Great Exhibition Bay

Beach

NickyBeautiful white silica sand beach we visited on our way to the top. A good taste of things to come!

01. Far North

Thar she blows! Cape Reinga, the start of the walk

Cape Reinga

NickyBrilliant to finally see the famous light house out in front of us and knowing the real adventure is about to start. But also feeling quite apprehensive suddenly. I think about the isolation, and being so far from people and help ( although I know that i’m in the expert wilderness-trained hands of Cookie of course ) and I know everything will be totally fine – but I think the remoteness of the location and the magnitude of the task in hand is starting to sink in! And, as they say in Bad Boys II, “This shit just got real!”.

First sight of our first beach

First beach

Nicky gives it the once over, “just like Cornwall… but MASSIVE” she says.

Nipped around this bit just before the tide came in

Cookie walking, lava flows

CookieThis is an old lava flow that we’re walking along, apparently the top end of New Zealand used to be a separate volcanic island which has been joined onto the north island by the ocean currents pushing sand up the coast. There’s certainly plenty of sand about.. Gets everywhere! 

Nicky walking along Te Werahi Beach

Nicky walking along beach

NickyThe first beach. Excited to be by the seaside.

Climbing up Herangi Hill

Climbing sandy dunes

Blimey it’s like the Sahara Desert here!

Cookie with Cape Maria van Diemen in the background

Cape Maria van Diemen

CookieThe cape in the background was named by Abel Tasman after the wife of his patron, Anthony van Diemen. It is – along with the Three Kings Islands – one of only two geographic features in New Zealand to retain the names given to them by Abel Tasman. Cheers Wikipedia! Well I’m not sure if Maria was a looker, but the cape named after her isn’t too shabby.

First view of the seemingly endless 90 Mile Beach

90 mile beach

CookieIn some respects I’m looking forward to 90 Mile Beach, it’s flat easy walking. But then again I’m also fearing it because it’s long, featureless and possibly very tedious.. time will tell!

Camp 2

Camp 2

CookieWe still haven’t found any grass to camp on yet.. Camped tonight behind the beach in the sand dunes, picked this spot because it was slightly damp to give the tent pegs something firmer to stick into! We camped near and filled our boots with water from Te Paki Stream, water tasted good, but a bit worrying that the the stream also doubles up as a road for all the fisherman and tour buses..