"The name Tangimoana meaning “crying sea” is not the original name for this sleepy little coastal settlement. In earlier times Maori knew this beach, next to the Rangitikei River as Tawhirihoe meaning “ a firm grip on the paddle”. This name is said to date from the late 18th century when a Whanganui taua ( war party) called into the river mouth on their way to Cook Strait. A skirmish with local Maori resulted in the Whanganui people killing many with the paddles of their canoe".
It was our boring day. Nothing to do today. Suddenly my B gave some idea “Ey, why don’t we go to Tangimoana”. Tangimoana????? What place is that????? Actually B already went there with his classmate for their site project visit. I’m not very sure where the exact site they were visited last time. But he told me some about the secret Tangimoana Base which located in a secret place and entry denied for public. He said that the base is for government spy activities and some believes New Zealand spymasters are monitoring the airwaves of the Pacific neighbours and supplying the information to foreign parties. Actually the function of these particular bases is to monitor communications in Pacific regions with independence struggles like Bougainville, East Timor and West Papua. Ops, enough for secret Tangimoana Base as we wouldn’t planned to visit that place.
Actually Tangimoana is one of the Manawatu seaside settlements. It managed by the Department of Conservation. It is a small village set in the sand dune landscape of the area, very close to the sea itself and the mouth of the Rangitikei River. It took about 15-20 minutes journey from Palmy. As I’m not very good about maping so I can’t tell detail how to go to this place.
He also told that they found wild berry area in their visit. Wow! as I’m crazy about taking photos, I thought that was the right place to go. Hmmm…my dreams were blown to pieces when he said he didn’t remember where the place was, coz they went there by bus.
We parked the car about 500 meters from the beach coz the beach access road was covered by the delicate sand. Only large and mobile sand drifts a four wheel drive is recommended. Actually it was a windy day and not the right time to go to the beach. We were almost can’t opened our eyes when the wind was blowing strongly carried delicate sands. We only took about 15 minutes on the beach areas to take photos.
On the way back, we stopped by at the lagoon near the beach. The lagoon is one of several resulting from the formation of sand dunes along the coast which prevented inland water run-off escaping out to sea. At the one spot I saw something that interests me. Hey, that was wild berry. Without further a due, we stopped for a wild. We had no intended to pick for business... hehehe... just picked some and took some photos.
