The girls arrived to Great Barrier Island on Thursday via a much calmer Sea Link ferry ride. After they got there and set up camp, we decided to take a walk on down Medlands Beach. We walked all the way to the far north end of the beach. Where the beach ended, a mountain (or big hill) started. We decided it would be a great idea to climb to the top, and an even better idea considering we were barefoot (Beth was in sandals which she had to shed halfway up, and then we spent half the evening searching for on the way down).
The way up was a bit treacherous, with lots of vegetation that cut my feet and arms to shreds, but the view from the top was amazing. The photo above shows the entire stretch of Medlands Beach from the top of the hill. If you look real closely, at the very left of the photo you can see the rocks pictured in Post: Shark Alley. Further down the beach you can see the rocks formation pictured in my original Great Barrier Island post. The latter also shows the mountain we climbed. It is the most pointed mountain peak in the background, to the right of the photograph.
One of our best experiences on the island was going out on the dunes one night to watch the stars come out. The stars were brilliant, with more of them visible than I ever remember seeing before. This was because with no electricity on the island, there was only one house in view with a light on, and then it turned off.
After a while, one of the locals came out onto the beach on his dirt bike. He circled around the farthest away part of the beach visible in the photo above and then revved his engine as hard as he could. We weren’t sure what he was up to, but we soon found out he was going to put on a show for us. He took off from one end of the beach to the other, and popped a huge wheelie and held it for as long as we could see, riding on only his back tire. We weren’t sure how long he actually held the wheelie, but we did see that he rode all the way to the other end of the beach, I suspect he held the wheelie the entire time. Maybe he does this every night after it gets dark? Who knows, but the show was definitely fun to watch.
Here is another photo from the top of the mountain. This is facing north, viewing Kaitoke Beach. We visited Kaitoke Beach later in our trip, and it was beautiful as well. In the picture above you can see the most unique feature of the beach. Waves broke from the left and the right, in front of the rock formation, and smashed into each other in the middle. It was really cool to see. Almost as cool as finding hundreds of meters of unspoilt beach around every corner.
2 Comments »
Comment by josh — February 17, 2007 @ 7:49 pm
The girls arrived to Great Barrier Island on Thursday via a much calmer Sea Link ferry ride. After they got there and set up camp, we decided to take a walk on down Medlands Beach. We walked all the way to the far north end of the beach. Where the beach ended, a mountain (or big hill) started. We decided it would be a great idea to climb to the top, and an even better idea considering we were barefoot (Beth was in sandals which she had to shed halfway up, and then we spent half the evening searching for on the way down).
The way up was a bit treacherous, with lots of vegetation that cut my feet and arms to shreds, but the view from the top was amazing. The photo above shows the entire stretch of Medlands Beach from the top of the hill. If you look real closely, at the very left of the photo you can see the rocks pictured in Post: Shark Alley. Further down the beach you can see the rocks formation pictured in my original Great Barrier Island post. The latter also shows the mountain we climbed. It is the most pointed mountain peak in the background, to the right of the photograph.
One of our best experiences on the island was going out on the dunes one night to watch the stars come out. The stars were brilliant, with more of them visible than I ever remember seeing before. This was because with no electricity on the island, there was only one house in view with a light on, and then it turned off.
After a while, one of the locals came out onto the beach on his dirt bike. He circled around the farthest away part of the beach visible in the photo above and then revved his engine as hard as he could. We weren’t sure what he was up to, but we soon found out he was going to put on a show for us. He took off from one end of the beach to the other, and popped a huge wheelie and held it for as long as we could see, riding on only his back tire. We weren’t sure how long he actually held the wheelie, but we did see that he rode all the way to the other end of the beach, I suspect he held the wheelie the entire time. Maybe he does this every night after it gets dark? Who knows, but the show was definitely fun to watch.
Comment by josh — February 17, 2007 @ 8:09 pm
Here is another photo from the top of the mountain. This is facing north, viewing Kaitoke Beach. We visited Kaitoke Beach later in our trip, and it was beautiful as well. In the picture above you can see the most unique feature of the beach. Waves broke from the left and the right, in front of the rock formation, and smashed into each other in the middle. It was really cool to see. Almost as cool as finding hundreds of meters of unspoilt beach around every corner.
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