HORAY - we’ve woken up and it’s not raining!!!!
A cloudy start to the day, but at least it’s not wet, so we finished showering and breakfast before heading down to Piahia to book our trip round the Bay of Islands tomorrow and to Cape Reinga on Wednesday. As we are going to take the coach to Reinga and along 90 mile beach, we have decided to extend our stay here by another day. That means we will not have to be searching for accommodation late into the evening on Wednesday. So with the tours booked and a bit more of the kids inheritance spent, we drove just a couple of kms along the road to the Waitangi Treaty Grounds. We opted to take one of the conducted tours with the entry, but had to wait about 45 mins for the next one. That gave us time to read a bit of history before getting some morning refreshment and a piece of banana cake.
The Treaty of Waitangi is the founding document of modern New Zealand, signed between the British Government and the Maori chiefs. At 11.00 on the dot a delightful Maori lady presented herself as the tour guide and as there were only five of us in the group, it was destined to be an interesting session. Like most of the guides we have had, she turned out to be equally as knowledgeable and passionate on the subject she was presenting as all the others. It turned out that she was directly related to Tamati Waaka Nene, one of the original Maori chiefs who signed the treaty back in 1840. After some initial history, we went down to the massive Waka or war canoe located at Hobson’s beach.
The canoe was launched in 1940 to commemorate the centenary of the treaty signing and requires a minimum of 79 paddlers to get its 8 tonnes of Kauri wood moving. It has a capacity for up to 120 paddlers and has allegedly reached an astonishing speed of 35 knots. The waka is only launched once per year now and that is on Waitangi Day, which is 6th February. From the Waka we headed up to the Maori meeting house or Whare, which was also built for the centenary celebrations. Every Maori tribe has a main meeting house that is specific to that tribe, but the one at Waitangi was built to represent all the Maori tribes. Inside, the individual tribes are represented by the wood carvings, the tukutuku or read panels and kowhaiwhai or painted rafter patterns. Before entering the Whare, it is customary to remove your footware as a mark of respect.
From the Whare we passed across the lawns to the Treaty House which is where the Waitangi Treaty was drafted by James Busby, the then representative of the Queen who had been dispatched to New Zealand to clean up the nearby town of Russell, which was nicknamed the Hell Hole of the Pacific. It gained this name as it was a trading port where sailors would settle shipboard disputes, usually after drinking too much rum at one of the many hostelries or arguing over women at one of equally numerous bordellos. The guide left us at the Treaty House, not because she knew nothing about it just that this was another payable option, which none of us had elected to take.
From the Treaty House we returned across the lawn to the perimeter path overlooking the bay and walked back to the visitor centre and car park to eat lunch. From here we headed back into Paihia, parked up and caught the Ferry across to Russell. Although the sun was frequently shining through the clouds, the wind was blowing fairly hard and was whipping up a few white horses on the sea. After just 20 minutes we were pulling up alongside the jetty in Russell, a pretty little port, which is home to New Zealand’s oldest church.
Built in 1836 by local settlers, this cream weatherboard building is very simple by comparison to other similar establishments, but has some amazing embroidered pew cushions. We wandered along the sea front stopping at the Museum, which amongst other things has a one fifth scale model of James Cook’s ship, Endeavour. From there it was onwards to the fascinating Pompallier building, which was once the headquarters of the Catholic religion in the Western Pacific. Originally built as a printing works for the French Roman Catholic Bishop, Jean Pompallier, it even had a tannery to produce the leather for the bookbindings.
As the sun was now shining, we decided to forgo afternoon tea and opt for an ice cream instead; fruit flavoured so it would count towards the five a day and complement the banana cake from this morning. We sat on the harbour front eating our ice creams and waited for the ferry to take us back to Paihia.
Early start tomorrow as we are being picked up at 07.50 to go on the island cruise. The weather forecast is looking good at the moment, but the sea may be a little rougher than usual due to this cyclone that’s still hanging around.
Sounds like you are spending most of our inheritance on cakes! Clare xx
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