The photo above is of the Manukau Harbour in Auckland, taken today. Most of the photos of the New Zealand seashore that I’ve shared, either on this blog or on Instagram, have been of the Waitematā Harbour. Many people call that “Auckland Harbour”, but the reality is that Auckland is built on an isthmus between two harbours—the Waitematā and the Manukau.
Well, it used to be that way, and that means it’s high time I diversified my photos.
Since the creation of Auckland Council in 2010, Auckland now meets another harbour—the Kaipara, one of the world’s largest harbours—in the northwest. There’s also the Firth of Thames in the southeast of the Council area. The Firth of Thames is a bay at the southern end of the Hauraki Gulf, which the Waitematā Harbour is also part of. The Hauraki Gulf, meanwhile, opens to the Pacific Ocean.
Despite all these options, I’ve only ever posted one photo of anything in the region other than the Waitematā Harbour, and that was a photo of the northern end of the Manukau more than a decade ago on my friend Jason’s last full day visiting New Zealand. The photo above was taken at almost the exact opposite side of the harbour.
The Manukau Harbour is fairly shallow, apart from its main channel, and at low tide the mudflats extend out quite some distance. The Kaipara Harbour is even shallower, with nearly half of it mudflats at low tide. Both are some drive from where we live at the moment, and we lived near the Firth of Thames before I had a blog and before social media was invented. So, I just haven’t had many opportunities to take or share photos. As I start to get around the outer reaches of Auckland a bit more, though, I’ll share more photos. Today is just the start of that.
All of this is actually spurred on by my using Instagram more frequently: I want to share nice photos, and since my Instagram account is set to “public”, I want the photos I share to be both generally interesting and also not too personal. The result is that I’m sharing more of my Auckland and New Zealand. Then, I talk about the photo in more detail here on the blog. Seems like a good arrangement so far.
The photo below was taken at the same spot, but turning to my right. The rock in the water (to the left of the tree) is completely dry at low tide, and there’s a small beach the other side of the grass (which is what the steps in the photo above lead to). Both photos make it look like an ocean beach, but the opening to the ocean is a long way away. The effect is the result of strong winds driving shallow water.
And these photos show yet another reason why I love Auckland so much: There are so many different worlds to see.
2 comments:
I was sad to hear about all the whales beaching themselves in NZ, many dead.
Yes, that particular area in the South Island, Farewell Spit, is notorious for strandings—apparently due to the fact it's shallow for a long way and whales are stranded before they even realise anything's wrong.
Post a Comment