Turns out that Wales and the Bay of Islands have something in common, besides a fondness for sheep: they both turn on the rain when they hear me coming.
At a cafe in Auckland this morning, I read a cookbook that contained a bit of seemingly obvious wisdom from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: “The best thing one can do when it’s raining is to let it rain.”
Two full days of rain marked our time in the Bay of Islands, the place I’d hoped would be the highlight of our NZ trip, and it turned out that Wadsworth’s advice is sometimes harder to follow than expected.
We arrived in town late afternoon on Feb 2 in time to tour the full, pricey or full AND pricey backpacker options in Paihia, before coming across Beachside caravan park and deciding that was the place for us. We had a leisurely dinner and called it an early night, feeling a bit overtired from our longer-than-expected (who are we kidding – they’re always longer than expected) drive from the Coromandel.
Feb 3 greeted us with ominous grey skies and rain in the forecast, so we put our brave faces on, prepared for rain, and headed out to explore some of the region.
Our first stop was Haruru Falls, just on the edge of town, which rewarded us with some lovely views and a lookout onto rowing and dance rehearsals in preparation for Waitangi Day.
The drizzle greeted us as we arrived at the very quaint Stone Store (oldest stone building in NZ) and Kemp House, but we carried on, as yet undeterred, to the Fairy Pools.
This stop was a little confusing. We walked down the trail until we found water, but what we were looking at could barely qualify as the Fair Pool (singular), let alone Fairy Pools (plural). We did a bit of exploring across the river (by ‘we’, I mean ‘I’) and very nearly had a face-to-surface introduction with the river as I struggled to keep any sort of grip on the submerged stones across the lip of the low-level babbling waterfall. What was Rich doing during my slightly perilous adventure? Standing on the river bank, laughing and suggesting I go further into the water. How very helpful…. He had, at least, had the forethought to remind me, before I got into much difficulty, that this was MY idea, therefore absolving himself of any responsibility if I went for a swim – planned, or otherwise.
Figuring we must have gotten seomthing wrong about the location of the pools, we carried on into the woods on a barely-there trail and finally had success finding the Pools (plural). Lovely! And, as we’ve come to expect, deserted. Not a single soul joined us during our time clambering around the rocks.
From the pools, we headed to the beautiful Rainbow Falls and then to Kerikeri to get info on where to find the Edmonds Ruins. I might as well have been speaking in Latin when I asked a couple of people, but thankfully the library was open and the clerk had the wits to Google it for us before giving us a map (found out afterwards that it was labelled on the map!) and sending us on our way. A little tricky to find but reminiscent of some of the ruins you’d find in Cornwall (UK – certainly not Ontario), the old family home of a friend’s ancestors stands in the middle of a field down an unmarked lane that we found more by fluke than by successful map reading. So we had a goo look around (in the rain) and then carried on our way back to Paihia (in the rain). All in all, we did a pretty good job of letting it rain, if not by choice then at least without spirits being too low.
Day 2 started with – you guessed it… Rain. Brave faces in place but starting to slide like a stroke victim’s, we decided to start our day somewhere unaffected by rain: Wakiti glow worm caves. We enjoyed a very cool half hour tour with James and got up close to some pretty bright worm bums. For those uninitiated in the world of glowing insects, glow worms inhabit caves around the country, dropping little strings of webbing down from where they have staked out their territory, aiming to catching passing insects. They are fiercely territorial and glow brighter when hungrier, which works to the spectators’ advantage because it means that they remain evenly spaced around the roof, making a miniature galactic display.
Then it was on to another stop where water is a boon rather than a bane: the Huntertwasser toilets in Kawakawa. A slightly odd choice of stops for the uninformed, but luckily our tour guide (ahem… me) had done her reading. A brightly coloured mish mash of earthy features (there are plants growing out of the roof), old steel tools, ceramic and glass, these public toilets are covered in mosaics and made a good diversion for a few minutes.
The goal for the day was to drive to Russell, so all other options exhausted, we now had nothing left to do but head for this cosy little seaside town. There’s one problem with the “cosy little seaside town” descriptor, though: it’s just a euphemism for “avoid like the plague when it’s raining because there’s nothing to do here”. We stopped the van on a patch of gravel looking out into a little harbor just outside of town, grabbed our books and climbed into the back to enjoy a bit of escapism and the view. Turns out that the view I ended up enjoying was of the backs of my eyelids, but we had a lazy hour of napping and reading and then headed for town (in the rain). With our spirits sinking lower with every drop that hit the windshield, we decided that now was the perfect time for a drop of a different sort in order to celebrate the newly-born Amelie Russell. After all, what are the chances that you’ll be in a-town-called-Russell when your friends-called-Russell have their baby?
Hindsight has cast an ever-so-slightly rosy glow to our days activities and, in my attempt to do this country the justice it rightly deserves, I’ve glossed over the extreme funk that this soul-sapping weather put me in. While this stretch of our trip was both disappointing ad disheartening, it served as an excellent reminder that, no matter what adventure you set out on, there will inevitably come some rough days. There’s an extreme form of guilt that comes with being unhappy while travelling – I’m on holidays; how on EARTH can I feel miserable?! Whether it’s because of the weather, culture shock, unrealistic expectations, an unexpected expense or homesickness, sometimes travel throws a big honking curve ball and you simply strike out. Well, I was at bat in the bay and I definitely swung and missed. Fortunately, Rich has developed a rather admirable (if irritating at the time) ability to stay cheery, so my funk went unindulged and we just came up with alternate plans to deal with each challenge as plan after plan (after plan after plan…) went awry.
We had dinner (fresh hapuka (fish) on top of curry – spirits were picking up!) and headed for bed, hoping for brighter weather and higher spirits the next day. After all, it could only get better from here.
Woke up the next day to… SUN! And lots of it. Hightailed it into town, booked a four hour boat trip in the bay, and set sail (well, motor) an hour later in pursuit of dolphins and a morning of lovely weather. Lots of dolphins, sun through most of the trip, some fun swell-surfing at the front of the boat that made me feel like I’d been to the bay and the carnival all in the same morning, and smiles upon our return. From there, we were back in the van, on to Whangarei Falls camp, and about to spend our last night with Delores – or so we thought.
Grateful for: a cheery husband, waterfalls and toilets that get us out on rainy days
Grateful for: a cheery husband, waterfalls and toilets that get us out on rainy daysTotal sun burns: HA! I think I should
be able to knock this down by two to make up for the complete absence of any sunshine!
