To Wanaka

BLOGPOST JAN 7 2017

It is quite delightful how friendly and helpful NZMCA members are, especially the men. I love how they gather together to nut out any mechanical problem. The club is sometimes a bit like a travelling men’s shed. After the torrential downpour in Hokitika on New Year’s Eve our gas-powered fridge decided not to function, although it hadn’t given us any trouble before. Some of the guys came over to help solve the puzzle. After many puzzled frowns and several unsuccessful attempts to get it going, we were ready to buy a bag of ice to keep our food cool until we could get professional help, when one of the local members came across for a look. He pulled out a plug and put it back in, and hey presto our fridge works again!

Franz Joseph is a touristy alpine village these days, sporting a variety of bars, restaurants and the usual assortment of shops selling souvenirs. We arrived in sunshine and sat outside the van baring our skins for a dose of vitamen D for 15 minutes or so when the dark clouds moved in. Before long it was raining heavily. Well they did say we are in rain forest. 

Flights over the glaciers are a huge draw card here and are probably worth the price. There are several different options which I wished we could afford, but we were happy with our walk to the glacier. The signage calls it a one-and-a-half hour walk, but it took us more than two by the time we read all the information boards and sat on the rocks to gaze in awe. This is my own country but I was impressed and can now understand why the tourists come. Though the glacier has receded back like the head of a balding man from where it was only twenty years ago, is still a wonderful sight. Not only that, the whole river valley is an amazing environment to experience, with almost vertical rock faces scoured out by glaciers, leaving a wide river bed with a snow fed river rushing along in several streams. We were lucky with a fine day and blue sky. The helicopters and small planes buzzing overhead as they flew tourists over the glaciers weren’t too distracting. 

Our lives are dictated by the weather these days, which makes a change from jobs and traffic. We would have stayed in Franz Joseph longer to do one or two of the other walks, but rain was predicted (no surprise there), so we decided to move on to Haast before it totally deteriorated. Even so we ended up driving though moderately heavy rain, but Warren, in his inimitable style, managed our big rig over some bloody big hills so well. I have to say, I have never been scared as the co-pilot, which is something for a nervous traveler.

The journey from Franz Joseph to Haast was a jaw dropping one in spite of the rain. I found myself gazing into the treetops, (never mind paying for a tree top walk), where the variety of natives is astounding. Big totara, many varieties of beech with their black bark and small light green leaves, huge matai, miro, rimu and kahikatea  (NZ white pine, our tallest and the most ancient of our native trees). Here there are no kauri and few pohutakawa (NZ’s Christmas tree), both North Island natives, but the hills bear the pink blush of the Southern Rata, a shyer relative.

It was exciting to drive from the West Coast to the East, through the Southern Alps via Haast Pass, the most southern of the three passes through the alps. These mountains were created eons ago when the earth was squeezed between two of the earth’s tectonic plates and apparently they are still growing. As a child in Christchurch, I was taken on holidays to the West Coast, but I don't remember much about that and this part of the country is all new to me. Once again, I was spell bound. This place is so beautiful! Big mountains and deep valleys, native bush, gushing shingly rivers with a winding road and many one way bridges. Totally my cup of tea. We parked behind the very modern Hawea Hotel with its views over Lake Hawea, which is almost as large as Lake Wanaka but less well known. It is time for a break from cooking, with dinner at the hotel restaurant.

This morning we drove the short distance to Albertown and are now safely tucked up behind another pub. Pubs are often kind to motor homers

All we need to do is have a couple of drinks at the bar which keeps everyone happy.

We tried out one of the many fabulous cycling tracks around here. This one is along the Clutha River.