The motor ran a little slow since the power was 50Hz. Having less air to cool the heating elements, after a few minutes the automatic heat sensor shut down the unit. We had to wait five minutes for it to reset itself before we could use it again.
While Janet readied herself for the day, I stole a few minutes to explore the upper floor of the one hundred and fifty year old house. We had the entire floor to ourselves because the other guest room was vacant. The balance of the rooms were furtively discovered to contain: a showroom for woven goods, a small, but overpacked library, and a weaving workroom. As Janet was getting dressed, I started filling in a few postcards. Our list of recipients was long, so I picked a few names of people who lived in California so that they would receive them before we returned home. Even though we had only been in the country for one day, we had no trouble filling-up the left side of the card with our past activities and future plans.
By 8:00 AM we both were ready and went downstairs to the kitchen for the other 'B' in B&B: breakfast. There we met Colleen who we had missed the day before since she had not returned home until after we had fallen asleep.
As we sat at the kitchen table, Thomas, the family kitten, introduced himself by pawing and scratching at my leg which was occupying his favorite chair. Upon closer examination Thomas was found to be entirely black except for a small white patch on his chest. He was not ready to meet the strangers in his kitchen, and, since he lost the battle to regain his chair, he fled from the kitchen to parts unknown.
As we talked to Colleen, we began to find out about Kauri. All this time I had assumed that it was the name of a tribe of natives since I had seen it used to describe the Kauri forests and the Kauri Homestead that we were staying at. It turns out to be a type of wood, as an example, the table we were sitting at had a top of roughly three by seven feet made from one solid piece of Kauri wood. Tony had reconditioned it to its original finish. The fine grain with absolutely no knots could be seen under the lace table cloth.
Breakfast was now ready. It consisted of country fresh eggs, whole grain toast, cereal, milk, and tea. In New Zealand the eggs have yellow-er yolks and the bacon has meat about two or three times the width of the fatty part that we are used to seeing in the United States. When the toast was served to us, we discovered what is called a 'toast rack'. This device consists of vertical wires bent like croquet hoops arranged on a tray such that slices of toast can be inserted between them. The idea is to allow air to come in contact with the toast to keep it crispy. If you were to lay it down on a plate, the residual steam escaping from the still hot bread would cause the toast to become soggy. We didn't ask, but we were sure Colleen was not going to part with her toast rack, so we added this to our list of souvenirs to look for.
Everything seemed to taste better. It was hard to tell if our exuberance for the country was playing tricks on our taste buds, or if the food was actually better. We tended to believe that the food had to be better being fresh from the local farms, but if there is any illusion to this, it is well worth the twelve hour airplane ride to experience the difference. Our day planned itself with some help from Colleen. We plotted a course north to Whangarei to see the waterfall and to find a SCUBA shop that might have charters to take me out to a secluded dive spot the next day, then, up to the Bay of Islands to explore the picturesque scenery.
What sounded like a simple schedule turned out to be more wonderful that we could have imagined.
We drove north along Highway 1. Not too far from the B&B we found the 'little tea room at the top of the hill' as Colleen had described it. Officially it is called the Skyline Tearoom. For the price of a cup of tea you can sit in the small enclosed patio dining area and get a bird's eye view of the surrounding countryside. The bright sunshine beckoned us outside where we took a few photos from the deck while our boiling hot tea cooled down below scalding.
After the tea disappeared, we got back into our Fiat and drove north towards Whangarei. I don't know what drew me there, but there must have been a sign somewhere that made me point the car towards Marsden Point. Located at the end of Bream Bay, it forms the mouth of Whangarei Harbour still fifteen miles to the city of Whangarei. After driving through a small seaside village, we came to the end of the point and parked near a jetty that extended into the bay.
We strolled out the jetty, snapping pictures as we paused to admire the view both across the bay and back towards land. On the way back, we stopped to climb down the large boulders that formed the jetty to the water's edge. It was clear and cool, but not cold. You might expect to find this in a pristine country such as New Zealand, but not next to an oil refinery.
We went into the Visitor's Center and pushed the button which began the multi-media presentation on several screens around a large model of the refinery. At the appointed time the automated controls illuminated the corresponding part of the model to highlight the video presentation's explanations. Upon completion of the presentation, we exited through the lower level lobby. This was the first stop of the part of the trip I called the 'techno-tour'. Coming from a technical background, I enjoy seeing how things are done in other countries.
What struck us as unique from our experiences in the United States is that the New Zealanders actually did things to protect the environment instead of just paying lip service. Notable, was the way that 100% of the crude oil is processed and used without waste. In the United States, you don't have to go far to see 'useless' gas being burnt off into the atmosphere almost every night. I guess this situation can be explained to some degree because gasoline is about twice as expensive in New Zealand. On the way back to Highway 1, Janet evened the score by suggesting that we stop at a local antique shop. We searched for a toast rack among the various object for sale. The small store did not offer much, and since it was early in the trip, we didn't buy anything.
