49. Motukawanui – Harawera – Panaki – Hamaruru (CC4)

Friday, March 29: Two bursts of rain in the night, overcast during the day, improving in the later afternoon

Kayaking: 12.4 km
Tramping: 1.0 km
Swimming: 400 m

Motukawanui Hut

Apparently everyone snored last night, but the spear fishermen were very quiet when leaving, and we didn’t get up until 7:30.

Breakfast was eggs and bacon on toast followed by the usual fruit salad. The weather was apparently not conducive to a circumnavigation so the plan was to stick to the west coast and try our hands at paddling through channels and into caves so that the helmets came on. Very beautiful, steep coast, caves and channels galore with the tide just returning from low. At one beach we stopped for a cup of tea and a biscuit, and a short time later we stopped fairly close to the north end of the island and continued up to the top of a hill on foot and returned to have lunch of salami, cheese and coleslaw on bread.

Slide Show

After that we went across to the outer islands in a rather rough sea before heading back to the main island. Now the question was whether to go rock gardening again, now that the tide was in. We put on the helmets on the water, and went though a couple of channels that had not been there earlier @ the lower tide. In fact the one cave that we had backed up into in the morning was now accessible through a northern channel, although “accessible” is relative. The entrance was blocked by a large rock with a much smaller gap to the right, and could only really be passed on a surge. I made it through the tunnel, as did the others, without major damage.

Interactive Map

Back at the hut I still wanted to go snorkeling, and Magnus was also game, so we donned a couple of wet suits and went down to a headland where there was a kelp/seaweed garden where we spent about half an hour, with Magnus diving for crayfish. He did come up with one, but it was too small. Haven’t snorkeled since Philip Island and the discovery of the sand bank between the parallel pier and the beach, or going out to the reef at Sandringham (Halfmoon Bay? Blackrock?).

Was sitting down enjoying the last of the wine on the deck when a headlamp appeared from the direction on the beach laden with equipment which was then pretty unceremoniously dumped at the far end of the deck. On enquiry I managed to glean that four further people were on their way which meant a wake-up call for our four – who had already put themselves to bed. Magnus & Ana moved their mattresses down to the lower bunk, mine towards the middle and our kitchen equipment was moved to make room for some of theirs.

Which they proceeded to use noisily, with banter between the two very young women about someone not being able to cook two-minute noodles. When they had finished their meal, Magnus got up and asked them to be quiet and they soon packed in and went to bed, shortly after 9:00.

There was less snoring tonight.