Farewell Spit

The “main event” of my visit to Takaka is Farewell Spit, a long piece of land at the top of South Island.  It was a little hard to coordinate the dates of the daytrip because it has to fit in with the outgoing tide and daylight hours.  Eg. on a certain day, it may start at 0600 and then shift progressively to 0700, 0800 etc until 1400.  Then it will not run for a few days because the ideal time tide-wise coincides with darkness.

My visit to the region coincided with a very civilised departure of 1330.  After a mid-morning cuppa, I drove to Collingwood, the starting point of my excursion.  The place was smaller and less “happening” than I thought.  So, I sat on the beach around midday and had my picnic lunch before killing time around town.

Boarding the modified minibus, it was apparent that most guests were oldies.  I guess at NZD160 for the tour, young backpackers wouldn’t be that ready to sign up.  I felt that I could justify the trip as the airfare was nearly free for me.

First stop on the trip was Cape Farewell, the absolute northernmost part of the South Island.  Due to the orientation of the land, the actual spit wasn’t actually as northerly.  It was a beautiful spot with the rolling land stopping suddenly, dropping into cliff and the blue sea.

From there, we continued to the spit “proper”.  Starting on the near-end of the southern side, we drove and bird-watched on the mud flats.  We crossed using a track through the native forest to the northern side where it was more sandy and drove the entire length to the lighthouse at the far end.

The running commentary by Pino, our Swedish-born guide was very informative:

• I was reminded that New Zealand (despite being so green and beautiful) is about 92% deforested of its native forest.
• The spit is growing at a rate of 2 to 4m per year.
• There used to be a jetty near the lighthouse but the area is now too shallow for ships to approach.
• She also knew a lot of the local and migratory birds that we saw.  A lot of them were wading birds making the most of the large expanse of sand and mud that’s rich in food during low tide.  Others hunt by plunging into the sea for their sustenance.

As we approached the lighthouse, we could see the distinctive conical shape of Mt Taranaki / Egmont across in North Island.  We also saw the carcass of a dead whale.  Its jawbone had been removed according to Maori custom.  We were told it wasn’t too smelly today.

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At the lighthouse around 1630,  we stopped for about 45 mins for coffee/tea, muffin and biscuits at the old lighthouse-keeper’s quarters.  We learnt about the lighthouse-keeper’s life and how mental health was actually a big issue due to the isolation and loneliness.

More interesting to me was the technological advancement of the light:  It began with fuel lamps, then electric lamps which required high-powered cabling from civilisation faraway, then reducing to domestic style power supply as the bulbs got more efficient.  Finally, we now utilise solar-powered LED.

Our return journey requires backtracking on the northern side.  The southern side is more muddy and interspersed with vegetation.  But it was our lucky day.  Pino and her colleague decided to throw in an extra for us.

They took us to the gannet colony nearby.  It’s possibly the only gannet colony that’s located nearly at sea level rather than on a cliff or outcrop.  I was surprised by how large the colony was as we observed it from afar.  Well, it was indeed lucky for us as this site (perhaps in greater detail) is an inclusion on another tour but today we got a taste of it for free.

Last stop on the trip was a walk on the largest sand dunes in the area.  The dunes do change and move depending on the wind conditions.  With the evening sun, it was quite scenic with the shadows.

Pino described our day as exceptional as the weather had been sunny, still and clear; and we had a good sighting of bird life including godwits leaving for their 9-day flight to Alaska (which is supposedly a once-in-a-lifetime sighting).  Today is “as good as it gets”, she said.  The area can often be very too windy.

I left promptly at the end of the tour back to Autumn Farm.  I was famished and heated leftover pizza from last night in the microwave before crispening them on a pan.  Alan, a camper in the campground offered me some rose wine which went nicely with my dinner.