Matakana is the perfect weekend trip: only an hour from Auckland with fabulous produce and craft markets, vineyards, galleries, high-end restaurants and, of course, plenty of gorgeous baches.<\/p>\n\n\n
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But it can get pretty busy at the weekends \u2013 where do you go if you want to get off the beaten track a little? We decided to ask a few of the locals where they take their visitors to show off their favourite coastline.<\/p>\n\n\n
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Michael runs the legendary Matakana Markets. He\u2019s come full circle since his boyhood holidays here with his grandparents. In those days, Matakana was pretty much a one-horse town.<\/p>\n\n\n
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His grandmother used to play the organ in the tiny, be-curlicued church on the main street, just along from the markets. \u201cI used to hang around while she practised,\u201d recalls Michael. \u201cI loved the font: it was half a huge clam shell. But after a while I\u2019d get bored and sneak out the back to the butcher\u2019s place. Mr Buckthought was a giant of a man and used to whack pigs on the head with a hammer to kill them!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n
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In the intervening years Michael has worked for the Salvation Army getting street kids into work, and then moving into men\u2019s mental health work. He says both have helped with his current job.<\/p>\n\n\n
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The fabulous Matakana markets are hauled into place each week like a wild travelling circus. \u201cI feel like I need at least three days to recover from the stress,\u201d Michael confides. \u201cBut I love it, love the crazy people. There\u2019s always some sort of drama \u2013 it\u2019s never boring!\u201d Michael himself likes to provide \u2018something a bit different\u2019 and has been known to get a local teenager to row up and down the river, while he serenades from the bank with \u2018O Sole Mio\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n
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One of Michael\u2019s favourite places is Leigh harbour. \u201cYou go down to the wharf and just walk left over the rocks,\u201d he says. \u201cIt takes you round the top of the harbour, over a bridge and through a beautiful bush walk along the other side. I once took a mental health bloke fishing out there; he jumped in the water just as a boat came in and I had to rescue him. Crazy times.\u201d He\u2019s also been meaning to do the Mt Tamahunga Walkway. It\u2019s part of Te Araroa, the Long Pathway that runs from Cape Reinga to Bluff. The views from the ridge between Pakiri and Leigh are \u2018simply outstanding, apparently\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n
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Wendy and her partner, Crighton Bone (a Director of Photography \u2013 he shot the anti-drink-driving \u2018Ghost Chips\u2019 ad, among many other award-winning film projects), along with their two small children moved up here a couple of years ago. Wendy famously came to view an auction and ended up impulsively buying their 13-acre property without Crighton having seen it.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
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Wendy was a cult figure in nineties London. She was a Kiss FM DJ and also hosted a celebrity chat show. She has interviewed the likes of Oprah, Quentin Tarantino, Sir Cliff Richard, Naomi Campbell, Sandra Bullock and Jerry Springer, along with countless superstar musicians \u2013 sometimes in the back of limousines. Rock and roll. Doesn\u2019t she miss it?<\/p>\n\n\n
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\u2018Yeah, but you know, I was really ready to move on from all that,\u2019 Wendy says in her Cockney accent. \u2018I\u2019d kind of done London! I absolutely love the quiet life here, and I still get my little media buzz from Good Morning.\u2019 She does a spot on breakfast TV every second Friday, covering what\u2019s on around NZ. She also, as this writer can testify, DJs a mean disco at the local primary school and has started selling real estate in the area.<\/p>\n\n\n
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However, Wendy\u2019s big passion is \u2026 knitting. She\u2019s part of a local collective, who meet every Wednesday evening in the gorgeous Matakana cinema lounge. The Matayarners knit, crochet and chat \u2013 and sometimes a breakaway group (the Frillseekers) go all-out and yarn-bomb the village, leaving colourful frilly or fluffy woollen grafitti on fences and walls. \u2018It\u2019s a bit of a laugh, innit,\u2019 she says with her trademark huge grin.<\/p>\n\n\n
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This London girl\u2019s favourite place is wild and windswept Pakiri beach. \u2018It\u2019s just so empty and unspoilt,\u2019 she sighs. \u2018It\u2019s an untouched haven \u2013 most people don\u2019t want to get their cars dirty on that gravel road, do they?\u2019 If you\u2019re up for it, Pakiri Beach Horse Rides is a great way to spend a few hours, or for an unusual local attraction, Wendy recommends the Leigh Reptile Park on the way back towards Matakana. It hosts reptiles of all shapes and size from alligators to tuataras \u2013 the kids love it.<\/p>\n\n\n
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Trish has been part of the community in Matakana for over 25 years. She and her partner, the late Joe Polaischer, bought 50 acres of run-down, gorse and weed-infested farmland in 1987, half way up Matakana Valley Road. They lived in their house-bus \u2013 \u201cWe were such a pair of hippies!\u201d she reminisces \u2013 until they\u2019d finished building the very first earthwork house in Rodney. Then they just carried on working until they had created Rainbow Valley Farm.<\/p>\n\n\n
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Trish and Joe were in on the ground level of the new groundswell of all things organic and sustainable, and they were passionate about permaculture. Joe became a renowned educator both in NZ and internationally. The pair ran \u2018total immersion\u2019 courses at Rainbow Valley, where you could go and stay for two weeks and really get to grips with the gentle art of permaculture design.<\/p>\n\n\n
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Tragically, Joe died suddenly in 2008. His passing left a huge hole in the community; Trish was bereft. She managed to struggle on with the farm for a couple of years but had to move on in 2010. She found a quarter-acre section in Matakana village, where she built herself a new house, mostly out of wood she\u2019d harvested from some of the 13,000-plus trees she and Joe had planted at Rainbow Valley.<\/p>\n\n\n
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She has a whopping veggie garden, whose produce graces the weekly \u2018Green Swap\u2019 in the village, and has just ordered 15 new heritage fruit trees. Trish continues, with vim and vigour, to travel around NZ teaching permaculture design, composting and general gardening.<\/p>\n\n\n
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Trish is passionate about the Matakana area and regularly takes visitors to her two favourite spots on the coast: Goat Island and Tawharanui Regional Park. She adores the teeming fish at the Marine Park at Goat Island (there\u2019s a glass-bottomed boat in summer, for those unwilling to brave the water). And at pristine Tawharanui Open Sanctuary (a huge, fenced, predator-free environment within the park) she says \u201cMy favourite spot is the tiny cove just to the right of Anchor Bay\u2026 it\u2019s just so perfectly secluded.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n
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So there you go: the inside info from the locals. Come on up to the Matakana Coast with a fresh eye \u2013 whether it\u2019s winter or summer, there are gorgeous beach getaways where you can breathe deep and get away from the rat race.<\/p>\n\n\n
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