Several days more than anticipated were spent in Ashburton where we went to the motorhome and caravan show, where many sellers have their buses and vans for sale. There were food and craft stalls too. Though we were not buying,the weather was stunning, it was a buzzy atmosphere, a chance fantasize about what kind of motor home we might like some day and also to meet other travellers.

Christchurch still looks like Christchurch to me in spite of all the damage and big gaps where buildings once were. Container shopping still operates in Cashel Street, though we noticed lots of building going on. I loved these bolted metal sculptures scattered

in between the containers. They depict ordinary people getting on with life in spite of earthquakes. They look so real.

Office workers eating their lunch beside the Avon.

The Cathedral looks exactly the same as it did when I was last here three years ago, except the grass is probably longer.


There is plenty of construction underway.

We met The Wizard having coffee in New Regent Street and Warren introduced himself. He seemed rather downcast as his spot in the square has been usurped by an over zealous Christian, but he was pleased to chat with us and still has plenty to say for himself.

We made the trip over the hill to Akaroa, site of many memories from childhood and adolescence for me. Sadly the place has been taken over by tourists to a large extent, but the bones don't change. Cruise liners anchor in the harbour every day, and passengers are ferried into the town. I dare say Akaroa depends on this influx for its survival.

We used to swim off Akaroa pier.

There are many examples of early housing in existence, some in disrepair but others are well preserved.

Looking out at earthquake damaged Sumner, taken from South Shore.

Sumner Beach, scene of many happy childhood days.

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Saturday night at Weedons NZMCA Park. The muso's got an airing and we all loved it.

Situated on the east coast of the South Island in North Otago, Oamaru is well worth a visit. With a population of 20,000 it is not a large town, but one with a significant history. Settled by Europeans in the mid 1800s Oamaru first provided services to gold prospectors, and thrived. Sheep farming, initially for the wool, began around the 1860s and later frozen lamb exports transformed the town into a prosperous settlement, rivalling San Francisco. Otago is known to be a very dry area, where farming is dependent on irrigation and there were no native trees growing. The new residents resorted to carving out the local limestone, known as Oamaru stone, to build their stores, banks, halls and even an opera house. In the late 1800s that prosperity melted away because other cities had deeper and more sheltered ports.Today the permanent material buildings erected in the town's hey day are a wonderful legacy, now restored to their former beauty. A Victorian and Edwardian precinct has been created to highlight the heritage. Greek architecture must have been in vogue at the time as the old Bank of New South Wales looks like an Athenian temple.

I was curious about the very wide streets here, and also in Invercargill and was told it was so that bullock teams could be turned around in a half circle. Doing a three point turn with animals is apparently not easy!
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The town now refers to itself as 'The Steam Punk Capital of New Zealand,' combining Victoriana with machinery which has created a fun atmosphere. There is a 'Steam Punk' museum which we didn't venture into, but there are lots of displays and steam punk 'sculptures' especially around the water front area.

A 'steam punk' train.

A steam driven crane.







On Sunday morning we enjoyed the local market where there was live music and all sorts of food to buy plus the veges we needed.

For our three nights in Oamaru we parked at Teschmakers, a former convent and rather posh boarding school. Joy and John now own the large property which is used as a wedding venue and conference centre. They very kindly allow us NZMCA campers to park there.

February 2017: Ohau Channel and Mount Cook National Park

Warren had a go at Salmon fishing at the Ohau Channel. Its just up stream from a fish farm so it does seem a bit of a cheat. In fact they are not easy to catch. He was unsuccessful so we bought some salmon at the fish farm shop!

Lake Pukaki, one of NZs larger lakes is an amazing turquoise blue due to sediment from the granite rock in the Southern Alps.

The DOC campsite at Mt Cook was quite busy due to it being Chinese New Year plus lots of Germans and French tourists. Apparently they get a great holiday allowance and do seem to love NZ. Lots of families, some with quite young children. Most were walking though some were on Dad's shoulders.

The views of Mount Cook on our three hour return walk up the Hooker Valley to the base of the Tasman Glacier were wonderful. DOC has done an excellent job of creating graveled walking tracks, with wooden steps and duck boarding in some places.

The glacier lake at the base of the mountain began from a sink hole in the 1970s and is now about five km across due to accelerated snow and ice melt. Yes global warming is at work here.

