From Trounson Park DOC to Rawene Motor Camp. About 42 miles. We started the day with walks in the kauri reserves. The kauri is what would have been called a gum tree but it is a lot more than something for our benefit. It's a big part of the bush ecosystem. The trees are huge - more than the length of a car (well, my car is a fiat panda) wide. They zoom up to a height before breaking into a fine set of branches not totally unlike, to my eyes, a scots pine. We eventually got going at, oh dear, about 1pm. And the road rapidly turned into gravel. So we crawled along for about 7kms before we met the main road (SH12) at a high point from where we zoomed down. At the bottom we found a visitors centre, where we ate a pretty hopeless diet of cream cake and chocolate chunks. I had a cup of coffee too. And a few old roast peanuts. This diet did help us push on up the hill from the visitors centre, which passed several big kauri trees including the delightfully named Darby and Joan where we met a cyclist - Clive Parker (see www.cliveparker.co.uk) who we had a good chat with about bikes, touring, touring cyclists we'd met, and a few other things. We cycled together for a short few kms but he is lighter and. frankly, a bit faster than us (inclined as we are to endless diversions, visits, photo opportunities, impromtu swims, literary moments, etc, etc). Saw the Lord of the Forest - the biggest tree, we are told, in NZ (tho' we were suspicious). It is, though, enormous. It's the biggest aspidistra, no kauri, in the world, well NZ anyway. Now running a bit late, we sped through Opononi - a very pretty location but you're a long way from Auckland's money and second homes here I think. The population density of northern scotland I'd guess and not so many well paid jobs or even perhaps jobs. Then, after a quick shop, we reached Rawene a little after 7pm....The views over the estuary are wonderful. Sea and mountains and a big sky, turning mauve as the sun started to sink.
From Trounson Park DOC to Rawene Motor Camp. About 42 miles. We started the day with walks in the kauri reserves. The kauri is what would have been called a gum tree but it is a lot more than something for our benefit. It's a big part of the bush ecosystem. The trees are huge - more than the length of a car (well, my car is a fiat panda) wide. They zoom up to a height before breaking into a fine set of branches not totally unlike, to my eyes, a scots pine. We eventually got going at, oh dear, about 1pm. And the road rapidly turned into gravel. So we crawled along for about 7kms before we met the main road (SH12) at a high point from where we zoomed down. At the bottom we found a visitors centre, where we ate a pretty hopeless diet of cream cake and chocolate chunks. I had a cup of coffee too. And a few old roast peanuts. This diet did help us push on up the hill from the visitors centre, which passed several big kauri trees including the delightfully named Darby and Joan where we met a cyclist - Clive Parker (see 
Saw the Lord of the Forest - the biggest tree, we are told, in NZ (tho' we were suspicious). It is, though, enormous. It's the biggest aspidistra, no kauri, in the world, well NZ anyway. Now running a bit late, we sped through Opononi - a very pretty location but you're a long way from Auckland's money and second homes here I think. The population density of northern scotland I'd guess and not so many well paid jobs or even perhaps jobs. Then, after a quick shop, we reached Rawene a little after 7pm....The views over the estuary are wonderful. Sea and mountains and a big sky, turning mauve as the sun started to sink.