Leigh

So after I parted from Brian and Naomi, I took the Naked Bus out to Warkworth, the closest stop to Leigh and where my flatmate Maia lives. Her mum picked me up and we chatted the whole way out to their house just outside of Leigh.

I think visiting people at their homes has been my favorite part of traveling; there's just something to be said about staying with a family that gives you the full cultural effect or what not. Plus Maia's family is awesome! So in Maia's family it's her, her mom, three younger brothers and her step dad. Her brothers are quite a bit younger (between a couple months and 4) so it was fun to play with little kids after not really seeing any for a while. Plus little kids with accents are ridiculously cute. Luke, the oldest, was such a flirt! Mace (second youngest) was just a cute little two year-old, and then the littlest baby, whom they just call peanut, is...well...a peanut!

I only got to stay with them for about two days but it was good to see one of my flatmates while I was traveling, and before I left the country. It was kind of like a vacation from vacation because I got to just sit and chat with them for the most part. On Friday after the boys had been dropped at preschool, we went out to Mangawhai Heads reserve. It's a long stretch of beach that's absolutely gorgeous. If the South Island is known for mountains, then the North Island is definitely known for beaches. Even though it was winter the weather was really good for just wandering up and down the coast. The sand was white and fluffy and there were tons of rock pools to explore. There was this really unique thing about the beach: it was all white sand except for this one little strip of beach that joined the hills.
Right at that area it turned into black sand for some strange reason. And if you dug around under the white sand it came up black underneath. I couldn't find a good explanation for why it was like that, maybe it had something to do with this stream that cut through the beach down to the ocean. Perhaps the stream carries black soil from the hills and it gets molded into the sand or something. Anyway, it looks really cool as you can see the black strip in the picture above.
All along the beach, and we walked probably a good mile of it, were these clusters of rock. We'd come at low tide, but you could see where the tide washed up and would make rock pools for little sea creatures to live. We hunted around in each one we went to but didn't see much of anything. On the way back through the rocks I stopped at one pool. A little glimmer of color had caught my eye, it stood out all the more because it was rather a grey day. It was a really little pool, only about a foot long and probably only six inches deep, but there was this tiny purple anemone. Even if it was tiny I was still excited to see some sea life! I'm sure there's more out when it's warmer in the summertime.

Maia even told me about a marine sanctuary where you could do dives, and go on glassbottom boats etc. Her mom, Kat, just said that if you took a bag of frozen veggies out to the sanctuary and dropped them in the water you could see plenty of sea life. Something I'll have to try if I ever make it back to New Zealand.

Strangely enough, my stay in Leigh was probably the only time I didn't have my camera out taking pictures of every little thing. It was a fun relaxing time hanging with my flatmate. We did dinner at the restaurant where she and her stepdad work, and then went home and did a ton of baking which thrilled me to no end! Then I had to get up early on Saturday to catch a bus up to Kaitaia. I was sad to leave them, and wish I had had more time to hang out and see more stuff, but with just over 2 weeks left in New Zealand I was on a schedule to pack as much ridiculous fun in as I could.  Till next time!