Hokianga

Story by Karen Walker
Photos by Mikhail Gherman

Last autumn, four of us (me, my husband Mikhail, friend Katie and dog Turkey) visited Hokianga Harbour in New Zealand’s far north. I’d never been there before. My impression of it, from an ever reliable urban legend, was that nothing much happened there beside marijuana farming; to the point that if you parked your car down a quiet road and went for a walk in the bush you’d risk coming back to find a dope plant placed menacingly on your bonnet or, even worse, that if you wandered too far into the bush and stumbled into unwelcome territory it wasn’t altogether out of the question that you’d come face to face with a couple of guys with AK47s guarding their patch.

What I found to be the reality of Hokianga was that it actually doesn’t feel all that tough or intimidating and it has more than its fair share of hippies and drop outs.

One of the things in the hippies’ favor is that where there are hippies there’s usually great organic fruit and vegetables and some pretty good home made carrot cake and, sure enough, Rawene has an amazing organic fruit and vegetable shop. Both Kohu Kohu and Rawene have brilliant little cafes built on stilts over the water with fantastic herbal teas and good coffee.

The best meal of the trip, however, would have to have been in Kawa Kawa. 10:30 on a Friday night can be grim time to stop in a small town but Kawa Kawa proved to be the exception to the rule. Not only does it have one of New Zealand’s greatest national treasures - the public toilets designed by the artist Hundervasser (seriously) - but directly across the road from them the takeaway bar offered a truly delicious tomato toasted sandwich and a Michelin star worthy potato fritter. Entertainment was courtesy of the local kids who were running races up and down the main street, which also happened to be part of State Highway 1.

An hour past Kawa Kawa, is the gorgeous little town of Kohu Kohu. It manages to be quaint and adorable while at the same time a little bit spooky. The attractions include dozens of stately villas from a century ago (when the region was thriving on Kauri timber and Kauri gum), a great little burger bar, and an excellent cafe as well as a fabulous little charity shop.

A short car ferry ride over the harbour to Rawene is the most convenient as well as the most charming way to get from one side of the harbour to the other. Here, it’s worth a stop at Wardy’s Fruit and Veggies Emporium which has a great range of organic produce displayed in big old wicker baskets plus a wall of tatty old second hand books in the back (oddly out of place but it works). In Rawene, there is the gorgeous Boatshed Cafe where we inadvertently did a dine and dash that went unnoticed until I went back the next day to pay. Also worth a visit are the historic jail cells, which were actually quite eerie and a typical small town junk shop.

The weekend we happened to be in town, Rawene was holding it’s inaugural ‘Great Hokianga Film Festival’ with showings in the Rawene Hall and the Moria Marae. ‘Come and celebrate our stories past and present’ is what the program promised. We drove out of town to the Marae on the Saturday night and it was one of the most magical movie viewings of my life with a hundred or so of us cosied up in the meeting house - an old building with elaborate ceiling, paintings and photos of elders lining the walls and mattresses laden with colorful blankets and pillows down one wall. They looked cozy as anything but being visitors we thought it more polite to stick to the wooden benches until invited to do otherwise. The audience was a mix of the local tribe and the local organic brigade. Of course, everyone knew everyone else and, adding to the bond, almost all of them were wearing big fluffy homemade sweaters - a real rarity these days. It was enough to release the inner craft fanatic in me, which is never far from the surface at the best of times. The $5 entry fee was money well spent. There were six or seven newsreels courtesy of the film archive dating from 1902 (the second oldest film in New Zealand) to the 60’s. They covered varied items of interest for the area such as Royal visits, the Maori Battalion (both leaving for and returning from the war - timely with it being ANZAC weekend), visits to the back of beyond by the local district nurse and, the highlight for me, the incredibly shot news reel about the felling of a giant Kauri for a Waka to celebrate the centenary of the Waitangi Treaty.

Keeping in theme with the giant Kauri, we couldn’t leave Northland without a visit to Tane Mahuta – an ancient, giant and sacred Kauri tree. It was my first visit and it was awe-inspiring. The highlights beyond the tree itself were the little old caravan in the car park selling toasties and postcards and the sign by Tane Mahuta itself instructing that there was to be no busking or soliciting. The foot of an ancient and sacred Kauri tree seems an odd location for either but they obviously had had some problems in the past, which makes the mind boggle at just what exactly was being solicited.

A drive right around the harbour itself is well worth taking. The little settlements of Opononi is adorable and you must stop here to see Opo the Dolphin’s grave. When you hit the coast a little further down the road, stop at the outlook to take in the harbour, the sea and the extraordinary sand dunes on the other head. It is well worth a few minutes. Almost everywhere you drive around this region you see little white churches dotted around on hillsides. They look so picturesque and are usually unlocked so you can just wander on in. They’re a constant reminder of the history in this area and the remoteness it must have felt when it was in its prime.

In terms of shopping, the two most intriguing things I bought whilst in Hokianga were a visit to the maze maze (ie - a labyrinth of corn) and a tarot reading. Not at the same place but they do have a definite link in their mood and feel. The labyrinth was, like most good road trip discoveries, a hunch on seeing a roadside sign. The side road itself was delightful. Loose gravel, golden poplars and willows, a fantastic old church with peeling paint. At the labyrinth Louis, the proprietor who appeared from his hexagonal tree house feeling shop where he sold an array of puzzles, greeted us. The ultimate puzzle was solving his labyrinth - clearly a labor of love with every maze plant being planted by him every single year. He clearly was truly passionate about his puzzles and took great pride in watching us fumbling about the maze, me intent on solving it, Mikhail bored and restless and Katie a bemused mix of the two. I think our dog was the most interested in the labyrinth of all of us as she frequently disturbed families of quail, which she loves to chase. After finally completing the thing we duly accepted our prize, a lollipop, and hit the road.

Louis had recommended Di down the road for antiques but without his hint we definitely would have stopped anyway after seeing her roadside sign declaring ‘ antique linen’ - a shared passion for two out of four of us in the car and since I was driving there wasn’t going to be any argument about whether we stopped or not. Not only was Di’s spare room enough to bring on a mild hyperventilation attack in anyone with a thing for antique linen and embroidery but she also must surely have been the high priestess of the local hippies and was setting up a spiritual retreat in her home. She was also a self-declared gypsy and she put me in a trance, aligned my chakra (still not quite sure what this is exactly) and then read my tarot and my stones. I learned more about her than she about me when I pulled from her velvet pouch of gypsy stones not an indicator of my future but her packet of Zig-Zag cigarette papers. By then, we’d all munched away on her special home made ANZAC cookies and when I asked if perhaps they had a little something special of her own mixed in with them she seemed genuinely disappointed they didn’t and as we drove out of Di’s driveway I could see her making some sort of hippy peace sign with both hands in the rear vision mirror.

Hokianga Hot Spots

Kohu Kohu

Waterline Cafe
09 405 55 52

Surrounding Area

The lookout on the southern head of the harbour - great views of sea, harbour and almost alien looking sand dunes on the other head.

Tane Mahuta - no visit to northland complete with out this. Take note of the sign at the foot of it though asking you not to busk or solicit. The mind boggles.

Opo’s grave
Opononi

Labyrinth Woodworks and Maze
647 Gorge Road, Waiotemarama, 09 405 45 81

Moirai Spiritual Studio and Antique Linen Shop
Waipoua Forest, Hokianga

Hokianga Brewery - New Zealand’s smallest brewery
Waimauku

Rawene

The Boatshed Cafe
09 405 77 28

Wardy’s Fruit and Vegies Emporium
09 405 77 17