Short and sweet:

That's how I would describe my stay in Piha. I was only there for an afternoon, one night and a morning. The previous few days I had driven around the North Island of New Zealand. Two nights of that trip were spent in Raglan and another up in the Northern Peninsula. It was a lot of driving but I saw a some of great things. My last stop though, before heading back to the States, was this little beach town called Piha. A friend had suggested it to me and it wasn't that far from the Auckland airport. It seemed like the perfect place to see before going home.

Once you get through all the outer lying towns of Auckland and find the road that takes you there, as far as I could tell there's only one way in and one way out. It's about fifteen or twenty minutes of winding road through the Waitakere Ranges Regional Park. As soon as you place your car on Piha Road, there isn't a single building until you get to the end of it. If I remember correctly there may have been a few hiking paths along the way but I didn't stop. I had been on the road for quite some time and was anxious to arrive at my destination.

When you do arrive you have to drive through some pretty steep hills. Cars were parked all along the road making it very narrow. After carefully and slowly making my way down I arrived at the beach. One of the first things you see when you look out to the ocean is this massively huge rock jutting up into the air. From my photo it doesn't look that large or maybe it does but I remember it being MUCH larger in person. It really towers above you. The cool part though is you can climb to the top or at least pretty close to it.

I'm not a huge heights person. To the degree that I don't like going up too high in buildings. I had a hard time going to the top of the Eiffel Tower. In Vegas. Not the real Eiffel Tower but the one that's barely half the size. I like the ground. It's a nice safe place to be. That being said, this rock is basically part of the ground, right? I was feeling adventurous. For me, this was adventurous. Luckily there was a clear path and a set of stairs that had been carved into the side of what is called Lion Rock. Surprisingly I ventured upward post haste!

Halfway up I took this photo. This was halfway. Look at the tiny little people on the beach. I'm not even to the top yet and they look like ants. Still, the view was beautiful. It was a perfectly sunny day and it was quite the relief having just come from three days of rain. That's how crazy different the climate and weather can be just a few hours in any direction. Not one day earlier I had been driving through torrential downpour and now I had blue skies in either direction. Summer season was coming to a close but it was still warm as could be.

I kept moving upwards the steep dirt path. I think I was barefoot. It wasn't really close to any of the edges so I actually had no problem with it. In fact I was moving upwards quite quickly. When I'm on a travel rush and there's a path to conquer, I typically move fast. Big strides or even slightly jogging. I want to see as many things as possible and sometimes that requires putting a little extra kick in your step. I get excited and I don't want to stop until I've seen it all. It was either that or I wanted to get it over with.

After a short hike I made it to the top! And I have to say it was quite worth the effort. There was water on either side and opposite the ocean you could see the entire town of Piha. It stretched back into a valley tucked away among the trees. There was a little viewing area where you could sit and relax and I sat up there for a few minutes to enjoy the sights. I even poked around the edges a bit just to see what kind of view I could get. Warning signs blocked off a once open path to steeper heights but I was satisfied with the peak I had reached.

I descended the rock and went back to my car. The room I had rented was ready for check-in so I dropped off my bags. After eating some dinner at the only open restaurant I went back to the beach. There was a little spot in the sand dunes a ways up from the water. I sat down with my tripod and camera and waited. As happy as I was to have bested Lion Rock, the impending sunset turned out to be one of the best I had seen. I took some pictures and thought about life. It had been a beautiful trip but I was finally ready to go home.

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