PEEL FOREST

We’re on the last couple of days now, and decided to stop the night in Peel Forest, the last bit of the original forest on the Canterbury plains.  Stayed in a little DOC cabin in a mainly empty campsite.  OK but it rained and stopped planned walk.

These huge trees – podocarps – have all been cut down now, but were used for canoes for up to 100 paddlers.  Very big trees.

FILIGREE CLOUDS OVER MOUNT COOK

When we stopped on Mueller Saddle the weather was clear and bright.  However after a while a small cloud developed in the updraft from the top of Mt Cook.  At the same time the mountains on the left started to show cloud tails streaming off the tops.

This means weather is building, so over the next 2 hours I took a series of photos of the cloud formations appearing above the summit.  The shapes show up the turbulence at the summit in the moist air being blown in from an approaching front across the west coast, pushed up the mountain range into the cold air of the retreating high.  As you can see the clouds get thicker as time goes on.

A most unusual set of circumstances I’d say – a calm sunny day, a front approaching and the time to sit and watch the cloudscapes against a clear blue sky.  All these photos were taken in HDR which allows me to emphasise the beautiful shapes of the clouds.

But what struck me was the ethereal beauty of the forming clouds – they were gossamer thin, forming different shapes and patterns every few minutes.

By the time we got to the bottom the clouds around the top were thick, and that evening it started to rain as the cloud came down the mountains.

 

 

MUELLER SADDLE

The Mueller track gives access to the range to the W of Mt Cook.  We climber up part  way – 700m to the saddle, giving us fantastic views of Mt Cook, the ranges and the valley.  Luckily it was a warm sunny day with little wind, so we stayed up there a couple of hours eating lunch, snoozing, and planning the rest of our lives.  Seemed like a good place to do all 3.

 

WATERFALL EXPLORED

Sally and I aren’t great fans of the prepared track, so we decided to have a look at this waterfall, which had promise as an interesting goal.  It doesn’t look far, but it took us an hour to get to its base such is the size of the mountains.

This creek looks tiny, but was too deep and fast to cross even here.

GLACIER FACE NOT WHAT IT SEEMS

You can’t walk up to the glacier face because of the melt lake (unlike the Franz Josef).  So tourist boats take you.  The face looks tiny in context of the whole valley, but shows it’s size when seen next to a tourist boat.

The glacial face walls drop into the lake, but underwater is a ledge sticking out about 60m.  Icebergs break off from this and suddenly pop up to the surface causing a certain amount of consternation on the boats.

DIRTY GLACIER FADES AWAY

Glaciers are supposed to be pristine white, but as these ones descend from the mountains they collect scree rocks and end up covered in grey boulders – you can see the glacial face at the end of the melt lake.  We walked up here in the evening, the landscape was desolate and not at all comfortable, only rock, water and mountains.

The sides of the lake are the lateral moraines left over by the melting glacier.  The highest level seen on the mountains at the back date back from the 1300’s: the glacier has been slowly melting since then, way before global warming was fashionable.

SHRINKING GLACIERS

NZ glaciers are shrinking along with global warming.  The two satellite pictures above show the change over 17 years.  We walked up to look at Tasman Lake, which now (2012) has shrunk further back to the sharp valley opposite the Murchison river.

Glaciers now just can’t survive at 720 metres, the climate is too warm, so the NZ glaciers are shrinking.

In 1985 I went up the Franz Josef glacier on the West Coast.  20 years later I visited again with Katie.  What really surprised me, and brought home forcefully what global warming means, was the extent to which the glacier had shrunk.  In 1985 I walked up a creek to get to the glacier face.  20 years later that creek was about 1km from the face.  Glaciers are immense when you get to them – a vast wall of ice, seemingly unstoppable and permanent.  But it isn’t.  That vast structure had simply melted away.

BLUE LAKE

en route to Mt Cook is Lake T, which is bright blue because of the suspended rock flour.  It scatters the blue light just the same way as the sky does.

