Ninety Mile Beach starts at the town of Ahipara and ends at the north shore.
From the Cape Reinga hilltop you can see where the sand spills into the ocean.
Along the 90 miles there are various access roads to the beach. The following sign is posted at each access:
WARNING
Ninety Mile Beach is a hazardous
stretch of coast, particularly
2 hours either side of high
tide.
Many vehicles have been lost
to the tides and drivers
are warned they proceed
beyond this point entirely
at their own risk.
Not only is the warning posted at the entrance to the beach but all the guide books and tourist pamplets give the same warning. And if you are fool-hardy enough to attempt the drive after all the warnings then please do not do so in a two-wheel drive.
Because some people still choose to ignore the warnings Don and I became involved in a rescue mission.
After signing into a motel in Pukenui we went across the street to the Take-out to see what was the latest we could order a pizza. We were told 7 PM. That gave us enough time to get our first glimpse of the Ninety Mile beach.
When we stopped at the entrance to the beach we saw a small group near the water's edge. There were two girls, a young man and an older man. They stood beside two vehicles, a small sedan and a four-wheel drive SUV. As soon as we stepped out of our car the young man left the group and started towards us. We were a little concerned as clearly he wanted something.
He indicated the two girls. He told us their car was stuck in the sand 2 kilometres further along the beach. "Would we come and help push?" We thought that would be fairly easy so we said, "Sure."
It turned out that the older man owned the SUV. It was filled with fishing equipment. Don and one of the girls got in with him. Me and the olther girl rode with the young man. I got in the back and soon realized that the seat was damp. He said he had been surfing.
After the time all of us were together dealing with the car I realized what an international group we were.
The Canadians, Don and I.
The two girls (Lena and Maggie), were from China. They were in New Zealand to attend a technical school.. They had only rented the car yesterday. On the way north they had already been in a fender bender. They made it to the north tip but due to the weather saw nothing. They had driven onto the beach and saw two vehicles going by. They decided to follow.
Gilly - from Chile. In New Zealand on a six month work visa. He had found work picking watermelons.
Joe had grown up in the area. As a young man he had taken tour groups up and down the beach. Now he lived in Brisbane. He returned to the area twice a year to fish.
When we arrived at the Honda we saw that it did not look good. The front end was sunk deep in the sand. Using our hands we dug out as much sand as we could. Then we put hand-fulls of the long sand-grass behind the wheels for traction. Maggie got behind the wheel to drive and we all pushed. We heaved with all our might but the car did not budge one inch. The wheels were not connecting. We realized that the car was stuck solid. It was beyond pushing out. The undercarriage of the car sat on a bar of sand.
Joe said he'd go back to his place for a rope. He knew a short cut through the pines and would be back in 45 minutes.
While Joe was gone for awhile we continued to shift sand but soon gave it up as a lost cause. Poor Maggie was obviously over-wrought. While the rest of us stood around talking she kept digging at the sand with an umbrella, which she broke. She had the umbrella in one hand and her cell phone in the other. She was trying to call a friend. When she started to cry all of us except Don took a turn to try to console her. When I asked her why she was crying she said she wanted her mother. I guess the car accident and now this happening was just too much.
Lena told us that her and Maggie had been stuck for over an hour before they decided to walk back to the entrance to the beach. On the way back they ran into Gilly. Lena kept saying to me, "We waited and nobody came." This perplexed her. Then she would add, "This would never happen in China."
While we waited for Joe we kept an eye on the tide which was creeping higher by the minute. At one point Don questioned as to whether we had left our car high enough.
Joe arrived back with a friend 45 minutes later. They were in a 4-wheel drive truck. In no time at all the Honda was pulled free. Don asked for the keys and said he'd drive the girls back to the main road. None of us trusted Maggie to drive. (Good luck to them getting back to Auckland unscathed.)
While Don was driving it was obvious that if we stopped we would be stuck again. He poured on the gas!
We made it back to solid ground and after hugs and good-byes we all went our seperate ways.
Don and I never did get our pizza.
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