Tinirau

Continuing on with the next leg of our holiday we left Auckland on my parents boat, the 35 ft Tinirau. Their boats name means "Guardian of the fishes" in Maori, however that doesn't quite apply, they catch more than they guard!

We motored to the end of the Waitemata Harbor to Ponui Island. I had never been there before and am a little biased when it comes to boating having spent my childhood on boats in the Bay of Islands. Ponui was a pleasant surprise. Some very nice beaches, undeveloped, and only 90 minutes by boat. In fact you can see Auckland on the distant horizon, especially the lights at night. It's amazing to be somewhere relatively remote and yet see "civilization".

Anyway, we had a great barbeque on the beach, drank far to much wine and had an excellent night. Or we did until the wind cam up and changed direction. We moved very early in the morning ...