Muriwai Beach

We have never been to the west coast beaches of Auckland - Muriwai, Bethells, and Piha - so took this opportunity to go for a look.  We stayed in a nice "cottage" in the country nearby - actually a room built on top of the owner's garage.

Sampling the water at Muriwai Beach

These guys towed their boat up the beach - no trailer required!

We liked our super-peaceful country cottage BnB.  About 5 minutes drive from Muriwai.

Muriwai has a large gannet colony - about 1,000 breeding pairs and their chicks.

At one viewing platform you can get this close!  Mother (father?) with chick at their feet.

On our second day we drove south to see Piha, because we have never been but have seen the TV programs showing how busy it keeps the lifeguards.  It take about 40 minutes to drive back inland then south-west over the Waitakere Ranges to Piha, with some panoramic views out over Auckland on the way.

Looking down from the approaches to Piha, with Lion Rock separating the two beaches.

The view back to Auckland from the top of the hill was quite hazy - Australian bush fires perhaps?

We found the track up Lion Rock, so of course we had to climb it.  The view is great.

This is (almost) the highest point - the track beyond is behind a locked gate.

The beach was quiet, but the lifeguards were still busy trying to marshall swimmers into the safe zone.

We were quite entertained watching the swimmers, surfers, and lifeguards.  The waves were big enough and there seemed to be a rapid cross-current which carried everyone off to the south.  The lifeguards spent a lot of their time blowing whistles and waving their arms to encourage swimmers to stay between the flags.

The motor camp letterbox had some interesting little occupants.

Our comfortable little room

The outside view.

We enjoyed chilling out at this place, with just a few birds and sheep to look at.  It is very peaceful, and once she had introduced herself we did not see our hostess again.  There were weka grazing over the fence, and the palm tree was popular with a wood pigeon.

Our wood pigeon.