Sunday, 16 September, 2007

We stayed across Hawkes Bay from Napier in a campsite outside the tiny town of Clifton. Today we walked the 8 km hike along the coast to Cape Kidnappers to see the Gannet Reserve. A Gannet is a type of seabird, larger than a seagull. The Gannet reserve at the tip of the cape is a protected colony of gannets.


On the way there we were flanked on one side by the bay and on the other by high, looming cliffs that threatened to come down on us if we stayed too long to admire their grandeur. We had been warned before our hike that there are frequent rockfalls and we should hurry so as not to be caught between the sea and the cliffs at high tide.

After two hours of walking, we arrived at the gannet colony and were treated to a sight of hundreds of gannets nesting and wheeling above us. One annoyed gannet decided to bombard my bald target of a head on his fly-by run. Good luck, I guess.


The good luck stood us in good stead on our return trip from the colony. As we walked along the cliff-lined coast, we were startled from our sight-seeing by a sudden cloud of dust extending down the cliff face and out to sea some 100 metres ahead. One of the rockslides we had been warned about. At least we weren`t below when it happened.



We arrived safely back at out campervan and toasted our luck with quantities of NZ wine.


Tuesday, 18 sept.-07

Having crossed over from the Eastern Hawkes Bay region, yesterday we traveled south and overnighted on the West coast beach, in a town called Otaki, approximately one hour North of Wellington. Now heading for the capitol.