08-Dec-2016 -- As we were visiting New Zealand for a wedding it was too good a chance to miss to try and bag a point and extend the "map". We were restricting our travel to the northern part of the North Island and I was a bit concerned to see that most required serious effort. On this occasion I was looking for an easy one! 36S 174E seemed a good option.
Having arrived at 5 am in Auckland after a long flight we had a cleanup and then set off for the point on the way to the wedding location at Russell on the Bay of Islands. We took State Highway 1 up to Brynderwyn (are we in Wales?) then west onto SH 12 to Ruawai and then north on minor roads to the point. Working from a Google Earth screenshot and the narrative of the previous 5 visits we came to the point from the south.
We called at the nearest house to the farmyard and were told by the landowner/farmer that he had been there for about 5 years but had heard about the point from the previous owner (I wonder if DCP adds value to your land – or detracts maybe!). He said we were welcome to visit and after a 5-10 minute walk along muddy tracks and crossing 2 fences we were at the point without getting our feet wet. The land is all grass and used for dairy cattle – no doubt contributing to the large volume of exported powdered milk.
After the visit we went back to the car and visited the largest Kauri tree “Tane Mahuta” – Maori for “Lord of the Forest” – an impressive 5 metres in diameter and then on to Russell.