New Zealand, the North Island

If you visit New Zealand and only have limited time, I suggest you keep your travels to the South Island (even though this chapter is about the North Island). The North Island, as we will discover in the next pages, is not as ruggedly scenic as the South. That being said, it does have its moments – the west coast towards New Plymouth, the northern coasts away from urban Auckland, Hawke’s Bay, and the Rotorua area all have natural and man-made features which are beautiful. And the National Parks are all located in scenic areas. The North has most of the population (3/4), most of the prominent museums (Wellington and Auckland) and most of the traffic. So without further ado, let’s start our visit to the North Island where the ferry from the South Island docks; Wellington, the country’s capital.

After we docked, we caught a cab to the car rental office where another Toyota, almost identical to the first one we left in Picton, was waiting for us. We loaded our luggage and made arrangements to leave it parked at the rental office while we wandered around the corner for some lunch on Cuba Street. This area of the city is full of Asian ethnic restaurants and we picked a small Malaysian one that had posted its recent reviews in the window. It was a good choice; the décor left much to the imagination, but the food was simply delicious.

We wandered up and down Cuba Street (a pedestrian mall like the Sparks Street Mall but much busier), stopping to watch a mechanical water fountain and also to buy some paperbacks as we had finished those brought from Canada. We had planned to come back to Wellington at the conclusion of our North Island tour, so we did not do any ‘sight-seeing’ other than Cuba Street. We fired up the GPS and made our way quickly out of the city, heading north-west, following the coast highway towards our next destination, a B&B in the seaside village of Raumati an hour north of Wellington. Just before we got there, we stopped at Queen Elizabeth Park (used as a US military base for a short period during WWII and Pelennor Fields in LOTR) to see the old trams that run around the park. However, we discovered the trams only run on weekends so we resorted to a walk on the beach, a visit to the US Marines commemoration and some ice cream we bought from a very lonely attendant at a small kiosk. I chatted with a gentleman who also stopped by and noticed the Whistler Chairlift Pass on his jacket – his son lives in Vancouver.

We arrived at our B&B and met the owner, plus her cousin who was visiting. We had a cup of tea and some biscuits and found out that the B&B was pretty much closed down since the lady’s husband had suffered a stroke a couple of months earlier (I had booked around the time this happened). She suggested a seaside restaurant for dinner where we both tried fish; I had a dark fish called Groper that is quite popular in New Zealand. Let’s just say I am glad I had prawns as an appetizer since the Groper was not to my liking – although not as oily, it tasted like mackerel.

The next morning after breakfast, we got back on Highway One and drove through farmland for the first hour. We pulled off the highway at Ratana Pa, a Maori town, where we could see (but not visit) the historic headquarters of the Ratana Church movement, dedicated to the Maori leader Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana who established the movement, as well as the Ratana Whare (meeting house). The church, called Te Temepara Tapu o Ihoa or the Holy Temple of Jehovah, is very beautiful and dominates this small town of 500 people. Other Ratana churches exist in New Zealand, but this was the only one we saw. The Ratana movement is very prevalent in politics to the extent that Labour Party leaders and Members of Parliament visit Ratana Pa each January, along with thousands of Ratana members, to take part in religious and political ceremonies.

Our next stop was the bustling town of Wanganui. Located on the river of the same name, it was really busy when we pulled in for lunch and a walkabout. The downtown has been restored and we went up one side of Victoria Street (the main street) and down the other, both looking for a place to eat and checking out the shops and buildings. Luckily they were covered with overhangs, because it was raining off and on. We popped into the AA where I picked up a couple of maps of North Island areas and finally settled upon an Irish Café for lunch. One of the menu items was pouteen – similar to poutine in Canada. Not a fan of pouteen or poutine, we had sandwiches and tea and afterwards, made our way back to the highway for the continuing voyage north. We drove through rain squalls but when we got to Hawera, the sun had come out. Hawera has this enormous 54 metre tall concrete water tower in the centre of town. It was built in 1914 to appease insurance companies because the town had suffered through two major fires. An earthquake the same year it was completed caused it to list a couple of feet, but engineers corrected this to a few inches when it was filled with water. We climbed up the 215 steps for some magnificent views of the town and the surrounding farmland. Incidentally, Hawera, named after the nearby Maori town of Te Hawera, means ‘the burnt place’. Maori’s do have an interesting spiritual side - and a sense of humour.

One of the reasons we had come to this area was to see Mount Taranaki, a perfectly formed conical volcano. (It stood in for Mount Fuji in Tom Cruise's The Last Samauri). Even from the top of the Hawera tower, it was impossible to see Mount Taranaki, it was covered in clouds. So we continued our drive to our destination, the farming town of Stratford. After arriving, I went for a walk around the town while Marie rested. Most of the streets are named after characters in Shakespeare’s plays. New Zealand’s only glockenspiel plays a scene from Romeo and Juliet, but was under repair when we were there. We had stopped in Stratford because it is the western terminus of the Forgotten World Highway (SH 43).

We set out early the next morning, heading east on the Forgotten World Highway. Many New Zealanders don't know about this road since it is quite remote, part of it is unsealed, and with the exception of the village of Whangamomona and a few farms at the start and end of the highway, is completely deserted. We saw no more than 5 vehicles on the whole drive, almost all were tourists like us. Shortly after leaving Stratford, we climbed up the Strathmore Saddle, the first of four; high ridges from which the views to the valleys below, and outwards toward mountain ranges, were ethereal in the morning mist. The roadside fences were covered with thousands of dew covered spider webs, shimmering in the early morning sunlight.

