10 December 2005 - Tawharanui Regional Park


Trip up: Wattle Downs - Northern Motorway (SH1) - across the Harbour Bridge - Albany - Orewa - Waiwera - Warkworth - Matakana - Tawharanui

Trip back: Tawharanui - Point Wells - Omaha - Matakana - Warkworth - Wenderholm - Waiwera - Orewa - across the Harbour Bridge - Southern Motorway (SH1) - Wattle Downs

End Mileage: 172397

Start Mileage: 172126

Distance Travelled: 271

Left Haslip Manor about 9am with a quick stop at Guild for a bowl that Rex is making and wants to continue working on on Monday.

Diesel stop at Papatoetoe then SH1 north ward bound, well nothing much worse than running out of diesel and it's probably cheaper than waiting and filling up at Warkworth.

Rather than stay on the main road went via the old road north so up via Albany which is growing and expanding. Made it to Warkworth just before 11am so found our way to the New World car park and Cracker Jack was there already. Figured the Lendrums (Alan and Maree) were off at the Saturday morning market on the main street - rang Alan and yes that's where they were! Found them and went for a stroll around down town Warkworth - haha. Had a coffee at Ducks Crossing - café on the river side. Great coffee and awesome scones (oh, darn, we succumbed to the scones) - the rest of the food looked lovely as well but we didn't succumb and eat more than morning tea!!!

Went to New World and did a food shop - staples like wine, strawberries, Christmas mince tarts, cheese, bread, steak, salad veges, sausages, oh ok and even some water!

Made it out of Warkworth by 12:40 pm - off on the road to Tawharanui. Followed Alan and Maree so got to drive behind them and their dust - yep, just a bit of gravel road. Can't have a trip away without gravel.

Got to the camp ground and set up our site, across the way from a load of teenagers all camped out, hmm just what have we done to ourselves, guess time will tell.

Well we had to park somewhere: The campsite view:


Went for a walk down to the beach - only just through a fence and over a small sand dune.

Maree looking back to make sure we are all coming along as well:
We made it to the beach, just missing the sun for the day


Beach views from the entrance by our camp site:


Came across some of the local bird life, a Variable Oyster and it's chick:


Honest there is a bird in the picture below: Oh there's the zoom and there's the bird:


Then of course we are back with views…

A bit of sea: A bit of grass, trees and coast:


Walk down to the next beach round the coast.


Oh look, shock horror, a flowering pohutukawa tree - yay


Hmmmm, is there a bit of wood here for me to turn?


Pohutukawa flowers in amongst the pile of pohutkawa wood:


Those trees will grow (or try to) anywhere, could be quite spectacular when it decides to flower.


More birds, probably the same Variable Oystercatcher and it's chick:


A New Zealand Dotterel hiding in the rocks.


Seagulls in the water and of course a pohutukawa tree.


These ones didn't really want to stay still for a picture; they were more concerned with getting out of the way.

More scenery:


Alan and Maree on our walkabout. Yes Rex and I were there.


The view from halfway up the hill.


OMG people are really swimming, rather them than us. We'll just go back to the campsite and have pre-dinner drinkies, cheese and crackers. This camping life is tough.

Yip, Alan you walk up the hill we will supervise. Yes Alan we know you're there:


Another awesome view:


Oh wow, a flowering pohutukawa tree in the campsite round from where we had parked.


Back at the campsite we'd set up. Getting organised for dinner (oh and pre-dinner drinks).


Tough life reading a book, yay, relaxed:


Oh a book and a wine. Ah life is so tough; just not sure how long the gang can cope with this.


Alan doesn't actually know how to sit still so we got him sorted to get the gas bottle going for the BBQ.


Of course Alan had to cook… Maree had to supervise. They both do there respective jobs so well. Hmm, does that mean Rex and I were left to drink and read ;-)


Maree just checking that Alan is doing this right.


Tui in the tree by our camp site. He (she?) was quite stroppy with anyone coming near the tree and made sure no one (be it bird or human) stayed around for very long.


Dinner of steak, sausages, salad, wine and of course great company (and a bit more wine). About this time the Ranger comes round with his kids in the back of the ute. He looks a bit impressed about what we are having for dinner. Rex offers the strawberries and Christmas Mince Pies to the kids to see if they want anything. The two girls take a strawberry each and the boy takes a Christmas Mince Pie so Rex offers the tray back and the girls take a Christmas Mince Pie each, the Ranger does take a strawberry.



Racing Rabbit checks out dinner and offers his tacit approval.:


Then there was dessert:


Ended up that we made more noise than the teenagers camping across from us (ooops), not a peep out of them! Guess lucky they didn't call the Ranger on us!!!

Sunday 11 December 2005 Tawharanui

Breakfast this morning was the standard camp fare of bagels, bacon, eggs and coffee. This met with everyone's approval, even the Ranger who turned up to check out what we were having. After breakfast Activity Alan decided we were all off for a walk down the beach, while it wasn't as good a day as yesterday it was still a good day to walk along any beach so we thought we'd better.

Maree and Rex find out they both went to Otahuhu College, this must be the ex-pupil walk from Otahuhu College.


This far from civilisation and there are actually two houses where this one is - figure must be the same family members… Wouldn't really expect to build here and get people you didn't know build that close to you:


Alan and Rex go off exploring on the rocks.




Alan just walks through the water - honest he ain't that good and isn't walking on the water.


Rex's turn to be artistic:


Shag (another bird).


Looking down the beach back the way we came:


And the view looking the other way…


Back to the camp site and after much deliberation we decided it was lunch time (well it was 1:30 pm) and after all, we hadn't eaten since breakfast which was oh, all of 3 hours earlier. Lunch consisted of corn on the cob, crackers with tomato and avocado and drink of juice. Not bad for a forgotten meal when we were doing the food shop yesterday! Knew that we'd never go hungry/thirsty, especially going away with Lendrums. (OK OK even if Lendrums hadn't been there Rex and I wouldn't be the sort to go hungry anyway.)

Tidied up and Rex and I left the Lendrums to it just before 3pm. As Maree doesn't work on Mondays and Alan is retired (and working harder than he has ever done) they had decided to stay another night. (Heard later from Maree that the Ranger came back on the Monday morning while they were having breakfast (cereal and chopped up banana) and did comment on the food not being up to the same standards as previous visits!)

Did a quick tour of Omaha - past all the new developments and out to Point Wells just to have a look.

Made it to Warkworth about 4:15pm and then good old SH1 south - had thought about going up to Wellsford and going home via SH16 but a bit late in the day by this stage so we'll have to do that next time!

Had a quick stop at Wenderholm Regional Park - very busy. Checked out the camp ground there. It's small but still will be fun to stay in so oh dear, another trip will have to be made in BILITY. How tough.

Back on the road and straight back to Haslip Manor just before 6pm.


Links

BILITY home page

Tawharanui Regional Park