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Wednesday, October 31, 2012

31st October – Mckee Reservoir to Nelson to Picton


We had a nice last morning in the campsite, going through the map and being given hints about where to go in the north island.

We planned to get a few mainly car-related chores done and Matt wanted to see Nelson so we headed there. We found a new indicator stalk at a breakers so we could get finally get rid of the one which was held together with cardboard. Feeling like we were on a roll we thought we should also get round to getting the wheels aligned since Matt has been complaining about the car pulling to the left since we set off.

Pulling into the mechanic’s, they immediately pointed out that one of the tyres needed changing because it was all worn on one side. We kicked ourselves for having left it so long but it wasn't safe to drive on so we had no choice. By the time we’d finished discussing it, the half hour slot they were going to squeeze us into had dwindled and so we needed to leave the car with them for a few hours.

Since we were looking at spending $500 in car stuff and ferry tickets for the day, we wanted to avoid the shops and so took a walk to the ‘centre of New Zealand’. It was a nice, steep, zig-zagged walk to the top of the hill and a 360⁰ view of the city looking like it had crawled out of the sea and spread out over the land. All of the cities we’ve seen in the South are low-rise and look less built up than UK towns. The only one that wasn’t was Christchurch and that has certainly changed now.

We circled the hill and came out at the other side of town near the Japanese gardens. We’d just finished a very pleasant look around when we got the call to say that the car was ready. We wandered back past rows of beautiful cottages, decorated with resplendent, colourful flowers and creepy Halloween decorations.
I just couldn’t get my head around having Halloween in the bright sunshine but it didn't seem to dampen the spirits of the groups of people out trick or treating later in the evening – though I do wonder if it puts more of an emphasis on having a decent costume when people can actually see them.

The day had flown by and we lost a few hours of the evening on the never-ending road to Picton. It was well signposted so we didn't use the map and only later realised that the main road took the most circuitous route possible. With a 5am start for the ferry, we didn't waste much time in getting to bed.

Tuesday, October 30, 2012

30th October – Mckee Reserve


I’d planned to spend our day of sunshine running, relaxing, reading and walking and it started off well with a nice jog.

After that though I’m not sure what happened. A ‘quick springclean’ of the car ended up somehow taking up the vast majority of the day and an awful lot of campsite space. I had our bedclothes airing on walkway handrails, the bed propped up against one picnic table, the tarp drying off draped over another, and all of our stuff spread out all over the grass.

Meanwhile, Matt was happily extending a lighter socket to the back of the car so we could plug our cooler in now the weather has heated up.

I’m sure no-one wants any more details about that and, other than a funny conversation with a fella who I thought was part of the family business but turned out to be doing community service, that was pretty much the whole of the day. Although we did get invited over to the neighbours’ to eat fresh bread, made in the wood-burning stove.

We spent the evening around the fire with Helen, Ken and Phil, making pancake letters on the stove in a cast-iron pan and generally listening to Phil as he told us ‘interesting facts’, comically -crappy jokes and showed us time-lapse videos of Maori ‘haungei’ – which we narrowly escaped watching all huddled together around a plug socket in the toilet.

Monday, October 29, 2012

29th October – Kawatiri to McKee Reserve


After so many days of rain recently, we were planning to head to Picton and get the ferry to the north island but today was so sunny and pretty that we just had to go to Abel Tasman national park.

Now I am sure that you are all tiring of me saying that the landscape and views were incredible but they were. Every single day we have been in New Zealand we have seen something spectacular. Sometimes I have found it hard to write the blog simply because I can’t wrench my eyes away from the beauty of what is outside my window.

Yesterday we followed the coast, looking past enigmatic cliff formations into the haze cast by unsettled seas striking stubborn towers of rock that had broken from the land and were dispersed far from the shore, We followed windy roads between ocean and rainforest and saw whisps of clouds lingering amongst the dark hills, suspended in vertical trails or wrapped cozily around smaller peaks.

