Orewa in January

We were fortunate to get a week's accommodation in Orewa, long a family favourite holiday spot. The Trust accommodation is just across the main road from the beach, and right on the edge of the shopping centre - a prime site!!
"We" are Jayne and Jack, Desiree and I. And the objective was to do as little as possible for as long as possible.
The weather was variable (wasn't it everywhere?), but at least you could assume it would improve whenever it looked doubtful or rained, as it did - heavily - one afternoon.

	An unusual palm - very tall, and almost leafless
	This was the evening after the very heavy downpour

But daily walks along the beach and then by the estuary produced some arresting views and interesting patterns
I was also taken by the birds we encountered. This one flew, quite deliberately, into our unit, presumably looking for food. It wasn't willing to wait to be fed, but did repeat the visit later in the week.
These others were encountered either on the beach or in the estuary.

I floated lonely as a ship
Good old ubiquitous seagulls
Pukekoes are one of my favourite native birds - their colours are stunningly rich
	Note the scale of development occurring across the estuary!

Oh, and there were a lot of dogs being exercised on the beach, most of whom were either bird-chasing or retrieving sticks or balls, often from the surf, like this one.
On the final morning, as we walked the beach, off-shore was this fine vessel, probably one of the sail-training ships like the Spirit of Adventure.
One of the evenings was quite windy, which brought the wind- and kite-surfers out to play. The results were quite spectacular, although it began to rain while we were watching, and we weren't game to stay out in it and get closer to observe the action.
The best shots of the kite-surfers need to be seen as a sequence in a slideshow. This will open in a new window or tab. In particular, watch the two surfers in fron of the cliffs, as they "take off" from the surf with the wind. They both landed without incident.
NB: If the pictures are too small, there is another slideshow with images at 1024 wide.