Story & photo by David Coxon

An Easter trip to visit the Morere Hot Springs in northern Hawkes’s Bay was a chance for David Coxon and friends to take some (more) roads less travelled.

With a reasonably long run from Wellington almost to Gisborne on the first day, and with Easter traffic to contend with, we decided to follow SH2 the whole way. 

Of course, it was impossible for us not to explore at least one back road, so we headed up the unsealed Blackburn Rd to the trampers’ car park at the edge of the Ruahine Ranges for a very pleasant, if breezy and damp, afternoon tea break. 

On the way we were treated to a range of weather conditions from warm sun to strong winds, and even some rain.  This changeable weather, “a new season every kilometre” as we put it, gave some very pleasant moody lighting for all to enjoy, and some great photo stops for me. 

Running somewhat behind schedule, we made Napier our dinner break before the final push to our accommodation at the Morere Springs Lodge.  The very twisty section between Napier and Wairoa was rather slow going in the dark, and it was a relief to reach Wairoa and have a fairly straight and quick run through to Morere Springs and our accommodation.  This section did, however give me the chance to try out my lighting setup in prolonged road use. 

A day to explore

Refreshed by a good night’s rest, Sunday was a day to explore the area.  Our first destination was to see three small mountain lakes that could be accessed from Tarewa Rd, about 15 minutes up the road from our accommodation.  We were a little surprised to find that Tarewa Rd was a working logging road with signage regarding use of radios and other safety precautions, however it was not gated, and as it was Easter Sunday, we felt safe to proceed with caution. 

The road was unsealed but in good condition as we worked our way through pine plantations up onto a ridge, then followed the ridge towards the lakes. 

According to the map, the road forked, with the main road running east of the lakes, while a smaller loop road climbed to the high point between the westerly two lakes before rejoining the main track. 

Our plan was to use the loop road for a good view of the lakes, however, although marked as an ungated, public road on the map, the loop was securely locked off with access by permit only.   Luckily the main track was still open so we pushed on and were rewarded with a very pleasant drive through the bush, and even a clear view of the lake from one point. 

We finally came down out of the hills for a short run along SH2 to Gisborne for fuel and lunch on the beach. 

Returning to Morere we enjoyed a long soak in the thermal hot pools before an evening visit to the intriguingly-named Happy Jack’s Boat Harbour.  We were not sure what sort of boat harbour to expect but the name sounded interesting, and since we could get there by following the unsealed Tunanui Rd over the hills to the coast, with a return trip along main roads, it sounded like a good trip. 

Tunanui Rd was a well-maintained gravel road, although somewhat narrow in places, with beautiful evening views over Mahia Peninsular as we crested the final hill for the run down to the coast. 

Jack be nimble

Happy Jack’s, in turn, was a small settlement with a very attractive beach, although no boat harbour, and a loop road along the edge of the beach. 

We followed the loop road, stopping for a walk along the strip of beach remaining at high tide.  The last few metres of the beach road, linking back to the main road was well under water, giving Ashley the chance to wade the crossing before we attempted it in the cars. 

It ended up being only knee deep and with a solid road base so completing the run back to the through road was a non-issue.  With Happy Jack’s explored, but no actual boat harbour seen, it was a short run back to Morere, with perfect timing allowing us to catch the sunset over the sea from a scenic vantage point.

Given our very limited timeframe over Easter, Monday was to be the long trip back to Wellington, however with a reasonably early start we were able to explore the northern Wairarapa by following a network of back roads from Waipukurau to Pahiatua. 

It was nice to see a few new tracks that were too far afield for a day trip from Wellington, although not knowing the tracks meant that hunger made us stop for lunch at a rather scruffy pull-off area on one of the more major roads with a nice view rather than at one of the smaller and cleaner areas we saw about half an hour later on a less used back road.  If we had known, we could have waited. 

The final success for the day was finally finding the waterfall on Coonoor Rd, near Makuri, that I had failed to find on two previous visits.  I think the signage had been recently re-installed since I can’t imagine missing such an obvious sign on previous visits.

Our final event on a very successful weekend was dinner at a very nice Chinese restaurant in Pahiatua before separating from Ashley and Gillian, who returned to Kapiti over the Pahiatua Track road while we headed down SH2 for Wellington.