Sand Tobogganing, the Almighty Sand Dunes ( Plus Cape Reinga and Ninety Mile Beach)

Wow!! What an amazing day we've had today!! It's been the first really touristy thing we've done and it was ace!! We set off at nine this morning heading north to the cape, stopping off at the kauri exhibition/shop place, and the gumdiggers museum/thing. At both we got to witness trees that had been carbondated as 45000 years old. I personally can't comprehend something like that, but perhaps to put it in better terms, they have been through 5 ice ages. After these we headed up the highway to Cape Reinga - the northern most point of NZ, and saw the tree where the maori people believe the spirits begin their journey to the underworld. Plus youcan see where the Tasman and South Pacific meet. The views were amazing - many pics. We then went back on ourselves (well we had to really didn't we?!!) and went off down a rather windy road to a little bay for lunch. It was very pleasant. But the best was yet to come!! Sand tobogganing!! yeah baby, it was fantastic. The size of the dunes was unbelievable, i was expecting ones maybe twice the height of the blackpool dunes (duh!). These ones were, i don't know, over 5/6 times the height at least (I'm not good at estimates, so excuse me if that's wrong). Our driver Dennis (who was fab) told us the tallest were about 150 metres. We climbed up the side with our little blue toboggans, and plunged down again at amazing speed, sometimes only just managing to stay out of the stream at the bottom. If you ever get the chance you have to go. Then, alas, it was back on the bus and on to 90 mile beach (no more alas), which is apparently only 64 actual miles in length. We drove along the sand for 50 miles, stopping at points to firstly pick up our tea of clams, digging around the edge of the surf to find the little treasures (sally also managed to bag a crab, but he was released safe and sound - fear not!!), and secondly to witness a car that had got stranded 3 weeks earlier. It's half buried in the sand now. Don't worry we have pics of that too. Dennis sang us a few songs as we cruised along the sand, and eventually we turned of the beach, back on to the highway, and arrived back in Kaitaia about ten to 5. The clams are currently spitting out their sand and will soon be satisfying our hunger. Hope you are all well. Tarra for now. xx