The trip from Wanaka to Franz Josef initially follows Lake Wanaka towards the west, then Lake Hawea and after leaving that lake starts to climb steadily towards Haast Pass. The only village along the way is Makarora and also the only place for petrol for quite some kilometers. I was keen to see Makarora again as I had memories of being stranded there one time when I was in my 20's hitch hiking with my sister Bronwen from Wanaka to Haast. We had beem lucky enough to get a ride from Wanaka after staying with Nancy and Chris for quite some distance to Makarora where there was a Post Office, a couple of petrol pumps and a motorcamp. After being dropped off at Makarora, we went into the shop to get some food and as there ... read more

QUEENSTOWN & GLENORCHY THE REES & DART RIVER VALLEYS The following day we had planned to visit Queenstown for the day. Queenstown itself is not our sort of town, far too touristy, but the surrounding areas have an amazing array of outdoor activities and great scenery. One of the reasons for this trip was that my sister Bronwen and her husband Sakaye and our friends Donna and Dick from British Columbia had given us some money to spend on something special during our holiday. The plan was to take the TSS Earnslaw steamship evening dinner cruise on Lake Wakatipu from Queenstown to Walter Peak Station (sheep and cattle not trains) for an enjoyable evening out. We called into the quaint old gold mining town of Arrowtown on the way and visited our favourite bakery, the ... read more

Sheryll and I have been coming back to Naseby for holidays for over 10 years now. The first time was with all of the 3 children and we were booked into a Miners Cabin (which is basically 4 walls and a roof around a double bed) the guys were meant to be sleeping in a tent beside the Cabin. When we arrived it had been raining for about 3 hours and there was about 3 inches of water flowing through the site that the kids were meant to be camping on. Suffice to say that 4 of us top and tailed in a double bed and I think it was Kyra who slept on the floor in the only remaining available space. That hasn't stopped us coming back though, for me I think it is ... read more

PANNING & DREDGING FOR GOLD AT NASEBY Naseby is a unique old gold mining town of about 86 permanent residents and about 280 homes of which most are holidays homes or as they are known in the South Island, Cribs. It was the location of a Gold Rush to the Hogburn stream in the 1860's and it was to here that my Gt gt Grandfather Charles Roberts came after leaving the goldfields of Victoria, Australia. My Gt Grandmother Ethel Gertrude Roberts was born nearby at Hamiltons in 1870, All that remains now of Hamiltons is a lonely cemetery high on the hill above the Maniatoto Plains and scattered through the mullock heaps traces of sluicing pipes and scraps of metal left behind by the miners from the days of sluicing for gold. Once briefly 2,000 miners ... read more

WANANKA TO NASEBY VIA BENDIGO & THOMSON'S GORGE It was time to leave Wanaka and the restful time we had had at Nancy and Chris's it is s shame that we didn't get to see them as Nancy is in Dunedin with Chris while he awaits a triple bypass operation, we hope to take some time out while we are in Naseby and go across to Dunedin to see them. I think from Naseby it is only about one and a half hours to Dunedin. Nancy had said to take some veggies from their wonderful garden so we picked some silver beet, spinach and zucchinis and checked for last of the summers red strawberries. Our trip today will take us from Wanaka via Tarras to north of Cromwell where there is one of our favourite historic ... read more