Katie and I stayed at her family's house in Ngunguru (near Tutukaka) for about ten days, from January 7th. This is our second of three different houses that we'll live in before leaving the country.
Katie's brother Joel and his partner Nat live there with their cat Pip.
Pip is an ex Turkish street cat, who adopted Joel and Nat while they were living in Istanbul. They think she might be about four years old.
She's missing all her front teeth, and her fangs stick out way below her bottom lip. Saliva continually drips down these, and she leaves little slobbery patches whenever she rests her head on you. Even worse, she'll often walk past you and shake her head vigorously, causing a spray of saliva to shoot out in all directions.
Don't get me wrong though, she's a super nice, friendly, cuddly little animal!
The house is, without doubt, a holiday home, not a bach. It's brand new with plush carpet, smart TVs, and soft-close everything. Two sides of the living room have massive sliding doors which let you open the house up completely onto the deck.
Nat has been planning to list one of their rooms on Airbnb, but as of writing this it's either not up, or fully booked. I was planning to steal some of her photos to put in this entry, but you'll just have to imagine it.
We spent most days hanging around the house, lying in the shade, or swimming in the estuary. Really, anything to escape the heat. Ngunguru is in a bit of a valley, and so doesn't get much wind. The hot, damp air just sits there, undisturbed. Outdoor temperatures generally moped around 30degrees (in the shade), and humidity never dropped below 75%.
We went for a walk to the Mermaid Pools at Matapouri, up the coast a bit. The hike over the hill from Matapouri Bay was intense, more like mountain climbing than tramping. There were ropes strung between trees to help pull yourself up, and ladder-like holes beaten into the cliff face by peoples shoes. We passed several people having a "quick stop to look at the view"... yeah right!
The pools were definitely worth the walk. We left home early so we could arrive before the crowds, which was entirely the right decision.
We saw crabs, and kina, and Art Green! Apparently, there's sometimes crayfish in the pools. As we were leaving, we could see a slick of sunblock starting to glisten on the top of the pools. Luckily they get washed out by the sea every high tide!
On one of our last sunny days in Northland, we went for a road trip up to Russell and Waitangi. Katie had read about a place in Russell called Pompallier Mission & Printery (known by everyone else as Pompallier House), so we decided to head there and see what all the reviews were raving about. It was such an enthralling place! We went on a tour, and learned about how the brothers of the Society of Mary had built the House out of rammed earth, and set up a tannery and book printing factory.
Volunteers from around Northland have restored the house to its original, working condition, and have started tanning hides and printing books there again. They still have the original Gaveaux printing press that the brothers brought with them from France in the early 1840s. I volunteered to demonstrate how the press worked and printed my own page!
We learned about the process the brothers used to print 40,000 books in just 7 years! Everything from type-setting to printing, cutting the pages up, binding the books, and finally covering them with leather.
After Russell, we visited the Waitangi treaty grounds, which is something I think every New Zealander should do. They've built a very engaging museum, which tells many stories of early New Zealand, and in particular, the events leading up to and caused by the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. We went on another tour here (this one very foreign-tourist-oriented), which walked through the grounds up to the lawns in front of James Busby's house where the treaty was first signed.
We're now back in Auckland, doing the last bit of perparation before we leave on Thursday. It's definitely starting to get scary!