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Published: September 26th 2007
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We stayed at Don’s for couple of days, being entertained by his vast knowledge of everything, enjoying great food (including my favourite Hokey Pokey ice cream, with honeycomb crunchy bits) and going for some lovely walks around the area. On the Saturday we visited Taylor’s Mistake a local beach near Godley Head that has a great selection of original style NZ bach’s (the Kiwi equivalent of a beach hut), some of which have become more like homes. Sunday saw us start the day at Don’s weekly meditation class, which focused around the Buddhist belief that ‘you may die today’ - essentially another way of saying don’t have regrets, but get on with your life. Then we walked around Victoria Park and up to the local landmark “The sign of the Kiwi”, before driving to Governor’s Bay, looking down into Lyttleton harbour over a coffee. Don’s son Tim who I had last seen when he was about 14, came over with his girlfriend Erin and cooked us some great sushi and told us about their plans to start up a cycle hire/touring company around the Akaroa area and Rob a friend of Don’s gave us some advice on places to visit in
South America
Saying goodbye to Don on Monday morning we took up Tim’s offer to use his bach if we wanted to and headed over to the Bank’s Peninsular and Akaroa. Using a combination of directions described whilst pouring over Google earth and a scribbled map, we manage to find the right gate in the fence and parked the van up off the road. Following the track for 10 minutes that cuts steeply down through the forest we found ourselves by the water’s edge, with a garden shed on steroids as our home for the night. The location is amazing, quiet and peaceful, looking out over Akaroa harbour and surrounded by the crinkly hills of the old volcanic crater. Tim has a 12V lighting system rigged up with a solar panel, an outside power shower, a gas heater and a lovely double bed, it really made a cosy home. As a way of saying thanks and inspired by the local driftwood, I set about making a momento of our stay in the form of an “On-2-Wheels” bike sculpture after the name of their company. The result looked pretty good, but I’m not sure that it will stand up
to a decent south island storm!
After a comfy night in the bach we headed back up the hill and following a bit of a struggle to get the van back on the road (we ended up fitting the snow-chains to defeat the mud) we were heading north again. Conscious of our ever decreasing amount of time left in NZ we decided to get some miles under our belt and drove all the way to St.Arnaud gateway to the Nelson Lakes National Park some 300 or 400 km’s to the north. We visited Christchurch on the way through for a failed attempt to find a Chile Lonely Planet and then took the Lewis Pass (past Hamner Springs again), but going all the way this time and crossing the alps. Picking up a hitcher on the RN65 we hung a right at Springs Junction, then it was up to the Buller Gorge again, but east this time on the RN6 to Murchison and onto Kawatiri where the RN63 took us towards St.Arnaud. We camped on a gravel side road called Speargrass just outside the small town of St.Arnaud, ready to drive in the next morning.
Waking up
to a thick frost we had some breakkie and drove into town. There are some fantastic walks around here and I desperately wanted to repeat one that I had done last time, but to make it a slightly less traumatic experience. The last trip up here resulted in me fearing for my life as I ended up staying overnight in a mountain hut without the crampons/ice axe necessary for the conditions. For the record, I had checked and been assured by the park ranger that it was OK without them, but then it had been 2 weeks since he had been up there, so I set off on the beautiful Robert’s ridge walk, followed by a steep icy descent into the natural bowl of Angelus Basin, where there is a hut by the lake surrounded by high mountains. I spent a candlelit night there alone, with a clear starry sky and snow being blown off the surrounding peaks, stoking the pot-bellied stove to a point where it would spit flames out the front every 5 minutes and the chimney glowed red. Surviving the night and my attempts to burn down the hut, I had the joy of scrabbling my way
back out of Angelus basin over the freshly frozen snow and ice using a metal stake I had found near the hut. Relieved to be back on the ridge I was rewarded with a cloudless sky and a beautiful view of the countryside for miles around and the Buller Gorge filled with fog and snaking away towards the sea.
Anyway, back to our present situation, it was blowing 40 knots in St Arnaud, with a predicted 60 knots plus up on the ridge…not an option. The forecast for the next few days was similar, the lower routes were possible although involved mainly forest and bush of which we had seen plenty already and hiring ice-axe and crampons (which were deemed absolutely essential) proved tricky as the place that hired them was holding a silent retreat with ‘Do not disturb signs’ everywhere! So, after a few hours of contemplation and heartache we decided to knock it on the head, call to book the ferry over from Picton for the following day and push on, hoping for better weather when we reached the North Island.
We followed the Wairau river east reaching the coast again at Blenheim and
took the very scenic and very un-made Port Underwood coast road toward Picton. We stopped overnight just north of Rarangi at an historic cable (telephone) house near Mount White and spent the night with the rain and wind lashing the van. Over the last few days we had heard about record floods and devastation in the north island, with areas still cut off days later - I think we were getting the tail end of the cyclone that had caused havoc up on the Coromandel.
The following day things brightened up a bit, still blowing an absolute hoolie, but sunny with it, as we wiggled the last 20km’s to Picton through some gorgeous bays. Catching an early afternoon ferry we followed Queen Charlotte Sound, the Tory Channel and passed West Head as we entered the Cook Strait and hit the full force of the wind and waves. According to the official sign, sailing conditions were ‘Moderate’, but as the crew who wouldn’t let anyone outside because it was too dangerous and the vast majority of the passengers were throwing up and falling over I would beg to differ…
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