New Zealand - Paihia

Leaving Auckland on a very sunny morning our destination was Paihia. The bus journey to Paihia was our first introduction into New Zealand’s scenery and the northlands scenery definitely met our expectations; it was unsurprising not that indifferent to that of our own, though on a much more dramatic scale, maybe sharing more in common with that of the Scottish highlands. Also you can tell the Romans never conquered NZ as it doesn’t seem to know what a straight road is!

On arrival in Paihia we were greeted with the worst weather we had seen in NZ to date, it was so cold and the skies looked unpromising- slight dent in a happy outlook. We did however have to chance to take in the seemingly reoccurring theme of amazing views.



Due to our late(ish) arrival we took what we had left of the evening and decided to go out for a meal. We ate at Al Fresco’s restaurant- to be honest all I can really say about the place was it was alright, nothing really to write home about. Also it was freezing in that restaurant, question to the New Zealanders who may be reading this, are you immune to the cold?

Moving on to our first and last full day in Paihia and we woke to a beautiful day, the sun was shining and we were raring to go. Our first port of call (no pun intended) was Paihia’s harbour for our Explore NZ ‘Hole in the Rock’ and dolphin cruise. First of all there is a couple of operators who run this service but from personal experience both myself and Jen highly recommend Explore NZ. With that said on to our cruise; the first part took us around some of the 140+ islands that make up the Bay of Plenty and giving us some history into said islands, also leading to some phenomenal views (I’m starting to wonder how many times we’re going to talk about these views).



Then we moved onto the dolphin seeking section. Now at the beginning I have to admit as much as we were quite looking forward to seeing dolphins, I think a part of both of us didn’t really understand the mass hysteria about seeing them. How we were wrong. It seems as soon as we saw them we were like two excited kids at Christmas; dolphins seem to have this affect on both people young and old that really can’t be explained, but I can say it’s definitely worth doing at least once in your life.



We then went onto the ‘Hole In The Rock’ which is the largest passing under any island… I believe. Anyway the seas were rough at this point and as you do I was out on the bow enjoying the trip, I should have probably heeded the captain’s warning, though of course me being me and male I didn’t, we clearly know better, and I got soaked and as a result very cold. Jen was also looking very pale due to the rough seas. Unfortunately we couldn’t pass through the rock but we did however get some photo opportunities.



Back on land, we decided to head up to the Opatu forest. The walk is approximately an hour return, not taking into account time spent at the top. The walk is moderately easy, though it is all uphill and offers some striking vistas at the top.

What was technically our third day in Paihia, though it was to be a short day due to our journey back to Auckland, was greeted by, in contrast to the first day, probably the best weather we had seen in NZ. However, due to poor organisation on our behalf we missed out on what we had originally planned to do. So instead we went for a long walk along the beach, I chilled and Jen went into photographer mode; unfortunately I became her target for the day- this is one of the more pleasent pictures of me.



Our evening in Auckland was spent eating at the food court directly under Sky City cinemas on Queen Street- very average food but cheap prices. After the not so great dinner we headed upstairs and watched District 9.