Hangin' 10 in Raglin

If you ready my blog yesterday, my apologies. I have more time tonight, and was appalled when I read back through it. If you have a chance, read it again as I have fixed the numerous errors that were the product of rushing.

As today was not nearly as interesting as yesterday, before I move on, here's some more about yesterday.

The kayaking trip was really an amazing time. Our guide was full of all kinds of stories about the area. For example...

HISTORY TIME WITH HUGH: The bay we were in, Mercury Bay, is so named because when Captain James Cook (I wonder if he had a hook for a hand too...) was mapping New Zealand for the first time, he was using the sun and the planet Mercury in the night sky to calculate the latitude and longitude of the region. On the night he spent in Mercury Bay, the planet was directly overhead in the night sky, hence the name. The next beach down is Cooks beach, where Capt. Cook planted the Union Jack in the soil and declared New Zealand for England. This presented a problem, however, because the Mauri were already here.

This disturbed a local Mauri Cheif named Ka, so while on an expedition in Mercury Bay, he remarked how the island Motueka, looked just like his nose (It has two caves in the side that faces the beach, that's about the extent of similarity). To most, this may have seemed like a trivial statement. However, the Mauri believed that if a land feature looked like you, or some part of you, then it was yours; along with all that could be surveyed from that particular piece of real estate. Naturally the audience of Mauri with him immediately and enthusiastically agreed. Therefore, the island is named Motueka, which translates into, "the Island of Ka." And the name of the beach (can't remember that one or find it on google maps) translates to "the breath of Ka," as the winds on that beach supposedly come from the "nostrils of Motueka"... you should see the tweezers they use to pluck THOSE nose hairs.

Mercury bay in Hahei was also used in "The Chronicles of Narnia, the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe." Down the beach a ways is a huge hill, where the castle Cair Paravel (sp?) was built. They did eight months of work and shooting, for footage that made up about 3 minutes worth of the actual movie.

Today was relatively uneventful. Hahei is on the east coast, we have now driven to Raglin on the west coast. Raglin is world renown for it's surfing. There was actually a guy who surfed a single wave at a beach here for more than 10 minutes. That's a bit of a record as you might imagine. Those who chose to could take surfing lessons, for a nominal fee. Given my level of coordination (which is about the same as a tree), I opted out, and instead spent the afternoon at the beach.

Tomorrow we spend the day at the Waitomo caves, and tomorrow night we will have a Mauri "cultural night," so I most likely will not be able to post tomorrow night.