Further up the feeding river is grey because there is so much suspended sediment, scattering most of the light back.  Same reason clouds are white and not blue.

When the lake is stirred up, as happened next day, the water has a big particle load the scattering becomes full, and the water is grey.

OMARAMA GLIDING WEEKEND

Omarama is in the middle of a large flat plain with mountains around the sides.  Ideal for gliding.  We stopped off to have a look – the Canterbury gliding club were flying, gliders queued up for the tow plane.  Cloudy, so not much lift, the flights were short.  Interesting, and I’d love to have a ride, but it seemed like a lot of expense and work.

WE AVOIDED QUEENSTOWN BUT UNFORTUNATELY NOT THIS

Coming at the famous Bags’O’Fun-Queenstown from the side, we managed to skedaddle away from it by turning right.  I’ve already been there twice in a never-to-be-repeated (I hope) experience.

But a man’s gotta eat, and Arrowtown, or more accurately Ye Olde Reconstructed Arrowtown where only the Kitsch is genuine looked like a good place to have a quiet fang.

It wasn’t.

 

TREE AVALANCHES

The sides of the fjord are steep, but plants nevertheless can grow. Starting with lichen and mosses gradually the rocks are colonised with shrubs and trees.  Eventually however the whole lot peels off in a ‘tree avalanche’, leaving the water strewn with tree debris and the rock bare again.

GLACIAL VALLEYS

New Zealand was covered in about 2km of ice for 70,000 years, only melting recently (10,000 years ago).  The legacy is these scooped valleys and deep fjords.

Milford Sound is 400 metres deep, with sheer sides and no anchorages.  There is 6m of rain a year, resulting in a 3m layer of fresh, tannin-rich water on the surface of the sea.  This cuts down the light to the extent that species which only survive at 70m in the ocean, can live in the fjord.

 

TOURISM ON A VERY LARGE SCALE

At the end of a spectacular drive was the Milford Sound (tourist) processing plant.  Quite a remarkable feat, given the number of people who go on a trip every year (500,000 according to the twerp in the Te Anau toilet).

The whole operation is run just like an airport – restricted parking, a large concourse, hundreds of people milling around. We bought a ticket  on the next available boat and were told to ‘board at 1.15 at gate3’.  Which we did, with a sense of dislocation – is this really happening?  I’m afraid so.

MILFORD SOUND IS AS GOOD AS IT LOOKS

This picture has been painted and photographed countless times – in fact it’s a wonder there are any photons left on it.

Despite its familiarity, the experience of going into the sound is impressive, awe-inspiring, and is one of the few times when the sight we have come to see stands above the logistics of tourism.  The Grand Canyon, and Zion National park were the same.

By contrast lesser experiences simply become subsumed to tourism – Pancake Rocks on the West Coast being a good example.  The triviality and banality of tourism is so hard to ignore, and so intrusive, that it often ovewhelms what you have come to see.

We went up Milford Sound with a small outfit, Jucy travel.  The same people who rented our car.  It’s a low-budget organisation mainly for younger travellers.  We expected some shonky little boat with muzak and a forgettable commentary, but it was the opposite.  Unlike the large tourist boats it was small, personal, and without music at all (for which we thanked them at the end).  The commentary was sparse, targetted, and interesting.  Only once (thank goodness) did we have to compare a rock to an animal.

THE ROAD TO MILFORD SOUND

The road from Te Anau to Milford was constructed as a tourist drive, and it’s worth doing.  The focus tends to be on Milford Sound at the end, but the road itself is beautiful. Here are some of the lovely mature beech forests en route.

One of the odd things about the bush in New Zealand-something we take for granted elsewhere is the lack of animals. In Australia there are always some creatures to see – kangaroos, devils, native cats etc.  But here there are none a few intoduced species such as deer, rabbits and possums, but you rarely see them.  The forests are essentially empty to the casual visitor.  Apart from birds, which are plentiful, it’s like an empty house.

