The tail of the fish has great beaches: Kaitaia is handy to them all

As always, many thanks to Destination Northland for helping with my itinerary and of course Rental Cars New Zealand

for the vehicle for this road trip: I can recommend both – no problems with either the car or my arrangements

 

Reluctantly I left the beautiful beaches and headed for  Gum-diggers Park just north of Awanui – its an authentic kauri gum-digging site that’s over a 100 years old. Buried forests – with trees 40,000 to 150,000 years old  – are exposed and a reconstructed gum diggers village helps show how these men ( mostly) lived and earned a living. Fascinating.

I also went to see the soon-to-be opened (Monday 13th Feb) Te Ahu Centre: an impressive collection of buildings housing the iSite, Museum,community centre, library and local Council – this will be a great asset to Kaitaia and I will write about it, and post pictures  soon. (& thanks for the lunch guys)

I’m staying at the Mainstreet Lodge tonight, and its great, but the new owner, who takes over at the end of this month, has big plans – as a YHA member and user for years he knows what travellers want and need so I have no doubt this place will soon be on the must-stay-at list.

Tomorrow I’m off with Sand Safaris for a day trip to Cape Reinga via 90 Mile Beach: so no photos tonight, sorry! I’m looking forward to a day as a passenger!