The Great Escape- Coromandel

Catch-up

Port Jackson did at least put on 4 or 5 days of calm, sunny weather towards the end of our three week stay. But the weather turned to custard once again on the Friday before the long Queens Birthday weekend.

Port Jackson

It rained on and off for most of the day on the Friday and then throughout the night when the wind also joined the party. We pulled the slide out in early on Saturday morning as the wind increased. It was blowing straight down the beach and catching the slide out awning which is sprung loaded; it tends to tug at it and release it with a thump and a bang.

We do quite often pull the slide out in when it's really rough weather, we don't like the stress and strain the wind puts on the slide; it is a relatively large (and long) slide-out compared with some and we have room inside to carry on 'living' so it's not an issue. We also sleep better at night knowing we are fairly stable no matter what the weather throws at us. We've had a few wild rides during our time on the road, none more so than one particular night at Elaine Bay in the Marlborough Sounds.

By late afternoon we were debating whether to shift off the beach site and move to the back of the camp to get some shelter from the small trees but in the end decided to stay put. By 10pm the wind was a howling gale and the noise on the roof from the rain was horrendous. But when we looked outside and caught the horizontal 'rain' in the torch beam it turned out it wasn't rain at all, we were being sand-blasted by the sand off the dunes. We quickly decided to shift before it got worse as real rain had now joined the melee. It was pitch-black outside but we managed to get ship-shape and hitched up within 15 minutes and quickly moved over to trees where we rocked and rolled the night away (luckily David had already packed the Takacat away before the weather changed).

The rain bucketed down during the night and it didn't let up until late Sunday morning. I decided to take a drive down to see how the Pahi Stream had coped with the deluge. The usually gentle flowing stream crosses a shallow ford and flows out into Port Jackson Bay near the start of the camp.

Never mind the stream, what about the ford! It was a raging torrent; and it had already dropped quite a lot leaving a tide line of debris along the grass and across the road. 

The two 'rooster tails' you can see on the far side in the photo above (click to enlarge) and below are the marker posts for vehicles to cross the ford.

As I watched, a couple of fairly large logs and an uprooted small tree went bobbing past and disappeared under the frothing water  at the bottom of the ford.

The stock fence, hanging off a wire across the stream, was taking a beating as the water and debris rushed past on its way to the sea.

Just in case you're thinking "Well, that doesn't look like too much water, I'd be able to drive through it", take a look at this video I did. Pretty impressive huh?  

Down on the beach near the mouth of the stream uninviting waves of  'brown soup' carried some of the debris back into shore.

As I drove back towards camp I though I'd go and see how the other ford was fairing (the one on the way to Fletcher Bay that can cause trouble for bigger vehicles). I stopped on the rise above the beach, to take a photo of the dirty water line creeping across the bay. By late afternoon the whole bay was brown.

It was no surprise to find the Fletcher Bay ford overflowing too. A couple of tourists are stuck on the other side; they've been at the Fletcher Bay camp and were heading back to Auckland. They'll not get through this one today, luckily they have a campervan and supplies and are quite happy staying where they are.

I tell them more rain is due so to cross as soon as they're able to. I leave them kicking a hacky sack about and head back to camp.

The weather forecast for the coming week is not the best with more wind, thunderstorms and heavy rain due from Tuesday onwards. We think we'll leave in the morning (Monday) but decide for sure when we wake up.

The morning dawns fine and calm although it looks like the rain is on it's way; we are in two minds about leaving but in the end decide we'll go. We don't want to be caught up here until the end of the week once the weather packs up. By the time we're ready to leave it's late morning and the rain starts (big fat plops) just as we say farewell to Ursula & Frederick at the camp office. And there's a couple of far away claps of thunder. Ominous signs...

The camp ford has dropped dramatically...

...and we head on through and turn left to head up the long haul to the top...

...when all hell breaks lose! A weather bomb hits directly over the top of us, lightening flashes through the gloom and the thunder booms not a half second later, wind whips around the rig and it's bucketing down; the wipers can hardly keep up.

