Hi Thinking out loud here :D
first things first sorry there was no upload last week I had a post planned to put up but never got round to finishing it but sadly it was about something that now is in the past if I get round to it I might upload it but for now I'm not sure if I will if I do it will be a nice little surprise. As for today's blog post I hope you enjoy and feel like you've been on a little trip.
Yesterday my family and I went on a day trip to Kawau Island in the Hurraki Gulf close to the north eastern coast of the North Island New Zealand, our day started early as the ferry we were catching set of at half ten and it took us a little over half an hour to get to where we needed to be for the ferry (thankfully the roads weren't too busy with it being school holidays.)
we arrived with plenty of time to spare even catching some filming that was being done for a new program, the ferry was already in dock but we had to wait until everyone was there and everything was ready for us to get on. Soon enough we were on our way we sat up top so we could see the views and the places the skipper was pointing out to us, once we had reached Kawau Island we made little stops delivering packages for the residents and dropping a couple of people off, whilst going around the Island we learnt about some of the history and about some of the first settlers who helped in building the Island and making it somewhat habitable although it is still very cut off from the mainland but there was power and means of water, however i'm not sure if there are any shops on the Island so any food would have to be well stocked up.
We saw a dolphin going around the island but sadly I didn't get any photos of it as it was out of the water for a second before going back under, we learnt about a guy who built boats and I think was one of the first people to live on the island, there was a boating club which closed down in 2012 but the community got together for funds and reopened it in late 2015 they've made it more of a part of the community and less of something the government have to deal with, but it;s closed during winter so we weren't able to look around.
We learnt about the mining of copper which was done by some Cornish men who had the expertise of mining in Cornwall and Welsh men who had the expertise of smelting which was done in Swansea for coal for what was needed to be done. i managed to get a photo of the only remaining chimney that was used during the time of mining on the Island. if you look closely you can see that one of the rocks is still green from the copper, I found this really interesting and ended up taking so many picture of this little piece of history.
The mine was closed down with problems for shipping and the mine flooding, it later reopened and the mine once again booming unfortunately I don't know when the mine was closed down for the finale time if anyone happens to know please do tell me in the comment section below, in 1862 Sir George Grey Governor of New Zealand at the time bought the Island making it a private retreat making him own what was then the mining managers house he extended it making it the mansion it is today, since Grey's time it has seen the life of many families and like any old building it has had it's times of hardship for a time when no one was living in it, but now it has been restored and made up inside to look like the era of when Sir George Grey would have lived in it and although some of the furniture isn't original you honestly can not tell, sadly about a week ago we had some horrendous weather with torrential rain, thunder and lightning which sadly caused some flooding to the mansion house leaving the basement and some of the first floor being closed to the public luckily only carpets had gotten wet and non of the furniture was damaged I guess in some way funny weird way this just adds to the history, we were lucky enough to be able to look around the parts of the house that were open and hadn't been flooded, sadly like most of these houses we weren't aloud to take photos inside of the house but I did get some photos of the outside and I must say it is a very pretty looking house again I loved taking photos of it I just couldn't help it but with such a great structure and elegance I really couldn't not.
The land around the mansion used to be homed to many more buildings infact it used to be quite the community it had gardens, and I think vegetable patches and orchards, it still has a garden but it is a lot smaller than the ones when the mansion was in all of it's glory. the land is now home to some of New Zealand's native birds and some that aren't native but have taken residence on both the Island and New Zealand. one of the native birds is Weka these are a brown land nesting birds and like the ever famous Kiwi they lay their eggs on the ground Kawua is the perfect Island for these birds as i'm pretty sure it isn't home to any pests. pictured is one of the Weka we saw it was very tame and wasn't shy at all with coming close to us.
some more of the animal life are seagulls, ducks, wallabies which we sadly couldn't see as the trial to get to them was closed due to the terentius weather the week before and not forgetting the spectacular looking peacock and peahens all pictured below.
when it came time for leaving the Peafowl even waited with us as we waited for the ferry to come and pick us up, it felt like they were going to come with us but as we walked closer to the ferry they stopped about halfway on the pier and watched us leave I personally thought that was a nice end to an amazing day out . I didn't take any pictures of us leaving the Kawau Island as we were down stairs on the ferry as on the way going we got pretty cold, also we were rather tired from the day. if ever you happen to be in New Zealand at some point I honestly recommend going to Kawau Island and going to the mansion as it's a really good day out plus you get to learn a little history which is always fun.
As always I hope you have a lovely day and thank you for reading my blog, I hope you enjoy the added photos and before anyone asks yes I took them all myself and I am in no way a photographer (however I did take photography for two years in high school but that was three years ago and in no way qualifies me) I used a normal bog standard digital camera which has seen me through taking many photos helping me add these photos in my blog to the collection,
love always Thinking out loud xx :D
P.S. on a side note i've just finished watching the chase with an amazing win with one lady winning 50,000 pounds on her own such an incredible chase very much deserved. just thought i'd mention it as it's let me with a big smile and feeling very happy for her, shows what watching the telly can do.
