Day 4 - 3 and 2 September
Carrying on from the Auckland page
Despite the cell like nature of the room, we had a sort of ok sleep n the Bin Chicken hotel. We dropped off the hire car and checked in for our flight. We managed to get all bags on so the threatened left luggage was not required for the third bag, just a $90 fee. Not sure why we were told it would be a problem, it wasn’t. I typed up this paragraph using on the plane using the airnz wifi which was quite impressive. Must look up what island that was off our starboard wing about 1.5 hours into the flight, (edit - the Kermadec Islands).
Landing in Niue was nice, the island just suddenly appears off in the distance so we must have approached it at an angle to allow us to turn to the run way. The prevailing wind is SE which seems to be roughly the alignment of the runway. Of course, there was now a time zone change of -23 hours, so we were now on the day before.
We got e-sims and picked up our hire car at the airport, followed by a trip to the cop shop to get our licenses. We have to come back to get our photos taken, not sure why this couldn’t be done then. (Edit - we never were able to get our licenses, despite returning another 4 times, it seems to be a bit of a rort).
The Scenic Matavai resort is nice, if a little dated. Apparently it was built by the NZ government to stimulate a tourism industry, not sure when but it would have been 15+ years ago. Ince we had unpacked we enjoyed our free drink from the bar, attended the briefing, after which we chatted to the GM Tobias who gave us a bit of history of the resort. It turns out the Chinese have also been sniffing around and have recently resurfaced some of the roads on this western side of the island.
Dinner with Tracy and Richard in the resort restaurant, Fran and I both had the fish start, Fran had a tuna main and I had an island veggie curry, washed down with a few wines.
Sleep was a bit affected by the wine, and the pillows are dreadful but I don’t think there is much that can be done about that.
Day 5 Tuesday 3 September - Dive day
Woke up, rushed breakfast at 7am so that we could get next door to the dive shop by 730, loaded up with all our gear. Thankfully we were able to leave the BCDs, regulators and wetsuits hanging up in the shed.
The dive boat left from Alofi harbour so we followed in our little buzz box car, the dive sites weren’t too far off, the first being the Chimney, a drop down a chimney from around 5m to 29m and also a cave near the bottom.
The second dive was called the Tunnel as there was a swim through and a number of steep valleys.
We saw, banded sea kraits included a big one that seemed to be sleeping wrapped around the base of a rock, lots of smallish fish, a turtle, Fran saw a Nudi but there was too much sediment by the time I got to look.
After the dive, I took a wrong turn and we ended up driving across the island and circling around the bottom.
Dinner at the New York Pizza place with Richard and Tracy.
Day 6 - Wednesday 4 September
Easy day, sleep in, then latish breakfast. Then left for a trip up to Limu Pools for some lovely snorkelling. Beautiful fish and interesting thermocline effect cause by mixing of cool freshwater and warmer salt water.
We also visited the 'Chasm' for a swim, apparently it was reserved exclusively for Niue royalty in the poast. We had a nice chat with a local who was moving back from NZ after 20 years away. Then a half hour walk to beautiful limestone caves with joined up stalac-tites and -mites followed by the beautiful Arch.
After this we went back to the resort to get ready for the night dive at Alofi wharf. This dive was ok but not spectacular. Lots of urchins, sleeping parrot fish, curious Kraits, weird worms, shrimps, lion fish and a white tip reef shark right at the end. The dive felt a bit cramped as there were 6 of us plus the dive master in relatively small valleys. This would probably have been ok in the day, but being a night dive made it feel claustrophobic.
Dinner at the hotel restaurant, we both had very tasty steak, thankfully I had told the restaurant that we would be late as they seemed to be closing up when we arrived.
Ready for our next dive tomorrow!
Day 7- Thursday 5 September
Another day another dive this time joined by our friends, Tracy and Richard. It was great as we were the only customers on the boat. The dive guide Charlie and skipper Jack were great. First drop was at a site with no name but we called it mushroom rock because of the rock formation on the nearby shoreline. There was a cave where we saw a group of beautiful nudibranch on a single rock. I am pretty sure that I have photos of these Nudis from the Whitsunday Islands so they must be widespread.
The second dive was on a site called Wormholes, in honour of a fairly narrow swim through. This dive turned out to be my favourite of the trip to that point as there was so much to look at. In the end, we dived the chimney again and that dive became my favourite, see below.
I haven’t been able to get fully comfortable with the Banded Sea Kraits (Sea snakes) have featured on all of our dives, they are apparently highly venomous but have pathetic mouths and rear fangs meaning they would be unlikely to envenomate a hapless diver. They have an annoying habit of thinking that we might help them find a snack, so they follow along, very close, and very very unsettling.
