Anatini - a podcast by Whitestone Geopark

Geopark - Sasha – Anatini 2020

Real Radio: Time to talk Geopark once again, joined by the. Geoeducator Sasha Morriss. Now, Sasha, what are we talking about this week?

Geoeducator: Yeah, hi. This week I'm going to be talking just briefly about a geosite that many may have heard of, but not necessarily visited. It's called Anatini.  Now Anatini actually means 'many caves', and it's just a few minutes up the road from Elephant Rocks. Often you go to Elephant Rocks - there are lots of people there. But you go up the road to Anatini and there's not a lot of visitors there at the moment. Last time I was there, there was a family there having a wee look around. But it's a pretty interesting sight to go through. And despite it still being Otekaike Limestone. It's quite a different experience going to the site. So to find it - it's just up the road. And it's well signposted. You go through a little farm gate, down a wee track. And then this kind of gorge opens up in front of you and you follow a little track with some stairs down into the gorge. And it's almost like you can envisage that you are at the bottom of the sea floor. There's limestone cliffs all around you and you can have a good wee hunt for some fossils. When I was there I found a bivalve that was still encased in the rock - bivalve, meaning two valves, two sides to it. And at the far end, there is a protected case - and underneath that is a baleen whale skeleton.  So you can go there and actually see - "oh, wow, this whale used to swim around in this area". It's mind blowing. It's awesome. So how accessible is it? Really accessible. So you need to park on the side of the road and be careful crossing the road because it can get very busy. It is a gravel track. And then there are kind of another gravel track down into the site with some stairs. So it's not accessible for wheelchairs or strollers, but kids can do it and adults who are able.  Just, you know, normal precautions of not climbing on the limestone. Should it be wet it is slippery and just keeping an eye out for fall hazards and things like that.

Real Radio: Okay. So if somebody wants a bit more information about Anatini where can they find that?

Geoeducator: Well, you can get information from our dossier that you can download from our website or we're about to put up a facebook post very soon of my recent trip to Anatini. So you can see photos of part of the access - the farmgate where you first go in and then just a few pictures of what you can see when you get down into the gorge. So I suggest you have a look at that and see if that's a site that you'd want to visit. But I encourage while you're  at elephant rocks, why not just take another few minutes to go up the road, have a look at Anatini and just compare the two. They're quite different, even though they're Otekaki Limestone. Another thing to point out actually at Anatini is there is really, really good examples of honeycomb weathering. So honeycomb weathering, as it suggests looks a bit like a honeycomb and in a crunchy bar looks a little bit like that, but obviously a lot bigger. Really impressive. And when I was there, I actually found there were birds had made nests in the little pockmarks in the rock. It was gorgeous. And so I guess that, you know, the rock heats up during the day. It's a nice little warm place, high up out of the way of predators that they can have their little nests. So as a cool site to visit.

Real Radio: So that's Anatini.  Just up the road and well worth a visit. Cool. Thanks Sasha we'll catch up with you next week.

Geoeducator: Thank you.

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