Our travels continued North of Auckland after a stop (too long for Ted) for supplies for our adventure! Though, I am pretty sure we did get everything so that is great.
We headed to Helensville to scope out the town where ‘Brokenwood’ is filmed. For those who are not familiar with this show we definitely recommend checking it out. The iconic post office in Helensville doubles as the Police Station on Brokenwood and was our first stop - yes, we were fanboying all over the place - especially Ted …
We then headed to Warkworth, where ‘Sweet Tooth’ is filmed and our waitress was telling us how her house was used as a background for one episode - so we feel connected now lol
Onwards to the Kauri Coast Holiday Top 10 so we could do the hikes at the Waipoua Kauri forest to check out the magical, gigantic Kauri trees. Some of the photos we are including cannot do it justice - one must see these trees up close - they are so majestic, striking, and huge.
We did two hikes and saw several Kauri trees, so we were happy. We also did a 3 hour hike to Maunganui Bluff and did not see a sole the entire time .. followed by a walk on the expansive beach (check out Ted’s Dune shot lol) and only saw 1 car - yes, a car, as you can drive on some beaches in NZ - 90 Mile Beach being the most famous and also doubling as a highway. It is odd to see, but the beach was literally just Ted and I - it was a perfect day….
We were hoping to see some Kiwi’s and both nights we showed up for our instructions we were told it was cancelled due to the torrential rains at night and due to safety they could not conduct the walking tours :-( … Hopefully there will be another time to see a kiwi in the wild.
Tomorrow we head North - actually, our northern most point and apparently, there is no wifi, so we may be off line a few days … Ted will panic I am sure, but adjust quite quickly as we are on the beach near Karikari …
I would be remiss NOT to mention how excited Ted has been being our intrepid Birder - camera in tow everywhere we go and I do mean EVERYWHERE .. photo op or not, because Ted says ‘you never know’ lol … So, be ready to see many bird photos throughout our travels. Admittedly, I am learning a lot about birds and we are seeing many every day - even from the comfort of our deck at our cabin …
Best wishes,
Robert and Ted