title: the northland experience
author: rebekah merriman

after two great mammoth christmas feasts - one out at parakai at rachel and regans, and another down in hamilton, eric and i headed to pak'n'save to stock up on a slightly different meal plan to take tramping with us on our four day hike.

we journeyed up to waitiki landing, the last pitstop before the very tip of new zealand. here we met up with approximately 4 million mosquitoes who greeted me with far more fondness and hospitality than i wanted.

the four day hike itself was a real highlight - to see completely deserted beaches with massive sand dunes on the horizon, to walk from sea level up huge cliffs around headlands and down into valleys, to clamber over such different environments from rock hard sand to farmland to gorse-scattered bush. the whole way we saw the sea, and the sea saw us.

backcountry camping involves boiling your own water, finding your own tent space out of the prevailing wind, watching the stars come out, and dealing with more mosquitoes. i thought mosquitoes didnt like the beach? i thought wrong. we met a couple who taught us how to make the local bush manuka tea - easy to do and handy as we would spend 5 hours a day walking past manuka to our next location.

a highlight that needs its own paragraph. the dolphins. after a 6 hour trek or so we finally came upon our destination for that day - a little beach called pandoras bay. erics first encounter with sea-life - a stingray floating past in ankle-deep water. but it was the next day when we were out in the breakers - about waist-deep - that we saw the teenage dolphins - having left their pod (which we could se further out at sea) - coming in to practice their surfing technique. only 10m ahead of us, on the next set of breakers, they dove, flapped their tails, leapt into the air, splashed and surfed the incoming waves with such graceful ease.

once back in civilisation where i could buy allergy medicine to stop the now 200 mosquito bites from winning over my sanity, we continued on our nothland adventure - visiting the hokianga harbour (where we rode horses), waitangi, paihia, kai iwi lakes and whangarei heads. we picked up my cousin brenda from whangarei and drove back to auckland, stopping in at goat island for a swim and a peek at the fish swimming around in the marine reserve.

i write this from auckland, but before the day is over we will have headed south towards tauranga... might as well make the most of this excellent summertime weather!

until next time...