Ulli: Long time no see...

Quite a lot happened since we last wrote something!

After our Kayaking trip to the black rocks in Bay of Islands, we headed direction North to Ahipara, the very beginning of the famous 90 Mile Beach, which is in fact “only” 60 Miles or about 100 Kilometres long.

Being no fans of bus tours, we were beaten by the amazing conditions and decided to get on a coach trip to the almost northernmost point of NZ, to Cape Reinga, where the Tasman sea and the Pacific ocean merge. This is the place, where according to the legend the souls of dead Maoris descend through the roots of a giant tree to the sea, and travel home to their ancient home, Hawaiti. On the way up we even had the chance to do some sand tobogganing on a giant sand dune. If one made sure to keep mouth and eyes shut at all times, it was really good fun!! The 90 Mile Beach itself is in fact a “normal” highway, where every car can go (4 wheel drive recommended!), as long as the tide is low! Still, there was almost nobody but two or three buses like ours.

Our next stop was at the giant Kauri trees in Waipoua Forest. They all have names, mostly maori names. The biggest, Tane Mahuta (Lord of the forest) hat a girth of almost 14 meters! The oldest (Tane Matua Ngahere – Father of the forest) is over 2000 years old. In the picture you see “Yakas”, which is the 7^th biggest, and already very impressive! A lot of the Giant Kauri trees where cut down in the last century, so there is only a very limited amount of them left. For all the souvenirs made of Kauris, it is promised that now living tree was hurt, but only old roots, some of them where in the ground for 20.000 of 40.000 years.

Further south-east in Auckland, we met the sister of my good friend Otto, Angela. It was a very nice and relaxing evening, we were invited for Lasagne and went to a Pub, and we got a lot of Insider information and tips. Thanks, Angi and Rich! The next day Markus took the ferry to the volcanic Rangitoto Island for a running trip, followed by another highlight that evening! We managed to get quite good tickets to see the “Phantom of the opera”!!

After a short stop at a campsite that even had its own sulphur pools, we arrived at Coromandel peninsula, where we plan to get very active again! Details will follow!