Karamea

Bruce and I had heard a bit about Karamea from others who have been here and thought the place was wonderful, so it was definitely on our “must visit” list. So here we are, for a few days to explore, and the area has not disappointed. We stayed at the Memorial Domain Camp and the hosts have made us very welcome, and provided a lot of information about the area. The camp backs on to a stopbank of the Karamea River. This river is like all those in the area – a deep chocolate brown colour from all the tannins leeching out of the abundant bush in the catchment area. The stop bank provides a great area for walking the dogs and leads down to a sandy estuary which will be the site for our fishing later today. The stop bank also provides a great vantage point for watching the beautiful sunsets.

Our motorhome was too high to venture into the Kahurangi National Park to visit the local attractions – the Oporara and Moira Arches, and the Crazy Paving, and Box caves, so we hired a car from an enterprising local, left the dogs at home, and went off to explore.

First visit was to the two caves. The road in to all these attractions was narrow, steep, winding and gravel road, which overall was in pretty good condition but a bit tricky when you strike traffic coming the other way. The bush surrounding the road was thick and probably virgin bush. The caves were right at the end of this road. We went into the Box cave first. It was pretty large, and came complete with limestone stallectities and stalagmites, but no fancy lighting such as at Waitomo. Good torches were a necessity.

The Crazy paving cave is called that because the floor of the cave has sediment that has dried out into shapes, much like mud does in a drought. Scientists think this is something special.

This cave was not as spacious as the Box cave, and Bruce had to watch his head! We then headed a few kilometres back down the road to the walking tracks to the two arches. The Oporara Arch was first on our tour and was about 1.5kms into the bush. The track was pretty good for the most part, and the arch was certainly impressive. It is reputed to be the biggest limestone arch in Australasia at 218 metres in length, 43 metres high and 79 metres long. It is big enough that the photos do not do it justice, and it was certainly awe inspiring.

We walked back to the carpark and had lunch which earned us a lot of interest from a local weka. They are tame enough that they will take a morsel from your hand, but we took care not to feed it.

We then took the path to the Moira Arch. Again, for the most part, the track was in good condition, but access to the arch was through a small cave, clambering down over boulders while holding on to a chain fastened to the wall. The photo below is looking back from the arch to the light source where we entered.

The arch itself is not as big as the Aporara Arch but much prettier.

The rock formations inside the arch almost look like the pancake rocks at Punakaiki, but there were also plenty of stallectites.

We wandered back to the carpark and were kept company for part of the walk by a little South Island Robin, and there were lots of little wrens around, but they were too  quick and shy to get a photo of.

At the end of our walks we still had a bit of time so we ventured further north to the base of the Heaphy Track. I was quite keen to do the Nikau Walk and was very glad we did. The scenery was very different – the road followed the sea which had beautiful white, soft sand but huge breaking waves. Not nearly so much driftwood here, and what was here was generally huge fallen trees, rather than forestry debris.

The Nikau walk itself was pretty short, and through totally different territory than the other walks we had done. The nikaus were certainly plentiful, and the ground was covered with old fronds, rather than the lush forest floor we had become used to. We had to cross a swingbridge to get to it and that was a bit of fun.

At the end of that we decided to head back and check on the dogs. However, we cannot be anything but amazed at the beauty of the land around us, its diversity, and how we have the freedom to get out there and enjoy it – what a privilege!.