*** UPDATING: March 12: 11:17am ***: We are not in danger of getting hit by the tsunami. It hit the US, but not us in Raglan. For our worried parents who are emailing us, we’re safe. 🙂
As we approached Raglan I felt a little trepedition, as we had only the say-so of “Tim”, met in Ahipara, who’s actually FROM Raglan, so did we get authentic advice, or hometown enthusiasm? Our first pass through town was reassuring. Cafes, restaurants, groceries… heck, they even had a Wesbank, one of the larger banks here in New Zealand. Compared to Ahipara this was a metropolis. Our arrival at the hostel itself, simply named Raglan Backpackers, was even better; rooms, both dorm and privates, are set around a courtyard which contains hammocks, small gardens, a sauna, and a hot tub. In addition to these ammenities, and free for use, are various pieces of sporting gear including kayaks and bicycles. Surfboards and wetsuits (required for non-hardened locals, for the cool water) are available for rent.
This is already our 2nd full day in Raglan and we’re enjoying every minute of it. After settling in on the first day we took some time to explore the town, try out the cafe scene, stick our collective nose into a few shops, as well as take advantage of the hostels laundry facilities.
Day two we went surfing. As we were getting set up with the boards and suits we ran into Tim, the guy we met up in Ahipara at ‘Endless Summer’. I had wondered if we would see him in Raglan, being a small town. We had heard all about Raglan from him, and had booked our stay here due to that conversation. A detail that he had omitted is that he happens to own the highest rated hostel in town, which, naturally, is where we had booked our stay. Once provisioned with our wet suits,
and surfboard strapped to the top of our car, we headed over to Ngarunui Beach. We first got Christina on the board to try and after a few successful stands, she relaxed and read on the beach while I took the board out to look for bigger waves.
I didn’t find them right away, and spent a lot of time waiting and swimming without much time surfing. After a little hunting I found some big enough to give me a push, and did get on the board a few times. I took a
break for lunch (sandwiches, from the bakery in town), then Christina had another run, which gave me a nice long break, then I had a good session before calling it a day. Our half-day rental was enough to wear me out, so we rested on the patio in front of Vinnie’s, ordered ourselves up a pretty awesome thin crust pizza, beer and smoothie. We also took advantage of the cafe’s free internet to fire out emails to the folks. We then immediately retired to our room for a little rest.
We hit the sack early, after such a busy day, and had a great sleep in our very comfortable room.
And now we’re into Day 3. A nice sleep-in is just the ticket after a long day at the beach, so that’s what we did today. Our plan for the day was to take a kayak out to the Oteke waterfall, which lies near the far end of the bay, but we couldn’t think of setting out without starting the day at a cafe with some coffee and a friand. We packed up some more sandwiches for the trip, which we estimated to last a couple of hours, along with juice and a camera.
Our first destination was what the locals call the Pancake Rocks. We snapped a few photos and pressed on to Oteke Falls, which required us to go through a pretty shallow bay, our paddles hit mud a few times, but we managed to find a rocky beach next to the falls to pull up to, have our soggy sandwiches (yes, water did get into them a bit) and take photos. The next 1.5 hours we were fighting the wind and waves back to our hostel, but we made it – exhausted, but in good spirits. We treated ourselves to a jump in the
hot tub before we washed off and started writing this very blog in the courtyard. We’ve been back and forth typing this out and chatting with our new friend, Patrick from California. It looks like we’re planning on sharing some beer with Stuart, his girlfriend Ashlen (who by the way is from Saskatoon), and Patrick. So, off we go for now…
Hey guys! Your tip sounds awesome so far! Good to hear you didn’t get any of the japan after affects in NZ. Things are going well here at the kronstal castle, I’m holding up the fort pretty well I think. I’m sad to inform you that 2 of the tenants in the building got broken into during business hours two days ago. I just the the notice yesterday but don’t worry I never let crazies up, rest assured. I actually havn’t even seen or met any of the other tenants, I have such odd work hours. But enough about me, I’m loving the site! When I read the blogs its like I’m there with you haha. I love it, keep up the good times and keep blogging 🙂
p,s. you guys are time travellers, it’s still only mar 11 here. too cool
Sweet! Surfing and kayaking. 🙂 Sounds like you guys found a pretty nice spot. I’m glad you two are safe. The earthquake was a biggie. Oh, and Dan I’m glad you found the best club sandwich haha. Too bad it’s super inconvienient to get to from Calgary!
Wishing that it was nice enough to kayak around here… Happy Friday! Err I guess technically it’s already Saturday for you guys. Looking forward to your next post.