January 29, 2013
After Rarawa Beach, I had one more white-sand stop in mind. Parengarenga Harbor is a natural harbor along the peninsula, nearly enclosed by the huge dune-covered sandspit named Te Kokata. There’s no real way to get out to the dunes (although a avid hiker/camper could do it), but there are a couple of spots where you can see them. We opted to go to a lookout in Paua, which meant searching out another hard-to-find, unpaved road.
After driving through grassy land and hills that reminded me very much of Santa Barbara, we parked by a decrepit barn, headed through a gate, and walked out to a point over the water. The view was amazing. We could see the big white sand dunes across the water, again looking like snow-covered hills, but the water was also striking, all shades of turquoise, teal and navy blue. It was windy here and the water covered with whitecaps. It all added up to a strange combination of Santa Barbara, a tropical lagoon, and a windy day at the north pole. So far today we’d seen two mind-bending places, and it wasn’t even 11 o’clock. –Cyndi