Today, what we can see is much closer to the UK at the height of summer. Many more trees I can recognise but not name and even more I wish I could see more often. The umpteen greens I’m becoming accustomed to but with some now being totally overwhelmed by flushes of red, orange, yellow and pink. It’s like the Wizard f Oz where everything turns Technicolor.

There are rivers winding around valleys and segments of the land given over to growing kiwis, oranges, pears, asparagus and apples. There are hills of corrugated slopes, hills of evergreens and hills of scrubland set against mountains of snow. And the sunshine, tripping though it all and bouncing off rock, water and leaf, makes all the colours far more intense.

We stopped briefly in the town of Motueka and roundabouts to pick up bags of fruit from little stalls with honesty boxes. We bought golden kiwis, pears, tangelos and saw kumara, asparagus and more that we didn't spot in time to stop

We took the windy road to Marahau, which is at the end of the road in Abel Tasmin National Park and has a lovely beach where groups of kayakers start their voyages deeper into the park. We sat around for a while, enjoying the view and then went to the information centre to find out about walks. Even the walks involved catching water taxis or kayaking and we considered our options before deciding that it would be too expensive considering our recent splurges and that maybe we’d just find a nice campsite and chill out in the sunshine for a change

Heading back to Motueka, we stopped at the Monkey Wizard brewery and had a taster of some local beers before purchasing a couple for our day of proper camping. The lady who owned it was sulking because she wanted to spend the day paddling in her kayak in the sea opposite her house. I had to suppress a giggle when she complained that she didn’t get away so much because she had to make use of her home pool and spa. My heart bled.

In Motueka we paid a visit to the very informative I-site office where we found out that the next few days were due to be glorious. The lady told us about some nice walks and campsite and gave us some more information about different kayaking options so we decided to hang around for a few more days.

Matt had been complaining about his size 16s falling down already and we found some men’s Columbia walking trousers for a bargain $5. We also spotted a book on bushcraft for him and another one on grammar (not quite so adventurous) for me and so we were set for a good few days of proper camping.
McKee Reserve was unlike any $6pp campsite we've been to so far. Sandwiched between ‘bush’ and the huge blue expanse of Tasman Bay, it had several blocks of actual flushing toilets, cold showers, lots of water points, BBQ ovens and a conspicuous lack of the little blighters that have not only plagued our waking hours but also kept us at night tearing at our flesh – the dreaded sandfly.

I went for an explore and got chatting to a lovely, positive local couple called Helen and Ken, who had an impressive camping set-up and were busy cooking up a whole leg of lamb over the open fire.

Helen made adorable fur-lined slippers that she sold at local markets. They had both worked together until business had slacked off and Ken had to get a job. Ken worked in mental health and was full of praise for the financing and execution of the provision of services. He supported men in sheltered accommodation and it was really interesting to hear about his work and how different it sounded from the stories I've heard at home.

Also hanging around nearby was a slightly odd but interesting fella called Phil, who lived in his car at the site. He liked to park in the shade ‘to keep the chilly bin cold’ and so was permanently tucked away in the trees rather than out on the pitches. 

When I wandered back along the beach to our camp, Matt was still absorbed in his bushcraft book but insisting on pancakes so I got to work. I hate eating pancakes but love making them so he was already feeling queasy when I got overexcited and moved onto making them ‘American-style’ with a strawberry and pear syrup.

When I took some to our neighbours, they had a big pot of delicious veggies roasting in the pot and so I handed them over and cleared off to cook up some noodles before I got too envious. Matt was still stuck in his book and not feeling too sociable though so I went over later to spend the evening sitting by the fire and chatting to Ken and Helen. We had a good giggle pretending that I’d actually made Matt up and talking about how they’d met at a funeral (!).

Sunday, October 28, 2012

28th October - Goldborough to Kawatiri


We were relieved when the skies had cleared a little in the morning and we achieved the first 10 minutes without rain for what already seemed like a long time. We stretched our legs and had a nice chat to some American girls who had been working and travelling and had been invited to stay under sponsorship.

