Te Arai is a seaside community roughly an hour north east of Auckland's CBD. My dad used to surf there when he was young. I've surfed there since I was young. White sand, crystal clear water, and miles of it, often with no one else around. You park right behind the dunes and take ten steps to the water. With only two public access points, Te Arai is what a big beach is all about. It's a genuine hidden gem, believe me, I wouldn't be telling you where it was if I didn't have to.
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This summer might be the last I'll ever enjoy Te Arai this way. The trucks and diggers have already moved in to level the landscape for development. The original plan was for 1400 houses. That was knocked back to 46 luxury holiday homes. And a golf course.The developers insist they are taking a "tread lightly" approach but local group Save Te Arai has major concerns over aspects of the development and its impact on the environment. The Council halted the developer's plan to push the carpark back 400m in May after strong resistance from the community. The big fear though, is that one day public access to Te Arai will be cut and future generations of Kiwis will miss out on the beauty that is Te Arai.One trip down Pacific Rd will leave you with the eerie feeling that change is coming. Trees have been wiped out, weirs made into small dams, piles of random sand and stones scattered around. Bulldozers wait in anticipation of the work to come. Random fences line the dunes and hide between the pines.I took my camera along on my last surfing trip to capture these photographs of stillness and foreboding.Follow Liam on Twitter.
