Whangarei, Bay of Islands, NZ

A Little History

New Zealand was discovered and settled about 700 years ago, by Polynesians, who developed a distinct Maori culture centered on kinship links and land. The first European explorer to sight New Zealand was Abel Janszoon Tasman on December 13,1642.

Bay of Islands

We took three days off our housesitting job, and drove the 160km northeast of Auckland to Whangarei ('wh'Maori is promounced 'f'). It is just as challenging pronouncing places and names here as in Vietnam.  Whangarei has 52,000 inhabitants, and is the only city in the Northland. There is, by the way, also a Bay of Islands, just outside Corner Brook in Newfoundland, Canada, where Andy was born. Interestingly, the explorer, Captain James Cook visited both places.

We climbed the 460m Mount Manaia. It felt like a mini Vancouver Grouse Grind!

We went for a swim at Ocean Beach, and walked around town.

 This is the most flexible bench we have ever seen! Yep, you just pull the wood and sit on the other side. Pretty smart these Kiwis!

We spent the first night at Little Earth Lodge, and enjoyed sharing experiences and travel tips with fellow travellers. in this case another Canadian. When I went inside, she took my wine glass 'by mistake', hence passing the Canadian test!!

Abbey Caves

Just next to the Little Earth Lodge were the Abbey Caves comprising of three significant caves, Organ, Middle and Ivy. Nathaniel and Amelia Clotworthy settled on 409 acres here in about 1860. Their house in the limestone outcrops resembled an Irish ‘abbey’ leading to the name. 

Our main reason for going into yet another cave was to see glow-worms, which had not seen in any of the other caves. And we were not disappointed. When we turned off our headlamps the ceiling was full of 'stars' - really beautiful. Unfortunately, our camera could not capture the glowworms in the dark, but here they are anyway. If you look in the right hand corner of the photo, and use your imagination, you can see a glimpses of light, which is glow-worms.

The glow worm is a medium to large sized invertebrate that is famous for having a green and yellow coloured light on the end of it's tail. Glow worms are found inhabiting dense woodland and caves around the world with the exception of the Americas. They have small tentacles, which they use to catch insects. 

Andy did the last longest cave by himself, and spent the last 100 metres waist deep in water. Really cool eery experience being by yourself. Only afterwards did the lodge owner tell Andy about the big eels in that last stretch!

Enough time spend under ground, time to drive to Paihia.