Devonport address to Ohope Beach private car — Kenji's family visit

The usual Auckland drizzle was falling when I pulled up to the neat little villa in Devonport. It was early May, the kind of damp chill that settles into your bones and makes you appreciate a good heater in the car. My passenger, Kenji Y, was waiting on the small porch, a compact suitcase at his feet and a thoughtful expression on his face. He’d come over to visit his sister, who had emigrated here a few years ago. He was heading straight to their place near Ohope, bypassing the city centre altogether. His flight had landed at Auckland the day before, and he’d spent the night in a hotel near the airport. He’d seen a bit of the city then, he told me, but his interest was really in the quieter parts of the North Island, the places he’d only ever seen on screensavers.

We were off across the bridge, the traffic a familiar crawl in the early morning. Kenji was quiet for the first hour, gazing out the window as the suburban sprawl gave way to the green hills of the Waikato. He pointed once, a fleeting gesture, towards a herd of Friesian cows grazing in a paddock. It was a small thing, but I remembered thinking on trips like this how different the perspectives are. For me, cows were just part of the landscape, the constant backdrop to the driving. For Kenji, they were likely part of the exotic tapestry of Aotearoa, a visual confirmation of a faraway place.

We stopped at a petrol station just south of Hamilton for a quick break. He bought a packet of crisps and a bottle of water, then stood for a moment by the car, looking back towards the rolling farmland. I think he was absorbing the sheer openness of it all. New Zealand, outside the main centres, is incredibly spacious, and that can be quite a culture shock for people from densely populated countries.

As we continued east, past Cambridge and towards Tirau, the landscape began to shift. The fields became smaller, rolling into foothills, and the dense bush started to creep closer to the road as we turned onto State Highway 5 towards Rotorua. The smell of damp earth and pine needles filled the air as we passed through the less-travelled sections of the drive towards the Bay of Plenty. Kenji mentioned he worked in technology back in Tokyo, something intricate and digital, and I could see him trying to reconcile that world with the mossy trees and winding tarmac ahead. He spoke about his sister’s letters, describing the birdlife and the beaches, and I sensed a gentle nostalgia in his tone, an appreciation for a slower pace of life he’d perhaps only glimpsed before.

We skirted around Rotorua, then took State Highway 30 towards Whakatāne. The views opened up dramatically as we got closer to the coast, the vast blue spread of the Pacific dotted with whitecaps finally coming into view, a dazzling contrast to the muted greens and greys of the morning. Ohope beach was quiet, the kind of quiet that comes from being slightly off the main tourist track, even in peak season. The late afternoon sun cast long shadows across the sand as I pulled up to his sister’s house.

He thanked me with a polite nod and a small, genuine smile. As he gathered his suitcase, he looked out towards the ocean again, this time with a look of quiet anticipation. He’d told me earlier that his sister loved to walk along that beach every morning. I had a feeling Kenji would be joining her, perhaps finding his own quiet moments of appreciation for this corner of the world, a world away from his own. I found a motel in Whakatāne for the night, planning to head back to Auckland early the next morning, reflecting on the subtle connections that can form across cultures, even in the quiet confines of a car.