I found myself kicking myself again. I always intended to work and travel in Australia and New Zealand and would sometimes love to turn the clock back 14 years and have a word or two with myself. Hindsight doesn’t reflect an alternate reality though and I have to try to learn from it instead of torturing myself. Matt feels similar in many ways. There’s so much we both want to do yet before we have to grow up and I spend a lot of time thinking to try and reconcile what we’d like to do with what we may have to do. I have a constantly expanding list of skills I want to develop, and hobbies I want to take up, and things that I’d like to do, and things that I want to learn, and stuff I want to do better, and it just goes on and on and on. I want more people, more places, more knowledge, more life. Sometimes I can’t wait to come home to get started and sometimes I’m too scared to come home because I cannot see how reality can possibly work like that. Surely I couldn’t have been doing all of these things all along? Maybe the magic only works while we’re away? It’s hard to not spend too much time scrabbling away in my mind for a way to somehow make it all work.

But in the end I don’t like to talk about it because it all sounds too corny. I just know that I have never been so relaxed and happy but how could I not be? I don’t have to do any of the things that used to fill me with anxiety and self-doubt. I don’t have to teach or drive or please anyone other than Matt and myself. I don’t even have to pay bills or clean the house or do the boring stuff in the same way. I’d be stupid to still be such a wreck all of the time.

Back in the not-so-real real world, we tried to start Garry and found he had a totally flat battery and could barely muster a splutter. Almost everyone else had already left the camp site other than a large hired campervan and a man with a caravan who was searching under the trees using a metal detector.
Not wanting to disturb the sacred haven of a person’s posh camper we opted to ask the treasure-seeker if he had any jump leads instead. He was friendly enough but Matt and I soon found ourselves somehow dismissed until he was ready to stop searching for whatever he was searching for and check to see if he could help us out.

When we got back to Garry however, he seemed to have mustered some life from somewhere and started straight away. Magic.


Glad to be on the move and reasonably dry, we headed to pancake rocks where, due to a geological process that isn't completely understood, the rocks form in layers like pancakes. The sea has worn away at the rocks and made chasms, blowholes and other interesting features that can be seen from specially constructed viewing areas. They’re best viewed in stormy weather (yesterday would have been perfect) or at high tide for their full effect but we still saw the sea having a good slosh and a few blowholes blowing.

Keen to be outside as long as possible, we followed a walking track along the banks of the Ponorari and Punakaiki river for a few hours. The vegetation was totally different from our last few walks and we wandered from temperate rain forest to grassy meadows. It seemed a long time since we’d just walked through plain old fields.

We went over the swingbridge and past some pretty ponies and back to the rocks to take some pictures before setting off to cover a bit more ground.

We drove along the dramatic coastal road for a while but Matt got sleepy so we pulled over in a DOC site for him to have a rest. Matt had a little sleep and I met Phil Solid. I introduced the pair of them when Matt woke up but Matt found him a dirty disgrace so we left him there and moved on back into the rain. I’d explain more about Phil but he was spectacle probably best recalled verbally.

We spent the night at Kawatiri , a camp by the main road. It was a bit noisy and full of bitey critters but it was free so we’re not complaining.

Saturday, October 27, 2012

27th October – Lake Mahinapua to Goldsborough


Woke up to torrential rain so we made the most of it while we could and went back to sleep to avoid nagging urge for a wee. Traipsing through the rain to the bathroom is not a very nice start to the day and I like to put it off for as long as possible.

Unfortunately the rain had no intention of giving up and continued to pour all day, changing only from driving to drenching to lobbing it down and then back again.

Matt thought that the indicator would be good to go with just a bit of soldering and so we thought we’d ask around for somewhere to do it. Despite the fact that everything other than supermarkets are closed after 5pm in the week and over the weekends, we managed to find an op-shop open until lunchtime. A bloke there offered to help out so Matt disappeared into the back with him while I sat looking at the books. Matt reappeared a short while later. Apparently the guys soldering iron was too huge but they had managed to ‘fix’ it with cardboard. It still didn't work properly but at least it reduced the risk of anyone piling into the back of us.

