The East Cape

This leg of our journey would see us travel round the North Island's East cape all the way round and up to the Coromandel. 


We decided to skip a trip to the local village with the world's longest name, as we wouldn't be able to pronounce it, but here is how it is spelt. Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamatateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu

The first stop was a stay in the Te Urewera Nationla Park, one of the biggest National Parks in the North island, with the intention of going on the various walks. We were not disappointed, it took us 3/4 of an hour to drive, on gravel roads, just to the start of the walking tracks, this place was massive. 


The lake that sits in the middle of the national park was so clear and still it was hard to believe it wasn't a postcard. We enjoyed only a few of the walks in the park in the afternoon, up to one of the lakes that was perched 900m above sea level. This lake was pretty cool as it had an island in the middle of it, with a lake in that (so a lake within a lake), sadly we couldn't get across to see it. We stayed the night just outside the park and then returned the next morning for a short walk before heaing back onto the main highway to continue East.


Our next brief stop was Gisborne, one of the larger towns along the north east cape. A little trivia, but this was one of the first places that Captain Cook saw 'land' and stopped in a near by cove to begin his travels of New Zealand. After a short stop and browse round the shops we pushed on up the coast to a small town called Tokomaru, a once bustling port, but now more a cosy ghost town. We based ourselves in Tokomaru for a few nights and decided to explore the local bays and coast line. We drove to Anaura in the morning and Waipiro bay in the afternoon, both just lovely, relaxed walks along the coast the beach.


This whole coast is the road less travelled and that was evident by the hostels and lack of, well signs of any life at all. The costal road was lovely and when the weather made it's mind up and stopped raining we managed to get some lovely views of the various bays and rugged coasts.


After our few nights stop in Tokomaru we set off early to the East Cape, the easterly most point in New Zealand. After a run in with the local farmer and his dogs herding his cattle down the single track gravel road we managed to get to the base of the hill on which the lighthouse stood. A short sharp 45 minute walk up the 700 steps and we were at the top.


With little en route to see apart from the rugged scenery and a nice little coffee shop on a macadamia nut farm, we pushed on toward civilisation to a place called Opotoki, where we stopped for the night. 

We decided to take a nice stroll on the beach, before it got cold/dark but were a little dumbfounded to see that the little bits of drift wood that had washed up were a lot more than we expected! The wood you see in the picture has been washed down stream, from inland, where they have lots of timber forests. The television though is a mystery....!

The final leg of our East Cape journey was to continue from Opotki round the northern part of th cape towards Mount Manganui. First though we swung through a nice beach town called Whakatane. This was coming quite a habit, but it was nicety just stop at random beaches, take a long walk, get our toes wet and then get back in the car and continue on our way.

So the end of our East Cape trip was in Mount Manganui. Definitely not a ghost town and a great surf type town with a young atmosphere. It also helped that the sun was shining! We walked on a number of the local beaches here and then took a stroll round the little town, before returning to the beach to see the surfers do there stuff, pretty impressive! 


So an interesting view into a different side to the North Island, we both really felt that this showed us a side to New Zealand that was in the past, tone which were once bustling ports and wharfs, now ghost towns with a fraction of the inhabitants left. A long but scenic drive, but well worth the detour from the main track.