New Zealand North Island day 7

Onward and across to the west coast as we make our way steadily towards the far north and Cape Reinga, the point at which the Tasman Sea and Pacific Ocean meet. We are heading for Kerikeri on the Bay of Islands. But first we take a short detour to the Ki Iwi lakes just south of Kuahu between the west coast and Highway 12. We drive is through wonderful undulating countryside to the totally unspoilt lake Taharoa which has a fine, white sandy beach at one end and clear blue waters lapping the shoreline. There is a basic campsite right on the edge of the beach – what a wonderful place this would have been to stay, if only we’d found it earlier.

Back on the road we take the Twin Coast Highway across from west to east stopping at Whangarei to pick up supplies and exchange some books (one exchange bookshop won’t take my Graham Greene or our LP ‘SE Asia on a shoe-string’ – they obviously don’t recognise quality when they see it – but will take Sadie Frost; bizarre!).

We met and English guy from Manchester a couple of days ago who is cycling through NZ while holding down a job in the UK via the internet. He has a fold up mountain bike on which he was managing to carry everything he needed for a camping and working, including a tent which hardly seemed big enough to house him and a laptop. He was relying on mobile telephony to get internet connections – apparently it is possible to buy mobile internet access on a month-by-month basis for about £35. This sounds good value given the sites we are staying at charge up to $9 (£3.25) an hour. So while we are in Whangarei we check out a couple of mobile stores. But the cost of a dongle makes the whole thing far too expensive and the sales assistant can’t confirm whether it could be used outside NZ. So that idea is knocked on the head.

From Whangarei follow Highway 1 through the undulating countryside which is mainly livestock farmland (although there never seems to be many cattle or sheep grazing) pockets of forests on the hillsides and gullies.