After climbing and descending the Whangamomona Saddle, we came upon the Republic of Whangamomona. (A short note on Maori pronunciation – 'Wh' is pronounced like a 'Ph' in English). In 1989 regional boundary lines were changed and the 40 or so village residents declared themselves a Republic in protest. Republic Day is held biannually and attracts thousands to the parties. Several presidents have been elected, two of which were animals (Billy Gumboot the Goat died in office; Tai Poutu the Poodle resigned after an assassination attempt). The current President, Murtle the Turtle, (a man) beat out Miriam (Bruce the Cross Dresser). As Murtle said in his acceptance speech "We've got an ideal place here. We don't want the population to increase. We want the flow of people to increase, but not too much. Not tourists, we want exciting people, and not too many of those either!" Apparently, the woman who runs the famous Whangamomona Hotel agrees with this philosophy. We arrived at 10 a.m., expecting to be able to get some coffee and our passport stamped. As Marie approached her (she was outside sweeping off the veranda), she coldly informed us that the hotel was closed and there would be no coffee that morning as she was cleaning up from an event the night before. She also informed us that we had to go elsewhere for washroom facilities (we went to the village washrooms – all villages in NZ have public washrooms). The official government New Zealand tourist web site, in describing the hotel, states ‘where the historic hotel is known for its hospitality’. This turned out to be the only person we met in New Zealand who was not the least bit hospitable.

We pressed on, leaving the Republic behind. We immediately began the climb over another saddle at which point the railway, which had been alongside the road, disappeared into a tunnel, never to be seen again. As we started down the other side of the saddle, we came to the one lane Moki Tunnel (called the Hobbit Hole by locals since it is pretty narrow and just barely high enough for a truck to pass through). It was driven through a mountain spur so that sheep could be taken to market at the western end of the Lost World Highway.

There are several ‘detours’ off the road; to see the second highest waterfall in New Zealand, an abandoned coal mining village, an abandoned road tunnel and other failed attempts at settlement. Some of these require long hikes to reach and as we did not have hiking boots, we did not see them. However, the scenery along the highway more than makes up for any missed side excursions. After climbing the final saddle, we entered the awesome Tangarakau Gorge with its high sandstone cliffs. This is where the road narrows and turns to gravel for about 12 kilometres. About half way through this gorge we soon found ourselves driving through a sub-tropical, primeval, rain forest. I trekked through the forest at one point to see the gravesite of Joshua Morgan, who died at 23 while surveying the route and is buried where he died. Sad, but somehow dignified. We saw and heard lots of birds and several wild goats as we passed through the Gorge. And a large ‘slip’ of rocks that blocked most of the road as we rounded a bend.

As the road once more turned to asphalt, we re-entered farmland and I climbed to the top of Nevin’s Lookout for spectacular views of the valleys and mountains - and sheep farms. Finally, we passed through the very unstable Herlihy’s Bluff, where a road crew was repairing another major slip (while waiting to pass the heavy equipment, Marie let one of the workers know about the slip we had passed back in the Gorge. He immediately reported it on his radio).

We arrived in Taumarunui, a fairly large town at the east end of the highway at lunch time so we stopped at – what else - a café, before going for a walk up and down the main street. Then, back into the car and north to our destination, Waitomo Caves. Since it was mid afternoon, we went straight to the Cave to see if we could get on a tour either that afternoon or early the next morning. Most of the tour buses had already departed for the day, so we got a place on the next tour.

The cave complex is not huge, but it is certainly worth visiting. We descended into the cave about fifty metres where we stopped in what is called the Cathedral cavern where our guide explained what we were about to see, the famous Glowworms that are not worms at all, but the bioluminescent larva stage of an insect that is related to spiders. Before we entered the Glowworm Grotto, however, she mentioned that the Cathedral cavern had amazing acoustics and proceeded to demonstrate by turning off the lights and in the dark, singing a Maori lullaby. Her voice filled the cavern with a haunting, slightly reverberating timbre. After the lights came back on, we moved on to the Grotto where large aluminum boats were docked. She proceeded to pull us, with the aid of ropes strung overhead, into the dark area where thousands of glowworms were doing their thing on the ceiling. The dome of the cave ceiling and the thousands of white points of light looked just like a moonless night sky. Understandably, photography is not permitted in the Grotto (light causes the glowworms to stop producing their luminescence), but I have included an image from the web that will give you an idea of what we saw.

The B&B we stayed in was delightful; we had our own ‘house’ which was like an apartment with quite a view of the valley and hills around us, and the beautiful gardens that surrounded the other B&B buildings. The hosts were fantastic and made lots of suggestions about the area. One of them was where to eat. We ate in the HuHu Café (named after the largest beetle in NZ) and although HuHu grubs are edible, in the words of a Kiwi, ‘eating them is not currently particularly popular’. While there was a large sculpture of a HuHu as we entered, we did not see any on the menu. Which was a good thing. As was the ‘normal’ fare at the café and we had a great dinner.

The next morning we encountered a first for us as travellers who have been on most continents and in many countries. We entered the common breakfast room and proceeded to get coffee and juice organized for our table. As we did, the host appeared and shortly thereafter, a Japanese gentleman came to the door. Seeing our shoes at the door, he asked the host if he had to remove his shoes to enter. She said no, only Canadians do that. And sure enough, two girls came in and removed their shoes. They were from Vancouver. Later on in our travels, another B&B owner recognized us as Canadians immediately upon our entry into their premises as we removed our shoes. So when you travel, it is not necessary to say ‘eh’. Just remove your shoes and people will know where you are from.

We went on a short walk in the morning recommended to us by our hosts along a river and to a cave system that while not extensive, was really interesting. The track started at a small pavillion that was built for the Queen so she could have tea when she visited years ago. She must have been smaller then. Part of the walk was along a wooden platform suspended above the river, and another inside a cave, suspended over a deep cavern and the river far below us.

Shortly after we left Waitomo Caves, it began to rain. Our hosts had suggested we take the ‘back road’ to bypass Hamilton because it was more scenic, which we did. We joined Highway 1 about one hundred kilometres south of Auckland and it was a straight and boring run into the city. About 25 kilometres out, we drove on the first four lane highway we had seen in NZ, to accommodate the traffic to and from Auckland, New Zealand’s largest city at 1.3 million people (or 1 of every 3 Kiwis). It took us an extra hour driving through city streets in the rain to get to our hotel as we had programmed our GPS with the street address but had neglected to enter ‘central business district’ so we ended up at someone’s house about 10 kilometres and a long traffic jam away from the hotel. We had booked a weekend at the swankiest hotel in Auckland and upon arriving, gave our car keys to the valet and went to the reception desk. The desk clerk explained that they had another special on for the weekend; for $110 NZ, we would get an upgraded room and access to the business lounge. So we took it.

