Thursday, Feb. 10 - The Road to Piha Beach

Yesterday was an interesting day of driving to say the least!  Poor Barry drove most of the winding road to Piha from Auckland with its lovely blind corners and very narrow lanes with no shoulder.

Leaving behind the morning rush hour traffic of Auckland, we headed west towards the West Coast to check out the black sand beaches of Piha and Karekare (site of several film locations including The Piano).  We took a crazy video on the road that winds down the final stretch to Piha, and if you ever watch it, take some Gravol beforehand if you tend to get motionsick!  The beaches were both beautiful, the sand is so fine it's like baby powder.  The surf is a little rough, so I lost my nerve to go bodysurfing out there. And there was a water quality warning for Karekare beach against swimming. Got a nice burn on my feet and my chest though, where I obviously forgot to put enough sunscreen!  Sun is extremely strong here, no doubt about it.

After visiting the beaches, we took the Scenic Drive back towards Auckland via the Waitakere Ranges and the winery town of Swanson.  The area was thick and lush with vegetation, similar to a rainforest, and quite mountainous.  We stopped for a hike called Fairy Falls.  I'll call this hike "Stairmaster, Part One", as you head down, down, down into the forest on a steep path and stairs, knowing that you are going to have to trudge back up at some point!  There were Kiwis actually running back up, just to humble us even more.  The destination was thankfully worth it, with spectacular falls and pools just inviting you to jump in!  We dunked our feet into one pool, felt great.  The way back was indeed a tad difficult, but at least it was a fairly short hike, in total around 1 hr, 15 minutes.

In the evening, we drove over to the posh district of Mission Bay, where million dollar apartments are the norm.  The main beach road has a seawall boardwalk and row of funky restaurants and cafes, full of people walking, people watching, and having picnics in the park area.  We tried our first "fush and chups" meal at a small takeaway place, and had takahiri fish - a nice mild white fish. Yummmm.