A sea arch in the distance on 90 mile beach
Freshwater running across the sand towards the ocean creating antidune formations
Once we drove awhile up the beach, we turned inland and drove through a stream bed through huge dunes. These dunes had to be the biggest I had ever seen in my life! Our driver then tells us we are pulling over to go dune boarding. I remembered that Mike had done that on his trip to Australia and New Zealand, so I knew I could not pass this opportunity up.
The view of the stream bed we drove through to get to the dune boarding site
The steep climb up the dune
That's me!
The whole group after our dune boarding experience
Unfortunately, more tours showed up at this spot, so we had to get moving. We headed to Taputaputa beach for lunch. We had the chance to go swimming again, so of course a bunch of us went in. We found a bunch of small jelly-like blobs floating around in the ocean with us that we assumed to be fish eggs. However, Doug told us that they were probably larvaceans, a small organism that forms jelly sacks around itself to stay afloat. After lunch and a quick dip, we headed north to Cape Rienga, the northernmost part of New Zealand.
The Cape Reinga lighthouse
The Maori have a legend about Cape Reinga, since it is the northernmost part of the country. They believe that when a person dies, their soul travels the whole way up 90 mile beach, then goes to Cape Reinga. Once a soul reaches Cape Reinga, it can depart and go up to the sky. It is such a cool place because it is the part of the island where the Pacific Ocean and the Tasman Sea meet, so there are unique currents which also play into the Maori belief that this is where souls go to depart Earth.
The view walking to Cape Rienga
A sign at the northern most part of New Zealand
It was a long walk to get to the lighthouse and back, so we were pretty tired by the time we got back on the bus. I slept most of the ride back to Paihia, and was so thankful that dinner was waiting for us at the hostel. After we ate, Art took out the ROV and we got to try it out in the pool. I got to drive it for awhile, then passed it on to some others to try operating it. It was then time to shower and go out to spend Trevor's $100 bar tab. It ended up that our professors and Stu were out too so we had a good time bonding and hanging out with them. We ended up staying out way too late, but the next day's plan was driving all day so we could sleep on the bus.
You guys got boogie boards to slide down the dune! We had wooden planks and had to pull up the front so we wouldn't get faces full of sand..but of course I did.
ReplyDeleteThis is such a great blog girl! It looks like youre having a lot of fun..Miss you!