Hooked On Cook

On 6th October 1769, Nicholas Young, the surgeon's boy, sighted the coastline of New Zealand from the masthead of Captain James Cook's Royal Navy ship, "The Endeavour".

On 8th October "The Endeavour" sailed into a bay, and laid anchor at the entrance of a small river in Tuuranga-nui [today's Poverty Bay, near modern Gisborne]. Cook named a peninsula in the bay "Young Nick's Head" after Nicholas Young.

Over the next three days, the Maori inhabitants, met, skirmished with and were killed by people from a world totally new to them.

Cook deeply regretted his failure to establish cordial relations with the Maoris and upset by the killings which had already taken place, decided to leave this area. He gave it the name Poverty Bay, as he had been unable to take on supplies.

During the next six months, Cook, the British seaman and explorer, circumnavigated New Zealand producing a remarkably accurate chart of its coastline thereby placing this country and its people on the world map.

Seems like we've been gone months, since we've done so much but we've been here only two and a half weeks now. We left Whakatane and drove to Gisborne (pronounced Gisbun) through the Waioeka Gorge, a 150 kilometer gorge, across the eastern panhandle of the North Island.

Gisborne, a city of bridges, is a port city and the site of Captain Cook's first landing in New Zealand.

We then drove to Napier around the coast of Hawke's Bay. Perched on the edge of the Pacific Ocean and originally established as a whaling station in the 1840's , this elegant city is a memorial to the 1931 earthquake which devastated most of the buildings and killed many people. During rebuilding, an earthquake-proof building code was enforced and architects adopted the then fashionable Art Deco style. Napier is probably a unique example of an entire city that has been built in a single coherent architectural style.

We happened to be in Napier for their annual Art Deco Weekend. We saw vintage cars, people dressed in the Great Gatsby attire, and building after building architected in Art Deco style.

We're now on our way to Windy Wellington, which according to the weather report will live up to its reputation during our visit!

Kia Ora!

Trevor & Rebecca

Did You Know?

The place with the longest name in common usage is a 252 metre high hill in Central Hawke's Bay, New Zealand. Taumata whaka tangi hanga koauau o tamatea turi pukakapi ki maunga horo nuku poka i whenua kitana tahu translates as the 'place where Tamatea, the man with the big knees, who slid, climbed and swallowed mountains, known as land-eater, played his flute to his loved one'. This is the place name recognised by the Guinness Book of Records. It is sometimes written without the spaces as one long word.