A WORD ABOUT TOILET PAPER

There’s a species of algae called ‘didymo’ – or more picturesquely ‘rock snot’ -which is invading NZ rivers and lakes.  It attaches itself to rocks in a jelly-like mass, then forms long white paper-like tails.

There is a species of toilet paper which is a far greater menace, and has already invaded many toilet facilities in South Island in both private and government establishments.  It clings to the walls and also forms long white paper-like tails.

In both cases the result of an infestation is a dirty bottom.

This stuff is so thin that you can imagine Ernest Rutherford, who lived near Picton, having the idea it could be useful to elucidate the structure of matter.  “Just pop down to that awful toilet on the docks, old chap, and get me a few sheets of the paper” he’d say to his assistant. “But sir,” the assistant would day “it’s made of so few strands of lignin that the atoms are too far apart.  Helium nuclei will go straight through like, er, everything else”.  “Hmm, maybe you’re right” says Ernest, “perhaps I’ll use gold foil.  At least the atoms are heavy, got a bit of substance to them”.

And that, ladles and jellyspoons, is how great discoveries are made.

 

A TOILET TO REMEMBER

One of the peculiarities of  travelling is coming across a wider variety of toilets than we are used to.  We do get to use them daily, and, inevitably, some make an impression – from the simple bucolic pleasure of a forest tree, the unsavoury back room of a pub, to a technological miracle like the public pay-toilet in Te Anau.

I felt somewhat under-dressed for the occasion – at least compared to the carefully-coiffured Japanese ladies and gentlemen passing in and out.  I sat  in the ante-room of this toilet, waiting for Sally to use up her dollar admission fee (down to the last cent, she reported), when the concierge, sitting behind his broad and imposing desk, looked across and said “Where you from, boy?”

Boy? This guy had a gold necklace, a diamond ear-stud and a black t-shirt.  Twerp.

“Tasmania”, I said.

“I suppose you’re not used to paying for the toilet there”, he replied.

“No, mate, I piss in the bush like the rest of them”, I said.

“Well,” he said, “we get international visitors in Te Anau, and we want to deliver a quality experience.  People tend to remember if they go to a bad toilet, don’t they”

“I’ll certainly remember this one”, I told him.

MT BURNS

We didn’t want to walk on the hammered tracks of the tourist routes.  Green boardwalk and admonishing signs.  We wanted to find a mountain and climb it.  One of the sons at the camp told us about this area, 30 km south of Manapouri, and, with the aid of a map copied from the display board, we had a good day out among stunning peaks.

Way out of the area where all the main tracks are – Routeburn etc – is Borland Road, leading to a power station.  Off this road are a few tracks, of which we climbed two.

Mt Burns is at about 5,000 ft, a delightful climb through beech forest above the treeline to a stunning view of the Southern Alps.  We were tempted to continue up the ridge to the peaks, but didn’t have any gear so unfortunately had to go back.

DESTRUCTION AND RESTORATION

This is the mighty Waiau river – what’s left of it.  In the 1800’s it was so wide and swift that it couldn’t be crossed, stopping development of a lot of farming land to its north.  It wasn’t until 1888 that a government punt attached to a steel cable provided some kind of crossing.

Finally the government build this suspension bridge, famously the longest in NZ, which survived until a new bridge was built about 50 years ago.  The suspension bridge is falling into disrepair and was to be abandoned but for a recent grant – you can see the work being done now.

The problem was the mighty Waiau river had been turned into the miserable little Waiau creek by a large dam upstream. Whose purpose was to supply electricity to the aluminium smelter at Bluff.  Flows had been reduced by 99% and nobody seemed to care.  Except the fish and the birds.

The loss of the river resulted in the loss of fish breeding grounds and wetlands for the birds.  Seasonal scouring of the banks was gone, resulting in the build up of debris and weeds.  The river was turning into yet another casualty of so-called progress.

