From Haast to contrast to an amazing view of The Remarkables

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The good weather keeps with us even if it is a little overcast.

The road ahead today is going to offer a lot of contrasts demonstrating just how diverse our beautiful country is.

It is easy to get hooked on Morning TV when you don’t have any work to go to and we have indulged ourselves a bit knowing that when the holiday ends so will morning TV(although Gretchen tells me she sneaks a peek or two when getting the oldies ready for the day at the Rest Home she works in)

We have been learning about all these wonderful kitchen implements etc that have revolutionised working in the kitchen and they are all so well priced, if you believe the advertisement. Just as well we have managed to keep ourselves from ringing the 0800 numbers or we would be swamped with courier deliveries by the time we get home.

Our first destination this morning is Jacksons Bay which is south of Haast and as far as the sealed road goes on the West Coast. It is actually not that far on to Milford Sound as the crow flies and what an addition that would make to the Heritage Highway if the Government was bold enough to extend the road. Mind you there is some mountainous country to get through even those the actual distance is not that far.

It is a fairly straight run of 40 odd kilometres down to the bay that is sheltered from the prevailing south westerly with a couple of small settlements on the way.

At end of the three major rivers we crossed over there were collections of caravans and small chalets were the people who were out on the banks of each river netting the delicacy whitebait that of course are now in season.

At Jacksons Bay there is a small collection of houses, a long wharf and a few fishing boats moored in the bay.

We took the walk through the rain forest to the ocean beach. Today the sea was quite calm as the wind had died away and there were just tiny waves coming ashore on the small beach.

However the huge pile of driftwood well back from the high tide mark showed just how rough the sea can get here.

As we returned to the car park we met DOC ranger who was going down to the beach to check whether there were any penguins around as this was the time of the year they were coming ashore to nest. We hadn’t seen any but perhaps we hadn’t been fully aware we would see any.

Just on the outskirts of the Bay we stopped to take in an historic cemetery that was located a few metres back into the bush. The graves that you could make out dated back to the early 1900’s.At some stage the bush has taken over the graveyard giving the location a rather spooky feeling.

Our next stop was at the Hapuka Estuary where there was a boardwalk that started off in amid a good stand of kowhai trees with tuis making themselves happy and drunk on the nectar.

The noise of their singing was almost deafening there were so many of them in the trees and flying around.

Gretchen was walking slightly ahead of me and had spotted a kereru or native wood pigeon perched on a branch directly above me.

What was so amazing was the kereru didn’t even move as I concentrated the video camera on him/her. That is as close as I or Gretchen have ever got to the most majestic bird of the NZ forest.

We would rank this short walk around the estuary right up there with the one at Lake Matheson yesterday with lots of information boards set out telling you what was going on in each stop along the way.

Heading up the highway that runs next to the wide Haast River towards the pass over the Southern Alps, the volume of traffic seemed to have picked up from what we have experienced over the past few days.

We took the short walk through a native fern grove to the edge of the river where there were views of Roaring Billy Falls on the other side of the river.

It was a pleasant easy level walk and we had lunch at a picnic table before we hit the road again driving up to the lookout where the two major rivers in the area, the Haast and the Landsborough come together to become the Haast down to the sea.

Gradually the road started to climb towards the lowest road pass over the Southern Alps but before we got to the summit we took a stop at the bridge that crosses the river where the boulders are huge and then drove slowly past a major hillside slip at Angel Falls which carried away a van and its two occupants several months ago. Only parts of the van were ever found along with one of the occupants whose body was located at the mouth of the Haast on the coast. One can only imagine how horrific the accident had been.

It is here where the road is closed at night between 5pm and 7am as the section of road is too dangerous to drive through at night.

All of a sudden as you pass over the summit the forest changes from dense, moss covered trees to beech trees starting the contrast that continues on as the drive took us onto Lake Wanaka where the mountainsides soar to the snow covered peaks while the flat land looks dry with open pasture.

We were keen to get to our overnight accommodation in Queenstown to enjoy its location so we didn’t stop in Hawea or Wanaka but did notice just how much the towns had grown by before we took on the Crown Range which is the highest public road in the country.

On past the historic Cardrona Hotel where we were tempted by the Emmersons Lager on offer on a sandwich board outside the public bar and up to the summit of the road at just over 1000metres where we did take a short stop to take in Lake Whakatipu in the distance and the surrounding mountains with a small amount of snow at the higher levels.

It has been years since we had been to Queenstown and its growth took us by surprise although it is clear to see why the lakeside town is now the premier place for tourists to visit.

The scenery of the lake and snow covered mountains all close at hand makes the location really quite spectacular and special.

We weren’t disappointed with our hotel a couple of kilometres away from the town and located on a hill overlooking the lake with the majestic Remarkables mountain range right in the centre of our uninterrupted view. Great reservation from booking.com!

Bring on the wine!

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