The rest of the day was a grim drizzle of not so interesting stuff. Being in the car in the rain is just not much fun. Getting wet means hours of trying to dry off and get warm again and constantly changing clothes from wet to just damp ones. It is incredibly frustrating when I don’t like being cooped up and want to be out exploring. I hate the rain at home but it is something else to be in a situation where to stand up means going outside and getting soaked.

Since the most interesting indoor activity without a big cover charge was the sock museum, we caught up on some online stuff and tried to upload the skydiving and cliff jump videos. We ran out of time before they completed so we went to the camp site. It was possible to pan for gold at the site but we since it was still pouring, we got drenched trying to make dinner and then did the only thing that we could think of to do that kept us dry and lifted our spirits – drinking beer, watching/listening to comedy and eating crisps. 

18th October – Invercargill to Lake Monowai



Invercargill had a shower at the bus station so we made use of that and I fell for the helpful, little old man that worked there and provided such a great service for a $1 wash.

Matt went in pawn shop to another look at the binoculars we were considering buying and to see if they had a cable that he needed (some things never change) and ended up buying a miniature guitar.

On the way out of the city, we stopped at the op-shop to look for some walking trousers for Matt again and ended up buying loads of stuff. Everything was $1 and we ended up spending $18 so you can see how unused to the wet and the cold we are these days. Oh, and just out of interest, size 16 woman’s trousers are too big for Matt these days.

The drive to Monowai was beautiful - the snow-capped mountains were back again but this time much, much closer.

We got to the campsite in Monowai and met Gabor, a Hungarian agricultural engineer who was working as a cucumber farmer. We went for a nice walk, adventuring over big swamps and through creeks, and talking about Gabor’s PHD where he spent a year collecting butterflies in isolated areas of Arica.  

We all spent the evening together, outside in the rain, cooking dinner, drinking cider and being attacked by beastly sandflies.  It was all very pleasant until we got too cold and had to go to bed.

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

17th October – Invercargill


After a day of chores, there were still a few more fun things that we wanted to do in Invercargill and so first stop was the Museum and Art Gallery where the Tuatara lived.

We’d heard that Tuatara are the closest thing do dinosaurs still on earth and the museum proclaimed them to ‘the last representatives of a lineage stretching back 225 million years’. We have to admit that we were expecting something a little bit more substantial than the almost duplicate lizards that we saw. Apparently, even though they do look like lizards, they are a totally distinct species of Sphenodonians that roamed all over the earth many millions of years ago. About 60ish million years ago, along with the dinosaurs, they became extinct in everywhere but NZ.

The art gallery section housed some very life-like pastels, some great photography and some community art. There was a project where teenagers made sculptures from tins of food that would later be donated to the Salvation Army and a room dedicated to raising awareness of mental health issues.

My favourite bit was the museum though. They had lots of exhibits and information but we spent the most time looking at the section of shipwrecks and the people who had (sometimes) survived them.  There were some amazing stories and examples of how resourceful the people had been. There were castaway huts containing provisions on some of the islands, just in case people were shipwrecked, but they could not always be found, were sometimes already empty and did not contain very much in general. One bunch survived 7 years but many were not so lucky.

Less than unlucky were the thousands and thousands of poor whales, penguins and seals that were plundered for their resources for  a number of years. There were charts of how the numbers had dwindled, to nothing in some areas, and pictures of how prolific they had been during earlier times.  There was even an example of a dreadful machine, a ‘steam digester’,  used to process penguins and produce oil. Four machines like that destroyed 3,500 per day (plus an additional 500 birds to help fuel the boiler).

Further on in the exhibition, more gigantic stuffed albatross made us seriously consider driving all the way back to Dunedin to go to the reserve. We made more enquiries and there was no guarantee of seeing them because they were nesting so I reluctantly decided it wasn’t worth the distance, time and money. Guess that means we’ll also have to come to New Zealand again too!