Until a group of concerned farmers and conservationists got together and petitioned – successfully – for the river to be returned to fulfil its original natural purpose.  Now it is regulated such that the level of the dams cannot get too high or too low, being kept within natural parameters.  A large farming property has been bought and turned back into wetlands by building retaining dams and re-establishing local creeks.  95% of the fish breeding grounds have been restored.

A DELIGHTFULLY ECCENTRIC STAY

We planned to go to fjordland to see either Doubtful Sound or Milford Sound.  Hopefully to do some kayaking on the sounds and a bit of walking. Simple?  Oh, no it wasn’t.

It turned out that the whole Fjordland experience has been sewn up by the National Parks guys, and commercialised by the tour guys.  So if you want to do anything,  there’s a company or two with the franchise.  And about a half-dozen glossy brochures.

The closer we got, the less interested I became.  It was clear we were going to have to pay about $800 for 3 days seeing and doing stuff in a highly controlled manner, living in plastic overpriced accommodation.  I was ready to turn around and leave, keeping our dollars intact, thanks.

Until we came across this little place.  A gem on the shore of Lake Manapouri.  There are two places in fjordland – Manapouri and Te Anau.  Te Anau has been done over and is totally commercialised.  Manapouri has been forgotten, and is only a place from which boats set out for the lesser-known Doubtful Sound and the Routburn track.  Once upon a time it was a holiday centre, but that was 20 years ago.

It’s run by a now-old lady who brought her family from Queenstown in the 70s because they didn’t like the development.  Her husband died, and the two boys have helped build the park since then.  It’s quite extensive, with an ecclectic colletion of living accommodation.  There’s a delightful family feel to it, with faded pictures in the kitchen of family events over the years, and ancient books in the TV lounge.

The family is clearly obsessive – everything is labelled – perhaps no longer as clearly as it was, but labelled nevertheless. And perfectly clean.

Mother’s glasses are held together with sellotape, and the boys – now in early middle age – potter around doing odd jobs.  There is a spotless collection of old british Morris cars on the lawn and in a garage. With a tent over some, and one son was washing them down.  He keeps them “mainly for uniformity of spare parts”.  

Our little house was a gem of a place, a miniature swiss cottage, beautifully crafted with a stunning view of the mountains.  Its chimney was a ladder with a trapdoor at the top, and the neatly planted shrubs formed a sort of garden around the house.

The view was remarkable. It was cheaper than anything else. We settled in and stayed 3 days.

PAUA PAUSE THAT REFRESHED

We stopped to buy trinkets in this unpreposessing shop in Riverton (the Paua shell capital of the world).  I’d done a bit of work with shells and wanted some broken bits to use. So I got talking to the owner who turned out to be a fascinating guy.  He was a fitter and turner who had got into the paua shell trade, and built up an extensive business in making shell.  He’d researched and refined his techniques endlessly to discover the best way of doing every part of the business – a true craftsman.  Now a one-man show, he used to employ 6 people in the store, and has managed 3 shell factories.

His approach to developing gadgets and finding out new techniques was close to mine – different fields, similar minds.  I spent a happy hour or so talking about shell polishing among the machines in the back of the shop, and came away with a few tips to use.

NOT QUITE BELIEVABLE AND NOT QUITE TRUE

As a matter of fact there was the Tuatapere Sausage Capital sausage shop in town.  A somewhat insignificant little corner store with a fridge containing homemade sausages. Which, it has to be said, looked more or less like any other sausages and not those one would expect to find in a sausage capital.

We did, however, spot 3 sausages of the human variety in the store – large, fatty ones too.

OREPUKI, FADED GLORY

There’s a kind of sad beauty about places like this. The town had a small pub doing little business where we bought a fried cod for lunch, and a closed community hall.  There were a few scrubby houses, but mostly derelict buildings.  The shop in the upper picture had lost any identification, but the one in the lower picture was once a proud clothes outfitters, which has now forever shut its doors and is closed up with rusting steel plates.

