New Zealand part III
Robert had to leave and went on a bus to Wellington to make his way to the south island. The weather wasn't promising and he got wet on his way to the ferry only to face two days of rain in Picton.
It was raining so heavy that the westcoast highway was actually washed away on four different spots around Franz Joseph Glacier. People were stuck and needed to be flown out. Highway 1 around Timaru was hit worh so much water that the bridges became fragile. The north Island had a bigger eruption on White Island and the Highway between Central North Island and Whanganui was also washed away in a few places so there was a lot of things going on.
I moved up to Tatanaki and after also facing heavy rain that forced me to stop driving stayed in Wainui Beach where I stayed with Frank almost 10 years ago. I surfed an incredible roght poont Break for a few hours until I cuddled myself into the van due to the next rain. That's when I met a lovely German couple with there ever smiling 1 years old son. He was into surfing so we decided to go further up north together since I know all the spots quite well.
But before i could surf all those good spots I stopped at Opunake and stayed at Michelle's and Angelo's place. I know him from years back when he was a professional basketball coach in New Plymouth and we talked basketball a lot. They invited me in and we had great catching up to do.
We went up north and the first stop was Rocky's. A left and right with a lot of rocks popping up in the face of the wave. Since they hadn't had a swell for a while everyone was throthrothing and it was quite busy. I surfed a smaller but very fun right all myself until the german couple showed up. It was so much fun, although cold in the chilly southerly.
Later that day we went to Kumera Patch, a left point that works almost all the time and is a 20 min walk away. We paddled until our arms were weak. What a great day.
I climbed Mt. Tatanaki later with the German guy and it was very exhausting. Well I'm 10 years older and not really well trained for climbing. But we pushed ourselves upwards and most importantly downwards while our knees seemed to crack like matches. We could not walk for almost two days. The view that day was amazing. You saw the Tongariro, the forests in the south and even Farewell Spit and the Nelson Lakes mountains on the south island.
The end of my stay in New Plymouth was the grant finale at the Pukekura Park with the annual Festival of Lights. I left taranakT because of upcoming two days rain to Whangamata to say goodbye to Aaron and Teo and surf the left sandbar again.
The last session was in and after a storm and I had those incredible waves with two other guys for two hours to ourselves all through wind, rain and sunshine at the end of the day. They peeled down the sandy bar for quite long and you could actually try stuff without conserning of not getting any other wave for ages. It was worth the drive and skipping Raglan once again.
It was raining so heavy that the westcoast highway was actually washed away on four different spots around Franz Joseph Glacier. People were stuck and needed to be flown out. Highway 1 around Timaru was hit worh so much water that the bridges became fragile. The north Island had a bigger eruption on White Island and the Highway between Central North Island and Whanganui was also washed away in a few places so there was a lot of things going on.
I moved up to Tatanaki and after also facing heavy rain that forced me to stop driving stayed in Wainui Beach where I stayed with Frank almost 10 years ago. I surfed an incredible roght poont Break for a few hours until I cuddled myself into the van due to the next rain. That's when I met a lovely German couple with there ever smiling 1 years old son. He was into surfing so we decided to go further up north together since I know all the spots quite well.
But before i could surf all those good spots I stopped at Opunake and stayed at Michelle's and Angelo's place. I know him from years back when he was a professional basketball coach in New Plymouth and we talked basketball a lot. They invited me in and we had great catching up to do.
We went up north and the first stop was Rocky's. A left and right with a lot of rocks popping up in the face of the wave. Since they hadn't had a swell for a while everyone was throthrothing and it was quite busy. I surfed a smaller but very fun right all myself until the german couple showed up. It was so much fun, although cold in the chilly southerly.
Later that day we went to Kumera Patch, a left point that works almost all the time and is a 20 min walk away. We paddled until our arms were weak. What a great day.
I climbed Mt. Tatanaki later with the German guy and it was very exhausting. Well I'm 10 years older and not really well trained for climbing. But we pushed ourselves upwards and most importantly downwards while our knees seemed to crack like matches. We could not walk for almost two days. The view that day was amazing. You saw the Tongariro, the forests in the south and even Farewell Spit and the Nelson Lakes mountains on the south island.
The end of my stay in New Plymouth was the grant finale at the Pukekura Park with the annual Festival of Lights. I left taranakT because of upcoming two days rain to Whangamata to say goodbye to Aaron and Teo and surf the left sandbar again.
The last session was in and after a storm and I had those incredible waves with two other guys for two hours to ourselves all through wind, rain and sunshine at the end of the day. They peeled down the sandy bar for quite long and you could actually try stuff without conserning of not getting any other wave for ages. It was worth the drive and skipping Raglan once again.
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