Week 2

Last Friday, we stayed at a marae during the beginning part of our weekend trip to Rotorua and Whakatane. While there, we were able to participate in several Maori customs, including having a hangi for our dinner and sleeping all together in the marae on mattresses that were provided to us. Though we did get to see yet another side of a cultural aspect of New Zealand this way, I felt that some of the practices we did experience seemed to conflict with each other. For example, when we took a guided tour of the treaty house at Waitangi, we were required to remove our shoes before entering the marae and were told that usually, pictures were not allowed to be taken inside the marae. On Friday, however, we did not have to remove our shoes and were allowed to take pictures throughout the night.

Climbing around on the rocks at Mt. Maunganui on Sunday enabled me to see a lot of the scenery of the surrounding area as well as a good example of a rocky intertidal habitat. Many rocks were encrusted with several mussels and barnacles, and one even held an anemone in its crevice. The rocks that were higher above the influence of the waves tended to hold mainly different kinds of lichens (orange, green, yellow). It was easy to see the levels of zonation where different organisms had the ability to live there.

Today, toward the end of our day trip, we hiked up a short trail to the top of Paku Mountain. From the summit, both beaches at Tairua and Paeroa could be viewed with just a turn of the head. The beach at Tairua is an example of a reflective beach, which means that the wave energy is much lower and the beach is therefore steeper. Paeroa’s beach, however, was dissipative, due to the fact that it is flatter and possesses higher wave energy. It was incredible to view both of these very different beach profiles from one localized point. Many other aspects of each beach could be examined from such a height, such as wave refraction, their dune patterns and structure, and rip currents.

My only regret so far is that the trip is already halfway over. I'm sure, however, that the next two weeks will be equally as amazing as well as educational.