David has the Ranger in 4WD & low range and it slowly hauls the van up the steep (and now slippery) incline- as dozens of flashes and thunder claps carrying on around us. We get a slight reprieve from the rain as we pass under the trees and then near the top the rain is suddenly replaced by dirty great hail stones! There's nowhere to pull over and David daren't risk stopping in case he can't get away again. 

The relief at finally reaching the top is short-lived as we round the corner and start to head down. We nearly get wiped out by a speeding car. Luckily we're only just moving and have stopped well before she slams on her brakes and skids towards us. She backs up and we shout at her to slow down, the conditions are treacherous. And to put her bloody lights on too!  

The road is awash with rivers of water...

...as we crawl towards the 'big drop off corner'. We round it safely and heave another sigh of relief.

This is the same view on a more pleasant day!

The rain eases a little and the gap between the lightening and thunder grows so we know the storm is moving away. Dozens of dirty brown streaks flow into the sea as old & new waterfalls and streams cascade down the hillside.

David has to avoid several small slips and a lot of debris that has fallen onto the road along the way, and we have to stop to move this fallen branch. 

This ford has reasonably clear water still flowing over it, the rain storm mustn't have hit up in the range above yet, although it's raining lightly down here.

We pass more vehicles coming towards us than we've ever passed on this road before, all heading towards Port Jackson. I know we were mad but I wonder what has possessed all those others to drive to Port Jackson on a day like today- Queens Birthday Monday of course!

The ford before the camp would have been raging again and no one would have been able to drive over it. In fact the woman who slid to a halt at the top of the hill has now caught us up coming back; we let her pass, she still has no lights on and is driving way too fast.

The storm hasn't finished with us yet, it catches us up and it's bucketing down again (along with lightening & thunder). Its the first time I've seen water over this small ford.

But many of the culverts are blocked by debris and the road has started to flood in areas...

There are several larger slips closer to the road end although they look like they might have happened earlier in the weekend. Unless someone is carrying road cones on their back seat.

Finally and with a great sense of relief we reach Colville. Talk about testing our nerve, David did a grand job driving but we both comment that we'd not want to do that trip again in a hurry. Talk about extreme conditions, at least we know we could do it if we did get caught out somewhere. 

And so much for shooting the Colville Store on a fine day. Oh well, I'm sure we'll be back again....just earlier in summer next time.

It rained all the way to Coromandel Town and in fact there was more debris over the road on this last section than we'd seen on the Port Jackson Road. The rain was still torrential as we pulled into the NZMCA Park, the grounds saturated and flooding so we backed in beside another motorhome on the little bit of hard still available. We had a cup of tea and then looked at each other and said 'Bugger this, let's get out of here'.

We pulled out and headed around to the nearby Long Bay Motor Camp, where we'd also stayed on our last Coromandel visit. And where we'd be able to plug back into the grid and not have to worry about our power usage. Generators aren't allowed at the Coromandel NZMCA Park and we were low on energy and with the sun certainly not looking like it was going to show itself anytime soon this was the best option. And in fact we stayed for 6 days in the end, enjoying a bit of sun after the storm cleared.

And we were once again parked up in the perfect spot for some magic sunsets...

From Long Bay we headed back to Mt Maunganui for a few days to catch up with the family.  This time parking in the Ocean Camp section and having the place very nearly to ourselves for the four days of our stay. Hard to believe I know!

Then is was on to the NZMCA Park at Taupo for a few days...

...to catch up with good friends Amanda & Paul who we hadn't seen in a long while. They were heading through to Tauranga for a few weeks.

We were lucky enough to be given a rainbow trout by a passing fisherman, so David smoked it and we had trout and bubbles for lunch. Never mind that it was bitterly cold outside; good food, fine wine and great company were worth the discomfort. Truth be told, neither of us wanted smoked fish smell inside the van; I was still trying to rid ours from the fish I'd cooked a few nights previous.

From Taupo it was back to Napier where we're now parked up on the concrete pad beside Mum & Dads' once again. Once we return from Melbourne we'll stay put as we have a couple of important family functions happening so it'll be a few weeks before we're on the move again.

This'll be the last blog for a short while- travel well, stay safe and keep warm!

