We pull off the Town Basin Marina dock with our friends on Q2 (Lewis, Sara and baby Skye) following us to a new anchorage, Urquharts Bay. A beautiful, wide bay with lots of moorings and local boats. This anchorage gave us access to many hikes and is located at the mouth of the Whangarei river. Despite how busy it was we secured a place all by ourselves.
Mount Manaia
Mount Manaia, Mt. Lion, Bream Head, and the Hen and Chickens, are scattered remnants of andesite, volcanic intusions that erupted 16-22 million years ago. They are part of a 50km 2 (19 sq mi) stratovolcano that extended to the Hen and Chickens.
This is a sacred place for the Maori. In former times, Maori placed the remains of their important chiefs on the tops of these rocks. It is believed that the craggy peaks represent an important chief’s family who were turned to stone in a dispute over the infidelity of his wife.
The left arrow shows how high I went and the right arrow shows how high Matt, Rich and Michelle got (they rock climbed the last 20′).
Mt. Manaia is blanketed by native bush and has jagged peaks that jet up into the sky. The entire area is a protected reserve which has a very well maintained track to the summit.
A Little Bit of Crazy
Our friends on Pogeyan (Rich and Michelle) invited us to go on this crazy steep hike up Mount Manaia. We dragged Q2 along with us (even 3 month old baby Skye came along). Matt and I had not been hiking in almost a year and I was a wee bit nervous to say the least. Rich said it was a short hike (a little over an hour to the top), but it is straight up – a total vertical incline with over 800 steps peppered in to help you get up the super steep parts. Yikes!
As we begin our journey our little pack slowly starts to split up. Matt takes off, in flip flops no less, and leads the way, the other two guys are behind him for most of the trail. Us ladies take it at a “more leisurely pace” and rest periodically as I am totally out of shape!
They installed really nice stairs over the super steep parts of the trail. Every 100 steps there is a small mark, but I don’t believe it so I count myself. I was spot on up to 600 steps but then things got wonky and I ended up wit 1226 stairs to the summit whereas the markers had 1136 steps. Hmmm. I had 2 other witnesses so I am going with my number of 1226 – which is a lot of stairs!
The Summit
After an hour we reach the platform and hope to find Matt. And wouldn’t you know he found a crevice to hang out in….can you see him in the far left photo or the top right photo?
Michelle and I at the platform summit – I’m so happy to be sitting down.
The unbelievable views….
I’m guessing these are the children in the fable….
The Pinnacle on the Summit
We continue on around the corner from the platform summit. Rich says we are not at the top yet. So, we carry on and do a few rock scrambles. At this point my legs are burning. I made it to the 2nd highest point but couldn’t carry on so Matt, Michelle, and Rich did the last 20′.
The views were spectacular. I wish I had the power to go up the last section but I had to save my reserves for the climb down.
We saw lots of beautiful Kauri trees and this beautiful stone archway.
At the end of the day we hiked up 1226 stairs or 104 floors, 4.1 miles and 9,759 steps. The numbers don’t seem so impressive when you break it down. But it was a hard earned workout!
Our blog posts run 10-12 weeks behind actual live events. This blog post occurred in late January. Did you read about our new set of wheels in our last blog post?