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Blimey, I'm seriously lagging behind with the old diary entries these days... Since Wanaka, we've done a big 'U' southwards via Queenstown, a branch off up to Milford, and then headed back along the Southern Scenic Route via Invercargill and the Catlins Coast to here, Dunedin...
We loved Wanaka. We arrived with autumn really setting in and it's in such a pretty situation on the edge of the lake with the same name, and very easy-going (not that many places aren't in New Zealand!) We ended up staying for four or five days (over Sarah's 30th on Friday 18th), spending the last two nights on the campsite in Albert Town having been woken up too early one morning by Council Security telling us (and the several campervans around us) that we were illegally parked in the town's main car park on the lakeside - funny that!? We're usually very good about spotting No Camping signs... It was very funny then being part of a mass exodus of campervans looking for vacant laybys on the edge of town before the sun had risen, to get a couple more hours' kip! We ended up on the roadside by a farmer's field being beeped by people on their way to work!?
We had a good day walking up to the top of Mt. Roy, one sunny day, for views over Wanaka and the surrounding peaks of Mt. Aspiring National Park, which were fab, and otherwise just enjoyed strolling around the town, and having fun tackling the labrynth and illusion rooms in Puzzling World, which, by all accounts got Linds & Paul reminiscing... (I empathised with Linds telling me that Paul had enjoyed laughing down at her from up in the turrets that you had to find your way to at each corner of the maze, while she became increasingly flustered with all the dead-ends! Boys...!)
We enjoyed sitting outside funky cafes (another thing there are lots of here...), looking out over the lake, and going to the fab little independent Cinema Paradiso on the edge of town, sitting in armchairs and on sofas and eating homemade cookies and ice cream while watching The Last King of Scotland (great, if graphic) and Babel. When you miss sitting in the living room like we do, well it was luxury!
At the same time, we were getting a new, expensive windscreen fitted... The saga of the van continued when we got to Queenstown.... But before all that, we said goodbye to Wanaka on Saturday 19th May and drove the Crown Range Road through the Cadrona Valley to Queenstown. After a quick stop in Arrowtown, we arrived in this town, infamous for its adrenalin-pumping activities (of which we partook in not one!) and immediately decided that it lacked any of the appeal that Wanaka had had: all very commercial and busy and more cramped than Wanaka with houses sprawling up the hills around town on the edge of Lake Wakatipu. (It's been described as getting "a little too big for its boots!") We mosied around and then headed out the very next day to Glenorchy, up on the northeast shore of the same lake. It was a beautiful drive and Glenorchy is so so lovely...
It's also the base to some big walks... or 'tramps'..., and we'd decided to do the Routeburn (which takes you over to the Te Anau-Milford road - otherwise a 300km drive from Queenstown!) and complete the circuit back to Lake Wakatipu along the Caples Track - a five day walk (this time over Graeme's 32nd on the 23rd!) We enjoyed it, although for the middle three days it rained solidly and we didn't really see any of the views it's renowned for!
What was really good, 'though, was that every day that we arrived wet and cold at the next DoC hut, someone else had, every single time, got there before us and got the woodburning stove fired up so that we were able to dry off and warm up, which was bliss! One of the highlights of doing the walk, according to the Rough Guide,is the cameraderie of the huts, and that was certianly true, with the few us mad enough to be out there huddled around the fire chatting every night. We met a Russian-American E.R. doctor, Greg from Texas, and his paramedic girlfriend, Daphne from New England; a mad and very friendly Kiwi, Dave, who entertained us no end and progressively filled the hut with (nice!) smells of marajuana as the evening went on and he got funnier(!); Jeanette, from Michigan - originally Grand Rapids - leading a group of university students from Miami on an outdoor adventure trip; and on the last night, in Upper Caples Hut, a lovely couple from the Czech Republic, Ivana and Karel, who'd recently finished working near Salisbury for the sister of Joe Cadbury! That was the nicest and littlest hut, and the warmest, and we had a lovely evening, playing Scrabble, even though we were beaten, hands down, despite the fact that they were Czech and we were playing in English!!! (Funnily enough, we bumped into them again this afternoon walking through Dunedin!)
I may have to rush through the next bits, going as I have gone up until now into far too much detail! The day we finished the walk was sunny (of course!) and lovely as we walked back to Lake Wakatipu to be picked up by speedboat and taken back to Glenorchy. It was also my 34th, so once back in Queenstown we indulged in an expensive campsite, fantastic hot showers and a night out at Pog Mahones, reportedly the best Irish pub in NZ, eating delicious mussels and Irish Stew, drinking local Pinot Noir, listening to a live band and watching Australia v. Wales in the James Bevan cup (entertained mostly by the sole Welsh supporter who would periodically call out 'Way-els... Way-els!') A very good birthday !