Mokau Landing- Lake Waikaremoana, East Coast

Catch-up

We left Lake Tutira Friday morning heading north up the East Coast towards our next stop. It's been a very long time since I've travelled SH2 north of Tutira, when I was younger it was the route to our family summer holidays at Mahia and I also used to visit a farm (and the Waikare Pub) at Putorino with friends whose family lived nearby. 

I was keen to see the familiar settlements along the way; Putorino, Kotemaori and Raupunga but most of all I was looking forward to seeing the Mohaka Viaduct again. And there it was as we rounded a corner; just as I remember it, one massive, slightly rickety looking viaduct spanning the mighty Mohaka River far below. 

With no lookout to stop at, it was a matter of grabbing a few photos as we approached the viaduct, went under it, then as we crossed the river and one last one just before we disappeared over the top on the other side. 

Once the 4th highest viaduct in the world and still the highest in Australasia, the 95 metre, NZ Heritage Grade 1 listed viaduct, was opened in 1937 and was in regular use until the Napier to Gisborne rail line was mothballed in 2012. Though, just in the last month or so, KiwiRail and the Labour Government have announced that towards the end of the year, logging trains will recommence using the line on weekends from Wairoa to Napier. That's going to give a few people who live along the line a bit of a fright as they once again get used to looking out for trains.

We stopped in Wairoa for a few supplies and then headed off to our next destination, keen to get there before the weather turned on us (it had been a dull grey day so far) and the weekend campers arrived. 

We were headed to the remote Mokau Landing DOC camp on the shores of Lake Waikaremoana, 77kms inland and deep inside Te Urewera National Park. We were holding out hope that the tarseal would last most of the way but it came as no surprise when it ran out with still 39kms to travel. 

Ignore the time to travel, there was a glitch in the system this day.

And now we wished it was raining, just a light sprinkle to deaden the dust! There were several short random sections of seal here and there though; some past farm homesteads for obviously reasons but others for no apparent reason. 

Much of the gravel road was deeply corrugated and I felt sorry for David as he cursed and mumbled under his breath. He'd spent the last few weeks polishing, painting underneath and cleaning the rig. By the time we arrived at the camp a thick layer of dust coated it  from top to bottom. 

There was no time to stop for photos at the top of the climb above the Tuai Power Station and Lake Whakamarino or looking down the other side to Lake Waikaremoana. I was hoping that I'd be able to return to Tuai at a more leisurely pace sometime during our stay.

Mum has a cousin, who with his family, lived at Tuai for many years. He was a local Maori elder/Kaumātua and a water taxi skipper for trampers on the lake's Great Walk. He was killed tragically in an quad bike accident a few years ago. During our stay I did manage to speak to several people who knew Noel well. Unfortunately I didn't get back to Tuai, the road and the weather kept us at Mokau.

Sign? What Sign?

It's 12kms from the Waikaremoana campground to the DOC camp at Mokau Landing. The road is even narrower and windier than we've already experienced. With very few places to pull over and many blind corners we were lucky to not have met anyone coming the other way.

This is State Highway 38 from Wairoa to Murupara and beyond. It finishes at Rainbow Mountain in the Rotorua District, a 200km long winding road, much of it gravel through a very remote and beautiful part of New Zealand. It's called the Te Urewera Rainbow Route and is touted to tourists as a stunning scenic drive. And it is. But I bet the tourists that drive it are very pleased when they reach the other end. You only want to do this road once in your lifetime. We have driven it- there and back- a very long time ago in our regular car. We have no intentions of repeating the exercise!

Finally we reach the turn off down into the Mokau Landing Camp. We're half way down the track before we realise that this is even narrower than the road. I got out to check around the blind corner, to make sure no one was heading up and when I looked back I could see David was suddenly more concerned with getting around the corner. There's no turning back now.

I needn't have worried about how busy the camp might have been over the weekend which was one of the reasons we left Tutira on Friday. Mokau is a large site with several areas to park- beside the Mokau Inlet and stream, at the back of the reserve, on the lake front or round the corner in a bush clearing tucked into another bay (a lovely spot but with no views of the lake). We set up right on the lake front and not far from the boat ramp.

