Recently, some visitors from the South Island gave us an opportunity and reason to visit Auckland's wild West Coast. While they were up, here in Auckland, it was a particularly bleak and cold weekend. Biting, cold Southerly winds. Heavy, featureless grey skies.
We are spoilt for beach and sea here in Auckland, with two harbours and a multitude of city beaches where the sea is gentle and pohutakawas provide a friendly green embrace. But when the weather was like it was that particular weekend, it calls for something altogether more raw, a place wild and rugged. Piha beckoned.
Piha on the fringe of the Tasman Sea, a small ribbon of iron sand wedged between the cold deep and the towering Waitakere Ranges. On that day, the wind ripped across the beach, dragging sand low and fast, flattening the roiling white surf and clearing the beach of normal strollers and fossickers. Only the hardy were there.
We walked and talked, admired the angry sea, the flat sky and the closeness of the bush. Eventually, faces rubbed raw from the wind, we retreated to the car. Refreshed and alive.
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