At the lookout point.

We were  unprepared for the beauty of this place. New Zealanders really don't need to travel overseas to see natures wonders. We have it all here, and the overseas tourists love it too.

Wazza gazing at the mountain Ed Hillary style.

We were totally absorbed for a couple of hours at the Conservation Department Alpine Center at Mt Cook Village. The displays showing mountaineering over the past one hundred years are fascinating and so beautifully presented with diaoramas to give you a real sense of what mountaineering is like, the immense power of the mountain environment and the extreme weather. Mountaineering equipment was pretty basic before the 1950s. The men went climbing in their woolen suits and there was little in the way of the hi tech gear and water proof clothing we take for granted today. There is a picture of one of the first women climbers on a glacier in 1890. She is wearing a skirt and blouse and carries a purse! All so formal.

Off again, this time heading for the east coast and Oamaru.

After a long drive from Invercargill, we made it to Te Anau, back in mountain territory. It is 40 years since I've been here and I can barely remember it, but like all of these places which were just a few streets back then, tourism has happened and small villages have become decent sized towns.

This picture is taken on the Kepler Track. Yes it is deceiving. We only did a little piece of it, an hour in, lunch by the lake, and an hour back but the Kepler is a loop track starting at the lake and going up to alpine scrub and rock. It takes several days to complete the whole thing. We loved walking along beside the lake and among beech forest. The leaves grow high up to catch the sun, creating a beautiful green canopy. Lots of moss too.



We shared a picnic table with a couple of women from Scotland who were enjoying a month in NZ. They commented about the lack of bird life. We too have noticed that there are few birds to be seen, just a few tom tits and bush robins. DOC has laid plenty of traps and I believe they drop 1080, but is it working?

The highlight of Te Anau for us was our trip to Milford Sound. The weather had been patchy but we decided to chance it, and take the easy option - the bus, along with a tour group of young people and 'Cowboy' our driver come entertainer. Fun in small doses. There were lots of photo stops along the way.

Homer Tunnel. 1.2 kilometers through granite.










Apparently it rains in Milford 2 days out of three, so we were lucky with a misty but fine enough day.

The boat trip is truly awesome. Moody mountains looming out of the mist and waterfalls spouting from the cliffs. We even saw a large pod of dolphins. The boats are taken right up to one of the biggest waterfalls and I got quite wet, but it was fun. Fish n chips for lunch were pretty good and we all slept on the way back to Te Anau.

Meeting up with a couple we were parked next to in Nelson back in December, was an unexpected treat. You can make good friends on the road, and NZ isn't so huge that your paths won't cross again.

We left Te Anau on Sunday and headed for Queenstown, about 150 kilometers. Once again I have been there before in a past life but I would not have recognised the place.

There isn't much parking for motorhomes around Queenstown, but we found a spot by the river, along with several small vans, parked there while they went to see the main event for Waitangi Weekend. We drifted off to sleep to the strains of Fat Freddie's Drop, which, fortunately, we quite liked, though we weren't so keen on being woken when our neighbours returned in the early hours to reshuffle their vans so they could fit another one or two in.  Our timing for Queenstown was not the best. The place was buzzing, a little too hyper for us. I didn't expect to like the place, but really, it is lovely town with amazing views out over the lake and those magnificent mountains. There are spectacular views wherever you look and I can see why its become so popular, and expensive. A few hours for a wander round were enough for us to get the gist of it and we were off. First stop Arrowtown. We drove through, but once again, our timing was off and the place was so crowded we didn't even park our rig. Arrowtown I do remember as the prettiest place in autumn with it huge English trees and lovely old buildings. We will be back for sure. We are back in Cromwell for a night or two before heading to Mt Cook.

INVERCARGILL, RIVERTON AND BLUFF

Having never been to Invercargill before, I was curious to know what this southern most NZ city  would be like, and I was not disappointed. The city fathers did Invercargill people a big favour when they planned very wide streets and a massive park. I guess there was plenty of space back then.

Eighty landscaped hectares make up Queens Park. It is huge, featuring long wide promenades which meet at a band rotunda in the centre, rather like European formal gardens. The various botanical 'rooms,' include acres of roses, rock gardens, a Japanese garden and large pond, herbacious areas, and stands of podocarps and evergreens - a great mixture of exotics including wonderful rhodedendrons. There is even an aviary. I was so entranced I forgot to take photos! 