It wasn’t till I read up on the town that I realised what an interesting history it had.  Originally it was a goldrush town, then it became a gold refining town for the miners between Invercargill and the port of Riverton.  Later it refined platinum.  Shale rock had been found in the area, and a large area excavated for a shale plant, producing good quality oil but not sustainable.  It developed an extensive flax-producing business using the native flax plants, then coal was found and it became a mining town.  Finally all these industries were overtaken or failed, and it became a farming community which dwindled with the conglomeration of the farms and reduction in labour to its present ghost-like self.

 

THIS NEEDS A BIT OF EXPLANATION

These are indeed a lot of new white gloves on a Hills hoist.

The people we stayed with (via AirBnB) were a kind couple (the McColghans) with whom we spent an interesting evening.  They have the mutton-birding rights to one of the offshore southern islands, and go there for about 6 weeks a year.  The gloves they use are these white ones, which chafe if they aren’t weathered on the line first.

INVERCARGILL DISAPPOINTS

When I was a little takker doing Geography at school I learned all about New Zealand.  One of the things I learned was about Invercargill, the southernmost port in the Commonwealth.

In my 8-year old mind this was immensely romantic.  Ever since then I have had ideas of a windswept harbour, filled with sailing ships loading bales of wool and mutton, setting off to brave the roaring 40’s. Crusty pioneers striding the streets with their pipes turned upside down to keep the rain out, and horsemen riding the hills to muster their sheep.  I have always wanted to go there.

Actually it’s flat, the harbour has silted up, there are all the usual shops, supermarkets and all the rest in a predominantly suburban town.  Hmph.

The only notable thing is we saw 6 churches on the way in and roughly the same number of places selling huge farm machinery.  Romance of a sort I suppose, but not quite what I expected.

WAIPAPA POINT LIGHTHOUSE

Somewhat bleak and blustery, but beautiful in its’ way, this lighthouse is nearly the southernmost point on the South Island.  Two families lived here and educated their kids onsite, in those days a long way from anywhere.  I wonder how they got on, but I’d love to spend some time in an isolated spot like this just to see what would happen to my inner soul.

LOG HAULING BACK IN THE DAY

I had to stop for a detour to this log-hauling site, currently occupied by little notices in the bush to say where things used to be.  So not a lot to see there. Interesting – though Sally found it easy to contain her enthusiasm.  But then there was this train, which I’m sure you’ll find as interesting as I did (Sally too, actually).

The whole gadget was driven by an old Fordie engine, which drove two shafts, fore and aft as well as its own wheels. These shafts powered the wheels of the fore and aft log jinkers, effectively giving the whole contraption an 8-wheel drive capability.

The brakes were just beams, organised so a lever clamped them to the side of the wheels.  The train ran on timber rails down some fairly serious slopes.

Not surprisingly things went wrong more than a little, and the drivers were expected to jump off in time to save their lives and if possible the cargo.

Makes todays’ obsession with Occupational Health and Safety look a bit weedy I reckon.

 

PETRIFIED FOREST AT PORPOISE BAY

Pretty interesting – at low tide you can walk on these tree trunks that are 170 million years old (happy birthday to you).  They are the remnants of the ancient podocarpaceae which grew in the then Gondwanaland which broke up to form the subcontinent Zealandia, which later became NZ.  Makes you think about the passing of time and the insignificance of mankind.  Ditto golf.

SUPERMARKET HINTS AT EVOLUTION BREAKTHROUGH

The question which occupied some supermarket time for me was the obvious one – what do they mean?

Could this be fish who have left school and shoal and gone out on their own (and lost their fingers?)  Perhaps – there’s plenty of solo fish around. For example marlin and suchlike stooge along toute seule, possibly being careless with fingers.

