Akatarawa Valley Hill Road, Taking the Hard Way Home…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

At this point in our travel diary we are travelling south on New Zealand’s North Island east coast and have reached the town of Waikanae which is just opposite Kapiti Island.

Now there are several routes to Wellington and you know us… So why not pick the most difficult one?, one that takes us quite literally up hills, and down dales. Yep, sounds like us!

The Akatarawa Valley Hill Road is a narrow twisting route that’s not for the faint hearted, there are hairpin bends, I-think-I’d-rather-close-my-eyes-than-look steep drops and the road is stupidly narrow in many places so edging past an oncoming vehicle requires caution, nerves of steel and a stiff drink at the end of the trip.

After years of flat-as-a-pancake Dutch roads Himself adores this kind of driving so was in his element. Kiwi Daughter and I pressed hard on our anti-car sickness armbands and stared a little fixedly out of the front window.

The Akatarawa Valley Hill Road is the type of road that is weather dependant on being open. There’s a big sign to tell you if the road is currently open or closed and we were lucky that it was open. (or in the case of the carsick-prone-two, should that be unlucky?)

I probably wouldn’t recommend this road for a tourist type camper vehicle or a heavy loaded vehicle as many parts of the road are both narrow and steep, but if you are an experienced driver, have a suitable vehicle (our van is 4-wheel drive) like a route that’s well off the beaten track, then this one’s for you.

On the photo I snapped of our New Zealand map you will see Kapiti Island in the top left corner and the town of Waikanae on the mainland close to it. Now follow the yellow wiggly line that descends from Waikanae down the centre of the photo and comes out by Birchville, slightly north of Upper Hutt …That’s the yellow road we are following today!

There are a few black squares dotted along the length of the road… they are the farms, and apart for a few very small settlements habitations are few and far between.

We did stop for a breather near one of the summits where there was a clearing, the views were extensive and I’m not sure but can I even see the Pacific Ocean in the distance when I zoom in? I’m not one hundred percent certain but I think it might be.

The road begins innocently enough, let’s see what it’s like further in…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Stunning Views from the Top…

(photograph © Kiwi Daughter & Friends)

Here is my last post from Tokatoka peak, Northland.

I gave Himself and the girls my small camera to take to the top.

Himself didn’t let them stay too long on the summit as he said it was a relatively small space with sheer drops over three quarters of the surrounding  sides and he felt more than a little nervous  there as the sole parent and half a dozen boisterous kids, the youngest of which was only four years old.

Yes, he kept the two youngest firmly by his side.

The older girls passed the camera around and didn’t remember any more who took which photo (there were a lot more photos but none of them were particularly  good at keeping the camera very still, so few turned out in focus.)

In a few other shots I got  close ups of leaves and branches on the closest bushes but only fuzzy background of the views behind)

Let’s take a look at the photos that turned out well and the stunning views they captured of the surrounding countryside.

In the second photograph (that I took from the bottom) the little grey upright faint smudges you can see at the very top of the peak is them!

(photograph © Kiwi Daughter & Friends)

(photograph © Kiwi Daughter & Friends)

(photograph © Kiwi Daughter & Friends)

(photograph © Kiwi Daughter & Friends)

Looking back down at the van…

(photograph © Kiwi Daughter & Friends)

(photograph © Kiwi Daughter & Friends)

(photograph © Kiwi Daughter & Friends)

Pardon, Paarden Me !!!

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Suddenly, to my surprise I find I’m not alone on this little gravel road at the back of Tokatoka Peak.

Two horses have appeared from behind some bushes in the paddock next to the road and decided to come and check me out.

I talk to them for a moment and then go to move  little further down the road to take a photograph of the surrounding countryside. Imagine my surprise when they both proceed to move directly into the frame of the photo I’m trying to take.

One of them is really persistent and every time I move he does too… Now several theories abound.  A) he likes the company and doesn’t want me to leave him. B) He’s a wannabe celebrity and wants his 15 minutes of fame. C) He’s a practical joker at heart and he’s having a laugh by imitating those people who jump into the background of other people’s photographs pulling stupid faces or making rabbit ears behind their heads with their fingers.

He’s definitely a character, he has a twinkle in his eye and he even looks like he’s teasing me by threatening  to eat one of the fence posts.

The word for “horse” in Dutch is “paard” and plural, Horses, is “paarden”… so it’s probably  little wonder that I found myself laughing at his antics and saying  ”Paarden!  Pardon me!”  every time he stuck his nose into my photographic shots.

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Poser!!!

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Tokatoka, Taking a Peak Around…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

You are peaking peeking into the pages of Kiwidutch’s retrospective journal as I document our December 2011-Janurayy 2012 trip to New Zealand.

