(written on April 6th from notes)
I was definitely late getting going today–no surprise given the enormous lack of sleep with the brake issues.
Several things to be grateful for.
- Grateful for the clouds that brought both rain and regular cloud cover that enabled a cooler morning for sleeping in.
- Grateful for the lack of sand flies, to be able to just enjoy the doors without the constant barrage of those little punks.
- Grateful to have a bathroom nearby in the camping area.
I veged out for a good little while, enjoyed the rain, availed myself of the toilet, and then headed out on my way.
I didn’t get very far before I decided to burn a bunch of partially wet toilet paper in the wet turnaround just before entering the camping area.
Partially wet toilet paper takes a really long time to burn. 😆 I tried to use a granola bar box to help it along, but that barely burned as well. 😆
Narrow-focused me didn’t even think about driving back to the toilet that was just 30 seconds Friends for classic New Zealand down the road to dump the toilet paper leftovers in the long drop. 🙃
Though I thought that maybe I finished my explorations of New Zealand, there were some places that I hadn’t been on the east coast of the North Island that I figured I’d go explore a little bit, so my first destination was a place called White Rock.
As I drove, I dictated journal entries and stopped occasionally for pictures.
White Rock was exactly that, a large white rock formation on the beach.
Pretty area 🙂
There was a shipwreck around a point in the area, and it was interesting enough to see if I could get there relatively simply, but when I realized it was going to involve a several kilometer walk along the beach, and it was only an old, rusty steel boat, I decided not to make the extra journey.
From there, I decided my next destination would be revisiting my favorite glow worm spot, so I began heading that direction.
On the way back from White Rock, I saw a glass bottle on the side of the road, so I turned around to go back and get it only to find that there were all sorts of bottles and cans that were hidden in the ditches. 🙃
So I gathered up several bottles and cans, mostly cans.
I stopped for gas in Masterton, and then continued journal driving, stopping here and there for more pictures.
before making an impromptu stop after seeing a sign for a historic landmark called Anzac Bridge and that piquing my curiosity.
While trying to find my way over to Anzac Bridge, I started wandering down a narrow dirt path into the bush along a creek.
After a while, I questioned whether or not I was going the right way, as the trail seemed a little bit odd to me. So I pulled out my phone and looked at the map and realized that Anzac Bridge was actually just a little ways further down the road, and I was simply at a park that happened to have a walking trail. 🙃
But that little unintended detour wasn’t a waste whatsoever, as on my walk back to the van, I happened upon this little critter. 😁
I didn’t even know New Zealand had owls. In fact, I wondered if it was an invasive species, and I might need to report the sighting.
I tried to take pictures, but it was getting later, there wasn’t much light, and the light there was happened to be exactly behind the owl. 🙃
So my pictures and videos of the cute little things are all garbage.
Super cool, though. I sent a picture over to my brother Richard to share my excitement. 😊
And, yes, New Zealand has all of exactly one native owl species, and I saw one for the first time today. 😊
Raumai Reserve, a free campground I stayed at last time I went to the Pohangina Valley Glow Worms, wasn’t too much further, so I headed that way.
It still wasn’t dark outside, so I hung out at the campground for a little while, downloading some stuff to my phone and generally just… waiting for night to come.
While considering my glow worm options, I toyed with the idea of going to my other favorite glow worm spot, The Limestone Creek Reek Reserve, but that was going to be over an hour each way, and I wasn’t too keen on another night with a significant lack of sleep. 😅
Like last time, Google Maps tried to tell me that I had to drive all the way around, something like two hours out of my way, to get to the glow worms place (Google doesn’t realize there’s a bridge over the river, so it sends you out into the middle of nowhere, to be able to come back to the other side of the river.
Fortunately, there is a bridge, so instead of driving for two hours to go something like 13 km, I just crossed the bridge. 🙃 (and as of the writing of this journal entry, I’ve updated Google Maps, provided they accept my update 🤞)
I arrived at Limestone Creek Reserve just as a few older ladies with electric lanterns were leaving, one of them telling me that the glow worms were beautiful today. 🎉
Apparently, they must have been staying nearby? as there weren’t any other cars on the road, and after leaving the little creek valley, they simply walked down the road.
There were a couple of nearby houses, so maybe they lived there?
🤷
There’s not much out here.
Anyway, before grabbing my headlamp and heading over to walk up narrow Pohangina Valley to the slot canyon where the bulk of the glow worms are, I spent a bit of time crushing can after can after can to make more room in my recycling bag. 🙃
With the walk up the little valley a known quantity this time, I wasn’t concerned about whether or not I should keep going like I was last time. I just wandered up the little narrow valley, periodically turning my headlamp off to look at the glow worms that are on the hillsides before I got to the big show at the end.
It was fun to be back with the glow worms: They make me smile. 😊
Did I mention that there was a lot less water this time, so the walk up the creek bed was much simpler. If I didn’t…
I’m not sure if there were fewer hungry glow worms this time, or if my memory incorrectly added more glow worms than were actually there, or if the magnificence was dulled a bit by the fact that it was almost a full moon, which made the sky pretty bright… whatever the case, the light show didn’t seem quite as incredible this time around.
I mean, it was still absolutely fabulous, just maybe… 70-80% of what I remember?
That got me thinking a little bit more about possibly going to the Limestone Creek Reserve, as the glow worms are inside of a cave there, so much less light pollution, but I was tired, and another three hours of staying up wasn’t quite in the cards for me tonight (not to mention relatively expensive with the current price of fuel 😅).
I hung out there for a good little while and was rather surprised to see a small eel, maybe a foot to 18 inches long, in the middle of the perhaps four-foot diameter pool of water at the base of the tiny waterfall that cascades down the dead-end portion of the slot canyon.
I was even more surprised when I watched the eel, startled by my arrival and my headlamp shining down on it, disappear into what must have been the only hole in that little pool of water. Made me wonder if somehow there’s a hole that connects to some other body of water, as the creek bed here was mostly just straight up dry, or if it’s just a hole barely big enough to fit a young eel into.
Either way, it looked as though the eel straight up disappeared into the ground like magic. ✨
Fun stuff 😊
Unfortunately, I didn’t get a picture of the eel, but here’s an upward view of the slot canyon dead end.
And here’s a picture of this not so little guy that was in the same little pool as the eel at the bottom of the waterfall trickle. 🙂
I spent a good little bit of time hanging out there at the end of the Pohongina Valley slot canyon, headlamp off, enjoying the magic of the place. I think I spent a fair bit more time there this time than last time.
Hard to go.
Wish I had loved ones with me to share it with.
I spent a bit of time working on my journal catch-up efforts before veging out during my normal nightly wind down and then crashing.
Lift the world.
Bring it on.
~ stephen
Lift the World 