Liz 1 Prawn 0

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Day 102 & 103
16th-17th December

We had an early start that morning as the space we were parked in was needed from 7.30am so we had to leave, not that we were complaining! We had 3 days to get down to Wellington so we could catch our Interislander Ferry to the South Island on the 19th and we had to get moving. We’d decided to drive via Huka Falls near Taupo. Ellory had picked up a leaflet at the Base Auckland about Prawn Fishing and was very keen to catch his own dinner! Fishing isn’t really my thing, but I like prawns so I was open to this idea!!

The early start meant that, although it was a long drive, we arrived in Huka Falls around midday. I, understandably was a bit tired having driven nearly 300km that morning and wasn’t in the mood to do anything. We found a campsite within 5 minutes of the Prawn fishing and settled in for the day. All we did was laundry, as we were both running out of clean clothes, and napping. We also cooked ourselves dinner on our little camp stove. Sorry it’s not very exciting on this day’s entry, but as all backpackers know, if you travel too fast and do too much you will burn out, that’s our excuse anyway!!

So, the 17th, after our day of rest we were ready to go again! The campsite we were staying in was linked to a Geothermal Park and we decided to check it out before going fishing for dinner. We spent about an hour or so, walking the trails and being freaked out by all the steam coming out of the ground all around us! Seriously, that is a strange natural phenomenon. It was very cool to see though, despite the smell of rotten eggs, and we were glad we’d taken the time and effort to see it.

And then on to Prawn Fishing, Ellory was all excited, anticipating a huge catch so we could dine in style that evening. I was not so sure about my fishing skills but I was willing to give it a go!! We paid our entry fee, collected our rods, bait and buckets of ice (so the prawns could die of hypothermia after we’d caught them) and settled ourselves down by one of the prawn lakes. We had to move a couple of times as we weren’t even getting a nibble but eventually we found a sweet spot by the bridge. There is an art to catching prawns, unlike normal fishing, for fish, you mustn’t ‘jerk’ the rod when you feel the prawns biting, they just let go. You have to patiently wait for them to take the bait for a walk and then after they’ve stopped walking and you’ve let them nibble for about 30 seconds, you can slowly pull them to the surface. This is easier said than done! Time after time we lost prawns off our hooks. However eventually, to my complete astonishment, I caught one!! He was quite a big one, about 5” long, I was so proud!

This, however, was the end of it, yes, I caught the only prawn of the trip! Ellory was annoyed! Think he had visions of a giant bucket of prawns. I tried not to be too smug and suggested we buy a bag of prawns the farm sold so we could have our prawn dinner. We proceeded to do that, and as they came with garlic butter it looked like it would be a tasty dinner! I also had my prawn which I was going to eat as well.

The plan after this was to start driving towards Wellington so we could relax for a day before our early morning ferry on the 19th. There was no way in heck we were going to do that in one evening as it was approx 380km away but we were going to drive until we were tired and then we would stop.

This seemed to work out quite well and we managed to drive around 250km before we decided to stop in a town called Huntersville. The campsite was extremely basic but it was free and somewhere to park the van, so it was good enough for us! We were looking forward to the prawns and Ellory set to the grim task of peeling the prawns, I was too squeamish! It had started to pour with rain so we were both huddled under the opened boot door of the van so we didn’t get wet! Fortunately, prawns don’t take too long to cook and with the garlic butter they were delicious!!! The rain was showing no signs of letting up so once we had washed up we got back in the van and had an early night.

Love Liz xxx

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