11th to 15th Apr - Salt Spring Island, Canada

We flew into Vancouver from Auckland in time for our connection to Ganges on Salt Spring Island on a ‘float plane’ as seen here – only 5 seats plus all our luggage piled up at the back. We rather exceeded our 35lb max per passenger, so excess had to be paid at $1 per pound. Well worth it for the wonderful view from the float plane. Although only flying for 15 minutes, it was low and slow enough to have a good look at the islands we flew over.

Met by cousin Tony and Susan, we were given a little tour of Ganges, which has apparently grown since many of our family were last there, with some of the old harbour space filled in and now an area of nice shops, eating places and galleries.

 

We stayed at Tony and Susan’s beautifully renovated house near Fulford with a lovely view across the Fulford bay and plenty of local wildlife – Bald Eagle (seen below in their fir tree), Californian Quails (seen below in their veg garden), Humming birds, Blue Jays, seals, etc (not keeping still long enough to be photographed). Possums are often around, but did not show themselves to us. Deer are carefully excluded since they are so destructive, especially since the garden is quite newly planted.

We were treated to a packed schedule of outings and meals, which was very nice since we only had 4 days and a pleasant change not having to plan any of it ourselves! We could now appreciate our jump from Southern Hemisphere Autumn to Northern Hemisphere Spring. Our first walk was in what I would call classic Canadian forest, with spring flowers, beautiful Redwoods and Douglas Fir and moss covered dead wood carpeting the forest floor. 

Never far from the sea of course, so we ended up at the shore where we found this gull fiercely guarding a prized meal of starfish – we all puzzled over how they manage to choke down such a shape, but they do! Of course lots of bird spotting. 

Tony and I had a kayak outing across the Fulford bay and around some of the little islands. Saw lots of seabirds (sorry, cant remember all the names) and seals. The next day we all went out in their canoe for further exploration.

Of course we also visited my other cousin Jennifer, Tony's sister who also lives on Salt Spring Island in the house we had heard so much about when their parents lived there. This was in fact the first time I/we had met Jennifer. It was lovely to meet her and Weldon ('Kelly') and to see the house that has so much family history. Great to see also the cliff top view first hand and climb down to the sea shore, followed by a delicious dinner cooked by Kelly.

On the final day Tony and Susan took us to Victoria on Vancouver Island where we saw some of the town, visited the museum and had a very colonial lunch experience in the Fairmont Empress hotel. 

After that we to the 'Clipper' high speed ferry to Seattle, where the USA and final part of our travels began.

New Zealand (26th March to Now)

Our departure from Australia seemed to be resisted by the fates, since it nearly suffered two major upsets. Firstly it turned out that our recently booked flight from Melbourne to Sydney had been booked (by someone who we shall call Charlie) for 26^th April instead of March. Obviously losing track not just of days but months after all this time! Fortunately with the huge number of flights these days we got onto a flight only 15 minutes later, not without a major cash penalty of course. This still allowed for our connection, from Sydney to Auckland –. Which in spite of being booked back in August 2009, turned out to have been cancelled due to a slip up by our agent, along with ALL our remaining Air New Zealand flights!!! The nice lady at the “Ear New Zealand chicken disk” (as they seem to say here) very efficiently re-reserved our flights, but the agent still has to sort out the confirmation and probably pay extra, which is a bit worrying. However we arrived in Auckland, NZ, as planned and were met at the airport by Pam, a cousin of Liz’s mother, who it was nice to meet. She kindly put us up for a night in Auckland before we got our campervan and she gave us some useful tips for our travels.

We have now been in our campervan for nearly the full 2 weeks and seen a lot of the North Island. We agonised over the North/South Island options but decided that it would really be impossible to do justice to both Islands in just 2 weeks. As it is turning out, even North Island is quite hard, but we have managed a good tour so far…..

View of Auckland centre from the harbour bridge.

Our introduction to the wonderful Kauri tree. To give you the scale, the little blue splodge at the bottom is Liz! This one was about 12metres in circumference and about 1200 years old. Some have lived over 2000 years. The surface of the lower part of the tree looks more like rock than bark, having no visible cracks or layers. We also saw examples of “Swamp Kauri”, which are dead Kauri trees that have been preserved in swamps for up to 25,000 years and lived thousands of years in their time. Some of these have been retrieved and are still carved or used for timber.

ay of Islands, first look. Next morning was raining, so we moved on fairly quickly.

Russell, Bay of Islands, from Flagstaff Hill

Californian Quail. Family of them I found on Flagstaff Hill. Much loved by those who have visited our cousins in Salt Spring Island. We hope to see them again when we go there – our next stop!

Traditional Maori canoes (Waka) at the Treaty Ground (Britain-Maori 1840) at Waitangi. Similar and larger canoes require up to 70 people to paddle it and could carry 120 or more. It is similar to those that would have carried the original Polynesian people to New Zealand in 14^th Century.

At the ferry crossing of Hokianga Harbour. Spoonbills(?) feeding in foreground.

Massive sand dune at the harbour mouth on which sand surfing can be done.

After Northland we made our way South to the Rotorua area.

 

Aptly named by George Bernard Shaw – “Hell’s Gate” thermal area.

‘Hangi’ Maori style meal, cooked on hot stones for our Matai village evening experience. More than us and the other fifty or so people could eat and very good too.

 

Welcome ceremony (Pohiri). Nicely and humorously done, without pretension, to demonstrate how a visiting or trading tribe would be welcomed. We tourists had to appoint our own chief to be welcomed. It has been interesting to see how differently the Maori people live here compared to the Australian aborigines. The Maoris have a much more confident presence, culturally and personally, in spite of having also been very suppressed until fairly recently.

 

Classic volcano outline. Visible from our next campsite at Whakapapa near Tongariro national park and from most walks in the area.

Skiing territory without the snow. Very bleak and volcanic….

 …but some lovely walking areas too, with new vegetation and birds to see. Sadly NZ does not have any mammals to look out for at all, having been already separated from the rest of the supercontinent before they developed.

Next camp further south at lake Waikaremoana. Unpowered site with minimal facilities, but very peaceful and with this lovely view directly from our van and this waterfall nearby. Lots of waterbirds including Scaup and White Faced Heron and others we couldn’t identify (sorry ornithological people).

In the same area we had some nice forest walks to more waterfalls, and had planned to hire a rowing boat the next day on a smaller lake nearby, which are the only boats allowed on that lake, but it was scuppered by a deluge of rain that looked unlikely to stop. Having had a summer of drought, there were no complaints from New Zealanders. We therefore headed back North having decided that driving an extra 600 km to see Wellington was not justified and would prefer to slow down a bit and have a bit of seaside atmosphere on the Pacific coast and the Coromandel Peninsula.

After another wet day driving and getting soaked trying to have a walk, we went to Hahei with this campsite overlooking Cooks Bay, full of little volcanic islands and right next to the beach. 

Now at Coromandel in our last campsite before flying to Salt Spring Island, Vancouver.