Tag: nature

Moeraki

by awayfromhomenz

After leaving Alexandra we ambled out towards the coast again, spending a night in Ranfurly along the way _ there is not much in Ranfurly. There was a good frost on the ground when we woke up but clear blue skies, so a good omen for Moeraki.

Moeraki is special because of the boulders, and we are seeing less of them every year which is a real shame. The boulders are said to be formed between 33 to 56 million years ago when shell fragments were rolled in a limestone mixture (which acted as a cement) with silt stone and mudstone. They were formed into a round shape and eventually spat out of the hillside as it eroded. Over time they become buried in sand, or broken apart.

Unfortunately the boulders are also on the tourist route and we had to share the beach with a group of tourists from Singapore and Malaysia. While these people are all very nice, they have no concept of sharing spaces – being polite is also totally lost on them. They individually posed on the rocks, adopting one pose after the other so they could be photographed, before the next one took their place and so on. It was difficult trying to get a photo without them in it. They all loved the dogs though.

The tide was half in so that also restricted the photos a bit – or maybe just gave a different perspective.

The next morning we set out early because the tide was out, and I mistakenly thought the tourists might not be there early – Big mistake. We faced the same battle as yesterday. This time Bruce tried to tell them to get out of the way – no result. Instead they shoved their phone into my hands so I could film them with our dogs!

When we finally got some photos we took the dogs off leash to explore the beach. We found several of these…

These are apparently the egg cases of Ghost Sharks, and they are known to wash up on Moeraki Beach.

Ghost Sharks were not discovered until 2002, and they are actually more of a ray than a shark. They do not have teeth, but have hard mouth plates for crushing us shellfish, and they do not have bones – only cartilage.

The egg cases house the young until they hatch and the cases then float away and are washed up on beaches.

It was lovely being able to walk on the beach again, and we thoroughly enjoyed our stay. We remember Emma and Justin gifting us a dinner at the famous Fleur’s restaurant at Moeraki. That has now closed down and the building is for sale – the end of an era really.

We are off to Oamaru next as we journey slowly towards the ferry and home.

Queenstown and Skippers Canyon

by awayfromhomenz

We normally avoid Queenstown as it is definitely NOT motorhome friendly, but this time we decided to stay at the Driftaway Camping Ground, in Frankton. This is a fairly new camp, and it was a delight to stay at. Here, we had the chance to catch up on laundry, and have some beautiful hot showers. It was only a short walk through the gate to the lakeside, with extensive walking/cycle tracks. We came across this automatic counter telling you how many cyclists had been this way today – nothing about walkers though.

The scenery from our campsite was beautiful as well.

The camp had amazing facilities for keeping children entertained – ping pong, bouncy mat, a little slide, sandpit etc. Everything was spotless, and the barbeque area had views to die for. The camp was pretty popular and almost full (school holidays I guess).

The next day we took a taxi into the centre of Queenstown (at an exorbitant price), to meet our tour party for Skipper’s Canyon. The road to Skippers is reputed to be the most dangerous road in New Zealand, and our 4wd Jeep was being driven by a slip of a 21 year old girl. However, she quickly gained our confidence and she had been driving this road as a tour guide for the last 5 years.

The tour follows the sides of the Shotover River. The road is a public road, but is not maintained by either Transit, or the local council, so it can be pretty rough in places. Ocassionally, one of the local tour companies will pay for a grader to come through. Although it is seen as a two lane road, there are not many places wide enough to pass if you came across a car coming the other way. This happened to us 3 times during the trip, and each time, our driver had to back up some distance to be able to let them pass.

The countryside is very steep, with almost vertical drops down to the river on one side. The hillsides are predominantly of a slate type of rock which readily falls apart – so very unstable.

There are three permanent resident families in Skippers. One was a squatter who camped on a particular piece of land, continually for 20 years, until he, by law, then became the owner of that land. At that time he built himself a small, permanent house, and he still lives there now.

The house in the photo above was built as a meeting point, halfway into Skippers by a couple who lived further into Skippers but whose children refused to drive all that way to visit them. The halfway house was used for visits while they were alive, but is unused now.

Along the road we also passed the ruins of a hotel, that used to serve the gold miners of the area. The story goes that that the couple who ran the hotel needed help, so they hired a young lady. Her employment lasted 5 days, when she was whisked away by one of the miners as his bride. This happened again and again to the ladies they hired to help, until in the end they advertised in Christchurch for the ugliest woman they could find to help them out. It was to no avail – 5 days later she ran off to be married to a miner.

