North to Tophouse,Lake Rotoiti via Reefton

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Our mornings in Hanmer Springs so far had all started with cloud and a threat of rain but this morning the story was different with broken cloud and blue sky apparent. This bodes well for our drive over Lewis Pass and onto Lake Rotoiti when we expect the mountain scenery should be spectacular.

Gretchen had washed off much of the visible dust on the car that we had picked up in Molesworth Station but there was still plenty in the sills in the door and other places where the hose water didn’t reach and it was hard to avoid dusting ones clothes when climbing into a seat.

We avoided the bakery we had been to for the last 3 days this morning for food for lunch on the road somewhere and decided that a break in Reefton should come around the time lunchtime was due. We did however purchase a couple of pies for our dinner tonight from a small stall in the main street and at $7 each they had better be good. By all accounts from people who look happy munching on a pie around the stall they should be good.

Heading down to SH7 we came back to reality passing trucks frequently as we made our way west following firstly the Waiau River and then the Hope River, both wide and free flowing. The summit of the Lewis Pass at 907 metres is the middle highest/ lowest of the three mountain passes over the Southern Alps. In fact you would hardly have noticed that the road had risen to 907metres and taken us over the peak and heading down the other side.

We had two options to take to Tophouse, Lake Rotoiti SH 65 via Maruia or continue on SH7,the latter taking us via Reefton,an iconic West Coast town we had driven by before but never through and there was a lot of history to soak up as lunchtime arrived.

We parked at the top end of the main street which still has a certain look of the late 1800’s about it with almost all of the building being constructed of timber and many still having the appearance of yesteryear. The one blot on the main street was the more ‘modern’ Mobil service station which stood out saying ‘I don’t belong here amongst all this old world charm’.

We lined up with the locals at The Future Dough Co café which had been standing on the same spot for over 130years, serving miners and their families all that time.

We had noticed over the past few weeks that Reefton had been enjoying temperatures into the mid to high 20’s and today was no exception. So we took the last small table on the footpath outside the café so we could watch the citizens of Reefton do about their business in the warm sun while we had our coffee’s and warm, freshly baked multi fruit muffin’s.

A stroll down one side of the main street and back up the other reading many of the plaques in the shop windows gave us a deeper insight to this old gold and coal mining town.

Heading out of town the rail line to Westport ran alongside the highway to Inangahua the location of an earthquake in 1968 which measured 7.1 locally on the Richter scale causing considerable damage to the houses and school in the small town that many were damaged beyond repair and people shifted away to other centres to restart their lives. Today there a couple of houses remaining but the school was never rebuilt.

We then entered the Upper Buller Gorge and were on the lookout for the AA sign that pointed across the Buller River to the very large landslip that came down in the 1968 earthquake and blocked the river to such an extent that authorities were worried that when the ‘dam ‘gave way that Westport ,downstream, might be badly flooded. Eventually the ‘dam’ didn’t prove to be such a problem and the built up water gradually drained away.

This was the third time we had been through this part of the Buller Gorge in the last 2 years on holidays and both of the earlier occasions we had past the sign before we could stop in steady traffic and there was nowhere nearby where you could turn around easily and go back.

But today it was third time lucky as we both watch out for the sign and we stopped to take in what was the wide scar in the hillside which now had a thin layer of undergrowth starting to cover up the scene.

The small town of Murchison was next and we passed on through without stopping although this settlement also needs a visit to take in its varied history that all adds to the experience of driving through the West Coast.

As we drove on towards and ever uphill towards Lake Rotoiti the weather overhead remained fine and sunny but we were wondering just how long we could expect this spell of great holiday conditions to last.

We had stayed at the Tophouse 18 months ago with our eldest daughter and son in law and their two boys and enjoyed our time taking in local walks through the forest that surrounds the lake and we planned to complete at least one walk that might have been too long for the two boys to have joined in.

Ownership of the property which included the old homestead with 4 guestrooms, that had been a staging post of travellers by stagecoach back in the late 1800’s had changed hands but the new owners were just as welcoming as our first experience.

Last time we had had a marvellous time full of conversation with two other couples sharing stories of our travels while a chef who owned a restaurant down in the village cooked a delicious three course dinner for us all. So we booked for tomorrow night as the dinner was only on offer on demand. And anyway we had our two pies already purchased for dinner tonight.

It had been another very interesting day on the road visiting Reefton and seeing sights that were new to us and we were well ready for bed as darkness enfolded our motel unit.

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