North Island Trip - Part I - Napier & Rere rockslide

North Island trip - Part I - Napier & Rere rockslide

Happy New Year! I am finally back on the blogwagon, thank you for your patience.




Over the 2016/2017 Christmas holiday, Mike and I set out on a bird-watching/dragonfly-finding/car-camping adventure to the North Island. I will tell you all about our remarkable travels in a series of posts.....so stay tuned.

To get to the North Island from the South Island we drove our camperized car (Toyota Caldina wagon with a bed in the back instead of rear seats) onto the Interislander Ferry. Since the recent November 14, 2016 Kaikoura earthquake damaged SH1, we were forced to take the detour route through Lewis Pass, which makes for a 5 1/2 hour drive (normally 4 hours) from Christchurch to Picton.

View off the back of the interislander ferry as we depart the South Island. 

The 3 1/2 hour crossing through Cook's Strait was calm and clear. From the boat I was able to see several lifers (birds that are new to my 'life list'), including Fluttering shearwater, Gray-faced petrel and White-chinned petrel.

Once docked, we traveled from the capital city of Wellington, along the way picking up Common and Little tern at Foxton beach.  We travelled northeast about 4 hours until we reached Napier, in the Hawke's Bay region.  Much to our pleasant surprise we had the opportunity to view both Marsh and Spotless crake at the Ahuriri estuary, which are notoriously hard birds. I also saw my lifer Wilson's phalarope and Marsh sandpiper as well as a Pectoral sandpiper.

I also found my lifer Plumed whistling duck at Anderson Park. Notably we also found New Zealand's best potato topped pie at the local New World! This trip was off to a swell start.

Here is New Zealand's best potato top! It was good!

Speaking of good food, we stopped at a local orchard and picked up some beautiful cherries, apricots and peaches....oh yes, they were as good as they look.

Gorgeous fruits of Hawke's Bay are ripe and ready to eat.

We did the 40 minute Tumanako forest walk at Boundary Stream, but I dipped (again!) on Rifleman. See pictures below from our walk.

A chicken egg is used as bait to trap predators, which threaten the native nesting birds.

This self-resetting predator control device can humanely kill up to 24 stoats per canister.

Bracket fungus

I found an amazing glow worm when I flipped over a large stump!

Towering silver tree-fern

At this point we decided to travel to Eastland. Fifteen minutes outside of Gisborne we found a spectacular camping spot at Tatapouri by the Sea ($22/night). You can't beat pitching your tent oceanside and being the first person in the world to admire the sunrise in the morning. We enjoyed our two nights here.

As a beach glass enthusiast, this is one of the best beaches that I have found yet!

I made art! This was our Christmas tree for 2016.

We also experienced the most amazing double rainbow. Even though I grew up in 'the city of rainbows' this may have been my most spectacular rainbow event ever. 

The most spectacular rainbow at Tatapouri by the sea. Picture provided with permission by Mike Ashbee.

Our last stop in Eastland was the Rere rockslide, which is actually a natural 60 metre waterslide (see video above and below). 

Serious risks -------- Schmerious risks......life is for living!

It was A LOT of fun going down the rockslide, especially because it is 100 % free (boogie board cost $10)! The Rere waterfall wasn't so bad either.

Rere falls

On our way to the Rere rockslide we found an amazing citrus stand; $2 for 20 mandarin oranges = a bone fide Christmas miracle!

Stay tune for the next lag of the trip - Rotorua where we discovered thermal pools other geothermal wonders
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