Could it be newly discovered amazing creatures – fish which have become dextrous, lost the webs and gained the ability to move their fingers independently?

Don’t believe me? Well read this: J Exp Zool B Mol Dev Evol. 2007 Dec 15;308(6):757-68. “Fish fingers: digit homologues in sarcopterygian fish fins.”

Is the Owaka supermarket on the cutting edge of evolutionary biology? Maybe.

Bugger me, what a teaser, eh?

Shopping can be so exciting sometimes, can’t it?

OLD RAILWAY TUNNEL

This tunnel was dug to allow the timber getters to transport their logs to the yards.  It was dug by hand, for 250 metres through a hillside.  That was a pretty remarkable feat – I stood at the entrance and imagined a pick in my hand.  Didn’t look enticing.

The second photo is interesting.  It was so dark in the tunnel, I couldn’t see the floor.  In order to show up the walls the photo was taken using HDR photography with 12 different pictures and one flash merged together.

The details are made visible by using differing exposures and ISO numbers, and post-processing to balance the images.  Took ages, as you might expect, but a nice result.

CAITLINS ARE DEFINITELY ON TRACK

this is a rare and special track – en route to the seals.

Rare and special because it hasn’t got duckboards, little green steps, helpful signs, unhelpful signs, information placards and all the other crap you usually get.

What a relief.  And beautiful beaches and seals at the end.

SEALION

This is a pretty amazing coastline.  The Caitlins are made of vertical mountain strata which has eroded leaving valleys going down to the sea.  The result is a lot of beaches in the valleys.  The coast is the breeding ground of a number of species including these sealions which come onto the sand and snooze, flipping sand over themselves to keep cool.

IDYLLIC SHACK ON THE SHORE

This camp was peaceful and our little hut right on the shoreline.  A few squeaky kids, but nothing much.  And very few midges, remarkably enough.

The beach had interesting boids – spoonbills which always amaze me with their daft but functional beaks.

There were big clams on the beach, which we didn’t realise until later.

It was so nice we stayed a couple of days – very gentle.

ALTERNATIVE LIFESTYLE – FOR SALE TOO.

So off we went down the coast into the Caitlins – a delightful area in the South East.  Finally ended up at Punaweia, a more or less forgotten estuary with a couple of caravan parks.

On the way in was this old scow.  Badly rotted decks, not much looked after, but with a shoresite shack, power, water and satellite TV.  Pretty big to live in I’d guess, but not perhaps going to do any more ocean voyages. Suit handyman.

It was for sale – tempting, but I’d have to give up wife, job, house, kids and become a batty old recluse and, on balance I decided not to.

CHRISTCHURCH QUAKES SINCE THE BIG ONE

The little square is the city centre, which was flattened. The other spots are the 13,000 odd shocks since then – minor ones which people hardly feel. But when they do there is often quite a lot of understandable worry.  Some people cannot stand loud bangs any more – including the son of the people we stayed with.  For a long time after the quake he slept under the  dining room table.

DUNEDIN’S SCOTTISH ROOTS

I like Dunedin – been there before a couple of times for conferences.  It’s a university city with interesting shops, a big harbour (but shallow) and an extensive peninsula nearby.  The accumulated brainboxes were having their degree celebrations on the day we arrived, so there were a lot of parents in smart suits, and graduates in academic gowns wafting about.  Interestingly some kept their gowns on for the weekend, which was quite nice I thought, showed they were proud of what they did.  The first time I graduated I kept it on for the morning and felt proud.  The other 2 times I didn’t bother turning up to the ceremony.

The place is full of scottish street names and places.  The town itself is supposed to be a small Edinburgh (Dun – Edin), and, since I went to school there I found a lot of familiarity with the architecture and the attitudes – it feels relatively genteel.  I wouldn’t mind returning one day.

R Burns esq featured prominently in the main street, as you might imagine.  And there were a lot of churches.