Next stop was Invercargill Micro-Brewery, where they had a fill-you-own pump shop and where we were treated to a taste of all of their creations. They were all so lovely that it was hard to narrow them down but we eventually walked away with a bottle of nice apply cider and some pale ale.

We drove Garry to Oreti Beach where he could actually go on the sand himself. Oreti Beach is where Burt Munroe (The World’s Fastest Indian) used to practice beating the land speed record and so Matt had a play while I went for a good jog. I’d really missed my Oz beach exercise and it was a bit of a contrast to do it next to a grey sea and in wet and windy weather but I enjoyed it anyway.

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

16th October – Curio Bay to Invercargill


The rotten weather was in full force when we woke up and showed no sign of abating.

We made a stop at Slope Point and decided to brave a walk to the most southerly point of the island. It’s 5140km from the Equator, 4803km from South Pole and just felt like the point that all bad weather collided. The wind was so strong it was hard to stay upright and the hailstones were lashing horizontally into our faces. It was good fun but we were soaked and red-raw when we got back into the car.

Further down the road we noticed more sign of the relentless weather. There were trees that were so battered by wind that they grew slanted with their branches permanently swept to the other side of the tree.
We stopped briefly in Fortrose for a glimpse of a the tip of a shipwreck poking out of the water but the tide was quite high and the rain was still coming so we didn't get out of the car.

When we arrived in Invercargill we had a quick look around and a look for some trousers ore suited to walking in wet weather for Matt. He was so reluctant to buy his first pair of jeans because they weren't very travel friendly and now that’s all he seems to have.

The lady in the charity shop was very nice and gave us a map and some instructions on where to find other shops. She also gave us directions to the Post Office because I’d seen a great sheepskin jacket that I would have loved to have at home and was thinking about posting back with my wonderful pajamas.

We’d stopped in the city to get jobs done and so most of the day was spent stocking up on supplies and trying to do little jobs that we couldn't get done in the more remote areas.

We also needed to do some laundry so were directed to Glengarry Shopping Centre near the city centre so we could do some laundry and were expecting a mall of some sorts. It turned out to be a semi boarded-up complex of shops on a run-down estate – which I guess might actually be more what you might expect with a self-service launderette. We got into the swing of it and went to the chippy while we waited. The lady in there was confused by our request for vinegar (“What, shall I just pour it on them?!”) but gave it her best shot. We carried our newspaper wrapped package past the park with the kids happily spinning on a roundabout cushioned with a double mattress, and munched them in the car. They were sadly disappointing but it was quite a novel experience altogether.

After pigging ourselves, I had fun folding out undies in public and had a nice conversation with a lady who fostered up to 6 troubled kids and held down a full-time job while Matt tried to fix a dodgy car mirror.
In the evening we went to Seaward Bush Reserve and had a nice walk around before cooking up a tasty sausage casserole (a welcome change from pasta) and snuggling into bed.

Monday, October 15, 2012

15th October – Papatowai to Curio Bay


I’d read about a place called the Lost Gypsy Gallery, a collection of hand-made automata created from found objects and on display in an old bus, and was really looking forward to having a look round and a chat with the guy who made it. It was just around the corner from the campsite and was immediately enticing with a corrugated iron hand-wound whale and a bunch of crazy wind-vanes. The sad part was that it was closed until 20th October and so we didn't get to go and explore. I especially wanted to go through the arch labeled, ‘Winding Thoughts Theatre of Sorts’ and would have telephoned the guy to beg but we didn’t have a signal on our phone.


We followed the signs for tourist information so we could ask them to call him but it led to a bay with a sign rather than a centre so we just went for a wander down the beach instead. The tide was out past the bay but the waves beyond were ferocious. There was also an almost completely decomposed sheep by the edge of the grassland there too so I’m not feeling too warmly about New Zealand farmers  -  or whoever is responsible for cleaning the beaches for that matter.

