The Far North

As promised, here are pictures from my trip up north earlier this month.

The amazing Hundertwasser Toilets in Kawakawa. I definitely felt weird going into a bathroom just to take pictures.


Doubtless Bay, where my boss Geneva grew up. Not too shabby.


The Cape Reinga lighthouse, the northernmost building in New Zealand

The water on the left is the Tasman Sea; on the right is the Pacific Ocean. Cape Reinga is where they meet.


This is little piece of land that sticks out furthest north at the top of the country. See that tree leaning over the water? According to Maori tradition, when someone dies, they leave the Earth by jumping off this tree into the water/afterlife.


Kauri trees are gigantic ancient trees found up in Northland. This staircase was carved out of the inside of just one tree. That's how huge they are.

Geneva failing to catch tuatuas on 90 Mile Beach.


More 90 Mile Beach (not actually 90 miles long). Before they built the road (and I mean literally just one road) up north, people use to drive along the beach to get there. Some people still do (we saw some vans racing along the beach at, like 7am), but it's very dangerous if you don't have the proper vehicle. I guess if you drive up there, you can sometimes see cars sticking out of the sand where they were trapped at high tide. Locals encourage tourists to use the road because all the driving has pushed the shellfish down in the sand, which is both bad for the shellfish and for fishing.