Great landscape..shame about the midges


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Oceania » New Zealand » South Island » Haast Pass
November 30th 2018
Published: November 30th 2018
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Land of the long white cloud
SC writes: Our last day in Queenstown was pretty much rained off. We did drive out about 50 kms to Glenorchy with some great views of Lake Wakatipu and Arrowtown, a ridiculously picturesque village. Both very pleasant BUT we have encountered the infamous, the dreaded, NZ midge. These are tiny flies that bite (and I do mean bite..they draw blood). The bites then itch like fury for hours....very unpleasant indeed. We remembered why we had avoided some places on the west coast back in 1994... The midges!

Today we drove northwards towards the west coast at Haast. Again the scenery was stunning and the weather was ok, sunny at times but also a few showers. We stopped at Wanaka on the way, delighful town on the banks of another large lake. A smaller, more chilled version of Queenstown. Then it was into the wild yonder... More fantastic lanscapes and photo opps... However, we when stopped to stretch legs, take in the view of walk to see waterfalls,....they were there again ..THE MIDGES. I have dozens of bites and Cj has her share too... (I remember that when my Mum visited NZ in 1988, she came home after 6 weeks, absolutely
ArrowtownArrowtownArrowtown

Very quaint
black and blue with bites... she was 65 then, younger than I am now!!)

Tonight we are in Haast, a tiny place on the coast with only one option for eating...not good! (Cj: 'not good'?! It was dreadful! Meat cooking since a week last Wednesday, chips from a buffet - and as for the 'live music' ... we could hardly hear ourselves think, and even recognising what they were playing was a challenge. Although I did work out that they were massacring first "Sittin' on the dock of the Bay" by the late, great Otis Redding, and then "Honky tonk women" by the Stones). (Cj is referring here to what I think of as local character...but it was a stinker!)

We are now gearing up for our journey to Sydney on Monday 3rd Dec but before then there are some important things to do...


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