Although Jeanette has a house in Paihia (as well as Auckland and Bern, Switzerland) we arrange to meet for lunch in Russell. We take the ferry to Russell, and have a bit of time up our sleeves so quickly jump on a 45 minute minibus tour. There is certainly a lot of flash looking craft in the harbour - but this picture is taken to capture a nice bit of blue sky.
You can start to get a sense of the islands in the bay of the Bay of Islands, but Russell is not on an island - just an exceptionally long and winding road from Paihia, which is why the ferry is so important.
Lots of nice swimming beaches here - but give me a bit of surf.
We went up Flagstaff hill - which was quite windy - and the road up was quite windy. We were glad that someone else was driving.
The views were spectacular and the mosaic map of the maritime area was of special interest to me as I had recently completed The Covid Mosaic on the plinth I am doing.
This was another interesting art concept - kowhaiwhai done on corten steel. You may have noticed in past blogs the use of corten steel to do art works on Kaiti Hill in Gisborne.
The roads around Russell aren't really four lane highways -as these two photos show. Just typical New Zealand!
The photo below: Its hard to see but this fence is covered with cups and mugs. It is a memorial to a Mum who had cancer, but always said, "Come on in and have a cup of tea with me"
Back in Russell we walk along the foreshore - millions of dollars worth of luxury boats in this harbour too. And also reminders of the history of this area. The seagull posed very obligingly.
Below is a picture of Duncan entering a Marae sort of set-up - just a paepae outside the council buildings for welcoming visitors I suppose.
Onto lunch at the cafe by Pompallier house. Jeanette Hoyle was in the same class as me since form 1, and although we were not close friends , the fact that we both favoured maths and science meant that we had a bit in common. She has lived a fascinating life, inventing and testing drugs for all the big Pharma companies like Seiber-geigy and Novatis. Lots of travel, two nice kids (one called Simon), and although Jeanette often found that she was competing with her husband for jobs, and they divorced, she has a relatively good relationship there.
Jeanette came with her cousin Pauline. I said did Jeanette and Pauline plan to travel together, but no, Jeanette said she thought she'd travelled enough. Pauline is based in England, and like Jeanette had been caught out by COVID and never got back to Europe. As you know there is always something that people have in common - and ours was Dave Metzger. Jeanette and I had had him as a maths teacher at Rotorua Girls'. Then he moved to Auckland to work at the Training College, and coached Duncan's soccer team. Pauline is involved with STEM (Science, Tech, Engineering and Maths) Education and he had worked with Dave when he was an adviser in this field.
I wonder if we'll meet again. The thing I always remember was if she was concentrating, she twirled the curls in her hair. I asked her if she still did it - and she couldn't remember doing it in the first place!
The weather was cutting up rough again as we boarded the ferry (nice catamaran) and it was a very squally trip back - the worst part was walking up the gang-plank! So we just headed back to the camping ground for the evening. Interestingly the toilets as you walked into the loos was a disco ball - acting as a deterrent to birds coming in.
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