Leaving Kerikeri and heading west, I stumbled over the Mission House at Waimate. An amazing old house built by Maoris under the direction of Rev Samuel Marsden in 1832, the idea was to teach local Maori some of the European tricks of building and farming.
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The Mission House
As I came into the carpark, there was one spot next to the Church entrance where I could back Rafe in and leave the front wheels on the gravel.
Rafe parked by the doorway!
The church is fascinating with some of the oldest graves you’re likely to see anywhere. There is one spectacular gravestone what must have been a local chief or Kamatua that looks well looked after. It must be of some significance but there was no one around to ask about it.
Not sure whos grave this is but its impressive
After this, I went into the house. I’m a real sucker for things old and well looked after so this was really interesting. There was even an old woodturning Lathe there too.
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The Church next door
Those stairs !
The Lathe
One of the bedrooms
Waimate
A spooky Motorhome picky!
Its amazing how well it was built given the construction methods of the day. The stairs were crazy. You’d never get away with those today 🙂
The living room
Well worth a visit and only $10 a head to have a good wander around.
You have to hand it to the Whangarei Council. They really have pulled out all the stops at the Bascule Bridge Parking area.
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Very civilised parking
There are white vertical strips on the fence to mark the parks with a number in the middle of each park. The parks are wide enough to get a decent sized 8 plus metres vehicle in and still be able to create a 3 metre or close gap between each Motorhome.
The opening bridge
I haven’t see this recently so was pleasantly surprised to see how well it was setup. I immediately went to a Hot Dog cart that was there and celebrated with a Hot Dog on a stick and some chips for lunch 🙂
Brightly painted loos
The Hot Dog man was telling me how the Rally was setup over the road and they were starting from the bridge that night with a special stage on the other side of the bridge. The cars were due to line up on the bridge by 5pm and then set off at 7pm.
The walkway into town
I thought I’d hang about and watch the action.
The rally cars on the bridge. This was as far as I could get without paying!
By 4:30pm, the car park was chocker but it was all very gentlemanly and apart from the rally cars noise until around 9pm, it was all good. I went for a walk down to the foreshore around 8pm and met a local couple with their young kids. They had just come down for a look.
The Rally start on the bridge
A great place to park for free and there are some nicely painted up new toilets too. You can also walk or bike into town along the pathways along the waterfront.
The Netspeed Speedtest for this site Download: 14.70 Mbps
Upload: 2.40 Mbps
Ping: 58 ms
About 20 k’s South west of Dargaville is the small settlement of Glinks Gully. There are lots of Baches and homes there with a fabulous beach. See Rafe’s Tracker map at the bottom for directions.
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I arrived around lunchtime with the intention of staying the night but given the state of the campground and how long and low Rafe is, I decided not to stay but its a neat spot if you’ve got a smaller and higher ground clearance Motorhome.
On the beach
The views are stunning straight down to the beach. There is an honesty box in the roundhouse like kitchen and the cost to stay with the NZMCA discount would have been $10 for me on my own.
The Kitchen roundhouse with Rafe behind
I parked Rafe thankfully without scraping on anything underneath and then went for a look around. I wandered down to the beach to check it out and once you get to the edge of the water, you can look in both directions and it is endless. The sun was shining and it was a great day so it was perfect for checking it all out.
The view walking down the road
A novel way to use an old watertank
On the beach looking south
The playground by the beach
Rafes park on the hill
I walked back to the camp up the hill and decided that I wouldn’t relax worrying about getting Rafe out in the morning so decided to head out again. I ended up having a 10-15 minute conversation with one of the local farmers parked in the middle of the road. The locals are really friendly and he was encouraging me to head down to Poutu to check out the lighthouse at the bottom of the peninsula. Another time..
Looking north
A great place to stay but I would recommend only for Motorhomes less than 7 metres and with plenty of ground clearance.
What a beautiful place Pahi is. We’ve been here before I was doing this blog with friends just after some heavy rain. We had to park on the gravel so its not an all weather grassy surface.
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Looking down from up the road.
Pahi is about 15 minutes off the main highway through to Dargaville. It is at the end of a peninsula south of Paparoa.
A local anti Fouling his boat
When I arrived, I was met with a sign in the office to make myself comfortable in a park of my choice and they’ll catch up with me. For $10 (with NZMCA discount) per person per night with power, it is exceptionally good value and its in a lovely spot in the northern reaches of the Kaipara Harbour.