Luckily, we both LOVE museums since the weather has been so patchy. The Southland Museum and Arts Centre kept us happy for hours. The museum is housed in a large modern pyramid shaped building, and specialises in displays featuring our natural southern environment and sub antarctic and antarctic explorations. Skeletons, taxidermied animals and dioramas bring it all to life. We loved the  shipwrecks dislays, especially the one of the General Grant which was wrecked on the Auckland Islands in the mid 1800s. There is even a rocking deck to stand on to really get in the mood! It brings it all to life - wonderful for kids and adults too. The museum ALSO has Bert Munro's original Indian motorcycle on which he won the world speed record at Bonneville in America in the 1960s.

We made the most of a good day on Monday to drive out to the coastal town of Riverton, where my great grandmother and her family lived when she was a girl. The town is situated right on a river with a bridge to the residential area on the other side, where there is a beach called, Riverton Rocks. I always wondered why the Vaughan family chose to settle in such an inhospitable place, so far south. It is very cold here in winter and the there is plenty of wind.  But I was delighted to discover what a pretty spot it is. The main street has the usual assortment of shops, old churches and buildings which once housed banks, a post office (now a cafe) and other stores. The Masons were secular businessmen who had their own building here. 

Once again we made for the museum, which has been dubbed New Zealand's best small town museum. There, stories are told of the Maori who lived in the area, and the European fishermen, sealers, who were attracted by large populations of seals, which sadly, they clubbed to death to the brink of extinction for their meat and fur. With the seal population depleted, they turned to the whales. It seems so brutal to us, but they did need the whale oil back then for lots of things, fuel for lamps and lubricating machinery, and of course whale bone was needed for ladies' corsets, a necessity for propriety back then. Wonderful stories are told of people who were shipwrecked and marooned on the southern islands; wild inhospitable places. These stories read like Robinson Crusoe!
Many of the Whalers married into Maori families which resulted in the first mixed race families in this area, going back over 150 years.There is an excellent WW1 display too. Like all areas in NZ many families suffered the loss of their young men.

Then we headed for Bluff, the end of the civilised world as we know it. The Bluff community doesn't seem to have embraced tourism much. Bluff oysters are what the place is most famous for, but it was out of season and there wasn't an oyster to be found. Many of the houses and buildings are 'au naturel,' ie, shabby. The town looks out over Tiwi Aluminium smelter, which isn't a particularly charming aspect. However the smelter does provide work in the area, and the aluminium is shipped around the world. The cheap electricity our Government provides for the running of the factory has been the subject of controversy among New Zealanders.

Heading through the township and out to Bluff's Marine Reserve takes you to a wonderful look out area and walking track, which goes around to the other side of the Bluff hill. We only did a short part of it, but enough to see the rocky coast and a nice bit of native bush. There is a road up to the look out on the hilltop so we went the easy way. Here we could see right out to Steward Island (Rakiura) and several other islands. A long sand spit stretches out to the east, and sandy islands dot the view before there is only sea.  Ruapuke Island, Campbell Island and the Auckland Islands must be navigated by any ships heading south from here.

In the days of sailing ships Bluff was sometimes used as a port or would be passed by ships coming from South Australia, as it was closest geographically and favourable winds would blow them south of New Zealand and onward to Europe. With wild weather and mist, and little in the way of navigational instruments, some ships came to grief on the Auckland Islands.

January 2017 is over (already) and yesterday, the first of February, we moved from our parking spot behind a pub at Lorneville, just out of Invercargill. It was a good park and the cod meal we had at the pub on the day we arrived was the best pub meal we'd had in a while. The only snag was we were so full we could hardly move!

In preparation for the next leg we filled the truck with diesel in Invercargill, got fresh water then took the coast road around to Monkey Island where free camping is available. We stopped for lunch with several other motor homers parked there, but decided to move on as it was so windy on the beach. We were glad to find a dump station at Tuatapere. It is always a great feeling to get rid of grey and black water and have plenty of diesel and fresh water to last the next few days. Though a little sad to leave the south coast, it was nice to be heading back into the mountains. The views through the glacial valleys were spectacular. We arrived in Te Anau in the afternoon and are pleased to settle into the NZMCA park here.