After checking out our room (there must have been 10 pillows of all sorts on the bed) and the lounge, we noticed that is was clearing up, so we walked down the steep hill outside the hotel towards Queen Street and the centre of town. We had not gone far when the rain came back. We went looking for an umbrella (mine had broken or more likely given up the ghost in defeat with all the rain it had had to cope with over the past days) but can you believe we could not find any in the several stores we checked? So we ended up making a quick dash back up towards the hotel (stopping to purchase two tickets for the cinema – reserved seats – another feature Canada should adopt) and we stayed in the lounge, talking to another couple, until it was time to go to the show. The movie X-Men – Wolverine had just been released. Supposedly set in Canada (Wolverine was a ‘Canadian’) and the US, most of the movie was filmed in New Zealand (the one lane bridge with its warning arrows on the pavement gave it away).

The next day, the weather had greatly improved. We decided to check out the Auckland Market, about an eight block walk from our hotel. There were lots of Kiwi products, as well as the usual flea market type stuff on sale. The market building is interesting in itself as it was a former industrial site built over 100 years ago. Other than that, most of the souvenirs and other products can be purchased on Queen Street (Auckland’s main street).

We strolled down to the waterfront and walked along Customs and Quay Streets to look at the boats, the Auckland Bridge in the distance (which we drove over later), the restaurants and shops. We saw one restaurant that offered a roast beef dinner (it being Sunday) so we decided to come back that evening. But first, we decided to catch a ferry and ride over to Devonport on the isthmus across the bay. Devonport is a delightful community; very English seaside in feel, yet colours that seem like Arizona Navaho in appearance. We visited a craft market, walked through the village streets and sat outside a pub to watch the people go by. We bought sandwiches later on and walked back to the large park that runs along the sea wall where we watched sailboats on the bay. It had started to get cool and windy, so we caught the ferry back to Auckland and browsed along Queen Street as we wandered back to the hotel. We did go back to the restaurant for the roast beef dinner that night only to find out that they had sold out by the time we got there, so we ended up going to another place where I had lamb (good, but not roast beef!).

The next morning it was time to check out and start north again. When we did we got a big surprise. The $110 special turned out to be for each night – I only noticed it later that night when I was putting away my invoice. I wrote to the hotel twice to get them to explain the discrepancy from what their desk clerk quoted and what we were charged, but got no answer to either enquiry. So if you go to Auckland, I suggest you stay somewhere else than the Langham Hotel.

The drive up the east side of North Island, once we got away from the Auckland area, was through forests, over huge hills with scenic views of the ocean from the top, along beaches and coves and through some farming areas. We stopped at a regional forest in Warkworth to see a Kauri tree. We went into one large town, Whangerei, for lunch, but ended up in an industrial area (GPS devices are not always right) so we drove on and stopped at a roadside café where we had fish and chips, sitting outside since it was a warm and sunny day. I tried a unique NZ soft drink called Lemon and Paeora (L&P) that states on the bottle ‘World Famous in New Zealand’. You gotta love the Kiwi modesty. Mineral water from the town of Paeora was flavoured with lemon to make a refreshing drink and although the town’s water is no longer used in the recipe, the same mineral components are retained in the drink. One town we did stop in was KawaKawa to see the public toilets. This sounds bizarre, but bear with me. When Marie and I visited Vienna a few years ago, we went to see Hundertwasser Haus, designed by Friedensreich Hundertwasser, an avantgarde artist, architect and sculptor. His designs are known for their colours, shapes, use of glass, brick and ceramics. Hundertwasser moved from Vienna to New Zealand, to KawaKawa, where he built a home and studio. He designed the public toilets in his adopted town. KawaKawa also has a vintage railway collection, with the train tracks running down the centre of the main street.

We arrived in the Bay of Islands at the town of Paihia around 3 p.m. and booked into a motel for two nights. Then we walked the kilometre across a bridge to Waitangi Treaty Grounds National Trust where the Treaty of Waitangi, a three article statement between the Maori and the English settlers, was signed on February 6, 1840. February 6 is now New Zealand’s national day. Because the Treaty exists in both English and Maori (the Maori a bit of a rushed translation), it has been the subject of disagreement as well as a founding document since its conception.

The National Trust was deeded to the people of New Zealand by the Bledsoe family, the patriarch having been a former Governor General of NZ. The park grounds are extensive and contain the Treaty House (where the British representative lived – NZ was governed from Australia) and Te Whare Runanga, the Maori meeting house as well as Ngatokimatawhaorua, one of the world’s largest Maori war canoes. It takes 70 paddlers to propel the canoe. A visitor’s centre provides an overview of the site and the history of the Treaty. It is certainly on the list to visit to get an appreciation for the history that forms the basis of much of the political debate still taking place in New Zealand today.

Paihia is located in the Bay of Islands, a breathtakingly beautiful area of the North Island. In the summer (December to February) the place is crawling with vacationers; it was mostly deserted when we were there and many restaurants were closed. The azure blue sea, myriad islands, some rocky, some covered with vegetation, small bays with sand beaches on many of the islands, and the town of Russell (the oldest establishment in NZ) across from Paihia all make for a recreational paradise. On the second day of our stay, we took a boat trip to see dolphins (lots and lots of them), fishermen catching Kingfish (huge fish, the size of a salmon), and to cruise around the islands, including a dash through the famous ‘Hole in the Rock’. It was a wonderful day to be at sea; sunny with a brisk feel to the air that required a light jacket when the boat was moving.

