After breakfast this morning, we had to move from one establishment to another. We are now in a very charming bed and breakfast, where we have not only a comfy bed but also a nice sofa.
As soon as we had moved our luggage, we set off for Kerikeri, where there are historic buildings to see. On the way, we stopped at Haruru Falls, where the falls are horseshoe shaped.
We could have walked there from the Waitangi Treaty grounds - it's 3 hours return - or we could have taken a kayak. The river below the falls was lovely and calm, and really pretty, so kayaking would have been nice. But as time is short for us, we drove.
It didn't take very long to reach Kerikeri, a town which is not really on the coast, but has a river which makes a basin forming a safe harbour. This was the site of an old mission settlement, the second to be established in New Zealand. The original mission house, referred to now as the Kemp House, was built in 1821, and ceased to be a mission later in the century when the Church Missionary Society wanted to move the Kemp family, who were living there, to a new mission; they didn't want to go, so they bought the house and continued to live there. It is a very pretty house, in a lovely setting.
The granddaughters of the original missionary lived there until the 1970s, keeping it exactly as it was and living exactly as their grandparents had lived - candles and hurricane lamps, no running water, cooking over a wood fire. In 1974, the surviving family gave it to the New Zealand Historic Places Trust, with the original furniture, so it looks very much as it did in the 1840s. You don't often get to see a place in such an original condition, and I was completely fascinated by it. The parlour, for instance, is very Victorian but you can see they were missionaries - they didn't have expensive furniture but they did have an organ for the hymns!
Next to the Kemp House is the Stone Store, New Zealand's oldest surviving stone building.
It was built as a granary and storehouse for the mission, but wheat was not successful in the area, and it was used for general storage and became a general trading store, particularly after the house ceased to be a mission station. It was also interesting inside
and Paul spent a lot of time reading the history boards and chatting to the women there, so they sold him a multiple-access ticket to several other historic places. Off we went to look at some of these.
We started by going to look at Rewa's Village, a reconstructed pre-European Maori fishing village, which was not very different from the one we saw yesterday at the Treaty Grounds. I though the best bit was the views it gave us of the original mission station - you can also see the tiny church on the hill behind the Stone House.
We set off for the next mission station, Te Waimate Mission, at Waimate North which is only a few miles from Kerikeri. The mission is the only surviving building of an English farming village set up so the New Zealand missions could grow their own food and not have to depend on Maori people for food. The aim was also to train Maori farmers to farm in the English way. The farm was meant to grow the wheat that would be stored in the Stone House at Kerikeri. There were 3 houses, as well as a church, blacksmith, carpenter and printshops, a watermill, numerous cottages, barns stables and so on. The mission was not a success, the farm was less productive than hoped, and eventually everything fell into disrepair. Now only the church and the mission house remain.
The church is not as small as that at Kerikeri, and it has many very old gravestones.
The house is built of kauri wood, and the inside planks, which are just polished or sometimes painted, are very smooth. There is a lot of original furniture - I was particularly charmed by this rope-sprung bed. I've read about them, but I had never seen one before.
We then drove back past Piahia and to a place called Opua where there is a car ferry across to Okiato, from which it is a short drive to Russell. Russell was originally a shore station for whalers during the early 1800s and was a lawless town, being known as 'the hell-hole of the Pacific'. It is very quiet now. It was chosen to house a catholic mission, which was built in 1840. The existing building, known as the Pompallier Mission, was actually not a dwelling but a building to house a print shop and book bindery. It is not a particularly pretty building, though the garden is lovely.
Inside, there are printing presses, a leather workshop and book binding tools, and at the back is a tannery. The Maori people were very anxious for books, so it was part of this mission to supply them, by setting the type, printing and then binding them.
We returned on the car ferry, somewhat exhausted. Tomorrow, we have to start back towards Auckland.
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