We made coffee this morning! After more than two weeks - our Gisborne house has first coffee machine we've had access to and thus the first regular pot of coffee we've been able to enjoy in New Zealand. So we had a nice relaxing start to the day with coffee mug in hand before setting out on our day. There was no set agenda for today, so we reached out to some Gisborne locals who have kids Reef's age (their number was given to us by our friends who live here but are out of town). As it turns out they weren't around either but the guy Brett gave us some great advice for burning off energy for the kids - visit the Gisborne Botanical Gardens.
So that's where we set off to. The Botanical Gardens are beautiful - set right on the river bank, and they have a fantastic playground (this seems to be the norm in New Zealand) which was well suited for kids of all ages. One of the features of the New Zealand Playgrounds that I like is that they have little trampolines but into the ground - I don't ever recall seeing that in a US playground, but like the playground Zipline ‘flying fox’, it appears to be a standard amenity.
River got in on the action climbing through tubes, going down the little slide, and riding the "bucking bumblebee" - he was having a great time. Meanwhile when Reef wasn't occupying the Zipline he was getting daring climbing higher and higher up a spiderweb structure they had (which fearless kids could get about 20 feet off the ground on). The place was super popular with kids of all ages playing and enjoying the sunny day.
After an hour and a half or so we ventured out to grab lunch - trying out an Indian place called Bollywood Stars which was very good (though not as good as the place in Whangamatā we tried). From there we headed to a place on the northern bank of the Tūranganui River where the river meets the bay that we had been wanting to check out.
On October 8, 1769 Captain James Cook on his first of three voyages into the Pacific became the first European to set foot on New Zealand soil. That landing happened right here in Poverty Bay on land that was known as Tūranganui-a-Kiwa and would later become known as Gisborne (after a Colonial Secretary). Captain Cook was the greatest European explorer of the Pacific, and though often first thought of with regard to his "discovery" of Hawaii (which happened on his third voyage), he also was the first European to set foot in New Zealand (though Abel Tasman first sighted it), the first European to circumnavigate New Zealand (proving it was not the legendary great Southern Continent European thinkers had long believed existed), the first European to sail up Australia's East Coast (through the Great Barrier Reef - with much difficulty!), as well as many other discoveries in the South Pacific and throughout the Pacific Northwest.
Captain Cook's first encounter with Maori, which happened here - was not pleasant. He had hoped to acquire provisions for his ships but was unable to, which is the reason he named the area Poverty Bay. The ship's Botanist Joseph Banks who landed with Captain Cook that day, upon returning to the ship described it in his journal as follows "Thus ended the most disagreeable day My life has yet seen, black be the mark for it and heaven send that such may never return to embitter future reflection." I'm looking forward to reading back through Cook's journals from that day when I get back to Maui, I don't recall what all happened but it sounds like a few Maori died at some point following Cook's landing. Whatever the case, this site in Gisborne is one of historical significance and so we were glad to be able to check out the landing site in person.
After the visit to the Captain Cook Landing Site National Historic Reserve we drove just a couple of minutes over to the Titirangi Reserve - an 80 acre nature reserve right in Gisborne, which is essentially a big forested hill immediately behind the Captain Cook Landing site (though you need to drive around the hill to access the road and trails). The road up the hill was closed to cars so we got a nice hill climb in going up the road. I had told Reef there would be a playground (the promise of a second playground was integral in extracting him from the first) but honestly wasn't so sure as Titirangi gave every impression of being just a forest and trails. As luck would have it there was a little playground - and since no cars could drive up the parking lot was empty and Reef was the only kid there (a big change from the busy playground this morning).
River and I took off on a little hike to find a lookout over the city, which we found only about 1/4 mile down the trail (is a 1/4 mile technically a hike?). After shooting a few photos we headed back to the playground and then made our way to the Gisborne Wine Centre just as the sun was starting to go down to do a wine tasting.
The wine center is situated right on the water at Gisborne harbor and incorporated into one of the town's fancier restaurants Crawford Road Kitchen. We didn't have reservations so just stayed for the flight of wine and picked up a couple local bottles to take with us.
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