On the way back to Paihia, we got off at Russell to walk around this old town. Russell (Kororareka as it first was known) at its heyday in the early 1800s when it was visited by whaling ships, was known as ‘The Hell Hole of the Pacific’ where no laws were enforced and ‘grog shops and brothels’ proliferated. Today, it is a tourist destination with mostly hotels, B&Bs and guest homes (grog is still available – I can’t speak for the other former offering). As a British town, Russell was involved in many Maori-Settler confrontations. The most famous of these was the Flagpole incidents in which a Maori chief repeatedly cut down the British Flagpole; the last time when the town was burnt by a raiding Maori party during the Maori Wars.

The Pompallier Mission (named after the Catholic French Bishop who was trying to convert Maoris to Christianity) still exists and is a very interesting museum to visit. The restored main building contains tanneries, printing facilities (it made 40,000 Maori leather bound language ‘prayer’ books in eight years, all by hand), woodworking facilities and of course religious artefacts. I got to operate the pre-Industrial Revolution printing press to make a copy of a picture of the Mission. The other really interesting historical place in Russell is Christ Church built in 1835. It is the oldest church in New Zealand. Unique to the church are the embroidered pew cushions made by the parishioners and the cemetery which contains graves of both Maori and Pakeha (Europeans), some of them famous people in NZ history. Church services have always been in both languages.

We caught the local ferry back to Paihia late in the afternoon and walked back to our motel, having spent a satisfying day on the water and in Russell. We capped the day off with a good meal at a recommended restaurant in the town of Paihia.

The next morning we drove north to Kerikeri, another early European and missionary settlement town. We went to visit Kemp House and the Stone Store, the oldest building and stone building respectively in New Zealand, but neither were open until later that day. So instead, I walked a short trail that went around the small bay to climb the hill to Hongi Hika's Kororipo Pa, a former Maori fort and town. Nothing remains of the Pa other than a cleared flat space, but the views of the small harbour and mission are good. As we headed back to town (we wanted to buy a postcard with the town name on it to send to our daughter Kerri, but no stores Marie visited had local postcards), it started to pour.

We had a lot of ground to cover that day, so we headed due east from Kerikeri, driving through farmland and an area that was covered with what looked like an ancient lava flow. It rained off and on as we traversed this region, making for some interesting rainbows. Then we started to head up into the hills again as we approached the west coast. We came to the coast at the small town of Omapere which is situated on a large bay. Just on the other side of the town, we turned off the road to check out the views of the bay entrance and the long beaches that headed north and south, with the surf from the Tasman Sea breaking in a long white line of froth unto a reef out to sea.

The next part of the journey was quite slow as we entered Waipoua Forest, a dense, sub-tropical area characterized by ferns, a very narrow and winding road, and best of all, Kauri trees. Kauris are a type of pine even though the wood is somewhat hard. The biggest Kauri tree in New Zealand, called Tane Mahute, is reachable by a short walk into the forest. It is over 50 metres tall with a circumference of over 14 metres. Estimates put its age at over 2000 years. The Kauri trees in the Forest are protected; early European settlers to New Zealand cut many down and they are rare today. At the car park for Tane Mahuta, a Maori woman was trying to make a living selling drinks and snacks from a small trailer so we helped her out by buying some pop and chips. We did not see many cars on this stretch of the road, so she certainly can’t be getting rich in the off season.

After exiting Waipoua Forest, the land dropped onto a rather flat plain as we came to the town of Dargaville, a former Kauri lumbering centre. We had lunch here in an omni-present café and then drove about thirty more minutes to the Kauri Museum at Matakohe. If you are in this neck of the woods, make sure you stop here. The museum, recommended by our B&B host at Waitomo Caves, blew us away with its history and exhibits of Kauri lumbering, the trees themselves, amazing exhibits of early New Zealand (European) life and room after room of Kauri furniture, Kauri boats, Kauri bowls and implements; in fact, hundreds of different objects made from Kauri wood. We saw that the wood runs from a honey gold (its natural colour) to dark reddish brown from the wood recovered from swamps (some of this recoverd wood is over 40,000 years old). We could have spent several hours in the museum, but our time was limited since we still had a couple of more hours driving to our next B&B on the east coast, just north of Auckland, in the town of Waiwera.

This B&B was on the estuary of the Waiwera River and was run by two retired school teachers/principals. It was another gem and we had a great room (an amazing loft with views of the estuary), a marvellous breakfast in the morning, over which we spent a couple of hours talking with our hosts (who have lived and taught in several countries around the world).

We stayed here so that we would miss the rush hour traffic of Auckland the next day, and indeed, when we crossed back over the Auckland Bridge (the North Island is very narrow at Auckland so there is only one highway), we sailed through the city without even slowing down. Our destination was twofold; first to go to the town of Matamata, famous because this is where Hobbiton was located, and then on to Rotorua where we planned on staying three nights.

The drive to Matamata was through gently rolling farmland with plenty of sheep, cattle and crops along the roadside. When we arrived in town, the I-Centre had a display of a Hobbit house in front and we stopped in to buy tickets to visit what is left of Hobbiton. We had time to walk through a bit of the town and get something to eat before we had to be back to get the bus out to the film site located on a private sheep farm. While waiting for the bus, we ran into two players and the coach from the Canadian Senior Women’s World Champion curling team that had just won the Briar held the week before in Dunedin. Like us (or at least me), they were great LOTR fans. We also had a young American couple who were on their honeymoon with us on the tour, as well as a couple from England.

The only way to see Hobbiton is by tour. And the only reason some of the site still exists is that when it was being dismantled after the movie shoot, it began to rain. And rain. And rain. For days on end. Heavy equipment could not be used to dismantle the rest of the site so it was abandoned, but not before the owner of the farm had made arrangements with the film company to turn what was left into a tourist attraction. We drove into the site on a special road built for Peter Jackson by the New Zealand army (to handle the film equipment, trailers, trucks etc.). The tour guide who took us around seemed to take exception that the army would be used for this, but at least it let the army engineers practice their trade and the army did get paid for their work (with only Orcs to think about as enemies).

