Hiroki Golf
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Content with his mornings work, Piripi plays the final note of his mesmerising tune:
"As long as day follows night we'll have a river of life and light"
The life and the light are all around me. Birds swoop low across the rolling waves and the morning sun now drenches the bay.
Wandering through the shallows in front of me are two men in olive green waders calling as if for a lost dog. They gesture for me to join them in the water.
Their bellows of 'Taraaaa' and 'Pancakeeee' are not directed at estranged labradors but are intended to wrangle a gaggle of sting rays. The vibrations of their booming voices and their reassuringly mellow heartbeats are coursing through the water like a radar, stretching over 1 kilometre out to sea. Responding to the calls, the rays start to swish by our feet. 300 kilos of alien shaped blubber rush us like puppies and they breach the water with snorting nostrils to wish us good morning. I glance out at the first light shimmering off the water then down to the enormous extraterrestrial nibbling at my toes and wonder if I might have crashed the car and slipped into an alternate dimension.
I'm starting to feel at home amongst the rays but we have a tee time to get to. Just a few miles across town is Poverty Bay Golf Club also known as Awapuni Links. By default it's the first golf course on earth to be graced with the sunrise each day. My new Gisborne friends ferry us to the opening hole of this charming community course and we squeeze in a quick nine.
In the days that follow we tick off two more courses that have me grinning from ear to ear.
Kinloch on the shores of New Zealand's largest lake makes use of an impossibly beautiful expanse of moonscape to produce the country's toughest golf course. But it's our final stop at Wairakei that confirms the full spectrum of golf in this country: an 18 hole championship course that sits inside an animal sanctuary. Built with the intention of preserving some of the country's most endangered species, a five and a half kilometre predator fence protects kiwi's, fallow deer and the flightless takahe bird. The perfect, dream-like end to a chaotic adventure.
Our next stop at Waitangi was a more humble experience but one I couldn't miss. The golf course sits adjacent to an important Treaty site where a formal agreement between the British Crown and over 500 Maori chiefs took place in 1840. The course itself has a history of its own: built on land donated to the town by the Governors of New Zealand back in the 1930s. I played 9 holes with the charming head pro who, just a few hours previous, signed for a 63 at Kauri Cliffs. I listened intently as he guided me down the signature hole: a curling par 5 that winds down to the shore line towards a blue horizon dotted with towering rock pillars.
The following morning took us to Waipu, where a feeling of Scotland hangs in the air. The town is a Scottish settlement populated in the mid 19th century when Reverend Norman McLeod made the 12,000 mile journey from Ullapool. But they didn't leave their Alba traditions behind - just along the road in Caledonian Park the annual Waipu Highland Games marks one of the oldest Scottish traditions in the Southern Hemisphere and the golf course followed suit: undulating links like terrain kisses the bright white sand of Bream Bay. I didn't expect to come to the other end of the earth and be struck with a feeling of home.
Our final stop before the long haul to Gisborne took us a few miles south to another pivotal site in the New Zealand golf story, at least for me. Tara Iti - plastered on the covers of golf magazines the world over - was the first course to draw my attention to this golfing haven. Back in 2015 Tom Doak completed his final brushstroke here and 2 years later the course debuted at #6 on the global rankings - the highest debut ranking in history. Alongside a pricey membership, golfers could gain access to the course by formal handwritten letter, but there was a curious stipulation. Those golfers could enjoy their time on site for as long as they wished, but once they left they could never return. The lore of Tara Iti grew and eventually turned fully private but one thing was clear: golf in this utopian corner of the world was in high demand. 5 years later Te Arai Links was born to bolster the demand.
Venturing onto the North Course felt more like an interstellar mission than a golf retreat - expansive fairways flow seamlessly onto comically undulating greens that demand you play the creative shot over the percentage one. Rollercoaster putts trundle along half pipes and upturned saucers before swooping towards the hole side - a slap in the face reminder to play golf with childlike curiosity.
From that 18th green we ventured here to Gisborne.