It was a really changeable day, with bursts of bright sunshine competing with torrents of rain and so we spent most of the day waiting for the gusty wind to blow the rain away before rushing out to have a quick wander or explore during the reprieve.

We’d noticed Niagara Falls on the map and followed a sign for brief detour to find it. We bobbed over some lovely hummocks and gullies and saw lots more sheep but we couldn’t spot the falls.

The day was somehow flying by and we didn't want to end up in Invercargill during the evening and so we decided to head to a nearby town that had a largish name on the map, Waikawa, for a look around. It turned out that Waikawa was even smaller than Owaka and seemed to just be a few buildings scattered by the side of the road. It did have real tourist info though, staffed by a couple of lovely old ladies in woolly hats who explained the Niagara Falls was named by a surveyor with a sense of humour. There was also a museum but we couldn’t look around it because there was a power cut and it was too dark. We could still see the restored buildings outside though and we couldn't help but chuckle because the town ‘jail’ was just a garden shed with barred windows.

Next stop was Curio Bay, where there was a petrified forest and also possibly our last chance to get a better look at the rare yellow-eyed penguin. We underestimated the length of the day and arrived early and so stood waiting on the viewing platform in the cold, rain and wind for well over an hour, shivering and watching the huge waves crashing against the cliffs. We could see the petrified forest just under the water and a rainbow that seemed to be continuously drawing itself, rubbing itself out and starting again.

It was just getting to the time when we were really expecting the penguins to appear when a group of 6 French people turned up and started to walk down onto the beach, something that we’d been warned against at every other site. I asked them very nicely not to and explained that we had been waiting there for a long time. They carried on regardless and one of them turned to say that they’d been there yesterday and the penguins had still come onto the beach.

I was furious. But other than chase them down the beach shouting about how the penguins were nesting and might come on anyway but it didn't mean that they weren't scared and just trying to find a way to feed their babies. I was even more livid when they then started poking away around the nesting sites right at the other end of the beach. By the time they came back I was so incensed that I would have just exploded if I opened my mouth, especially when the one friend who had not gone had clearly told them about my raving about it and they all gave me smug smiles.



Of course, with them already on the beach, I was totally unable to do anything about the brightly dressed and careless-footed troop of people who then turned up and started to stream down there. I could not stand to watch them tramping all over the area that should be protected and preserved and so went back to the car.
We were just pulling away when a German guy who’d waited on the platform with us came running and told us that the first penguin had eventually braved coming out of the water. We ran back for a look and saw one climb to its nest undisturbed but then everyone flocked to that spot with their cameras. The next poor penguin got halfway home and then had no idea what to do when it couldn’t get any further because here were people squatting in its way,  pointing their long-zoom lenses at the poor thing. I stalked back to the car in a big, sulky disgust.

We stayed nearby at a cool little campsite that was right on the cliffs by the sea and had bays marked by long grasses to buffer some of the fierce winds. It had a little round kitchen and a little round shower block but both were busy so we just sat in the car while I sewed the other curtain and Matt used his pen-knife to individually whittle down a bunch of curtain-sliders to fit the back curtain rail. We felt rather traditional.

Sunday, October 14, 2012

14th October- Allanton to Papatowai


We woke up to incredible views of rolling green hills, dotted with sheep and cows, coloured with trees and bright yellow gorse, and sandwiched between pure white icey mountains and the flat blue sea.



We followed the country roads further, trying to get as high as we could. We didn't get as high as we would have liked but we got some fabulous views and used a fair bit of fuel trying.

We got ourselves onto the Southern Scenic Route road and weren't driving very long before we took a short detour to see Cannibal Bay. We didn't find out why it was called that but we did see some remnants of the huge masses of sea kelp that lurk by the shore, stranded on the beach. It's really fascinating-looking stuff and I had to resist a real urge to poke, squidge and play with its thick, juicy looking tubers.

