It's Magic!

Miri and I wanted to book a Magic bus tour to Auckland when we came back from the Cape Reinga tour but the Magic bus office had just closed and we couldn’t get a hold of them. So all we could do was have a try and just go to the bus the next morning and hope that they have some space left. So we did. It was a huge forth and back but we finally could get onto the bus and took off. First stop: Hokianga, the area around the Waipoua Kauri Forest. Miri and I decided to spend the night there and take the footprints tour through the forest. We have heard a lot about it and it was supposed to be amazing!

We didn’t really have anything to do until the tour started so we just wandered around the beach a little bit and went to the iSite where they also had a little museum about the town and showed a short movie of “Opo” the dolphin who became a tourist attraction to the town in 1955. Quite a cool story!

Miri and I messing around^^

Footprints tour: We were guided by a Maori called Bill (We’re guessing that it’s not his Maori name). It started at 6 and when we got picked up the weather was just fune and sunny but as soon as we got to the forest it started to rain and all I thought was: oh man, this is not gonna be fun.. but actually it wasn’t too bad. We got umbrellas and then the tour began. Bill taught us a lot about the nature, the different creatures that live in the woods and about the Maoris and their relation to the forest. It was really interesting! We hugged trees, saw an owl, saw “Te Matua Ngahere” (Father of the Forest) and then finally “Tane Mahuta” (Lord of the Forest). Believe it or not.. this tree is about 2000 years old, 51m high and 14m in perimeter. Bill sang a song in Maori and then he told us about the Maori culture and it was just a very special moment because it was just us (the group) and the Kauri tree.

Miri hugging one of these huge trees!

Bill lighting Kauri tree gum

The next day we got picked up by the Magic bus again and had another look at Tane Mahuta.. well it really seemed bigger the night before but now we have some good pictures of the tree ;-)

Sam, Charlie and Miri in front of Tane Mahuta

The next stop was the Kauri Museum but we didn’t go inside because we only had 20 Minutes (what are they thinking??) So we just looked at the old church, the school and the post office that were near the Museum.

Miri at the old post office

Off to Auckland!