Bannockburn and Beyond

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The Grand Tour was always all about revisiting old places we had been to in the past but more importantly about discovering new locations, many of which we expected we might have been so close to previously but never actually got there for some reason now faded in the past.

And today was to be one of those occasions with Bannockburn, a small settlement, just outside of Cromwell.

We are sticking with Highway 6 still, as we have since leaving Nelson all those days ago, and heading for the Kawarau Gorge.

Now if you live in this part of NZ you would have no trouble pronouncing ‘Kawarau ‘even though you say it not quite the way the word looks. I will leave that over to you to check that out on Mr Google to get it right.

The outskirts of Queenstown had considerable growth in housing with a large number of newish homes in a valley off to the right of the highway and on the approach path for planes to the airport if they have to land from the north. Alongside the main road is a retirement enclave with good space between the dwellings which is not always something you see in some villages in cities where space is at a premium for the developer. Perhaps the extra space is added into the cost here in Queenstown because it is what the retiree here wants.

Cyclists appear to be well catered for with a separate cycle trail that follows the highway and makes it safer for both as they take in the sights.

The banks of Lake Hayes which we thought would have trees with spectacular autumn coloured leaves wasn’t quite as we had hoped for and we had had better photo opportunity spots elsewhere.

Next up was AJ Hackett Bungy Jump off the old Kawarau Bridge (constructed 1880) which towers above the river.

There didn’t appear to be any punters lining up as we approached and as we had been there before to watch people ‘jump ‘on the end of the bungy rope into the river we decided not to wait for the next victim to emerge from the building onto the bridge.

Through the early part of the gorge there are a number of wineries some of which sell their wines to the market and area available in the North Island while others sell only locally and their names were unfamiliar to us.

However wineries weren’t the top of the agenda today and we pushed on.

As the gorge narrows a tiny power station building comes into sight and it was worth the stop to refamiliarise ourselves with the history of Roaring Meg named for the short small river that starts up in the Criffel Range above the gorge. The river supplies the water to the turbines and for the past 85 years the power station has supplied electricity to the national grid.

Our target location of Bannockburn was just a short drive from the end of the gorge.

Over the years we have passed by on Highway 6 the turnoff to Bannockburn but never actually travelled the short distance to the old gold mining settlement sited above the Kawarau River shortly to join the Clutha River at Cromwell.

We had read about the historic Bannockburn Hotel and had thought a visit and lunch would be a good break in the middle of the day.

We hadn’t factored in just how popular this hotel was especially on a Saturday and we were a bit deflated after we had bowled in the front door expecting to get a table easily despite the fact that the road outside was lined with cars and as there wasn’t anywhere else the occupants of those cars would have been we should have realised we were up against it.

The next available table was going to be at 2.15pm, an hour and a half away and we were just about to head back out the door Gretchen came up with the idea of a glass of wine at the bar. That wasn’t going to be a problem and neither was making a choice from their finger food menu and consuming it from a very comfortable settee in front of a roaring log fire and doing some people watching as we drank a very agreeable glass of rose and ate smoked salmon pate with horse radish cream (yum!)on ciabatta and a good size bowl of homemade smashed potato’s (large chips).We comfortably passed by an hour or so and left feeling fully satisfied.

We agreed that our glass of rose was one of the best we have ever had and so before we left the Bannockburn Hotel we asked where the winery was that bottled what we had so enjoyed.

DomaineThomson Winery was in fact local and just a few kilometres away at Pisa Moorings on the western side of Lake Dunstan below the Pisa Range.

The barkeeper gave us basic directions and Mr Google did the rest and we made our way through the industrial area of Cromwell and back onto Highway 6.

The winery was located up a dirt road that wound through various blocks of vines to a parking lot and the tasting building which was built low into the hill so that it wasn’t visible until you actually got there.

A very pleasant young woman, very smartly attired, served us giving some history on the winery and its owners. Making the winery somewhat unique is that it also has a location also in Burgundy, France and sells wine made there here in New Zealand at its NZ location.

Without having drunk our glasses of rose at the hotel we would probably never have visited the winery as the entry to it was not particularly evident from the highway.

So we can tick off another unique experience on the Grand Tour.

Heading back and shortly after leaving the winery we noticed that we had again crossed the 45^th parallel(obviously we crossed it on the way to the winery)and it makes one think,briefly,that we were half way to the South Pole from the Equator or vice versa!

It was just the reverse trip back to Queenstown and a decision as we got closer that we had eaten enough at lunch that we were still full enough not to have to think about where we would go out for dinner opting instead for some leftover chicken and potato specialties from Thursday.

The day out hadn’t been too exhausting and so we planned another location we had never visited before for tomorrow, weather again dependant.

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