On the 28th january we went to a place called Anawhata (pronounced Anafata) for our friend Britta’s birthday. Anawhata is a fairly remote house on the coast west of Auckland and managed by the Auckland council. It is a stunningly beautiful place and from the house you have magnificent views of the bay below, a 5 minute walk downhill to get to the beach.
It was a lovely couple of days, unfortunately Ursula and I were only able to stay for one night but we thoroughly enjoyed to the occasion and the location. And it was especially good to be able to share Britta’s birthday with her and her family. It was a pity to leave, but we had to get back to Franklin road.
Britta cutting her birthday cake
The sea was quite rough and had a strong cross-current, but we able to do a bit of “boogie-boarding” in the surf.
The stream on the right of the first picture flows into the sea and has a number of warm springs at the bottom which keep the water lovely and warm. It is great to come out of the coldish sea and warm up in the stream.
I was especially pleased by finding a group of 3 Caspian terns on the beach and spent some time trying photograph them. In the end I was pleased to get a few reasonable shots of them, including this one of an adult just taking off.