All tide ramp
Apparently it is one of the few all tide ramps in the whole of the Kaipara.
Just like in the travel magazines!
The wharf is great for a walk down or just for a look around. There are some really quirky little houses there dotted around the waterfront, almost like an old fishing village you see in the magazines.
The office
Looking across to Whakapirau
Looking north past Whakapirau
Just like in the travel magazines!
Close to the water
Dawn with Fog
Pahi Hall by the wharf
The camp is a Doc park with the staff being managed by a local committee and apparently it works well. There is an old Hotel which had its license transferred to the Paparoa pub in the 50’s. It is still in great shape but is now a private house. The camp has a dump stations and a recently renovated toilet and shower block.
Looking across to Whakapirau
A lovely spot which you could easily spend a few days at and run by some really nice people.
There was a good 3G Internet signal here but I forgot to speedtest it.
We’d survived the weather as fortunately the storm veered away from Coromandel and left us with plenty of rain but no wind.
Debris after the storm
I woke up early on Good Friday and took Rafe around to the dump station and got prepared for the next few days at our prebooked beachfront site. Fiona was driving down to Ardmore to be picked up by Helen and Rob and they were due to arrive around the middle of the day. Rob was following in their new Autotrail Tracker with daughter Chloe.
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Our wee spot in paradise
When I arrived up at the beachfront site, there was another little Swift rental alongside. I jumped out to move a BBQ table out of the way and Eric from the Swift gave me a hand. Eric and his wife Mary Ann were from Victoria in Canada and were traveling around NZ.
About 11am, I received a call from Fiona to say that they had arrived and that the camp wouldn’t allow them to come in until 11:30. Seriously? This does nothing to create a holiday atmosphere!
Our little setup with the tables. The Tracker and Rafe
Half an hour went by and Rob brought the Tracker in to park. As Rafes door is on the right and the Trackers door is on the left, I suggested I move to Rob’s park so the doors faced each other. This turned out to work really well as Gary, Dianne, Neil, Christine and even Eric and Mary Ann all came around to join us for drinks and nibbles for several nights. A lot of fun.
Happy Hour. LtoR: Dianne, Gary, Fiona, Christine, Neil, Helen, Chloe and RobHappy at Hahei
Back to friday. As the day went on, the park got more people in but by Sunday morning, it was really only about 1/3rd full.
The Playground
Motorhomes parked behind us.
Beachfront cottages behind us.
Us at the end of the road.
Some white water
Its a great park, a stunning location where our parks on the beachfront had tracks directly down to the sand. We were effectively parked on the back of the sand dunes.
Beachfront parkingThe outlook 🙂
Toilets were handy, Gary and Diannes Beachfront cottage was right next to us, it couldn’t be better.
Beachfront cottages behind us.
My only comment would be that I found there was definitely room for improvement in the welcoming process at the office. To be fair this may have been stress caused by the cancellations they would have had.
The stunning beach
All the same, I have to rate it as one of the better Motorcamps around in a great place and we had a lot of fun.
After a good solid weekend of babysitting, we thought we’d escape for our last night before Fiona had to return to work.
The Peninsula Campground at Awhitu
I wasn’t really in the mood for huge driving for one night so we figured that up the Awhitu peninsula might be quite nice. I called Auckland City and it seems that even in the height of the Summer silly season, you can still use your camping pass at Awhitu and other parks like it.
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Peninsula Campground. Plenty of room.
After booking in on the phone, we were off heading for Awhitu. We arrived around 1pm and settled Rafe down in the Peninsula Campground.
When you book with the Council, the choices are Self contained or not. When you get to Awhitu, it is Brook Campground or the Peninsula campground. I was a bit confused as to where we were supposed to park as there is no mention of SCC and no signposts 🙂
It wasn’t until we had the downloaded map off the council website that we saw two Motorhome emblems on both the Peninsula and the Brook campgrounds with tags saying SCC camping that we were happy with where we had parked.
The Brook Campground which is behind the Brook Homestead and the Peninsula camp is beside the Homestead and closer to the water. Both have nice toilets and great rubbish collection points and both are an easy walk to the beach.
