After leaving the farm, I decided to hit the road again to finish my tour of Northland that got cut short a few weeks ago.  My first stop was in Whangerei, where I met an American couple on their sailboat, Sereia, for what was basically an interview.  I contacted them about a week ago about a post I saw on one of the job boards I check regularly, and apparently they got a bunch of responses.  Anyhow, I’m hoping to be selected to help them crew their boat for a few legs of their trip around NZ.  They were a cool young couple with a fascinating 18-month-old kid, and because I have basically no sailing experience (which they assured me was no problem), I think I could learn a lot from them.  I’m trying not to get my hopes up about this one, but it would be awesome if I get some sailing experience while I’m here.

After sharing a great meal of lamb steaks and a few beers with them on their boat (Antonia used to be a chef), I headed off to a campground north of Whangerei, to an area known as the Tutukaka Coast, and I’ll be honest, I chose it more for the name than any other reason.  When I was in Peru prior to coming here, I never made it to Lake Titicaca, so when I saw the opportunity to stay in Tutukaka, I had to take it.

The road to the campground was amazing…not very wide, plenty of hairpin turns…I put my new (used) car to the test, racing against the setting sun in the hopes that I wouldn’t have to set up my tent in the dark.  But to no use, I didn’t quite make it before dark, so had to set up camp without light. The site was incredible, though.  I was practically alone at the campground, a plot of land just over some dunes from a curvy, white sand beach.

After I setup camp, I went down to the beach and walked around in the dark.  I was gazing at the stars, which are totally different in the southern hemisphere, and admiring their reflections in the bay, when I realized that what I was looking at in the water wasn’t the stars at all.  Along the edge of the surf was a number of faint, but undeniable glowing spots…like lighting bugs had fallen into the water and washed up onshore.  I kept trying to see what was producing the phosphorescence with my flashlight, but could never see anything.  After a few minutes of this, I ran into a group of kids, who with characteristic Kiwi kindness explained to me that it is actually the plankton in the water that glows.  On a good night, the entire bay could glow green, orange or red.  I will have to keep looking for these fantasy glowing waters…

After my walk, I fell asleep to the sound of waves crashing.  In the morning, I got up and took another beach stroll, this time I could see in the distance the Poor Knight Islands, a sort of mecca for deep-sea divers.  If you’ve ever seen the BBC miniseries Blue Planet, this was where that amazing shot of the hundreds of manta rays floating in the narrow channel was shot.

I then hit the road northward towards my first ever planned potty break.  Near the Bay of Islands, there is a small town named Kawakawa, and in this town lies one of the world’s absolute best public restrooms.  The famous Austrian architect Friedensreich Hundertwasser apparently lived the final years of his life in Kawakawa and one of his last works was a public restroom, created entirely out of recycled glass from the community.  The building was pretty awesome…if there is any way for a bathroom to be a work of art, this would be it.  The roof had plants growing out of it, and the rest was an artistic assortment of glass and tile…it reminded me of Guell Park in Barcelona.  Having a strange affinity for public restrooms, I very much appreciated this stop.

Next was the Mediterranean-feeling town of Kerikeri, which is where most of the orchards in Northland are.  This was a cool little town, full of cafés and small shops.  I stopped and had a superb coffee and muffin and planned the rest of my day.

I decided to go the northernmost point of the east coast, right before the far, far north of Cape Reinga (this will be tomorrow) and chose an isolated beach camping ground known as Matai Beach.  It was another spectacular drive, through farming country full of the luckiest cows and sheep I’ve ever seen.  Beautiful sunshine, mountains and volcanic hills, and miles after miles of curvy, white sand coastline.  And the crazy part is that there is almost no one here.

There are a few beach towns, but there are just as many isolated, deserted, beautiful beaches.  Matai Beach was no different.  There is a Department of Conservation campsite at the end of the peninsula, and it overlooks twin coves of sparkling blue water and white sand.  I made a good choice.

I set up camp around 2pm and then headed down to the beach with a book and few of my leftover beers.  I had the entire landscape to myself.  I sat on an old lava flow (pahoihoi, if I remember correctly) that looked like the good-guy rock monster from Neverending Story and cracked open a beer.  That afternoon was marvelous.

After a few hours of relaxation, I had an itch to explore so I set out along the beach towards some rock outcroppings.  After scrambling over rocks for awhile, I found a sea cave that was fully accessible because it was low tide.  I went in as far as I could without a flashlight, and found a few starfish in the tidal pools.  It looked like the cave kept going, but without light I had to turn around…plus the thought of the tide coming back in while I was exploring the depths of this cave crossed my mind as a really idea.

I went back to my tent, made some Lamb Korma (it was prepackaged, don’t be too impressed), read some more and then went to sleep…again, to the sound of waves crashing just on the other side of the dunes.  I could get used to this.

I’ll post some photos soon…I’m writing all of this from my mobile workstation (iPhone tethered to my laptop for internet connectivity) but it is pretty slow, so uploading photos is not an option right now.  I’ll post them as soon as I get some broadband.