Many of the original Hobbit houses, including Bilbo’s, are still visible in the hillside. The Party Tree still spreads its branches over the meadow where Bilbo's 111 birthday took place, albeit looking a little worse for wear from age and storms. The pond where the Mill and the Double Arch Bridge exists, but the gardens and the fake oak tree that was above Bilbo’s house are gone. It was still a thrill to walk around the property and to take pictures of the site. We could even go into ‘Bag End’ for a picture through the front door (only a small dark room exists, all Bag End inside filming was done at a studio in Wellington). All other Hobbit holes are just plywood fronts with nothing behind the ‘doors’ and ‘windows’.

After the tour, we stopped at the Alexander Farm buildings to watch a sheep shearing demonstration. The shearer does not compete any longer in contests, but he got all the wool off the sheep in about a minute. He said pros can do it in less than 20 seconds! Then it was back to Matamata to continue to head towards Rotorua.

Entering this famous part of New Zealand, with its geothermically active area, was really interesting. First, we passed through several large conical piles of rock, which we later learned were ejected from volcanic explosions. Then we descended a long hill into the outskirts of town where our motel was located. We were staying at a ‘resort’ so we had a really charming room, with a restaurant on site (we ate there that night, the only ones in the place – the food was great!), the usual laundry facilities, a hot tub on our back porch (we did not use it since it rained too much during our stay), as well as a trout stream on the property, play areas for kids and a small mini-golf facility. The manager suggested several of the best things for us to see, some free and some with admission and made us a booking for a Maori Cultural Performance and Hangi for the next night. As it was late in the afternoon and getting dark, we did some laundry, ate at the restaurant and rested up for the next day.

When we awoke it was rainy. I wonder sometimes why Kiwis don’t all have moss growing on them. So grinning and bearing it, we headed out after breakfast to Wai-O-Tapu Thermal Wonderland, a geothermal park about a half hour south of Rotorua. According to the hotel manager, it is the best local park for the colours of the minerals that come out of the ground with the geysers, steam and hot water. Unlike Yellowstone Park in the US, most of the geothermal areas in New Zealand are private, so a substantial admission fee is paid to enter. We spent about 3 hours at Wai-O-Tapu, dodging the rain that ebbed and flowed, coughing in the sulphurous clouds of steam and water vapour that are prevalent everywhere, and marvelling at the colours of the minerals in pools, caldrons and other fiery natural phenomena of the park. There are extensive tracks around the park, as well as boardwalks that climb up hills; one of the hills led us to a view of a geothermal plant that produced electricity in the distance.

After exiting the park we stopped at a mud pool, a public area of, wait for it, bubbling mud. It was like the earth had a bad case of indigestion with the burping of the mud that was a thick gooey greyish mass in front of us. Some of the burps were quite violent based on the mud way up in the branches of the trees that rimmed the mud pool. When we got back to Rotorua, we went for a late lunch, then went to the public park in town to view the steaming vents in the ground. They can pop up anywhere; indeed we saw some in peoples’ yards, in the front of a motel and on the side of one of the main streets in town. Just a couple of years ago, one of the vents in the public park erupted fiercely and sprayed hot mud over most of the trees; thankfully it was late at night and no one was hurt. Rotorua is a somewhat dangerous place to live. As our hotel manager said to us, if the vents around town stop steaming, she will be the first one to head up over the hills out of town. She was not going to wait around for the pressure to be released all at once. Downtown Rotorua is replete with the smell of sulphur, one of the reasons we stayed on the outskirts.

We had to be back at the motel for 5 p.m. to be picked up to go to Tamaki Maori Village for the event we had booked. This turned out to be a highlight of our trip to New Zealand, particularly for me as I became a Maori ‘Chief’. On the way to the village, a half hour ride, Mark our bus driver (and one of the participants we were later to find out) greeted us in about 50 different languages as he found out where each of us was from. He taught us some Maori which had us laughing, and then he told us what was about to happen when our ‘tribe’ arrived at the village. He said he needed a chief from among us to represent our tribe – the chief had to be male, had to have kids, had to be good looking, had to have been successful, but most of all, had to have played rugby at some point in his life (rugby being an ancient Maori game apparently). No one (including the Aussie gentleman behind me) volunteered that they had these attributes. He then asked me (Marie and I were sitting in the first row) if I played rugby in Canada and I admitted that I had dabbled in the game in High School. I was suddenly the Chief of our tribe. He talked to me about what to expect when we arrived at the village and the role I had to play.

When we arrived, the Chiefs of the other two buses and I were brought before a large palisade (it being dark, it was lit by torches that flickered and made the scene surreal). The rest of our tribes had to wait behind us. We Chiefs were told to keep our hands in front of us, to stand still, to show no fear and to hold the eyes of anyone who came out of the palisade (Maori Pa) to greet us, as we were going to experience a Maori greeting that mimicked those of hundreds of years ago when one tribe visited another. No sweat, we all said. Little did we realize…..

After a good fifteen minute wait, the keening of women’s voices arose behind the Pa wall. Then people started appearing on the top of the wall. Dressed as Maori warriors, they flitted in and out of the shadows thrown by the torches, all the while shouting down at us in Maori. The challenge had begun. The three of us (Chiefs) stood there not knowing what to expect, trying to look everywhere at once. Suddenly, a small door in the Pa opened and two warriors emerged. One stayed in the background, while the other slowly approached us. He carried a large weapon which resembled the blade of an oar on one end and a long spike on the other. As he approached, he was doing a war dance (haka) and screaming at us, waving the spear around above his head in intricate manoeuvres and striking it on the ground in stabbing motions. He kicked up the gravel of the ground with his bare feet as he moved, and his face went through some of the fiercest grimaces I have ever seen. His eyes bugged out, his tongue protruded to an impossible length. As he got right in my face, I continued to stare at his eyes. I have to admit I felt fear, but tried not to show it. Stepping back he waved the spear in my face, and with a quick descending blow, it whistled by my ear – I heard it and felt the wind as it went by. I may have flinched even though I was trying not to. He did this only to me (I was standing in the middle) before he backed away, continuously staring at us. His voice quieted and he lay a fern frond on the ground in front of my colleague to my right. That was the signal that we were accepted into the village and were not to be killed.