After diving, we had lunch at a nearby café, Fran and I both had fish n chips which was delicious.
We booked dinner at our hotel which included an enchanting cultural performance by a local youth group.
We had a relatively early night in preparation for our expected early start for a fishing trip,but the weather forecast, and weather itself was foreboding.
Day 8 - Friday 6 Sept
Sure enough, we woke up at 4am to go to the 5.15am rendezvous at the wharf to go fishing, but it was pishing down with rain! Fran texted Tracy to say that we were going to pull the pin, Tracy responded saying a similar thing. Tracy later told us the the fishing operator, who was next door to their accommodation, was in total darkness at the time they should have been getting ready to meet us at the wharf, so we dodged a bullet by making the call ourselves, otherwise we would have been aoggy, tires and disappointed (or annoyed?).
Instead of fishing we, then had a nice sleep in, instant coffee in bed followed by a late breakfast.
We met Tracy and Richard in town, at the cop shop where we were again (3rd time at least) thwarted in our attempt to get our photos taken for our Niue drivers license. We have paid for them at NZD45 a pop but haven’t been able to close the deal with the merch that would be our Niuean drivers license. This represents the biggest disappointment of our whole trip! Actually not such a big disappointment so it has actually been a fantastic trip.
Back to the narrative, the day continued to be very wet, so we had all decided to go for a drive, stopping at Avaiki, which according to legend, is where the first fakas (actually whakas) arrived from who knows where to settle the island. This was (as usual) beautiful, but it is essential to be wearing shoes in these places as the limestone coral is soooo sharp and difficult to walk on.
We then set off for Mutalau, still in the pouring rain, and visited an enchanting cave and sea scape location. The cave had whakas and fishing rods that are owned by locals. There was evidence of a recent fire in the cave so I reckon that people camp here occasionally. This would be awesome to do. I loved this place, the ocean looked so deep and beautiful, completely uncompromising yet life giving (and affirming). I loved this place.
As always, the drive back was way quicker than the drive there, we stopped at bukbuk, a fried creature (guess what creature!) for a late lunch, spent some time in an artist’s shop then headed home to the Matavai to relax and get ready for tomorrow’s dive which will hopefully go ahead. As I write thi,s the rain and wildish wind has eased so I think we will be good to go. (Update - it was).
Day 9 - 7 September
Final dive day and what an awesome dive it turned out to be! We actually saw a big whale swim past under the water, and, and! We got photos of it. We had seen whales not too far away before we moored up, and then could hear them nearby underwater. Then after about 30mins in the water, and after we had dropped down the chimney, we felt these deep pulsing boofs which reverberated through our cheats! Then a few mins later while looking at a little nudi, Ari our guide starting screaming and pointing into the blue, at this massive whale cruising past fairly quickly. I fired off a few shots but also made sure I looked at it with my own eyeballs, incredible experience!
Niue State of Origin, North vs South a draw at 26 all but south took out the series 2-0
Day 10 - Sunday 8 September
Everything is shut.
Breakfast at the Matavai with Tracy and Richard
Drive to Togo Chasm on east side. Amazing place with jagged and sharp limestone rocks. Walk through a tropical forest to get there.
Then back to Avetele for a drink and swim off the boat ramp. This and the hotel are the only places you can get lunch on a Sunday. The swim was enjoyable with flounder, snakes and the remaining usual suspects.
Back to hotel to pack, then bbq dinner with Richard and Tracy at the hotel.
Day 11 - Monday 9 / Tuesday 10 September
The day dawned with rain around again. Our flight was at 13.10 so we had all morning.
Bags checked in at 9, then fuel fill up. Followed by sea trails in Alofi and visit to the information centre.
Also visited JimNam at Niue Ocean Wide. I had already signed up for my 1km2 of ocean at $NZ250, Fran also signed up- what a great initiative.
Uneventful flight back to Auckland and stay at the Novotel which was way better than the Ibis experience!
Day 12 Wednesday 11 September
Fly home day!
The flight was pretty uneventful, I was able to finish my book (the first John Le Carre spy book) and start a new one. The valet service at the airport was awesome. Driving to Fran’s folks place to kuier with them and pick up large and small doggos highlighted how hard it was to get from the airport to north Brisbane.
Impressions of our trip
Niue is an Awesome place to visit but only if you like being in the water and particularly snorkelling and scuba diving. It isn’t really feasible to do other water sports like kitesurfing or wing foiling due to the waves breaking on the reef making it near impossible to safely get out and in. The terrestrial attractions are all around the coast and are really impressive. These include the Togo (pronounced Tomho) Chasm bit the Talava arch, northern Mutalaiki and other sea tracks were fantastic. We did drive across the island and could see that the natural forest was beautiful, this was very evident on the walk to the Talava arch and the Togo Chasm