We got up at 07:30 and went out to seek breakfast. We tried Third Wheel Coffee, a place which had the best online reviews and which my wife wanted to try. They didn’t have a full cafe service on the weekend, only take-away coffee and a selection of baked goods. They have some slices, sweet and savoury muffins, banana bread, and an “almond croissant white chocolate blondie”. I tried this last one, which seemed to be a blondie inspired by the marzipan and almond flakes on a croissant. It was dense and sweet with almond paste and chunks of white chocolate. My wife had a slice of the banana bread, which was also very dense and cake-like, with choc chips and walnuts in it.
She also bought a piece of the coffee caramel slice to give to her mother and sister to try. We returned to our room at the motel, where we saw them emerging, and she gave them the slice to try. Then we packed our bags and checked out. We had to wait a little bit for the other two to be ready and check out too, and then loaded up the car.
For our first port of call we drove over to Kerikeri, a town about 20 minutes away, where there was a farmer’s market on in the morning. We got a parking spot very close and explored the market, which was not very big at all, having maybe 20 stalls. One of them was a woman in a caravan selling toasted sandwiches, and one listed in the menu was a Reuben toasty, which sounded good to me as a savoury second breakfast after the almond blondie. So I got one of those while the others explored. my mother-in-law had been craving a banana since yesterday and found a stall selling fresh bananas by the bunch. She asked if she could just buy one, and the man gave her one free of charge!
Having exhausted the market faster than expected, we went looking for a cafe so they could all get coffee. We found Cafe Zest & The Waffle Room, where my sister-in-law also got a blueberry muffin since she hadn’t eaten anything yet except half the caramel slice. As we were leaving, my wife’s younger nephew and his partner arrived. They took our table since they wanted to get spree breakfast too. And as we walked back to the car we passed the older nephew and partner coming towards the cafe too.
Back in the car, we backtracked out of Kerikeri the way we’d come to check out an arts and crafts market that I’d spotted on the way in. It was also right across the road from the Makana Chocolate Factory, which my sister-in-law had wanted to visit as well, so we went for a look in there too. The market was in a large old industrial building of some sort, with internal divisions into workshops, store rooms, and one large cooler room, but now mostly converted into spaces for market stalls. There were a few dozen stalls, as well as a bustling cafe and a butcher and cheesemonger. My wife got an orange and date scone from he cafe and I picked up their “famous Kerikeri cheese scone” for a later snack.
Across the road at the Makana Chocolate Factory we walked into a pleasantly air conditioned display room, which looked into a production room where a couple of workers were hand-finishing chocolate truffles. Another woman gave us free samples of their macadamia butter toffee crunch and an orange fruit jelly. The macadamia crunch was amazingly good, and she said it was their biggest seller by far. My wife bought a box of it as a gift for our friends back home for looking after Scully for us while we are on this trip.
Next we drove out to the old Stone Store, a historic building begun in 1832 and now the oldest stone building in New Zealand. Originally a storehouse, it now houses an antiques and knick-knacks shop. We parked across the river and had to walk across a bridge to reach it. It was a pleasant and scenic walk, with beautiful views up and down the river, flanked by lawns and gardens. On the way back across the river we saw some pūkeko (a.k.a. Australasian swamphens) with young, feeding them. And as we left the car park, we saw our nephews and their partners arriving to go see the Stone Store too.
Next stop for us was Rainbow Falls, another five minutes’ drive away. Here there was a short walk to a series of three lookout spots above the falls. There was also a path down to the river below, but we didn’t bother walking down there as we had another sight to see and were running out of time.
We drove another 20 minutes north-west, down narrower roads ending with a length of dirt road in a heavily forested steep-sided valley. Here was the Puketi Forest Kauri Walk, a short boardwalk track through a stand of enormous kauri trees. As we followed the narrow dirt road down the hillside into the valley, we came across a tour bus ahead of us, and it had to pass another one coming the other way! We’d hoped to have the forest walk to ourselves, but it looked like we might have to share it with a whole bus full of tourists.
Fortunately the bus group took some time to get organised and we took off down the boardwalk ahead of them. We were never among the group, but we could hear the tour leader talking to them all over an amplified loudspeaker the whole time, even when we couldn’t see them through the dense trees. We could also here many birds high in the canopy above us, but never saw any. The forest was dense with ferns and trees, and after walking some way we came across the kauri trees, which were enormous. Huge thick trunks several metres across, towering high into the sky above. They were incredibly impressive, with only the giant Californian redwoods which we’d seen before on a trip to the USA able to compete with them.
Finished with the walk, we returned to the car to set off on the drive back to Auckland. We only backtracked a short way to the nearest intersection and then continued along the dirt road past the paved road we’d come in on. This road continued for several kilometres before eventually becoming paved again. We were headed south on Highway 15, rather than 1 which we had come north most of the way to Paihia on. This route led west around Whangerai instead of through it. It was a slightly longer route, but much more scenic and winding.
We stopped at the first town we came to for lunch, Kaikohe. This was not a big town, and being a Sunday nearly all the shops along the main street were closed. The only place we saw open for food was the Kaikohe Bakehouse, which was doing a roaring trade with people entering and leaving almost non-stop. It boasted an eclectic menu, offering American hot dogs, nachos, butter chicken and another type of Indian curry with rice, Japanese chicken katsu, a range of Chinese stir-fried dishes and fried rice and noodles, and steak, lamb chops, pork roast, and other European style dishes. Oh, and French toast! They also had a range of meat pies, including a butter chicken one which I selected for my lunch. And rows of cabinets full of delicious-looking cakes and slices! My pie was excellent, and I was very tempted by many of the sweets, but decided I’d had plenty of sugar on this trip already so I stayed strong and didn’t get anything.
Hitting the road again, we continued driving on the scenic Highway 15 south until we reached the junction with Highway 1. We stopped near here to fill the car with petrol, at a cost of NZ$82 for about 28 litres. Further along we stopped at the Dome Forest Lookout Walkway, which I thought would have a scenic lookout spot near the car park. But when we looked at the information sign, it said the lookout spot was a 40 minute walk away! We didn’t have time to spare, so we only stay long enough to stretch our legs. But my mother-in-law spotted a New Zealand pigeon in a tree and I spent a few minutes getting a photo.
We arrived back in Auckland just after 18:00. We grabbed a car parking spot in the Wilson car park next door to the hotel we had booked and then checked in. This gave us just enough time to freshen up and change before heading to for dinner, which was booked for 19:00 at Soul Bar & Bistro, on the Auckland Harbour waterfront.
We walked down as a group and found the restaurant facing the picturesque harbour and yacht moorings. The place was decorated all in pink for a special pink theme, with rosé wines featuring on the menu and also some special pink desserts. All the staff were wearing pink as well. We had a very friendly and helpful waitress who cheerfully took our orders. I had the John Dory fillet with Pernod romesco, cherry tomatoes, olives, and almonds, while my wife chose the corn and ricotta tortelli with jalapeño and zucchini. And for dessert I had a Snickers sundae with peanut whipped cream and chewy caramel. The meals were excellent, although honestly I slightly preferred last night’s meal.
After this we returned to our hotel for the night, walking along the beautifully lit main streets of Auckland, to spend our last night of the trip.