Shortly afterwards, the real Chief emerged, his face lined in black. He welcomed us Chiefs to his village, and after one of his wives sang the welcoming song, he asked us to follow him into the Pa through the large gate that had now opened. Our tribes followed after us. He led us past several Maori huts and houses, all with cooking fires burning in front and torches lighting the paths, to his own house where he again welcomed us and told us to relax, that the worst was over. He invited us and our tribes to wander freely around the village until we would be summoned for the dancing and singing. I spent quite a few minutes talking to him about the significance of the tattoo, the Moko, on his face. Only chiefs can wear a full face Moko. In the past, these marks were cut into the face with a bone chisel, with soot from Kauri charcoal rubbed into them. Each line had a meaning; some spoke of his ancestors, of his battles and triumphs in war, one spoke of each of his wives and the children he had fathered, another of his travels to distant tribes and parts of NZ, etc. He offered to get my face done since I was now a Chief, but I politely declined (having enough lines on my face already). Then we heard the summons and I met up with my other two colleagues and the Chief led us to the Whare where we were welcomed by the Chief’s oldest wife. We were led inside and asked to sit in the front centre row in the place of honour – our tribes had to find seats on their own. Then the Chief and several Maori actors put on a great show about the revered Chief and Ancestor, Uitara. It had storytelling, Maori songs, dances, hakas, fighting and war demonstrations, and we even were honoured to have revealed to us, through a very long story, a magical musical instrument that the Maori call a guitar. Must be the same story that Rugby is featured in.
After the show, the Chief came back to get us and stated he had seen the three of us watching his six wives during the show, perhaps a bit too closely for his liking. I spoke up on behalf of the others and told him that he was blessed to have so many beautiful wives which just proved how great a Chief he was. He graciously thanked me for my kind words and said he would not have to kill us after all. He took us to another building for the Hangi – a Maori dinner cooked in the ground over hot stones. What a spread! Fish, lamb, beef, pork and turkey were the meats; kumaras (sweet potatoes), carrots, regular potatoes, and corn the vegetables, with salads (not cooked in the ground) and other condiments. The food did have an earthy taste to it, but it was delicious. Huge deserts followed, including some traditional puddings.

At the conclusion of the evening, the three visiting Chiefs were called up to the front of the hall where we received gifts from the village (necklaces with a wooden talisman of Tiki – the ‘first’ man). Then it was onto the buses for the journey back to our hotels and motels. On the way back, Mark our driver, started a sing song, that while sounding hokey, was fun as he got us to sing songs typical of our countries – he knew many of them and effected accents of our native lands to sing along with us. If you go to Rotorua, go on the Tamaki tour – other Maoris in different parts of NZ told us it was the best, the hotel manager told us it was the best, and I can’t argue with them.

The next morning we left to see some of the other suggestions made by the hotel manager. One was the Buried Village of Te Wairoa. Like Pompeii (but certainly not as extensive), Te Wairoa was making tons of money housing and ferrying early English tourists to see the famous Pink and White Terraces (volcanic formations) of Lake Tarawera. A local village shaman warned the Maoris of the town that something bad was going to happen unless they turned back to traditional life. On the night of June 10 1886, Mt Tarawera blew up and Te Wairoa and two other villages were buried in ash, mud and rocks from the eruption. The village shaman survived (150 others did not) but was abandoned in his half buried house by villagers. When he finally was rescued, he was taken to a nearby hospital, but died shortly thereafter. The village has been excavated and an interesting and informative tour of the site is provided.

The second place we visited was Hamurana Spring, on the far side of Lake Rotorua (Rotorua in Maori means ‘Second Lake’, being the second lake discovered by an early Maori explorer). Hamurana is the deepest fresh water spring on the North Island (over 15 metres deep) and produces 4 million litres of crystal clear water an hour! The spring is part of a conservation area. The kilometre long stream that flows from the spring has a track on one side that goes through a large California Redwood (imported trees) forest and on the other side, follows a golf course. It is not visited by many tourists (we only saw two other people). It is a very beautiful, peaceful area.

When we finished circling the lake on the road that hugs the shore, we walked across the road from our motel to visit the Rainbow Springs Kiwi Wildlife Park. (The trout stream that goes through the motel grounds originates here). The park contains many of the native birds and animals found in New Zealand, some of which are endangered. One of these is the Tuatara, a reptile that has not changed in 200 million years and is unique in the world. Another is the Kea, an alpine parrot known for its curiosity and intelligence and for its ability to get into just about anything - including pulling the rubber off the edge of car windshields. The park also contains lots of Rainbow Trout (imported from North America). Huge Rainbow Trout that get even bigger when people like Marie buy a bag of corn to feed them. The trout are raised here and swim down the stream to Lake Rotorua (they cannot be fished until they enter the lake). Rainbow Trout are the preferred freshwater game fish in NZ. We enjoyed the two to three hours it took to visit the park which culminated with a visit to the Kiwi House. Kiwis are nocturnal birds so lighting in the house operates opposite to reality. Kiwis are raised here for about a year then released into the wild (where they are endangered). It was the only place in NZ we actually saw this famous bird. No photographs are permitted so if you want to see one, you will have to look it one up.

That evening we went downtown for dinner and ate at a Turkish restaurant. The waiter was from Istanbul and until recently, lived not far from the hotel that Marie and I stayed in when we were there a few years ago. I could not remember the name of the hotel, but when Marie described it, he named it. Small world.

In the morning, we packed up and headed south towards Lake Taupo and our next adventure which was another thermal park recommended to us by the Waitomo Caves B&B owners called Orakei Korako. Out of the way and thus not visited as much, it is nevertheless an excellent geothermal park in that it has active geysers, hot mud pools, caves and mineral formed terraces. To get there, a motorboat takes you across a lake to the smoking, steaming thermal area. We spent a few hours there, wandering the tracks, watching the geysers erupt and checking out the large cave. When one is ready to leave, you ring a bell at the boat dock and the boat crosses the lake to pick you up. While it rained off and on while we were there, we did get enough sun for some good photos and to see the colours of the mineral pools and terraces.

