Big Trees

Cape Reinga Lighthouse watching the Tasman and Pacific 

New Zealand's history unfolds along the Northland's coastline and mountain ranges.  Extending from Auckland to Cape Reinga, the Northland encompasses bays, beaches, farms, small communities, and fishing villages.  And, like the rest of the country, it is beautiful.

Bay of Islands

The Polynesians arrived on large catamaran sailing vessels maybe 1000 years ago.  They found it to their liking and stayed.  Many of them opted for the Northlands and began their cultural traditions becoming the Maori people.  European immigration began in the 1700's and peaked in the later half of the 1800's.  Fishing and whaling, timber, and mining attracted those seeking new opportunities.

Hokianga Harbour

The country supplied fortune seekers with many bays and harbors to utilize the natural gifts.  The land even today remains formidable to transfer goods and products.  Water and shipping remain a major tool.  The bays remain isolated despite the use.  Adventure seekers and pleasure seekers now explore the waterways.







Upon discovering New Zealand the Polynesians were introduced to big trees.  Very big trees.  Monster trees.  Kauri trees.  These trees had existed untouched for over 100,000 years.  Until the European settler arrived, the tree dominated the landscape.  Within a century, the giant trees disappeared leaving only small pockets scattered in the Northland and Coromandel.  Some trees have documentation of 2000 years of growth.  During the time of trees, a resin oozed out of the trees into the surrounding ground.  Both the reddish wood and the resin (gum) became valuable commodities on the world markets in the late 1800's and early 1900's.  A lumbar industry and a resin/gum industry flourished.  Asian, American, and European ships, furniture, and buildings were built with the wood  and protected by the resin.  Today the pathetically few trees still standing are protected, but suffer from a disease destined to eradicate them.

Tane Mahuta

Tane Mahuta is the largest Kauri tree yet living.  Considered the father of the forest in the Maori creation mythology stories,  Tane Mahute rules on the west coast of the Northlands Peninsula in Waipoua Forest.  Tane, one of the children of Mother Earth (Papatuanuku) and Father Sky (Ranginui), acted by separating his parents' embrace with his arms and shoulders allowing the light to enter the world and a space created between his parents.  The tree is estimated to be 2000 years old.

Cheryl and Tane in perspective

The kauri industry folded by the 1930's.  The price today of a 6"X 6" X 2" piece of kauri is $50.  So, what do you know?  Swamp Kauri has rested beneath the soil of areas in the Northlands and is currently being hunted by 21st century fortune seekers.  Some swamp kauri logs are preserved for over 50,000 years.  Not for long.  Mankind has found them.









The wood began as an expression of art and support for the primal Maori cultures.  The art of wood carving told the stories.  Using the ornate woods, the paua shells, and hand tools, the artist brought forth the cultural myths and legends locked in the wood.

While exploring the Waitangi Treaty Grounds, the whare runanga (meeting house) and house of the giant war canoe demonstrated the extensive wood carvings.  Great symbolic meaning is rendered in the designs.  The one on the left means "please scratch my back" and the one the right, "no worries, keep your panties on".

Bus ride up the "Ninety Mile Beach"

The trip up the Northlands coast culminated in the pilgrimage to Cape Reinga.  As the Maori souls return to their mystical land of Hawakii, the souls must first travel along the coastline to the end of the Cape.  The Cape views the Tasman Sea and Pacific Ocean crash into each other.

Cape Reinga and the tree where the Maori souls leave
From the Cape lighthouse

Tom and Cheryl took the bus.  Up the beach, literally.  90 Mile Beach (actually 60 miles).  Starting at 7:00 AM from Paihia on the Bay of Islands, the animated bus driver, Paulie, kept the Kiwi humor flowing as they picked up riders and
investigated points of interest.  At an isolated country rode, Paulie took a sharp left and guided the bus onto the beach.  Throttle down.  The surf sprayed and the sand dunes splayed along the path.  Prior to arrival at Cape Reinga, a quick boogie board ride down a huge sand dune scraped the toenail polish off the blonde woman.

The Cape Reinga experience completed the Northlands trip.  A place of origins.  A place of history.  A place of characters.

Ninety Mile Beach

Tasmen and Pacific converge

Sand dunes along beach

Sand boarding

Hokianga Harbour and Partners

After Tom and Cheryl bummed around the Bay of Islands searching for good eateries, awesome views,  dolphins and other wildlife, and the ever-present new experience, they returned home to Thames via the Kauri forests and back through Auckland.

The land of the North remains beautiful, but has suffered the ignorance of misuse and has lost or is losing some of nature's grandest possessions.  An appeal in the Maori poetic genres seems directed at the North and potentially all we touch:

The land is slipping away;
Where shall man find an abiding-place?
O Ruaimoko!
Hold fast our lands!
Bind, tightly bind!
Be firm, be firm,
Nor let them from our grasp be torn.