We drove north and after a few stops, to drop off a radiator and spade retreaval, we were soon on the open road. And what a lovely open road it was. Once past the hills trapping us in Wellington, the weather completely changed. It was much warmer and incredibly sunny. The scenery, as always, was beautiful. We stopped for lunch at Dannevirke, a town settled by the dutch, and ate the mandatory pie. Apparently there is an electronic public toilet that plays “why to birds suddenly appear …” on a continuous loop. For fear of getting the song stuck in my head I opted out of a toilet break.
View from a vantage point somewhere on the way (Jan's photo)
We drove northwards for a few more hours, until we reached Lake Tutira. The others have all been on field trips here, either demonstrating of being taught. Apparently, there had been a large landslide, which now separates Lake Tutira from Lake Waikpiro, blocking the water flow and hence building the lake. Or something like that. To be honest I was feeling a bit tired so wasn’t fully concentrating.
After a 20 min break we continued our journey. 8-9 hours later, we reached are fist stop for the night, Gisborne. This is located on the east coast and is a typical tourist surfer beach town. We stayed at a camp site and set up our tents. Katrin is Austrian and thereofre being from a landlocked country had never learned to surf, so John took her out for her first surf. Although she didn’t manage to stand, she did really enjoyed herself. The rest of us went to the shops and bought the food for the the trip.
Once Katrin and John had had enough of their surfing we ate tea, played a game of cards and promptly went to bed. We were going to set off reasonably early the next day to explore the East Cape.
No comments:
Post a Comment