Then it was onwards towards Taupo, situated on the lake of the same name, but first we stopped just outside Taupo to see Huka Falls. New Zealand's longest river, the Waikato (used for lots of LOTR scenes) which begins a short distance away at Lake Taupo, is constricted here into a narrow passage where 220,000 litres of water a second flows through a short ravine that culminates in the 11 metre falls. A footbridge crosses the ravine where the power of the surging water can be felt vibrating the bridge footings in the rock.

Lake Taupo is a huge caldera lake, which started to form over 26,000 years ago when a volcano repeatedly blew up. The largest eruption however, occurred in 180 CE, when over 120 cubic kilometres of material was ejected. The effects of this massive explosion which turned the skies red around the world from the dust were recorded by Romans! We stopped here for a late lunch (it being Mothers’ Day, the restaurants and cafes were packed). Afterwards, we headed due south on the drive across a couple of mountain passes, pass the volcanoes of Tongariro National Park (Mt Doom and Mordor in LOTR) hidden by clouds and down into Napier where we arrived at around 4 p.m.

The centre of the town of Napier was completely destroyed by an 8.3 earthquake in 1931. The centre (and many houses in outlying areas) was rebuilt in the Art Deco Style and the city has been nominated for UNESCO World Heritage status for the architectural style. It was also the scene of a police shooting a few days before we got there, a very rare event in New Zealand. Our B&B was located on the Parade, the main boulevard that runs along Hawke’s Bay (ocean) in a house built in 1900 and one that survived the earthquake (built of wood – maybe Kauri?). It was a short walk downtown along the black volcanic shingle beach where we went for an evening walkabout and for another fantastic dinner.

We returned to the downtown in the morning to get some photos and to see the town in the light of day. It was hard to watch where we were walking because we kept looking up at the art deco buildings (until Marie got to the shopping street). Very few of the buildings put up after the 1931 earthquake are more than two stories. The colours used to highlight features on the buildings such as cornices, windows and frames and doors, range from pastels to deep and vibrant primary tones. Miami Beach contains similar structures, so if you have been there, you will know how interesting the style can be. The waterfront contains a garden, a bandshell and large stage, and the famous statue of Pania of the Reef, representing a Maori maiden who swam with the People of the Sea during the daytime and returned to land at night. Her land based lover, following the advice of his Chief, tried to keep her on shore by feeding her land food, but she fled back into the sea and was turned into a reef off Napier by the People of the Sea to keep her from temptation. And my daughters thought I was a tough father!

Napier would be a good town to stay in for a few days to visit the Hawke's Bay area (and vineyards), but our tour of NZ continued later that morning as we started our drive to our B&B in another famous wine producing town, called Martinborough. To get there, we followed SH 2 as it meandered along Hawke’s Bay before heading inland through hills and valleys as we headed south again. We passed through a couple of towns where more of LOTR was shot, including a private garden (no entry permitted) which subbed for Isengard and Lothlorien.

Late in the afternoon, we arrived in Martinborough and tried to visit some of the vineyards (there are over 25 in the area) but most were closed as the harvest had been completed a couple of weeks before we got there. We did manage to visit two and bought wine from both. The wines of this area are predominately white and Pinot Gris (the first time I had heard of this variety - it is quite good). Martinborough is formed around a quaint square and has streets named after the many places that Mr. Martin visited on his round-the-world trip in the late 1800s. It was virtually deserted when we were there and we were the only guests at a large B&B. When we went for dinner that night, we were the only patrons of a restaurant so we received top service from the owner and had the best soup (made from Kumara and pumpkin) we had tried in New Zealand. I opted for another feed of lamb while Marie chose Blue Cod. Suffice it to say it was a quiet night in Martinborough.

In the morning, we did the short drive through a pass and gorge into Wellington and our last stop on the North Island. Our GPS had difficulty finding our hotel (located on Bunny Street). I knew it was near the ferry landing, so I stopped at a nearby Shell Station to get gas and asked the clerk where it was. She pointed out the window and said it was the black and white building across the corner. But when we went over to the building, it was obvious that it was an office complex. So I parked and we started searching on foot. I asked a passing Army officer and he told me to go around the office building where I found a very small street (thus its name, perhaps) and a red and white building which turned out to be the Holiday Inn.

We registered before we set out for lunch and a walk around downtown Wellington. After lunch, we took the Cable Car up to the Botanic Gardens. We strolled around the top of the hill to see the Observatories and weather station, returning to the lookout for a view of the harbour and Mount Victoria (site of several LOTR scenes). It was a beautiful day so I wanted to spend more time exploring the Gardens and I also wanted to see the NZ Parliament Buildings. Marie decided that she had had enough sightseeing for the day, so she jumped back on the Cable Car to return to the hotel and I set out on the paths that led down into the Gardens.

My two hour walk proved to be interesting as the Gardens changed from rare New Zealand plants, to Australian, to desert (cacti were strange to see in this wet country), to North American, to Japanese etc. The paths wound in and out of gullies, around duck ponds, to an actual tree house that is used for children’s parties, past unique sculptures including a sundial where I was the ‘rod’ that cast the shadow which told me it was 3:00 p.m. and time to go back to the Cable Car where I descended back down to the lower part of the city. It was a fifteen minute walk from there to the Parliament Buildings. I was going to tour them, but since I would have had to leave my camera and backpack at the door for security reasons, decided instead to walk around the outside of the buildings. There are four main buildings; an Edwardian one (replacing an earlier building destroyed in 1907 in a fire) completed in 1922, The Beehive completed in 1979 and where the Executive Wing of Parliament (PM, Ministers) is located, the Parliamentary Library built in the 1880s and Bowen House, a modern (1990) skyscraper where MPs work.

