Emma Hall, a participant in Sport Northland’s Active Families programme, shares her story of a new active adventure

Ko Emma Hall tōku ingoa.  My name is Emma Hall and I was fortunate enough to be chosen to be a participant on “Voyage 786T5 Ope Rangatahi” on the Spirit of New Zealand which was taking part in a special event called Tuia 250.  Tēnēi āku korero.  This is my story.

Monday:

Monday the fourth of November at 4pm we boarded the ship with four other schools.  We stayed on the boat overnight at Port Nikau in Whangarei so we could get familiar with the crew and the boat.  

Tuesday: 

We set sail and headed towards the Poor Knights and arrived at midday.  We had our first of many acknowledgements where we would stop at significant wāhi tapu (sacred place) on the way and were told about the history of the wāhi tapu.  After that we were put into four groups of ten which worked perfectly because there were four schools from around the North Island and each school had five girls and five boys.  We were all put into groups and each group had a raft, in our groups we paddled into one of the caves at Poor Knights and we all went for a swim inside the cave.  After our swim in the caves, we paddled the rafts back to the ship and we chilled for a while, then we headed to our bunks to rest.

Wednesday:

We woke up early and went for a walk around the ship to wake us up for the day. We were supposed to go for a morning swim but we didn’t have time because we had to get to our first acknowledgement at 7am so we set sail and get on our way to Whangaruru. We all had to clean the ship in our little groups, then we had breakfast and headed to the aft deck (the back of the ship) where we had our first acknowledgement of the day. We learned about the history of Whangaruru and then we were on our way again to head to our next acknowledgement.  We set the sails heading for Rakaumangamanga and once we arrived we learned about the whales that lived there. All the waka and other ships of the flotilla were there, with one of the kaumatua from the waka Ngahiraka Mai Tawhiti, then all of us headed to a nice sheltered bay for a swim.

My group were on night watch where we paired up and took shifts looking after the ship making sure that we didn’t hit any other ships or their anchors and that we were not sinking or on fire! We were on two-hour shifts throughout the night till dawn. My friend and I took the last shift and we got to watch the sunrise which was cool.

Thursday: 

My friend and I were the first ones awake so we just walked around the ship and waited for the rest to join us. We all had to jump off the ship and there was a warm shower on the mid deck for us after our swim.  After that we were ready for the day and set sail for Waitangi.

We saw a small island and the crew decided to blow up the rafts, so we stopped sailing and rowed to shore. It was a long paddle, but we got there. We played tug of war and my team won then we did some relays.  We were given about an hour to chill or swim. Some others and I went out and got some seafood and ate it on the rocks. We got to Waitangi just before nightfall and once again we sat on the deck and chilled watching the sunset. That night we were able to eat on deck rather than in the cabin below.

Friday:

We woke up early and put these big orange raincoats and pants on so our clothes wouldn’t get wet while we rafted to the shores of Paihia Waitangi for the pōwhiri.  Once there we all gathered along the shore - everyone from all the different ships and waka then made our way to the marae atea. There were a lot of people I knew there.  The haukainga were doing the haka pōwhiri which was a good two - three hours long. After that we had a mean feed then we got back on our rafts and were towed back to the ship. My team’s raft was the last of the four and got filled with water. We used our boots and shoes to empty the raft of water. 

Saturday

We all woke up early, cleaned up, had breakfast and then chilled as we waited for our rides home. We took photos and made plans to meet up again and hugged each other more than once, sad that we had to say goodbye.

It was an eventful week and I learnt a lot of things I never knew. I had fun. I saw beautiful scenery, learnt a lot of history about wāhi tapu in the area, and most importantly - I met wonderful people and developed new friendships. Overall I am grateful for this once in a lifetime experience that I will never forget.