The West Coast

From Whangarai we headed West to Bayley’s beach, where the pure force of the ocean greeted us when we drove our van directly on the beach. Heavy waves create a beautiful flat sand beach, perfect for beach sailing, kite buggying, playing soccer, skim boarding or just running around.

it seems that in NZ you can drive and park where ever you want, especially on the most beautiful beaches...

A clear sign from Sienna: chocolate powder means breakfast time:

chocolate milk daddy?

After breakfast it is time for some home schooling. We are spending a lot of our thoughts around the education of our kids and our basic finding is that a school that enables the kids to impact what they learn seems to be much better suited for today’s children trained for tomorrow’s world, where flexibility and adatability will be key. Children learn best when they learn what they want to learn. There are plenty of examples such as Rudolf Steiner, Waldorf, Forms, etc. around. We have met quite a few home schooling parents and it is a very interesting concept.

a taste of home schooling

From Bayleys Beach we headed North, only to realize in the middle of nowhere that even the larger dots on the map are not so large and generally do not have gas stations, or if they do then they close at 5 pm. This became a bit of a problem as our van only has a 50 l tank. The sun had set, so we descended to Tarahau lake, beautifully nestled in the rolling hills, with warm water and a sand beach and flat water, a heaven for wakeboarding and waterskiing. In the morning a big trailer picked up all the kids of the camp ground for play time.

play time

The forest North of here is spectacular with big old Kauri trees. We descended into Opononi on the Hokianga Harbour Inlet, which has a spectacular view of the towering sand dunes on the North end of the bay.

don't be fooled by the perspective, it takes hours to climb those dunes

Opononi was full of energy, and the reason was the evening concert of the best Maori reaggae band, the House of Shem, who can certainly play with the Marleys and Burning Spears of the world. There were about 1000 Maoris and 30 white guys, with me standing out as the one with the whitest hair. I danced and drank a lot of beer and spoke to quite a few Maori and had nothing but peaceful and happy moments, until I wobbled back to our campsite at about 2 in the morning, still feeling the reaggae beat in my blood.

House of Shem grooving all night

check them out on myspace, you will love the sound!

Categories: New Zealand