The Shotover River was an important gold mining area, and that was what the road was originally built for. When panning for gold became less successful, miners resorted to water cannons to erode the hillsides to hopefully reveal more gold. As the result, the landscape was altered substantially, and remnants of their pipes etc are still visible.

The midway part of the tour was the old Skipper’s Canyon Schoolhouse, where we stopped for a coffee and a gingernut.

To get to it though, we had to cross the Skipper’s Canyon Bridge, which is only just wide enough for the jeep. Apparently several wing mirrors have been lost on this bridge.

All this makes you realise what a hardy bunch our ancestors were. Maybe it was worth it – Skippers was once known as the richest goldmining area in the world! We were amazed that today, there were three families camping here for a few nights. Hope they don’t freeze to death.

We made our way back, but stopped along the way to go down to the River where we had the opportunity to pan for gold. Our Guide demonstrated for us, and out of a spade full of sand from the river bed, all she got was one tiny speck of gold. The rest of us decided it wasn’t worth getting cold and wet for.

This was also the site for the Shotover Jet base. We hung around to watch it return.

Overall, it was an educational and interesting trip, but there was no way the motorhome would drive on that road! I seem to remember my Dad saying he took the bus over it but surely I misunderstood. I don’t see how a bus could get around those corners. Apparently, stock trucks don’t use it – all livestock has to be walked in or out.

Once back to Queenstown, Bruce and I were shaking our heads at the queue for Ferg’s Burgs. It was about 50m down the street when we left, and was still about the same when we came back! They must be really good burgers!

We will be sorry to leave tomorrow. The scenery has been wonderful, but I really want to see if I can visit Arrowtown in the autumn.

Twizel

by awayfromhomenz

From Tekapo we headed away towards Twizel which is another favourite place of ours. The weather remained overcast with the occasional shower, so the photos I took all looked a bit gloomy. Because of the weather we decided not to stop at Burke’s Pass. We wanted to get to Twizel in plenty of time to go to the laundromat and get the washing done, and still get to the canal in time to get a good parking place.

We managed to achieve that. It was disappointing to see that the machines at the laundromat have not been updated in years, so we still had washing strung up in the motorhome to get properly dry.

However, it all got dry in the end and we had a prime parking spot on the side of the canal.

Instead of buying a fishing license, this time, we elected to watch and see if any fish were being caught before we wasted the money. There were up to 12 fisher people at any one time, but we did not see any fish being caught. We did see several fish jumping from time to time.

We did get some salmon though – we purchased it from the salmon farm shop!

Up behind the canal is a steep little hill, that we walked up with the dogs. At the top is a lone apple tree – heavily laden with red apples with no Codlin Moth damage. We picked some, and filled my pockets, and stewed them up to have with our breakfast. The view from up there is pretty special.

The next day we walked under the bridge at one end of the park and headed out towards where the canal starts from Lake Ruataniwha. There were several fisher people there as well – people out and about, taking advantage of the Easter break. We didn’t see any fish being caught there either!

We really enjoyed sitting outside the motorhome watching the birds. There were many little black ducks, called the NZ Scaup or Papango. They are New Zealand’s only native diving duck and seem to have a little fluorescent strip at the end of their beak. Really cute!

They swim around in groups of 8 – 10 , and then all but 2 will dive pretty much at the same time. The remaining two seem to stay as look outs.

There were also birds called the Australasian crested grebe. They seem to spend quite a bit of time floating around with their heads buried in their wings. When they are awake they have a little crest on each side of their heads. They also dive for fish, weed, snails etc.

It was a relaxing time at the canals, and after a wet night we decided to get on the road again, destination unsure but possibly Omarama.

Cave Stream

by awayfromhomenz

We left our park in Cass quite early the next morning which is unusual for us. We decided to head to the lookout of Arthur’s Pass because we were so close, and then come back out east again.

The terrain here is very steep and incredibly shingly. I am sure these peaks must lose some of their altitude each year when the snow melt washes some of it away.

We stopped at the lookout over the half tunnel which protects the main road from falling rocks. There are usually kea here which Bruce was already starting to moan about, (but I was secretly hoping they would be there), but not today.

We had to do the obligatory stop at the Otira Hotel. I would have to say it needs a bit of tender loving care. The scones with butter and jam were just as before, but some of the antiquities look neglected.