At the moment we are staying with one of my oldest friends in Northland (at the very top of the North Island) and whilst my friend attends to some things that need her attention at home, we are taking her girls on a day trip around the region.

The kids voted to walk up Tokatoka peak so here we are at this odd looking hill on a baking hot day in January.

Naturally it’s not a track I could even remotely think of navigating  on crutches so I got to stay by the car whilst Himself and the kids scrambled to the top.

“Scramble” is definitely the operative word here because  although it’s hot and dry here  today, it’s been bucketing down rain in recent days and this track already has a reputation for being slippery. It’s very quiet out here in the countryside so quite soon after they left the van and disappeared into the trees and scrub I could hear squeals, shrieks and laughter for quite a long time after they departed and then all repeated again as they got closer when returning. When they finially re-emerged from the vegetation I saw the reason… every kid bottom was caked in mud.

Apparently some parts of the track are so steep that the kids steadied themselves with their hands and picked their way down on their bottoms to avoid even more slipping and sliding, so back at the van I got  a series of  lovely photos for the two family’s albums that consisted of  back-shots of a row of kids of various heights sporting wonderfully muddy backsides (clothes).

Naturally I’m not posting photos of my own children here or those of my friend on the Internet so you’ll just have to imagine  how funny they all looked, as well as the strange boasting that  ensued around the idea of : “ I got dirtier! ”  and “ No!!! I got more mud than you ”  or “ ha ha …(name) is even dirtier than you are!“.

I  had some time of my hands whilst they “conquered” the track a so I carefully picked my way a few meters down the road in both directions and let the zoom lens on my camera do the rest as I took photographs in a wide circle around me.

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

A young Kauri takes centre stage…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Typical small shingle (gravel) road, often labelled on maps as “not tar sealed”,  both an unfamiliar term and a type of road that’s caught out more than a few unsuspecting tourists who have no clue how to drive on gravel.

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

A diverse range of  trees for my drawing studies…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

This one’s a Cabbage tree (yes it really is called that!)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

In this next photo a look at the Peak from slightly different angle that better shows the “point” that sticks out to the front at the top…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Whoa! Where did he come from!?? I was distracted by the shrieks and laughter on the hill so I startled when all of a sudden I realised I was being watched from  very close range…seems someone is curious as to my presence…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Tokatoka, a Peak with a Point…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Now I get to see if anyone was paying attention to stuff I write here LOL…

Do you remember when I was showing you around (a little bit of) Northland that I mentioned a pointy shaped hill that was deep into the background of one of the photos?

Well…  It’s called Tokatoka Peak (sounds like the island name of the Pippy Longstocking’s South Sea Island adventures , but indeed it’s a proper Maori name).

It’s an interesting geographic feature becuase this hill looks very different depending from which side you are viewing it.

It’s not uniformly pointed in the same way that a standing bottle is pointed…

…rather there’s a ” back side” that is less steep and enables you to drive a really decent way up, and then there’s a track leading to the summit. My friend has told us that there’s a steep but fairly short walk to the top and great views to be had so it’s well worth a visit.  Her girls have been here many a time so they navigate us onto the turn-0ff road from the main highway without any problem. If you are a visitor you will probably not have a local to guide you, the hill is of course rather obvious but just for reference,  the road you need to get around to the track branches off at the building and sign in my next photos. (pity the only photo of the building I have has been taken on the side road itself looking back at the main road.)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Today I’m Driving You Around (the Bend?)…

Today I’m giving you a photographic post to take you on a partial journey of Northland, New Zealand. (The most northerly part of the North Island).

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Small town New Zealand…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Produce the region is best known for…”Kumera” which is a type of Sweet Potato that  looks the same a regular sweet potato but tastes uniquely different. It’s very popular in New Zealand and they grow them here commercially for distribution around the country … (yes, Kumara is on my list of Kiwi favourite foods). As far as I know there appear to be two popular pronunciations of the word: “coom- a- rah” and “coom-rah”. I’m in the first group but I don’t actually know if I say it correctly or not.

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Thundery (a.k.a. “painterly”) skies and moody landscapes…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

This firm had fruits and veggies on the roof of their building and a big show of All Back (New Zealand Rugby Team) Support. The Rugby World Cup took place in New Zealand in September 2011… to all New Zealand’s delight the All Black’s won!

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

In the next photograph, in the far distance (centre) you can see a very pointy hill… it’s called Tokatoka Hill , Take note…. you’ll be seeing more of it soon…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Rural weatherboard church, … and school.

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Signs of local wildlife… and New Zealand’s National symbol… (kiwi are nocturnal and motorists have to be careful not to run them over)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

Local wildlife … not  so national symbol…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)

And then the landscape closes in… becomes denser as we near the home of something very special…

(photograph © Kiwidutch)