Even though we were fast approaching our 'first' stop, we took our time and pulled over to the side of the road every now and then to view the idyllic scenery of verdant pastures that rolled away from the road to the horizon in every direction. Each stop refreshed our spirit, and we began to forget the hustle and bustle that we left behind in Los Angeles.
Upon reaching Whangarei, we felt pretty confident about driving on the left of the road. This was quickly shattered in the small city. You see, in the big city of Auckland, it is easy to follow the traffic and be safe. On the open road, you have plenty of time to remember, 'stay left, stay left'. In Whangarei there is just enough traffic to be dangerous.
Our objective was to find a SCUBA shop in the city, so we navigated through the business district and headed toward what looked like the most logical place on our map to find our quest: the harbor area. On the way, the streets and turns came at us faster and faster like the progressively more difficult levels of a video game. In the middle of a sweeping right-hand turn, we almost received a dent on, logically enough, Dent Street. A quick swerve in the middle of the intersection avoided the blunder of going the wrong way down a one-way street into oncoming traffic. We found the other half of Dent street heading in the right direction and followed it to a small fish market where we stopped to gather our wits. Janet ordered a fresh crabcake on a stick, while I got directions to a SCUBA shop which turned out to be near the center of town on Water Street.
We almost arrived uneventfully. While hunting for a parking spot, we found ourselves going into the exit of a parking lot and ended-up on the sidewalk! The Fiat, being a small car, made a quick three-point turn and put us back on the street heading for a legal parking spot.
The SCUBA shop, simply called 'The Dive Shop', was run by Kevin Butler who warned us of the southwester that was kicking-up making a trip to the Poor Knight's Islands out of the question. His charge would have been $200.00 plus fees for equipment rental. This was too rich for me, so we decided to check out the diving opportunities at the Bay of Islands, an hour's drive to the north.
But first, we walked around the town to further calm our nerves and happened across the Clapham's Clocks Museum. Inside, the walls were completely covered by clocks of all types and descriptions. While we were admiring our favorite, the Speaker's Clock, that was used in Parliament to limit speakers to a reasonable length of time, the curator mechanized a number of the older clocks which set a flock of cuckoos announcing the time of the artificially advanced minute hands.
We also found out that the waterfall was not flowing because of a lack of water in the river, so we spent some time further exploring the park. Behind the clock museum, through the rose garden and over a small creek, we found the Snow Fernery. The three connected greenhouses provided the perfect climate to grow the numerous rare and exotic flowers and plants neatly arranged in rows along corridors of arching native ferns.
Heading back towards the car, we discovered a small shop selling items carved from Kauri wood. While searching for an unusual souvenir, we noticed that the shop was also selling weavings from Colleen Moore's loom. Knowing we would have an opportunity to make our selections directly from Colleen, we only purchased a Kauri letter holder made of two cylindrical pieces of wood which, when pulled together by gravity on their concave platform, form a crevasse that will hold letters thrust between them. The final adventure in Whangarei was a stroll through the business section of town where we priced wool sweaters among other things, but didn't find any we wanted. Making a large loop around the many stores and shops, we found our car which was as glad as we were to get back on the open road. On one of our picture stops, we realized that we were both taking pictures of identical scenery. From then on, we resolved to use only one of the cameras and share the photographic responsibilities to maximize the number of different shots.
Paihia, the city at the Bay of Islands, arrived before we knew it. Parking near the building that housed various charter and tour companies, we only received direction to the SCUBA shop since none of the occupants dealt in SCUBA charters. A short walk down a touristy street brought us to the 'Paihia Dive, Hire, and Charter' shop which offered SCUBA charters. Their price was a reasonable $100 which included the equipment rental, but they were booked-up until after we had planned to leave the area.
We wandered through a few of the closely spaced streets and purchased souvenirs at a couple of shops. Loaded down with packages, we stopped for a rest and a soda at an ice cream parlor. Our last stop in town was the Post Office where we bought stamps and mailed the first batch of our completed post cards.
It was beginning to get late in the day. Reluctantly, we began the trip back to the B&B. Just as we exited Paihia, we spotted a sign pointing to the Opua Forest and Kauri Walk. Without hesitating for a moment, I headed the car down the metal road which led to the beginning of the trail. Don't ask me why, but gravel roads are called metal roads in New Zealand. As we had to limit our speed, it took about ten minutes to reach the sign which marked the start of the path. We left the car in a parking lot, which was really just a wide spot in the road, and began our tramp at first on a dirt path, and later on an excellent board walk. An easy fifteen minutes of walking brought us to a gigantic Kauri tree. We sat at the provided bench at the base of the tree and reveled in the shade of a thousand year old two hundred feet tall gargantuan of the forest. |
