Bay of Islands and beyond...

After a 5 hour twisty bus trip to Paihia north of Auckland I found a bed to lay my head and set about on an explore of the town. The town is basically a gateway to all that the bay of islands has to offer beautiful scenery, boat trips, swimming with wild dolphins, fishing trips and all that jazz...however the day i arrived all had been cancelled due to bad weather..."very unusual for this time of year" at once I could see how the area would be outstandingly beautiful and a completely different place given some sunshine however I have to admit that for the four days I was around the area the mist wind rain and churned up brown waters apparently caused by the Fiji cyclone really reminded me of a windy cold day in the lake district which was rather sad. Not to be put down by the situation myself and three other lone traveller woman i met in the hostel made our way to the pub. where as luck would have it was happy hour and we won several prizes including a horse trekking trip ! Well that was the next day of activity sorted come rain or shine.



After a horse trek I explored the Waitangi treaty grounds it was here on February 6th, 1840, that the Treaty of Waitangi was first signed between Maori and the British Crown. The treaty has been a source of debate ever since. It seems to me that the British got a pretty good deal. The Maori guides at the site were open about the tension that exists over the treaty and encouraged debate with you which was really insightful. The tension partly exists due to the small fact that until the treaty was drawn up the Maori language had never been expressed in the written form.

The grounds are beautiful and really worth visiting regardless of the sites significance. Apparently each year on the 6th Feb the grounds attract thousands of people for a reenactment of the treaty signing and a celebration of culture involving all the Maori tribes which sounds rather spectacular.

Tongue action ! The wonderful and entertaining traditional Maori carvings from all the Maori tribes in New Zealand are represented in the meeting house at Waitangi... yes, I took photos of all the carvings with tongues poking out !

Making it all the way up to the most Northerly point in NZ Cape Reinga was wonderful if not a hellishly long drive. I was inspired and some what comforted learning of the Maori belief that spirits travel on the wind to the cape and jump into the sea from the ancient tree on the rocks to continue thier journey to the spiritual after life, families make a pilgrimage to the cape as part of thier grieving process.

Being a windy day I was lucky to experience the meeting of the Tasman sea and Pacific ocean which have different tidal pattens resulting in the waters meeting or crashing at different levels (see background of photo). The maori refer to this as the meeting of Te Moana-a-Rehua 'the sea of rehua' with Te Tai-o-Whitirea ' The sea of Whitirea' Rehua being male and Whitirea being female.