I was really excited to travel to New Zealand after much persuasion from my travel buddy. A three week long holiday to travel both the North and South islands. How cool was that!
Anyway, our arrival @ Auckland started amazingly well with a cottage stay at Pakinui Farmstay. The host from the farm picked us up from Auckland airport and the journey to the farm took slightly over 30 mins.
The farm is quite small as compared to the ones that I've visited in Perth. It was drizzling on our arrival and we quickly checked into our cottage. Do check out the farm's website@ http://www.pakinuifarmstay.co.nz for more details.
Check out our cosy self-contained cottage and you will agree with me that it's absolutely fabulous. And just behind our cottage was the farm where all the cute animals were waiting for us. I can't wait to see the Alcapa for I've never seen one before.
Not to mention, there was this very fat and chubby pig with black spots named Bazel in the farm. This pig was a favourite of my travel buddy who named it "Bazelpop" for no reason. See the pictures below to spot "Bazel".
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| Very clean and spacious toilet and bathroom |
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| Maggie mee for dinner, so typical of us Singaporeans |
The cottage is just nice for couple stay. If you travel as a family, I would recommend checking with the host on the room availability at the main cottage (just next to our cottage). Anyway, there were various activities that you can enjoy at the farm such as feeding the animals, eggs picking and even pony rides for the kids subject to host's approval.
We certainly had fun playing and feeding these animals. They were simply too cute. It was also quite an experience picking eggs from the pen. These freshly laid eggs felt warm.
Although the farm small, it is really of a decent size with enough animals for visitors to interact. The farm is nicely kept and has a nice garden full of roses. As this is a farm, we do not expect luxury amenities or fantastic food. While the breakfast was really simple - toasted bread and tea, it was the nicest I've had.
The host is kind enough to offer us a ride to the nearby Muriwai beach and wineries.
Muriwai beach is very popular with surfers and also home to one of New Zealand's onshore gannet (seabird) colony. Just a short walk along the walking trail leading to the viewing platform, we can see also many sea birds gathering at the colony. The sea breeze also brought along a scent of birdie smell which was simply too overwhelming for us! Hence, we quickly walked away after a few scenic shots of the colony of birds. The sea view along the walking trail was spectacular. By the way, the black sand beach of Muriwai reminded me of the black sand beach at Iceland.
It was super windy as we strolled by the beach. I felt so refreshed and relaxed. This place is highly recommended if you happen to stop by the wine-growing region of Kumeu and Huapai.
I'm a wine-lover (although I'll get a little tipsy with over 2-3 glasses of wine) and hence looked forward to visiting the wineries. I can't wait to sample the wines. We visited 2 wineries @ Soljans Winery and Cooper's Creek.
Soljans winery is a family owned and run since 1937. The winery has its own vineyard for visitors to tour around and offers wine tasting. Check out their website @ https://soljans.co.nz for visiting hours.
Coopers Creek on the other hand offers finely crafted wines from grapes drown with care and dedication from its vineyard. It was here where I tasted a finely sweet porter that made me a little tipsy because the host is really generous with his wine serving. We bought a bottle of white wine to chill @ our cottage. Website of the winery @ https://www.cooperscreek.co.nz .
Overall, it's worth to get away from the city life once in a while and this farm stay along with the black sand beach and village of winery really gave us a relaxing start of our trip :)
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