The Cottage
After settling down and having a look around both Brook Homestead and the Cottage, which they used before the Homestead was built, we sat down for lunch and just blobbed in the sun. A perfect spot for watching the planes coming in to Auckland Airport and they were far enough away not to be a nuisance with sound. A lovely spot.
The Brook Homestead
The Cottage
Peninsula Campground. Plenty of room.
Nice Bbq’s with the wood all stacked ready to go.
Nice looking loos
Fiona dumping rubbish she found on the beach.
In the morning, we went for a walk down to the beach and had a look around. The Ranger popped in and checked the park so it was then I knew for sure we were ok where we parked although we were on our own. There was no one else there which surprised me.
The Beach with the tide out. Pipi gathers out on the mudflats
The park is huge and there are lots of great walks which we’ll check out next time we’re here but it’s a great spot and not too far away from the big smoke.
We only had a night to check this place out before having to head back but we have visited here before but not stayed. See the earlier post. It is a magic spot with a nice beach and plenty of places to explore. We’ll be back for sure.
There is good 4g internet here which surprised me, being where it is although it’s not fast but good enough for Netflix.
The Netspeed Speedtest Download: 5.84 Mbps
Upload: 1.55 Mbps
Ping: 54 ms
I didn’t ever think I’d ever become a birdwatcher but when you sit down and watch them, its crazy how clever they are and what they get up to.
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A quiet day at Rays Rest
I’d popped in to one of my favorite spots on the Firth of Thames, Rays Rest. I’ve done a couple of posts on Rays Rest over the last year or so and although I haven’t been here for a while, it is one of my all time favorite places to stay.
Its not popular with Fiona but I suspect that’s because there are no shops there or “anything to do” but that’s its charm. 🙂 Your choices are to Blob and to Blob.. just great.
It wasn’t particularly busy being a Wednesday afternoon but stinking hot.
The birds were amazing as just before the tide turned, they’re were all quite happily sitting on the sand banks and then it was like someone had blown the whistle. They were off to spread themselves out along the edge of the water for a feed and then follow the water as the tide went out. Its amazing just watching them following the water.
All settled
And they’re off
The weather was due to change and pour with rain. No problem here as it is all well draining sand. There is always a friendly face here too and its amazing who you meet.
The local horses came down for a swim too
I also did a Netspeed speed test here and was amazed it was so good given that it is a rural area and quite remote. See below.
Download: 41.19 Mbps
Upload: 24.30 Mbps
Ping: 54 ms
Fiona had left Bland Bay and was heading back to town to do other things .. and work so she suggested that I spend another night out on the way back. We stopped in Waipu and had lunch and then Fiona went on to Auckland.
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The cricket pitch with the campground behind
I rang the good folk at one of my favorite spots when the weathers good, Whangateau by Matakana. A great campground run by Auckland City.
In the Grandstand
Today was a bit different as when I arrived, the tide was out and there was a friendly game of cricket with two families involved. One was from Whangaparoa and the other from the UK visiting. They were having a ball. I had to get some piccies.
Looking out to Omaha
Kids enjoying the pontoon
The Estaury
It is a fascinating place to watch as the tide comes in really quickly covering hundreds of metres of exposed mud in just under an hour… Amazing to watch.
The water is coming in
A nice campground if you’re looking for somewhere not to far from Auckland. See my earlier Whangateau post here.
The forecast was fantastic for the best part of the next week. My thinking was I had to be near a nice beach and it had to be northwards. With the holiday weekend approaching, I thought I might be lucky getting a park at Bland Bay but thought, I’ll give it a go.
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Bland Bay
After 50ks odd of winding road around the Whangaruru Bay, I arrived at the Bland Bay Camp. In the office was manager Wayne who couldn’t do enough for me and even though I’d just walked in off the street, made me very welcome and even found a waterfront site for the night. If I wanted to stay longer, I’d have to move one back which was fantastic.
Rafe with the best seat in the house
I’d just plugged in Rafe, opened vents and settled things down and then went for a walk (5 steps to the beach) to get a piccy with my phone for Facebook.
The Office and shop
No sooner had I posted it when several old colleagues from my days at the Herald as a photographer, reminded me to be on my best behaviour as another ex photographer Ross lived here. Several suggested I look him up and found the address. An hour later, I’d found Ross in his kitchen preparing Veges for his freezer. In his early 70’s, he’s a picture of health, fit as a buck rat living off his huge vege garden and the fish he catches in the bay and loving it. He’s just the same and it was great to see him.