It was starting to get dark so I headed back to the hotel (about 5 minutes away). Later that evening, Marie and I decided to take our car back to the rental office, about a 25 minute walk east of the hotel. After we dropped it off, we stopped in at an Irish Pub on our way back for a nightcap. We ended up being the ‘unofficial’ advisors to a table full of university students who were participating in a fun Trivia game held by the Pub. We provided them with many answers to questions which they could not answer. They came second in the game, winning about sixty dollars – they wanted to share their winnings with us, but we told them we had fun helping them and they should keep the money to pay for their drinks the week following at the next game night.

The next morning, we were up early and wheeled our luggage the 300 metres to the ferry. We sailed on time, it was another beautiful crossing and we arrived in Picton just before the movie Journey to the Centre of the Earth ended (doesn’t that always happen?). The ferry’s shuttle bus that picked us up took us to get our rental car, and after we waited for a half hour for the clerk to arrive, we were once more on the road for our last two days in New Zealand.

We retraced the road from Picton back to Blenheim where we turned left towards Christchurch. For the next fifty kilometres, we travelled through vineyards that were located in just about every valley of the hilly terrain that we were traversing. The NZ Alps, with the white snow glittering on their tops, formed a backdrop to the green and browns of the vineyards. Then we came upon the coast again and drove out to look at the salt works whereby sea water is evaporated through the use of several huge pools to the point that eventually all is left is concentrated salt. This salt works supplies all of New Zealand with table salt. While it is hard to see all the pools since the land here is extremely flat, the colour of the pools is amazing, going from a deep blue to a very pronounced purple as the salt and other minerals in the water becomes concentrated through evaporation.

Once past the salt flats, the road began to climb again as we started up into a more hilly terrain. The mountains off to our right, the NZ Alps, got closer to the point that their flanks approached the water. A train track to our right cut through multiple tunnels, while the road hugged the coastline. This part of the drive reminded me of the coast road from Santa Barbara to San Francisco, albeit on a much smaller scale. The road crossed over high bridges, and twisted through S turns as we headed south. It was really rugged, except for the odd bay where the beaches of black volcanic sand were littered with driftwood and bones – I found what I think is a ‘hip’ bone from a dolphin, bleached on a beach, now a souvenir. I did not know at the time, but Marie had picked up a beach rock for her brother (he collects them from around the world) and put it in her suitcase (thank God because it was almost the size of a curling stone). The coastline and mountains offered great photo opportunities so we stopped often, including at a seal colony where we watched seal pups playing in the tidal pools.

We arrived in the town of Kaikoura, famous for whale watching, at about 3:30 p.m. This town was the location of our last B&B which also turned out to be the most family oriented one, but more of that in a moment. First, we drove through town out to a peninsula where another large seal colony existed. Seals were sprawled in the bushes near the beach, on the beach, on the walkways, on the sea walls – just about everywhere, most of them sound asleep in the late afternoon sun. We took several pictures, as well as going for a walk on the rocky shelf as it was low tide to watch the breakers hitting the rocks further out to sea. From this location, we could look across the bay to the snow clad Alps. It was an extremely beautiful location and if New Zealand were not so far away, would make a great place to have a home.

We reluctantly tore ourselves away and headed back through the town and up the road to our B&B which was located on the heights above the town, with a view of the mountains and the bay. This is where we met Margaret, the delightful 79 year old owner. She immediately brought us over to her kitchen table to meet friends who had driven over for a few days from Nelson (they had lived in Kingston Ontario from 2001-2004), a Japanese girl who was a boarder, a young man from England who was working for Margaret for a few days and later on an Australian couple. She gave each of us some tea and carrot cake she had made and we sat around the table and talked for a couple of hours before Marie and I excused ourselves and asked Margaret for a dinner recommendation.

We went back into town to find the restaurant she suggested, but unfortunately it was closed for renovations, so we ended up at a ‘western’ type place where we had great steaks. When we got back to the B&B, Margaret’s daughter and her husband had arrived, so we were invited once again to sit around the table where we spent another couple of hours talking about everything under the sun.

In the morning, Margaret made us breakfast (we opted for cereals, breads (home made) and her jams), and spent another hour or so chatting with her, the Japanese girl, the English guy, her guests from Nelson and her daughter and daughter's husband. We found out that Margaret’s dream is to visit Anne of Green Gables in PEI so we told her when she gets to see her dream through, to come and stay with us on her journey to Canada. Before we left, she asked us to sign her guestbook, letting us know that in 2010 she will host her 10,000th guest.

We left her beautiful and friendly home and headed south once more, our destination Christchurch. Instead of taking the ‘boring’ coast road, which now went straight across the Canterbury plain, we headed inland along the Alps. The scenery was spectacular (I have run out of ways to describe it) and we stopped about every kilometre it seemed so I could get more photos. Eventually, though, we turned back towards the coast for our run into Christchurch, and when we arrived, went to our hotel which was close to the airport. We had now driven completely around both islands of New Zealand.

That night, we parked the car, and with the confusing map given to us by the hotel clerk, made our way to a nearby restaurant for our last dinner in New Zealand. We both decided to have salmon which was very good, slightly pinker than Coho but with a similar taste. We drank our last bottle of New Zealand wine (in NZ at least) and wandered back to the hotel where we repacked everything for the journey home.

The next morning, we were up early and drove to the airport, dropped the car and checked in for the series of flights which would take us from Christchurch to Ottawa via Sydney, Australia and Vancouver, BC in one day. A very long day, mind you, given that we flew back over the International Date Line. Twenty-six hours after we took off from New Zealand at 7 a.m. local time, we were back in Ottawa at 5 p.m. local time the same day, having completed our journey to one of the most beautiful and scenic countries I have ever seen.

Seeing that the cinematography from the Lord of the Rings inspired me to want to go to New Zealand in the first place, perhaps a bit of dialogue from that movie is a fitting end to our journey there as it describes Middle Earth on earth:

Gandalf: "White shores... and beyond. A far green country, under a swift sunrise."
Pippin: "Well, that isn't so bad."
Gandalf: "No. No, it isn't."