Turn Back Time

Turn Back Time
East Cape, New Zealand

East Cape, New Zealand

The next leg of our journey was to get ourselves back to Auckland in time for our flight to Tahiti, but we had a bit of time to spare so decided to spend our final weeks in New Zealand returning to our favourite spots and visiting a few we missed the first time.

After a sad farewell to Gemma, Shane, Owl & Piglet we didn’t want to go too far so we returned to one of our trusty campgrounds that we had stayed at in Blondini. Dannevirke Campground is somewhere we stumbled on by accident back in November when the weather turned and we just needed a place to stop. It turned out to be our favourite campground in the whole of NZ. Without Blondini we upgraded our stay to one of the cabins which at £7.50 each per night was an absolute bargain. As usual we fed the deers and ducks before setting off on our first adventure.

Having already driven this route 4 times, there was a small diversion that we had never had time for on the previous trips. We needed to go to the sign for the longest place name in the world. I am sure that you will need to google it as you won’t believe me and will think that the longest place name is in Wales but no, it is here in North Island and at 85 letters will take some beating. Our first problem was how to programme our sat-nav with Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateatur ipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakit anatahu. We knew approximately where we were headed and just hoped for dumb luck along the way to actually find the sign. Thankfully after about an hour we saw a sign and we were there. We are fairly easily pleased at the best of times and this was no different. We spent a good 20 minutes messing around with our cameras at the sign. As if the fact that this is the longest place name in the world isn’t enough, I have another factoid for you. This place name, Maori in origin translates as: “The summit where Tamatea, the man with the big knees, the climber of mountains, the land-swallower who travelled about, played his nose flute to his loved one”, interesting huh!

Our next stop was another town high on our favourite places in NZ list, the wonderful wonderful Napier. With no Blondini we were back relying on the kindness of strangers and found ourselves at the door of William & Katie, two young doctors who offered us a room through Couch Surfing. We only had one night with them but it was such a great evening, we laughed the hours away listening to their stories of the mad lives of junior doctors, we played with their stethoscope and I even learned how to make sushi. Thanks William & Katie, hopefully we will see you when you are on your travels!

Whilst we had been enjoying the usual sun in Napier we had been reading the news about the East Cape of NZ being battered by flooding and storms. Typically this was our next destination. We had not had time to get there the first time and now we were unsure whether we would make it at all. Having been to the most Northerly tip and most Southerly point we had to make it to the most Easterly edge, didn’t we??

We set off from Napier and headed to Gisbourne, the last part the East coast before you round the East Cape. Gisbourne and the East Cape have significantly higher Maori populations that the rest of the country and we had heard so many good things. We were utterly amazed by Gisbourne, we expected a little sleepy town and whilst it is by no means a metropolis it was a much bigger and more sophisticated town than I expected. We holed up in a little campsite cabin and set about visiting the main attractions of Gisbourne. We found an awesome viewpoint over the city and then headed down to Poverty Bay, the beach where my good friend Captain James Cook first stepped foot on New Zealand on the 7 October 1769.

With no time to spare we had an early start to commence our trip around the East Cape. Back in Blondini we would have probably spent about 4 days doing this trip, but with accommodation costs to think of an a distict lack of places to stay on the cape we opted to do it in a day.

Our first stop was Tolega Wharf at 600 meters long this is NZ’s longest wharf. Back in 1998 the wharf was in danger of being closed as it had long been out of use since the last maize cargo left the port in 1968. Thankfully it was restored and reopened in 2013 as it is a beautiful bay and wharf. With the sun shining we enjoyed the view, had an icecream and set off to our next stop, Tokomaru Bay Wharf. Sadly this small town is more reminiscent of a ghost town than the once thriving flax trade port. The town is home to just 350 people who mainly live from fishing and handicrafts. It was a little bit like going back in time arriving in this this small town. The old rickety wharf is a far cry from the lovingly restored Tolega Wharf, but the brave Maori’s fishing off of the end of the broken and unstable wharf was a fantastic sight and the main reason we wanted to come around the cape to see some of the real Maori culture that still exists here outside of the Theme parks in Rotorua. We walked freely around the old damaged warehouses along the shore which showed what a thriving place this once was.

Next on our route was the East Cape Lighthouse, little did we know that this was going to be more of a challenge than we anticipated. We reached Te Araroa which had been battered in the storms the week before and the shoreline was awash with trees and logs. Little did we realise that the drive from here to the lighthouse was a good hour on an unpaved road with unstable cliffs after the storm. We had come this far and figured we had to commit. In the hire car with full insurance we didn’t really have a care in the world so we set off. The drive was awesome, there were cows in the road, pigs on the beach and not another person or car to be seen anywhere. We drove and drove and drove and eventually reached a field which had a rickety sign headed up a hill, presumably to the lighthouse. Sadly with time not on our side we opted not to make the climb and instead retraced our route back to Te Araroa. It would have been great to see the lighthouse, as it is the location of the first sunrise in the world, but technically we went to the most eastern easterly Point of NZ, so I think we can still consider it done.

Our final stop on the East Cape was the much awaited Waihou Bay, the filming location of the epic NZ movie Boy. How could we possibly resist. Funnily enough after hours of rugged hills, tiny shacks and people riding bare foot and bare back on horses we got to Waihou and discovered that it is actually an upmarket little town with hotels, bars and lovely houses. Thankfully the Waihou Post office was exactly as it was in the movie so we re-enacted a couple of movie scenes here and in the area.

The East Cape did not disappoint at all, it is proper old school New Zealand and I would have kicked myself if we would have missed it.

After an epic days driving and touring we had booked a stay at a ladies house through AirBnB, it was a perfect location and the lady was lovely, the only problem was that she had just had hip surgery so we gave her some much needed company and helped around the house for a few days. After all the kindness that we had been shown in NZ it was not a problem at all and it felt pretty good to give something back.

Our final stop on this mammoth drive from South to North was near to Mount Manganui, another place we missed the first time because of the weather and were blessed with bright sun to complement the beautiful white sand. Here we once again landed on our feet as we found ourselves at the door of Lillian and John, a retired couple who have the most epic travel stories of anyone we have ever met and probably will ever meet. They travelled the world in the 70’s and 80’s when backpacking was hard, no internet, no forward planning, no chance of paying for a flight from Australia to Europe, they took a boat. We had just one night together and had so many laughs. Lil took us on a tour of their amazing orchard whi
ch contains every citrus fruit I have ever heard of and some that I am still pondering what they were! It was certainly a sensory overload on the taste buds and Tim, who has no tolerance for anything sour pulled some pretty special faces during the tour. Lil and John are up their as some of our biggest travel heros, there is no stopping these guys as despite having photos of pretty much every town in every city adorning their walls they are currently renewing their passports ready for the next adventure. Absolute legends, I hope we see you in South America next year guys!!!

Back on the road again we are headed to Middle Earth, yup really. Hobbiton here we come!