Yeah, I know, I know. I'm not doing very well keeping this blog updated. It's at this point I should just quit promising to do better. There just may not be a "better" in me! It takes hours to go through a bazillion photos, choose the ones to go in the blog, gussy them up in Photoshop, write up what's going on in the photos, then get 'em posted on the blog. Frankly, I have to get myself psyched up to get it all done. <grin> Enough whining from me.
Meanwhile, back to the blog... For our first overnight trip away from Auckland, we took a trip up the west coast of the North Island. The destination is the Waipou Forest and some big, old Kauri trees. Kauri is a native tree, mostly found in the north part of the North Island. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agathis_australis If you want to read more about the Kauri.) We were on the hunt for Tane Mahuta (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tane_Mahuta) "Lord of the Forest" and the Four Sisters, four large Kauri trees growing so close that they have fused together at the base. The Four Sisters were further south, so they were the first stop for us. Good thing, too. We didn't know how small and wind-y the road was going to be and we were a bit queasy by the time we made it to the park.
After we gathered our jackets and camera we were greeted with a sign telling us to wipe our feet on the brushes and wash the bottoms of our shoes. A sprayer is conveniently supplied for that purpose. The reason? There's a fungus that is attacking the trees and has been carried by people going from place to place and tracking the fungus with them on their shoes. You can see the photo of a Kauri tree that has been killed by the fungus. It can kill the largest trees.
Now that our shoes have been cleaned, we headed down the path toward the Four Sisters. The path was lined with trees of all types. As we turned to the Four Sisters, it got even darker. We walked on a raised sidewalk deeper in the woods. As we made the curve, there they were! Just as promised, four Kauri trees fused at the bottom. Pretty cool! We saw some other trees that were larger, but the more interesting thing about the larger is that they seem to have their own ecosystem in their branches up top! The branches are huge, and apparently big enough that dirt built up and other plants grow in the well between the trunk and the branch. We spotted several different types of plants in up there. Pretty neat.
Then we were off to Tane Mahuta. More windy roads, but luckily not far. This was a short walk and they have the whole thing on a raised sidewalk. The forest was dense and we were on top of Tane Mahuta before we knew it. No kidding, it's a HUGE tree! Important safety tip: If you want to show that something is really big, put something in the photo for comparison. Our photos simply don't do it justice because neither of us thought to stand next to it when we took the photo! Anyway, we stood there for a while in amazement at the sheer size of this monster. Wow.
We left Tane Mahuta and headed off to our hotel for the night. Which also happened to be our 30th anniversary! We drank some good beer (Kent) and wine (Anna) and had a great dinner. And since the restaurant was by the water, we watched a great sunset over the harbor. What a way to end the day and celebrate our anniversary.