There was one other couple and their caravan when we arrived and we had 3 or 4 others come in over the weekend and then we were on our own again for the rest of the week with the caravan couple (hi Chris & Bernard!) and one or two tourist campers in each night. Folk who just couldn't go any further after driving the Rainbow Road me thinks! So far we've seen none of the overcrowded camps in the North Island that many people have complained about. But then again, we tend to visit the more remote places or ones off the usual beaten track. We'll see how we go the further north we head.

Photos clockwise- Mokau Landing DOC Camp, Wairoa Anglers Lodge at the rear of the camp, lake front view, sunset at Lake Waikaremoana and a friendly White-faced heron/Matuku Moana who sunbathed each evening on a nearby clump of dirt.

The Panekire Bluffs are a prominent feature of Lake Waikaremoana and can be seen from many different vantage points around the lake. The Lake Waikaremoana Great Walk starts off to the left of the bluffs at Onepoto and passes along the ridgeline on the very first day of the 3-4 day walk. 

David had the Takacat up and ready to go not long after we arrived and contrary to a few comments from other fisherman about the fishing being hard, managed to catch four trout on two outings. Usually a catch & release fisherman, it was time to bring one home for dinner. In fact he bought two home in the end because I had a new recipe I wanted to try out. We smoked the other one. 

I went on a couple of exploratory trips with David in between his fishing...

...one to see a waterfall he'd found. He'd seen it in good light as the sun went down but by the time we arrived back, the sun had disappeared. And bobbing about in a little rubber dinghy is not conducive to getting a slow-mo shot of the water falling, but still, it was a lovely setting.

There was another reason we headed out in the boat several times with no particular place to visit; we had no cellphone or internet reception at the camp but if we motored out into the bay we managed to pick up a Vodafone signal. Normally having no reception wouldn't be a problem, we enjoy the break, but with two family birthdays during the week we were able to give them a call and wish them Happy Birthday while bobbing about on the water! (the red cord David is holding is the quick-cut line to the outboard).

On one trip we pulled onto this tiny beach to have lunch. David found quite a large abandoned camp site in the bush behind- grass flattened, neatly stacked woodpile, fire pit and a few missing trees; obviously a family has holidayed there over summer.

I thought I might like to walk a section of the last part of the Great Walk while David went fishing, but in the end I decided that part of the track wasn't too interesting though he did drop me off to check out the Whanganui Hut. Many of the Great Walk walkers get picked up by the water taxi near the hut and don't walk the last section to the road (you can see the road cutting around the bluff in the third photo below). 

I spoke to several walkers who had just arrived and I talked to a hunter who had returned to the hut with his catch; sadly an older fawn. He was a little embarrassed as he'd been after it's mother but instead shot the youngster when it stuck it's head out instead of the mother. The walkers were horrified that some one had been shooting nearby. He assured them that it was at least 500mtrs from the track as required by his permit but still, I'm not so sure I'd have felt safe with somebody shooting nearby. We're told that the Mokau camp is very busy during the 'roar' (April/May); can you imagine that! Not a good time to go camping if you don't like hunting.

Mokau Falls- this beautiful cascade of water is at the head of the Mokau Inlet, and feeds the lake via a short stream beside the camp. There's a viewing area back up on the road,  you can see the road bridge which passes over the stream on the other side of the inlet, in the photo.

The Mokau Inlet has a unique feature, there are in fact two waterfalls entering the inlet, the Tauwhare Falls are on the opposite side to the Mokau Falls and can only just be seen through the dense bush (not helped by the fact that the sun doesn't shine in there either). I couldn't see them but I could certainly hear them from the Mokau lookout. I had to drive over to the bridge to catch sight of them. That's the edge of the Mokau Falls at the bottom of the photo, a very cool edge for a waterfall. I wonder how many people have climbed down there and peered over the edge. 

Once I had finished taking photos of the waterfalls, I drove up to the top of the road hoping to get a view through the bush overlooking the campsite. This was my first stop; you can't see the camp, that's off to the right but it's overlooking the bay and the other finger of lake where we explored and where the hut is located. We didn't stop for lunch at the beach you can see, ours was not far around the next point.

 I stopped a few more times and finally managed to get a clear line of sight down to the camp.