MOTAT Aviation Hall

After switching rigs at Jucy, we drove out to Auckland's MOTAT (Museum of Transport and Technology) to see its Aviation Hall and its vintage aircraft and memorial to one of New Zealand's WWII heroes, Sir Keith Park, who commanded the 11th Fighter Group defending London during the Battle of Britain. The Aviation Hall has some dozens of aircraft, and I'll focus on just a few either new to me or of special interest.

A replica of Park's personal Hawker Hurricane, OK-1, which he
used to get around to the various airbases in his command; the
Spitfire is pretty much the emblem of the Battle of Britain, but
the Hurricane accounted for 70% of the kills, mostly among the
German bombers; part of Park's strategy was to let the Spitfires
engage and distract the German escort fighters, while the slower
Hurricanes attacked the bombers... 

The Brits' Avro Lancaster heavy bomber, somewhat similar to the
US B-24; of "Dambusters" fame

Evidently, quite a number of New Zealanders were in the RAF's
Bomber Command

A Bomber Command office

The Mosquito, aka the "Wooden Wonder," high performance
fighter/bomber; made from composite wood...kept the UK's
furniture manufacturers busy during the war

Sunderland flying boat/patrol bomber

There, beneath all the craft above 

The Solent, post-war commercial and passenger flying boat

Lockheed Electra

The Flying Flea (below)

A kit plane from the 30s

Dangerous, never popular...

DeHavilland Dragon Rapide

The US Navy's TBF-1 Avenger, standard torpedo bomber after
Midway; President George W. H. Bush flew one of these (until
shot down in central Pacific action)

About as large as a single engine plane ever got; I reckon

The Navy's Mark XIII torpedo...lots of problems

And finally a Curtiss P-40, earlier WWII US fighter

Return To Orewa Beach And Auckland; And A Different Rig

After Waipu we thought we'd return to the Tasman side and explore some coastal scenery northwest of Auckland. En route, however, we decided to spend a couple lazy days back at Orewa Beach. It was a fateful decision since it was there, at the Orewa Beach Holiday Park, that we discovered our Jucy Chaser was not connecting to the AC current at the campground. The mains, as Brits say. As our house battery dwindled and we enacted the usual conservation measures, I checked every connection that could be checked. The mains worked, the electrical cord worked, no fuses burned nor tripped; nothing got past the electrical box in the camper, however. 

A day and a half of calls to Jucy in Auckland availed nothing but promises to have someone come and look at it; and a dozen un-returned calls and messages. Saturday we decided to just drive to the Jucy facility in Auckland. The mechanic there never actually got to the electrical problem but found something else amiss in the water heater and said we'd have to change vehicles. So we unhappily spent Saturday morning at Jucy transferring all our stuff, including many improvements and additions we'd made, to the new vehicle. This all took four hours. The good news is that the "new" vehicle, identical in design and features to the old, has 40k fewer kilometers and appears much less worn on the interior. It even had a kettle. Everything, including the connection to mains, works. Plus we had the opportunity to once again go through all our stuff. 

One of the things I had wanted to see in Auckland was the MOTAT Aviation Hall, its vintage aircraft and its memorial to Sir Keith Park, Auckland native and commander of the 11th Fighter Group that defended London during the Battle of Britain. We did this and then headed south to overnight at Onewhere Rugby Football Club facility and its freedom camp. By no means our first campsite at a rugby club.

In addition to nice walks on the beach, into town, and a nice lunch,
there were some Pohutukawa trees in Orewa still in bloom

Our Saturday morning consisted of moving the contents of the left
one to the right one

Waipu Caves, 2023

Waipu Caves are a Department of Conservation site wherein, at no cost but getting your feet (or more, depending on water depth) wet, you can see glow worms in their natural habitat, without the drama and production values and costs of the commercial sites. We visited in 2014 and in 2018 and again this year. It's worth the return, especially if you like mucking around in the ick and being illuminated by worms. The water was only ankle deep this year, and we saw rather more glow worms than in the past, a whole Milky Way's worth. Alas, my little camera doesn't do dark very well, especially when the photographer has balance issues in the dark. 

Earlier in the day we were on the Tasman side of the island, sunny warm Bayly's Beach, a favorite, hoping to do some low-tide quad-cycling. Alas, the quads are no longer rented there, nor anywhere else on the beaches we've seen. Not profitable, we were told. Alas. We stopped briefly in Dargaville and decided to cross back to the Pacific coast to do the caves and worms. The island is only 50 or so miles wide at this point. After doing the caves, we spent the night at the Waipu Caves freedom campground.

Vicki exploring

The little creek that runs through the cave

Stalactites, dripping cold slime down the back of
your neck

Glow worms; click to enlarge, stare at the black for seven minutes
to let your eyes acclimate

OK, there are better pix in the 2014 and 2018 posts (and my recipe
for glow worm canapes); and on the web

Off the web

Stalagmites too (equal time)

Tane Mahuta, 2023

Our plan following Hokianga was to drive south through the Kauri forests, see old friend Tane Mahuta, the Lord of the Forest--largest of the surviving giant Kauri trees--and then spend the night at the Trounson Kauri Park campground, going out in the bush after dark to see whether we could find the elusive kiwi. 

The Kauri--second largest of trees after California's sequoias--is
now endangered by the Kauri die-back disease, which can be carried
on boots; for any of the major Kauri visit sites, you have to scrape
and then disinfect your boots using the above apparatus

Then walk across the bouncy floor that traps excess disinfectant

But then you're ready to enter...on a catwalk of course

Tane Mahuta...only 146 feet high...but it's the girth
that is staggering...the trunk is about 9,000 cubic feet...

Thought to be between 1,250 and 2,500 years old

From a second viewing stand, a bit more perspective

Us, there

Just enter "kauri" in the search box and you'll
see many of our previous Kauri experiences

Vicki demonstrates proper de-disinfectant form upon exiting

We indeed camped at Trounson and later that evening went out into the bush, in the rain, no less, looking for kiwi. Vicki's idea. After many such efforts in four long New Zealand visits, I have concluded that the kiwi is in fact a national prank, akin to the jackalope in Wyoming.