We couldn’t find any accommodation in the city because of graduation, so went out to Portobello and stayed in a modern motel room with a view over the harbour, a spa, a balcony and peace.  After the awful Omaru BnB we deserved it.

 

PRIMEVAL GOBSTOPPERS

The Moeraki boulders are left over from way back when concretions in sandstone got buried in mud.  Eventually the mud became cliffs and released the spherical concretions onto the beach.  Eventually busloads of tourists came along to photograph them.

Happily National Parks provided a picture to save us getting out feet wet.

Whatever will they think of next?

OAMARU STEAMPUNK

Oamaru has some things which are definitely not dour and Scottish.  Steampunk is one of them.  Somehow the area got infused with the steampunk idea some years ago and people have been doing it ever since.  When we turned up there was an exhibition – not little stuff either, big things like this train and the motorbike.

KIDS PLAYGROUND IS REFRESHINGLY DANGEROUS

This sign warned sensible and God-fearing adults to keep away from the little hole in the ground.  However in the background is where the kids go – a playground where there are a large amount of things a kid can injure themselves doing.  A refreshing change from the plastic stuff in our cities – all round corners and rubber mats to keep our little ones safe.

Here’s the elephant coming in to land.

OAMARU – SCOTTISH HERITAGE

This is the opera house.

This town reminded me of the architecture in Scotland, where I spent my formative teenage years.  Dour, granite and with a large number of sewing shops and fish and chip eateries.  The rain helped too.

Oamaru made a huge amount of money out of its harbour.  It was a deep- water port easily accessible to sailing ships right in the middle of the most fertile area of South Island.  They built a big harbour, warehouses and loading facilities and it took off – the first refrigerated sailing/steam ship took a cargo worth $70M of frozen lamb in the early 1900’s.  The prosperity of the town shows even today  in the architecture, the wide streets, the parks and the general air of organisation – it’s definitely not one of the ramshackle towns, but something planned.

BREAKFAST WITH ROMANCE

Decent breakfast anyway.

During which we witnessed the first tentative moves of a great romance – from chance comment, to response, to interest, chatting, exchange of phone numbers (I suppose, could have been lotto numbers or poetry for all I know).

Bound to work.  I have a theory that people are attracted based on their features. I mean everyone knows people look like their dogs.  But what about their partners too?  Makes a lot of evolutionary sense since the face is mirror to the soul, and that’s what genetics is all about.  Check out the noses in the picture.  See exactly the same.

Who says a rainy day in Oamaru is boring?

 

 

GRIM NIGHT IN OAMARU

We picked a B&B out of the book.  Sounded OK, however it was dark, dank and smelled of old carpet and paint.  Half done up, it was somewhat scruffy inside – but it needed it, hadn’t been changed since the 50’s.  It was also full of house mites and I sneezed all night.  The landlady, who was heavily into alternative medicine, left lavender (and crystals) everywhere so it smelled of that too. We figured out we slept in the bed wherein her mum died.  It was cold and rainy.

And I left my pillow and toothbrush behind.

We left as soon as possible, never to return.

 

SPOTTING PENGUIN SPOTTERS

There was a sign to a yellow eyed penguin colony.  Here is the bus that takes the penguin spotters to spot the penguins:

And here are penguin twitchers, twitching:

Here is a rarely seen female penguin twitcher wearing black furry earmuffs.  These are effectively keep her ears warm and making her look like a complete nong.

And here are the penguins:

As you can no doubt see (it took us 20 minutes and some twitcher assistance) there are 3 of them.  Up on the right at the end of the beach, halfway up the cliff next to a light green bush.  They aren’t moving, just standing there – as penguins will.

Exciting, hey?

HEDGES

NZ is a country of huge hedges, which you don’t see elsewhere.  Predominantly they are there to stop wind erosion of the soil and to provide stock shelter.  They are big- not weeny little things you could jump on a foxhunt, but 20ft high tree barriers.  Cut with somewhat large lawnmowers.