The day started early for Bruce who decided he wanted to experience a Catlins sunrise. He got up and dressed and gave me a nudge and opened the blind on my side of the motorhome with instructions to look outside. He then grabbed the camera and took off for the beach, The dogs refused to move and remained under the covers, snuggled up to my legs. However, the colours were beautiful and I was quite pleased that Bruce returned in one piece (he didn’t stumble over an angry seal in the dark) with some lovely photos.
Seeing I was awake we were up earlier than usual and headed off for another day of exploring. Today was to be a day of waterfalls and waterways. Some places were foggy, and others very clear – a bit of a strange old day really.
First up though was a little town called Owaka. Nothing much there, but a good I-Site and little museum, and a lovely cafe for a coffee. They informed us that one of the bridges we needed to go over was closed for repairs so there would be a 14km detour over metal roads – yay. The coffee was definitely going to be needed. What Owaka did have was a quirky garden called Teapot Land. I am not sure why they decided on teapots, but they were there in the hundreds – in every shape and form.
First up was Matai Falls. Another lovely bush walk in to the falls over well maintained tracks, and with the serenade of numerous bell birds. Once we started on the track we found that there was a second set of falls – Horseshoe Falls, within minutes of Matai Falls so we felt that was a bonus.
Matai Falls were lovely. They were not very high, but certainly higher than Purakaunui Falls, and the walk in was only about 10 minutes.
Just a couple of minutes further on was the Horseshoe Falls. Again, we could see that the full horseshoe was not in operation due to the dry weather of the last few weeks. Instead of a steady flow of water there was nothing more than a trickle in places. Nevertheless they were also lovely.
The bush here was thick and quite dark , but so peaceful and yet noisy with the sound of falling water.
Next stop was about 20km along the road to Lake Wilkie. Lake Wilkie is a drainage lake but is supposed to be magical because of its reflections. It was a short walk there (about 15 minutes) but there was a bit of a breeze disrupting the surface, so maybe not as spectacular as it could have been.
There was morning fog clinging to the land in places and Lake Wilkie had a bit of fog still so that added to the mystique of the place.
Next stop was McLean Falls, which are reputed to be the one of the most photographed falls in the South Island, and also the tallest falls in the Catlins at 22m high. It was a longer walk in this time, but still through pristine bush and over well formed tracks. There were lots of other tourists sharing this journey with us.It remained a bit of a sport seeing who would expect right of way on the track, and we would chuckle at some them reminding each other to keep left!.
Once we got to the falls it was easy to see why they are the most photographed – they are exquisite. They are quite fast flowing, over 4 tiers, and the height of them made it very difficult to get them all in a photo.
The nature of the rocks the falls run through made climbing up into the falls relatively easy for the young and silly, and many of them did just that. We settled for the first little platform.
The nature of the terrain close to the falls also made that last little bit of track quite interesting to negotiate, with a little stream running across it and a bit of clambering required. Well worth the effort though. The dogs had to be on leads throughout the walk but they seemed to be quite happy as well.
However, we decided they probably needed a bit of beach time, so we stopped at Papatowai Beach, so they could have a run around. There were no seals here, so that helped. There is a river that has a bit of an estuary, and we were fortunate to see some white Spoonbills feeding. It was the first time I had ever seen them live.
Where the river joins the sea there is a lovely sandy beach, punctuated with just a few rocky outcrops. It was low tide, so Bruce had a bit of a hunt for mussels, but found none. The dogs had a great time though, before we bundled them back into the motorhome and headed into a little town called Niagara, and the NZMCA park there for the night. There are some falls here as well that are supposed to be the smallest falls in the Catlins (the name was a bit of a joke), but we decided we had “fallen out” so we did not go there. We elected for a wine and a wind-down instead.
Away From Home NZ 