March 30, 2013
We had one more anchorage to see before heading back towards the mainland: Tryphena Harbour and its small town. It’s at the south end of Great Barrier Island, and the harbor has a few anchorages to choose from. We chose Mulberry Grove since it looked more protected than neighboring Puriri Bay.
Mulberry Grove is an easy place to anchor, but it’s a hard place to bring a dinghy because of the wide expanse of shallow water and sandbars along the shoreline. For us, this meant a long, exhausting walk carrying our dinghy up to the beach.
Once we arrived onshore, we spotted a beautiful stone and wood building next to a grove of Pohutukawa trees. It turned out to be a local restaurant, the Mulberry Grove Bistro and Bar, a cafe and bar with a general store attached. The cafe and store didn’t have much, but they did have croissants from Auckland.
After enjoying a couple of those croissants and getting some bread, we took a walk over the hill to Puriri Bay next door. Come to find out, the actual town of Tryphena is over that direction at the north end of Puriri Bay. The walk up and over a hill was beautiful, and we were rewarded with a wonderful view of the beach. We thought about walking all the way to Tryphena, but instead decided to reserve our energy for the long, dinghy-carrying walk back through the sandbar-strewn shallows.
If we ever make it back this way, we’ll plan to go ashore at high tide. For now, though, our good weather window for the long trip to the Hauraki Gulf was coming to an end, and we needed to leave the next morning. –Cyndi
