Not too long this time only a couple of things of note happened recently but worthy of a post. First of all, now all my toys have arrived, my main task has been clearing up my life to create time for using them. This has mainly been boring administration/moving and not worthy of note but the main thing is its now over and my time is being used in a much less constructive manner with all my toys.
I'm yet to get properly on my bike, but hopefully that will change in the next couple of days, my creek boat on the other hand has seen a bit of action and once more in life I'm hooked on the best of drugs - scaring the shit out of myself.
The main action in the boat is a river just 20mins drive from my house (the Wairoa) which is dam release every week - excellent, reliable boating - living the dream. (WARNING MILD BOATING CHAT) Its a grade 4 river with a couple grade 5 drops with consequences. The first couple of times I went down I got some sweet lines and missed everything that could have done me too much damage with just one swim from a sticky hole at the bottom of a 4m waterfall on my first time down. However, last week we got 19cm of rain in a day and all of a sudden everything was blowing its tits off. This meant we could do one of the Wairoa's tribs - the Mangakarengorengo (classic comical kiwi name). This was a sweet run and again I was on form for me - hit some lines missed others but coped well in general. Then we went continued on to the Wairoa and my skills seemed to lapse but fortunately for me my luck held. First of all I ended up going throught the infamous "toaster" on the waterfall of the Wairoa - a narrow slot between two rocks with a large potential for hurting oneself on rocks or getting pinned under water, but like I said my luck held, much to the relief of everyone I was paddling who all looked as scared as me when I saw their faces as I shot clean through the middle without a scratch. The next rapid "the roller coaster" had been my undoing before and I was desperate to get a clean line through it but another miscalculation later and I found myself backwards above the main drop of the rapid. A rather panicked last minute spin at the top of the drop saw my luck come good again and I cleaned the drop and kept my head dry. As I celebrated prematurely my boat was sinking and it was a second or so before I noticed my spray deck had popped on the main drop and I was heading to an undercut, my luck held one last time as I swam as hard as I have in a very long time an narrowly avoided getting trapped under the rock. That was Sunday and so it was with a little blow to the confidence and a little trepidation that I set off for another new river last night to try to tackle the 7m drop of tarawera falls on the Kaituna. But my skills hadn't deserted me last night and we had a couple of runs down and although not styled I did hit all my lines. The drop was fun taking a little psyching up before launching off an impressive horizon line and reinstated some of that lost confidence. (BOATING CHAT OVER, sorry that dragged on longer than i thought)
The surfing continues to continue at a slow pace but there's a gale blowing at the minute so that normally means a good two or three days swells once it dies down so before and after work surf sessions on the cards.
Monday and Tuesday I had off so it was in the car with a couple of others from work and off with a tent to explore some more of the north island. We decided to head to the east and found that on the east cape away from the coast there's not a lot there. However, what we did find was awesome. First we hit up Rere for a picnic by a gorgeous waterfall
before a short trip upstream to a 60m rock slide which we threw ourselves down on specifically purchased cheap spongebob body boards. lots of fun, but after a while the insects were savaging us and it was time to move on.We headed for the Mahia peninsula, a barren yet beautiful place with a nice campsite full of gypsies with very impressive campers.
Next morning we discovered that a rumor I had heard a while back turned out to be one of New Zealand's highlights to date. There is a dolphin at Mahia beach who has forsaken his own kind in preference to play with the humans each morning. A wild dolphin mind, not tamed or domesticated, just choosing to play with people. He doesn't get fed and seems to get no reward for coming to the beach other than the enjoyment of being with people, his name is Moko. We played in the waved for a couple of hours with him and spongebob once again became useful as it turned out that body boards are one of Moko's favourite things and it provided much entertainment for everyone as it was stolen from human to dolphin and back again several times. And when that game was exhausted he would push you around on the body board at full speed. It was just like riding a dolphin.
Me, moko and spongebob. a happy threesome.Also just realised that I haven't shown any photos of the mount where I live so heres a couple of pics one from the top of Mount Maunganui after which the town takes its name and a close up of my house from the top. Its on the first picture about halfway between the patch of green on the left and the beach on the right. The surf is on the left hand beach and the sun is in the sky, as always. This isn't quite an accurate picture though, there's normally less cloud.