The next day we hung out in Queenstown, waiting for the garages to open on Monday, when Simon sorted out Bob's reverse lights and we put the van in for its WoF (Warrant of Fitness). It failed! And the reverse lights didn't even have to pass! We were given 28 days to sort out the things that were wrong, and so left the expense of Queenstown and headed south, hoping to be able to do things much more cheaply.
Another development during these last few days, had been our decision (somewhere in the rain along the Routeburn) to come home to find work, rather than to stay in NZ. There are lots of reasons: we're more informed now about what employers expect; it's not really financially viable for us to stay here at this stage; and it's... well, it's not home, is it?
This meant that we weren't in a rush (as we have been, it seems, for weeks) to get to Invercargill. The interview that Simon was going for still hadn't been set up anyway. Instead of heading straight there, we decided to branch off up to Milford Sound, one of NZ's "greatest sights"! Hmmm.... We weren't there long! We made the long drive up from Te Anau, after a night on Lake Te Anau, in the morning and were back at Te Anau the same evening. The approach, particularly on the far side of the Homer Tunnel (which opened up access as recently as the 1950s), is supposed to be one of "the world's best drives" and the views over Mitre Peak and beyond once in Milford, spectacular. We, however, couldn't see anything, and, prepared to wait another day, we were told the forecast was the same for the next day: nothing but cloud and rain. I admired the few tourists still going on the 'scenic cruises' into the sound, but did wonder why they were bothering...! Oh well. You can't win them all, and we've had some fantastic weather...
From Milford (there's nothing brief about any of this, eh?) we headed south, onto the Southern Scenic Route, away from the fringes of Fiordland and into Southland and Invercargill. We liked it. We'd once thought that we might live here, and it wouldn't have been bad. They say 'a wee bit', as a result of their Scottish heritage, and the people are just lovely. Bernie (Preston Wreckers Yard) sorted us out with a new tyre and tie-rods (looking after the van has, in itself, has been a whole new learning experience... 'though with a lot of appreciated coaching from Colin!) and Steve over the road balanced our rear brakes. He also told us about Chris Allan , who'd sort our rust out for us (panel beater and highly recommended to any people needing rust work on their vans!) They're very strict on it here, apparently after travellers were for a long time driving around in really dangerous rust buckets!
Chris was an absolute star. He really looked after us, charged us nothing like what he said it would cost to patch Bob up, and the next day, after we'd shown the WoF people that we'd had the rust sorted, plastered and painted the welding for nothing, even though he was there for an hour doing it, chatting away to us all the time. We talked so much to him, the evening before, too, about his life in Invercargill, how his grandad had come over as a vet from England, about how he had never left the South Island until last year, when he went to Auckland...! He was a lovely guy, and has left us with very fond memories of our time in Southland, perhaps even with a hint of regret that we won't be living in Invercargill after all...
With Bob all new again, we set off for a quick look at Bluff (the bottom of NZ, having been to the top!), and then along the Catlins Coast. It's beautiful, with lovely little bays and windswept, rocky shoreline... We've really enjoyed our few days, going down all the little roads to the points: Waipapa, Slope (the real most southern point!) and Nugget, which reminded me lots of Miyako in Okinawa, with its lighthouse perched precariously at the end of a steep peninsula - all very beautiful. We spotted a few sea lions along way away, but no little blue or yellow-eyed penguins (the photo's from a picture!) We've still to see the wildlife of the Otago Peninsula, just up the road from Dunedin, but we've been quite spoilt for wildlife this year already... It's just nice to get out to all these rocky outcrops along the coast, and look up and down along the coastline and it's yellow beaches. I still maintain that New Zealand's coast is the most wildly beautiful, continuously beautiful, I've ever seen... I'll miss that, although it reminds me a lot of Northumberland, too.
So, this afternoon we arrived in Dunedin. It's a bank holiday (because of the Queen's birthday!) so relatively quiet, but lovely, and with a much greater cultural and historical feel to it than anywhere else we've been. We like it a lot. This was somewhere else we briefly thought we might end up, and walking a little around the university today, I could definitely see myself here: something else to perhaps think about when we're back at home and in a position to be a bit more objective... But then we like it, perhaps, because it has more of what we like about home... but then it doesn't have the crowds to go with it... Anyway, it's another must if you're headed this way. Cadbury World and Speight's Brewery are on our 'to do' list for tomorrow! Something for both of us!!!
And that's it. I don't suppose there are many of these diary entries to go. While part of me is really anticipating seeing you all again, I had a real sense, driving along the last little bit of coast before Dunedin this afternoon, that I will miss all of this such a lot.
Okay. I've gone on a lot today! (Not easy with Simon howling at that famous clip of Del and Rodney dressed up as Batman and Robin!)
See you soon, us xxx
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