December 2012
One of the best ways to see Whangarei is to head up to the Mount Parihaka Lookout for a panoramic view of the city and the river going out to the ocean. You can hike, or you can cheat and drive up. We opted to cheat and drive up, figuring we could always do the hike later.
Unfortunately the area around Whangarei was close enough to us in Opua to fall into the “we can always do that later” category. “Later” has a nasty habit of becoming “never.” Thus, we ended up seeing almost all of Northland (everything north of Auckland) except some areas near Whangarei.
Whangarei Heads, Chapman’s Clock Museum, Native Bird Recovery Center, Mair Park, Bream Head, Longview Estate Winery, and McGregors Bay are all still waiting for “later.” –Cyndi
