I remember years ago exploring London and sharing our adventures with family who lived there. Many times their reaction would be “Oh we’ve not actually been there, but hear that it is a great experience.”
Those memories came rushing back recently when we visited Tawharanui with two of our grandchildren. We have lived in this area for six years and last weekend was the first time we have visited this Regional Park – right on our doorstep!
This park is made up of coastal forest, wetlands, dunes, farmland and beautiful white sandy beaches. The Tawharanui Open Sanctuary (TOSSI) was formed in 2002 and its volunteers have worked tirelessly, with the Auckland Council, to develop this open sanctuary.
A predator free fence has been built across the peninsula allowing native animals to replenish their numbers.
Driving up to the car park we appreciated the hard work the volunteers put in to maintaining the area. The plantings and the wildlife fitted well with each other and prepared you for the amazing vista from the beach. It is beautiful!
It is not yet summer, but the beach was full of families relaxing, some brave enough to be swimming and boogie boarding. We will be back again soon to explore the ecology trail and other walks. We’ll download the Bird Sheet for the kids, as I’m sure they’ll want to return and we’ll see how many of the re-introduced native birds we can spot and how many native trees we can identify.
Why on earth haven’t we visited here before? We will be back soon!