Dam, it’s good to be back at magic O¯ hope

Summer essay Lloyd Burr spent three years overseas, and says the pull of a Kiwi summer was a dream that helped pull him back to Aotearoa.

I’ve been dreaming of this summer for three years. Glorious blue skies. Sandy beaches. Clean water. A refreshing breeze. I’ve been bereft of these ingredients since April 2018, when I moved to London to become Newshub’s Europe correspondent.

Over there, summer means swimming in a filthy pond in Hampstead Heath, or travelling for hours to the ‘‘seaside’’ for a swim. It’s called the seaside because it can’t be called a beach. It’s stones and rocks and you get a sore arse and sore feet.

While I was privileged enough to get two breaks away to Croatia and Turkey, my summers in Europe were pretty bleak. It was either rainy or cold or spent indoors because of lockdowns.

Which is probably why the longer I spent in London, the stronger the pull of home became. Add the Auckland lockdown to the mix, and it’s made me long for the beach even more.

So which beach have I been dreaming about? It’s New Zealand’s best beach: O¯ hope Beach.

Beautiful white sands that stretch for 10 kilometres along the Bay of Plenty coast, just over the hill from Whakata¯ ne. The main road is called Po¯ hutukawa Ave, and for good reason: during summer there’s a glorious contrast between the blue of the sea and the vibrant crimson blossoms of the trees.

Simply put, O¯ hope is a slice of paradise. One I’ve been lucky enough to visit since I was in nappies.

My Great Aunty Mary and Great Uncle John had a bach there and my family would go and stay for a week with all the cousins. It was magic. Mattresses on the floor, tents in the yard, lots of Christmas leftovers in the fridge, and plenty of laughs and definitely the odd tantrum.

The bach was one of the oldest houses in O¯ hope, and it was built with native timber. It had plenty of quirks: weird cupboard handles, rounded wall corners, a terracotta stone bench top, and an eclectic mix of crockery and cutlery and furniture. The wardrobes smelt of moth balls and there were always old bottles of cod liver oil in the bathroom.

My favourite thing to do at O¯ hope was building dams across the local stream. I’d spend days and nights digging up sand and dragging logs and driftwood to create my masterpiece.

I call it that because it was incredibly intricate; there was a tailrace overflow, channels, and even a bridge over the outlet so people could use the dam to get across the stream without getting wet shoes.

By the end of the week, I’d have created a massive swimming hole which would warm up in the sun and become the local hot pools.

When I wasn’t damming, I’d be swimming and boogie boarding. It’s the perfect beach for it, long and wide and relatively safe for kids to learn how to respect the power of the sea.

The garage was a dumping ground for old boogie boards – but a gold mine for us kids, who’d have a field day with them in the water.

And when we weren’t riding the waves, we were bracing ourselves against them while gathering pipi and tuatua – a task that always featured roars of laughter from Aunty Sharon as we got battered around by the surf, or nipped by the local crustaceans.

We’d collect the shellfish into onion bags or hangi sacks and haul them up to the bach for shucking, using old bone-handled butter knives. We’d then have pipi or tuatua fritters for days: white bread, tomato sauce, gritty fritters. Perfection.

O¯ hope is synonymous with longlining too. Dad and Uncle Bruce would take the end of the long line out in an old tinny while we all stayed on the beach to ensure the line and hooks and bait deployed smoothly. It was then a bit of a waiting game, but we’d kill the time by building sand castles or swimming or dam building. The long line was an investment in our dinner, and we’d hope the snapper would bite.

Bringing in the long line was always an excitement. There was an array of fish, the odd octopus or starfish and even the occasional hammerhead shark. A real-life shark was always exhilarating.

O¯ hope also has an epic flying fox, mounted on top of a big lighthouse structure down by the Maraetotara Stream. We’d all march down there in the evenings, and if we were well-behaved, we’d

call in at the dairy for an ice cream. The dairy was always generous, and there would be a trail of melted ice cream splotches along the path to the flying fox.

As a kid, the flying fox seemed huge. It was terrifying, and it took me years to build up the courage to fly solo. It’s still there, although it’s not as massive as I remember.

There was an awesome wooden pirate shipinspired playground at the flying fox park too, where we’d take to the high seas and sail around the world. I’m not sure if it’s survived all these years.

My childhood memories are not the only reason why O¯ hope is my favourite spot. I’ve spent many of my teenage years there too, seeing in the New Year or just escaping for the weekend to relax and unwind.

As I’ve become an adult, my friends have experienced the magic of O¯ hope too, joining me for holidays at the bach – which again would become a sea of mattresses and beds to fit us all in. We’d still gather pipi and tuatua and fire up the barbie on the deck – a perfect place to people-watch, enjoy a few drinks, and watch the day turn to dusk and dark.

Sadly, the bach doesn’t exist any more. It was sold a few years ago after Great Aunty Mary passed away, and a few months ago it was torn down. It feels like a part of my heart has been torn down with too.

But even though the bach doesn’t exist any more, the memories always will. O¯ hope will always have an immense pulling power on me and my soul and I feel like I owe part of me to that beach, because it’s been the backdrop for many of my formative years.

Luckily, two of my best mates now live at

O¯ hope, and I intend to spend many days and nights this summer adding a new chapter to my O¯ hope story. I’ve been dreaming of O¯ hope for three years, dreaming of that amazing moment as you drive over the hill from Whakata¯ ne and you’re suddenly hit with an amazing ocean vista.

The po¯ hutukawa forest then opens up, and the beach appears. And all the stresses of the world disappear.

It’s perfection. It’s heavenly. And it’s what a Kiwi summer means to me.

The dairy was always generous, and there would be a trail of melted ice cream splotches along the path to the flying fox.