Started early and walked 16km from Paihia to Russell via beaches, boardwalks through mangroves, tracks through kiwi country (if they had been awake we would have seen them but being nocturnal little animals they didn’t come out and say hello).
We crossed the bay on the vehicular ferry, saw where the first Europeans settled, The first capital of New Zealand (Okiato) and saw our first Pukeko (cute, rare NZ bird) and continued walking until we got to the Duke Of Marborough Hotel where we had a well deserved drink.
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| Pukeko - a very rare bird in NZ. Since we rarely see birds (other than seagulls) they all seem rare but this has such a cute name, I am sure it's rare. |
Caught the ferry from Russell to Paihia and had dinner at Jimmy Jacks Ribs again because it was Sunday night and the beginning of the tourist season and not many restaurants were open. They love us there now, we can tell, because we got half price beer and wine and free chocolate sundaes for dessert. We had a very peaceful day which turned out to be a great day to do the walk because a cruise ship came in and 4,000 tourists arrived in Paihia while we were away. That put a smile on the tour guides faces. Had another ice cream and went to bed fairly early.
