Paihia --> Auckland

We are now back in Auckland, bye bye Northland! Hopefully we'll get a chance to go back to the Bay of Islands in the summer when there is better weather and a little more to do.  Paihia was really nice, a little town right on the water, very much a tourist town and holiday destination.  Lots of shops, cafes, and restaurants. Some were closing for the winter while we were there. The hostel we stayed at, the Saltwater Lodge, was nice, the work was super easy as there were 3 of us working (and 4 the last two days) and hardly any guests since its winter.  The room we got in exchange was a staff dorm, a small room with four bunks that we shared with Marie from Germany, and later Ana from France.  My task was to clean the bathrooms and communal kitchen, and Chris emptied garbage and recycling bins and vacuumed.  Our plan was to also find part time jobs while we were there, but it was too quiet.  Hopefully we'll find a place that we like over the next few weeks so we can work and make some money during the winter months.
The following are photos of our time in the Bay of Islands, its a great place to visit.

fancy pastry- strawberry lamington with cream

Oats with cinnamon apples and chia seed :)

Real coffee.. yum

half of our lovely room

Saltwater lodge Hostel

Russell- across the bay by ferry, NZ's first capitol and now a quaint holiday destination. Lots of B&Bs and cafes.

NZ's oldest church in Russell

Paihia beach, one block from our hostel

Helping out with a barbecue for a student group  at the hostel

Mangroves and boardwalk on a hike

Haruru falls

Stone Store and Rainbow Falls walk in Kerikeri, 30 min North of Paihia

WAITANGI treaty grounds:
We also visited Waitangi treaty grounds, 1 km from Paihia. It's the historic site where the Treaty of Waitangi was signed by Maori chiefs and the British settlers in 1840.  The treaty laid out the way for Maori and British settlers to come together in New Zealand.  Translation problems and different understanding about what the treaty meant for property ownership and government has been under debate even till now.  Read about it more here.
We were able to get into the grounds for free with our work visas, nice to save $50! We did pay for the cultural show and guided tour which were definitely worth it. The culture show had great traditional singing and dancing following a traditional welcome onto the Marae (I have video but its not loading to the blog at the moment...), which we've seen before, but it was still awesome.  The tour was really interesting, it was given by a woman named Denise who is an 8th generation descendant of chief Kawhiti, the first to sign the Treaty. She had a lot of interesting insight into Maori/British relations and knew a lot about her history. She also talked about the significance of the carvings on the marae and in the meeting house, everything tells elaborate stories of the tribes, even the woven panels which were to predict tide and fishing patterns.

From here we will head south/east to the Coromandel peninsula, to the Bay of Plenty and then around the East coast. After that we will be in Feilding, my hometown in 2003 (ten years ago... sheesh.) then to New Plymouth and then Taupo- a busy 4 weeks is coming up.  We will try to do a new post after each homestay we are at. We haven't helped at homestays yet, we've only been working at holiday parks and hostels/motels. It'll be a good change to stay with families in their homes.