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Published: December 6th 2006
One thing everyone says about New Zealand is that the weather is really changeable and you can experience 4 seasons in one day. We have now experienced this ourselves. The weather here has been really mixed and from talking to some Kiwi’s (people not the birds obviously), not really typical of this time of year. It is supposed to be summer!
After leaving Te Anau we drove across to Wanaka which is a lovely alpine village, very much like a Swiss or Austrian town on a lovely blue lake. We stayed in a campsite here which was totally Hi de Hi, really felt like we were on the programme, the only thing missing was the tannoy. The toilet and kitchens all had concrete floors and there was a TV room which was a wall mounted TV and then a room full of carpeted steps to serve as seats. Totally hilarious but actually we really liked it because it was well run and really clean with a great view of the lake. Best of all our little cabin (built from breeze blocks and painted pink inside) was only $35 per night (which is mega cheap with the exchange rate nearly $3
to the £).
From Wanaka we drove further inland towards Mount Cook. It is the tallest mountain in NZ, in fact in Australasia. There are two lakes nearby Lake Pukaki and Lake Tekapo famed for their bright blue and green colours. We arrived at Lake Pukaki and went into the visitor centre. We could see some mountains but none that were really impressive. So reluctantly we asked the lady in there ‘where is Mount Cook’ (felt really stupid here!). Must be a frequent question as she calmly replied, ‘oh you can’t see it today’.
At Lake Pukaki the water was really bright blue/green but it was almost gale force winds as you can see from the photos! We carried on to Lake Tekapo. It is really beautiful and a really bright blue. We stayed at the Lake View Campsite which was in a great spot with fantastic views of the lake. We arrived to nice sunshine and sat outside to have lunch. There is a nice little village although a bit touristy, it is obviously a main stop for coach tours.
The weather here was unbelievable. First it was gale force winds (approx 130km per hour) and
the lake looked like the sea with big waves breaking at the edge. We walked into the village and nearly got blown away - seriously. By night time a huge storm started with thunder and lightning all night along with the winds (thankfully we had a little cabin again here or I think our tent would have been blown away!). Next morning the wind had dropped but as we drove out of Tekapo it was starting to snow. Soon it was thick snow like the middle of winter and by the time we reached Lake Pukaki again we could see a faint blue glow on one side and realised it was the lake. The visitor centre was closed and everything and obviously we didn’t get chance to see Mount Cook! By this time we had really experienced the 4 seasons in 24hrs from warm sunshine to snow!
We drove on from there over the mountains (through quite a bit of snow) to the West Coast. It was a really nice drive through the Haast Pass which is very scenic. We saw some stunning waterfalls as there had been so much rain so although we have had some bad weather
it is not all bad!
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