Derek and Judy’s bus Eagle Rock further along the beachfront
I’d just got back to Rafe when a face popped in the door with a platter of Tuna with two sauces inviting me to try them out. This was Derek who I later had a drink with and his wife June by their bus further down the waterfront. A lovely couple who have been living aboard for 2 years or more. Derek was in the Army for 20 odd years and he knew a few people that people in my family knew so we had plenty to talk about. A great evening.
First Thing.. well worth getting up for 🙂
The next day I moved Rafe back a parking space and found myself next to Terry and Louise with their grandson Max in their Dethleffs Sunlight. I spent most the day nattering to them and lazing in the sun. I really wanted to go for a swim but with a cool onshore breeze and the water being so cold, couldn’t quite get there.. One day soon :-).
The Bland Bay tree which was struck by lightening recently and is now a shadow of its former self.
Yum .. friends of Dereks
The Dump Staion on the end of the toilet and shower block
The new Toilet and Shower block
Later in the afternoon there was a lot of excitement when Derek and his friends in a 26 foot odd runabout with half cabin had returned to the beach with what turned out to be a 149kg Marlin. Huge excitement and it was later put next to Derek’s bus and packed in ice for all to see. Amazing.
The kids from around the camp admiring the Marlin
After another day with Fiona having finished work and she was going to drive up and join me. Shops or beach I asked her.. It didn’t matter she said so Wayne managed to squeeze us in for two more nights and she arrived later in the morning.
This camp really is spectacular. Right on the beach sheltered by another peninsula, it is just a lovely. Although several people asked me not to rave about this place as they wanted to keep it for themselves :-), it really is special. At $22 pp powered, in peak season with nice loos and showers ($1 shot), a dump station, UV treated bore water and a good internet signal, it doesn’t get much better.
Staying at Mangaweka! What’s there? .. A fabulous campground by the river and a neat wee town bulging with personality 🙂
Gary and Dianne had finished up in Taupo and we’re ready to come out to play again in Rosie. We arranged to meet at the riverside campground at Mangaweka. I’ve been wanting to try the riverside camping thing for some time and the reviews show these campgrounds are pretty good.
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Rafe and Rosie with the cliffs of Mangaweka
Fiona and I arrived early in the afternoon which was just as well as it had been really busy and it was first in best dressed. At $9 per person including power it was sensational value. We met some really nice caravanners parked in the centre, who were packing up to go, said we could grab their spot which was nice, and just as they left after 20 minutes or so, Gary and Dianne arrived in Rosie the XLI.
Fiona, Gary and Dianne on the bridge between the two campsLooking back to the bridge
We plugged in, settled down and then set off over the bridge to pay at the Awastone Resort which is setup to be a little more upmarket than the campground.
Both campgrounds are owned and run by Paul and Tricia and their family. The bar, cafe, cabins, with gravel based parks and power right by the river, are $38 for a night for two. We could not go without having a few glasses of wine with homemade sausage rolls on the deck in the sun. After that we walked back over the bridge to celebrate Gary’s birthday. It was good to see them again. We we’re going to celebrate Gary’s birthday in Martinborough .
The Main Street
The next day we walked into the village to check it out. It’s an interesting town as State Highway 1 was moved to bypass the Main Street quite a long time ago and all the old buildings are still there. It’s like time stood still. We met a friend of one of the shop owners and it seems like there is a real arty, creative sort of community getting established there.
The Barbers shop
The Mangaweka Hotel
The kitchen facilities
Rosie and Rafe with Gary lounging
After having a look around and a cuppa at the cafe, as we headed back to the Campground, we tried to collar a couple of escaped sheep from a paddock and return them but after 20 minutes or so of pretending to be Sheep dogs and losing badly, we gave it away and carried on after making sure the sheep were heading away from State Highway 1. Isn’t it funny how the sheep can spot some townies pretending to be shepherds a mile away 🙂
The shops in the Main Street
This is another classic case of a place that’s usually a thoroughfare for most of us being completely overlooked as a neat destination. With both campgrounds here on either side of the river with different price points, they’re well setup for your next visit.
Fiona & Chris, two empty nesters put their dreams of doing something different into reality… Now back in a house, they were living in their Motorhome, come along for the ride.
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