Atiu Creek Regional Park

Today we went to visit our friends Murray and Rachel and their daughter who live in the Kaipara Flats, near Warkworth. Rachel and Jessica were out giving their pony, Rainbow, a work out in one of the paddocks when we arrived.  For brunch, Murray cooked us up a delicious chorizo hash on the BBQ, with poached eggs. Very yummy. After a catch up with them we then drove north towards Wellsford, and went west to head towards the Atiu Creek Regional Park.

This park is the newest regional park in Auckland, and was gifted to the region by Perre and Jackie Chatelanet in 2005, so that the public could enjoy access to the Kaipara Harbour. It's quite a drive to get there...but well worth it as it is a beautiful part of the country and has fabulous views of the huge Kaipara Harbour.

We went on the Reservoir Walk, which took just over and hour and a half. I had wanted to go on the longer Oruawharo River Trail, but just as well we didn't, as it was a sweltering hot day and quite steep in parts of the track. We'll go back another day to do the longer walk.

Here we are at the start of the walk, overlooking the Kaipara Harbour.

Here are some images from the walk, which started off following the ridge track through a few grassy paddocks, then went down through a pine forest to the reservoir, followed by a steep up hill stretch at the end to get back to the car park.

One of the two Pou Kaitiaki (Guardians)