, has a beautiful 50 hectares garden in the city centre and on the banks of the Waikato River. We didn’t feel like we had time to do it justice today, so instead we went to the excellent Waikato Museum.

Most of the display areas can be visited for free and the galleries housing Maori treasures were what we wanted to see. Sadly, we were not allowed to take photos in this area, but the whole display was outstanding. The piece de resistance was a magnificently carved 200 year old war canoe that had quite a history.

The museum is positioned on the banks of the Waikato River and it has lovely views from all the windows on that side.

After a late lunch in a Mexican restaurant that served great tacos, we hunted for a big brimmed hat but never found one that looked good or fit Chris. Oh well. Food and puppet making materials though were easy to find.Meer informatie
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