On our way up the east coast from
Dunedin, we stopped to check out the Moeraki Boulders, 55 million
year old, large spherical rocks that ended up on a beautiful beach.
It was quite a sight to see at low tide when most of them were not
underwater. After that we went to Oamuru and to see their 19
th
century limestone commercial buildings down by the harbourfront, now
used by galleries, antique shops and local artisans, making the
historic area a nice place to walk around. Heading inland along the
Waitaki River we passed several large dams, all making use of the
natural surroundings to generate power for the South Island.
We settled for the night in Omarama, a
little further south of Mount Cook than we had planned when we found
everything else closer booked due to a cycling event (new trail
opened) and some canal work bringing contract workers into the area.
We found a cabin in a camping park that worked out great. The next
day we drove to Mt. Cook, the highest mountain in Australasia at over
11,000 feet. Not interested in attempting a summit hike, where close
to 50 people have lost their lives doing so (including one
Calgarian), we settled for a 3 hour hike on the Hooker Valley Track.
It followed the Hooker River, crossing 3 swing bridges, leading to a
glacier terminal lake that had small icebergs floating in it (broken
pieces from the glacier). With Mt. Cook looming above the lake it was
a wonderful place to relax and admire the surrounding views. Along
the trail we passed another glacier that was calving, creating a
rumble followed by a surge of water and ice dropping from the steep
mountain side. Back in the car we passed several ski areas, all
closed for the summer. They were quite small compared to what we are
used to, having only one or two lifts and 10 different runs, but
probably large enough to support the small population in the region.
We stopped at Lake Tekapo where we had hoped to spend the night (no
rooms available), so we had to settle for beautiful views of a
turquoise coloured lake surrounded by mountains before driving back
to the east coast for the night.
We are now in Christchurch where we
will complete our New Zealand adventure. Once again we had quite an
adventure finding accommodation and the closest place we could find
was 25 km's outside of the city. The 2010 and 2011 earthquakes
seriously damaged much of the city, and room availability has been an
ongoing problem since then (a small inconvenience for us in the
overall picture). Today we toured around Christchurch, including a
downtown walk and a visit to the Antarctic Centre where we could
pretend to be back home in a storm room where they dropped the
temperature to almost -20C....(I still can't believe I paid money to
do that......it must have been a sympathy move for our friends and
family back home). The Blue Penguins which are being rehabilitated
back to good health were fun to watch. The centre provided an
excellent picture of what life is like on the Antarctic
continent......if we do make it there some day it will be a very
brief encounter! During the downtown walk, the Avon River, parks and
Botanic Gardens were all looking lovely but the ongoing pain felt by
the city was also evident as we passed many areas still cordoned off
due to the 2010-11 earthquakes with many older buildings still
waiting to be torn down or rebuilt. There are still many years of
work to be done to restore this city which is very beautiful but also
earthquake-prone with small tremors happening regularly.
Tomorrow we are going to drive around
the Banks Peninsula and spend some time in Akoroa, a quaint community
by the sea that was originally settled by the French. There is also
supposed to be an open water swimming race that will be interesting
to watch. The following day we fly to Sydney to start our adventure
in Australia. We have a camper van waiting for us in Oz so our recent
issue finding a room to sleep in will disappear.......we will only
need to find a place to park :-)
More pictures on their way.....
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