you can plan a pretty picnic but you can't predict the weather

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Whangaparapara

Thursday, 15 February 2007 : Filed under: Great Barrier Island E-Mail This Article

Whangaparapara
Calm west coast waters of Great Barrier Island – Whangaparapara, New Zealand

2 Comments »

Comment by josh — February 15, 2007 @ 12:31 am

After a couple days of harsh weather, the rain stopped and the sun started to shine. Andy and I wanted to explore more of the island, and because no fires are allowed on the island (there is extreme fire danger), we had to find more fuel for our gas stove. We set out by foot, and hitched rides with several locals on our way through the “city” of Claris, where we bought gas for the stove, and then on to the capital city of Great Barrier Island, Whangaparapara, with a population of 45. By the way, the ‘WH’ letters found in New Zealand place names are Maori and pronounced like an ‘F’.

It was really amazing the difference on the west coast of the island. The east coast had huge waves, huge wind, and rough, murky waters. The west coast had water like glass, and was calm, sunny, and peaceful.

Our last ride dropped us off at the Great Barrier Lodge where we ordered coffee and had some extremely good banana chocolate chip muffins. We drank our coffee on the porch overlooking the port and inlet seen in the picture above. Photo credit goes to Andy on this one, as I was having some technical difficulties with my camera due to the high humidity of the past couple of days.

We would return to the lodge by car with the girls in a few days to satisfy our craving for more muffins. On our return, while we were sitting on the porch drinking our coffee, we heard a helicopters in the distance. It got closer and closer, then landed two feet away from where we had parked our rental car. Some executive looking dude got out, ordered a beer, and walked down to his yacht as the helicopter took off.

Comment by Claire — February 15, 2007 @ 5:34 pm

This picture is beautiful, and those muffins sound delicious.

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