We had barely started on our walk and were just admiring the ferocity of the waves when we noticed a huge sea-lion lolling by the cliff. It's dangerous to pass between them and the sea and inadvisable to go within 10m of one so since passing this chubster would have meant flouting both of these 'rules', we chickened out and went back to the van to make a nice hot coffee.

Next stop was the Catlin's Main town, Owaka, which boasts a hefty population of 395. We stopped at the tourist info to see if they had any information about walks. they weren't particularly helpful on that score but they did have a great museum, especially considering the size of the town. We enjoyed finding out about the local shipwrecks, industries and locality and I really enjoyed reading the projects about local people, done by school children. We nearly got a longer spell in there than we'd planned though because the guy had got halfway through bolting the doors when we got to the exit. He was just telling the other lady working there that we'd left as we turned the corner. This would have been particularly funny because he'd made a dry and possibly sarcastic joke about not getting locked in when I'd enquired about whether we had enough time to look around.

Though thinking about it, he may have done it on purpose. When I spoke to him the first time there was a large, black book on his desk that had 'Death Book' written on it, seemingly in Tippex. When we went back to pay for the museum, he had it open and was reading through the obituaries that had been cut out of the paper and glued in there.

We continued further, following the road around a sea inlet and aiming towards Jack's blowhole. We had to stop on the way to take a picture of a giant rainbow that arched completely over the road. It was the widest and thickest I think I've ever seen but the right side was already fading by the time I got out of the car.

We stopped on the edge of a windswept beach flanked by black and white cliffs and started the steep climb to Jack's Blowhole. The views were astounding as usual but as always, it was hard to capture the multitude of greens and the contrast of the high, green, sheep-dappled clifftops, with the blue sea far below and the slate-gray rocky outcrops. And there were loads of extremely cute, long-tailed, fluffy lambs frolicking about.



Now there are lots of things that I'd kind of forgotten about walking in a cold climate that came rushing back to me as we struggled against the wind, including that:

You never have enough tissues to cope with your continuously streaming and sore nose.

It's totally possible to be sweaty on some parts of your body whilst feeling the effects of near frostbite in others.

Cold-air somehow burns your lungs.

Driving rain can feel like someone is chucking needles in your face.

Despite all the discomfort, it's somehow invigorating.

We weren't quite sure what to expect from Jack's blowhole but it was a lot bigger and a lot less blowey than we'd imagined. Named after a frequently cussing Moari chief, it was 155m deep, 144m long, 68m wide and sat in the middle of a sheep-field just 200m from the sea. We stood on a ledge at the top and watched as the waves rushed under the natural arch and licked up the sheer sides of the hole in the land. It was easy to imagine that on a stormy day, the impact might shoot the spray upwards but today the sea there was fairly calm.

On the walk back, I was pretty distressed to see a dead sheep lying peacefully in the gully next to the path. It looked very recent and we hadn't noticed it on the way there so we stopped for a while and looked carefully to see if it was still breathing. Matt meanly refused to try and stand it back on its feet and insisted that I was satisfied with looking out for a farmer to tell. A few hundred metres further down we noticed a slightly lumpy sheep skin further up the slope that could only really have been a decomposing sheep and so had to conclude that the farmer was not likely to be anywhere close. Matt still refused to go back and make any attempts at resuscitation.

After a cold coffee (it turned out our 'new' flask is missing the seal), we took the gravelly road to Purakaunui Falls and had a quick wander to those before making our way to the Papatowai DoC camp site that the tourist info guy had told us about. We think it must have been recently created because it wasn't on our maps but we thought we'd give it a go because the old guy had told us that it had an 'ablutions area', a term I've only ever heard in French or in reference to mosques. I'm sure his odd choice of words for a wash-block, his lack of a full set of fingers (I don't like to mention them but I can't get the image of him 'pointing' out of my head) and his interest in death, all have a very righteous and worthy back-story that would put me to shame but they do add up to an irresistible character formation.

The ablutions block was gratefully received too. It was a rainy, cold evening and we were grateful for the sheltered area to cook and wash. In fact, the campsite was very nice and we had it all to ourselves again so thank you NZ Department of Conservation.

