Having made it to the far north, it was now time to turn south, down the west side of the North Island, also called the Kauri Coast for the last remaining stands of the gigantic ancient trees. The west coast in the Northlands is wetter and more sparsely populated than the east. Driving up and down the hilly country roads reminded me of back roads in Mendo or Humbolt Counties, and I suspect a similar cash crop may be grown, but not in the same quantities. It was misty farmland, and my camera couldn't quite capture the serene loveliness of it. After about two hours, we arrived on the north side of the broad Hokianga Harbor, in the tiny village of Kohukohu. We had coffee and lunch at the cozy Waterline Cafe.
It was a brief wait for the tiny car ferry to transport us across to Rawene, at pop.515 a veritable metropolis. Muchas gracias to the ferry staff for jump-starting the rental car after I left the lights on for the crossing (tiny, tiny battery!).
The drive continued uneventfully to the mouth of the harbor at Omapere,
on down through the sub-tropical rainforest to the last lair of the ancient giant Kauri trees. The biggest is 
who looks like this.
The WIDEST is
Definitely a chubby hunk of cellulose, I would say.
A popular quartet of trunks from the same roots made me think of home and family.
The day-long drive continued South. Our final destination was the highly touted and quite expansive Kauri Museum in Matakohe. It is dedicated to all things Kauri: from large milled planks,
to fine furniture like this armoire
and conference table,
to oddities, like the Kauri bathtub the Kiwi lumberman made for his wife.
There were oodles of machinery and milling equipment (we could do a similar thing in Fort Bragg with the mammoth old redwood sawmill). There even was a complete boarding house recreated inside the museum. And would not have been complete without a room full of kauri gum and amber.
Dusk was nigh, time to turn in after a full day in the Northlands.
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