Saturday, October 13, 2012

13th October - Dunedin to Allanton


After the fun of yesterday, it was quite a grim start to the day. I was tired because it had rained a lot during the night and we'd been parked under a tree. There are few things more annoying than the loud and irregular tap-tap-tapping of water falling from leaves onto the metal roof of a van - like sleeping in a room full of amplified dripping taps. It's particularly annoying when sleep is the only thing keeping your mind off needing the loo.

Added to that, it was a cold, grey, windy day of the sort I haven't seen since we left the UK. I've always struggled with the cold and hate feeling bundled up, hunched and tense against it but it's interesting to see how much more it bothers Matt now he's lost his insulating layer.

We made our way down to Dunedin city centre for a day of indoor sight-seeing, starting with the art gallery. There was the usual mix of talent, interest and obscurity but we spent most time at an exhibition called, 'Breaking Down the Fourth Wall' - more for its documentary content than its artistic merit - that focused on alleged 'first contact' with the Tanahashi tribe.

After lunch we went to the Otago Museum where they had a great display of items from Edmund Hillary's Everest expedition, including the second-hand camera he used to take the iconic summit of placing the flag at the summit.

General stars of the show for me were the animals there though. I was gob-smacked at the size of lots of things including: a stuffed sunfish in the foyer, which was only half the maximum size; the skeletons of native moa birds, now unfortunately extinct due to being munched up; and the stuffed albatross, particularly the baby one since it was bigger than most small dogs. We also got to see the dinosaur fossil from Shag Point which was pretty impressive.

We were still happily exploring the museum when the call that it was closing came so we went to Moana swimming baths. There were huge and really well layed-out with lots of lane swimming organised by speed. I stayed in one of the slow lanes of the shallow end doing laps until I got tired, then I skirted the diving pool (with just an envious glance) and joined Matt in the fun pool to play in the 'lazy river', waves and toasty warm spa pool.

Last stop in the city was Baldwin Street - the steepest hill in the world. We drove up it, climbing to a height of 47m over 161m length. With an average gradient of 1 in 3.41 and the steepest gradient of 1 in 2.86, it would be good to see the 'Baldwin Street Gutbuster' foot race that happens there every year. We wouldn't fancy living in one of the houses at the top during snowy weather though. There were even several little shops selling certificates to testify to the achievement of driving up it.

After seeing the albatross in the museum, I was really keen to see some real ones that weren't full of straw with plastic eyes, so we took the scenic drive right along the edge of the sea to Otago peninsula where there's a colony. We didn't realise it was a privately owned colony until we were over halfway there so we trucked on anyway in the hope that that we might get to see some flying around.

It was dark when we got there so we just took a little wander along the path around the tip of the peninsula. We didn't see any albatross I don't think (although I did see something pretty huge flying up ahead before the darkness fell too thick) but we did spook a mass of seagulls that Matt kept insisting might be albatross. I got a closer look at them as they dive-bombed near my head - especially the one he was annoying by shining a torch at at the time - so I'm certain they were just gulls. It was freezing cold, so windy it was hard to walk straight and the gulls were still making a horrid noise and acting odd so we didn't stay for very long.

We took a  steady drive back because the lack of barriers between us and the sea made driving in icy rain just that bit more dangerous.

Instead of staying at Dunedin we decided to make a little bit of progress so got on to the highway out of the city. We soon hit roadblock where the police were stopping to breathe-test them. The policeman was pretty rude to Matt because he thought that had to pull over rather than stop next to the guy and block off all the traffic. Matt was very polite back though and we were soon on our way - Matt was just a bit disappointed because he felt he should get a minus reading for not having a drink for so long.

It was getting late though so we didn't drive very far before we felt it was time to rest. We took a street away from the main road and up the hills and stayed on the first flat patch we could find. It was muddy and the wind was blowing a gale so we crawled straight into bed and wrapped ourselves in blankets.