We started to wend our way back east but stopped in along the way for a look at Lake Lyndon. Although the wind was getting up a bit it was still lovely.

Further on from there, just before Castle Hill we came across a sign for Cave Stream and decided to call in for a look. Once again, it is run by DOC and there was a lovely carpark area and nice paths.

Cave Stream is also a limestone area and the views are wonderful.

The stream runs beneath steep limestone banks, and at the lookout there is no sign of a cave at all – just a little wooden gate with a steep, narrow muddy track leading down to the stream at the bottom. Of course we just had to have a look. It was a careful walk downwards. A steep drop on one side and a narrow and slippery track increased the nervous tension. Part way down the track we could see the cave, and it became apparent that Cave Stream has that name because the stream runs through the cave, and we would have to walk through the stream to get to the cave! We were not wearing tramping shoes so realised that probably wouldn’t be a good idea for us. I slipped at one stage so it wasn’t long after that we decided to head back.

It was a bit disappointing, but we have to be sensible occasionally. We took it slow and easy coming back up, with a few stops for me to catch my breath, but it still felt good.

This time we headed towards Ashburton – a frequent stop over for us and a safe place to wait out the coming storm.

Hamner Springs

by awayfromhomenz

We have been to Hamner three times before but we absolutely love it so we had to go back again. We stayed at the NZMCA park again and while the weather wasn’t beautiful and sunny, it was still nice enough to let us do the walks and things we wanted to do.

Hamner has wonderful facilities for visitors, and one of the places we love best are the sculpture walks in the forest. We have taken Oscar (our standard schnauzer, who has since passed away) there in the past and he was a lot of fun because he really got into the sculptures, whereas, despite Bruce’s best efforts, Hunter and Beau just were not interested. The walk is about 2 kilometers though and the dogs and us really enjoyed it.

The first thing that was noticeable were all the beautiful red toadstools. There were hundreds scattered about, probably due to the recent rain. Beautiful as they are, they are very toxic – red for danger. Luckily the dogs were not interested in them.

It was fun following the “dog” signs in the forest and coming across the various wooden art works.

We managed to get the dogs to pose next to some, but it took a bit of effort.

In all, we went through the forest twice, and another walk took us across the highway from the camp, and towards the river bank. The track was very uneven, with large mud puddles and if you tried to dodge those, you had to contend with blackberry vines, but it was still a nice walk.

We arrived just in time to see the Hamner jet boat speeding by, but I didn’t manage to catch a photo of it.

On our last day in Hamner Springs, we actually went to the springs for a soak. The whole complex is a wonderful set up. Many different pools, including a full sized swimming pool for swimming laps, and at least 4 different waterslides. Bruce and I enjoyed riding the circular track pool with fast flowing water (like tame water rapids). There were foam rings and flutter boards available for anyone to use in this pool and it was a bit of fun. There are smaller rock pools, very hot pools, water jet pools and medium temperature pools. I think we spent 2 1/2 hours there and all for a very reasonable price of $22 per person (compared to $70 per person for the Lost Springs in Whitianga).

We could easily have stayed longer, but there is more to see, so after doing the various housekeeping tasks (laundry, filling and emptying tanks etc), we headed out onto the highway again. This time there was a bit of anxiety about it as there was a severe wind warning for the area, – strong winds and high sided vehicles are not a good mix!

Mt Terako

by awayfromhomenz

It was a cloudy day, but not raining, when we left Kaikoura, headed inland towards Mt Terako. We stopped just outside of Kaikoura for a coffee and to give the dogs a good walk before the drive inland.

The area we were driving in to is called the Inland Kaikoura Range. The road was predictably, windy and seemed to go up hill forever, and I was glad it was Bruce’s driving day. Before we got to the steep stuff though, we were treated to beautiful hill country farm views. Some of the farm houses out here were quite substantial as I guess they had to be because they would be cut off by snow in the winter. Some of the houses were absolute showpieces.

We even came across the TUX dog trials which we stopped to watch for a minute.

As we got further inland the landscape was notable for its very steep drops down to gravelly rivers, and erosion was evident everywhere, especially on Mt Terako itself.

It seems that the “Roar” was in progress because we came across a large deer enclosure that seemed to be full of “bulls” who had recently had their antlers removed. It didn’t stop them roaring to each other though. The dogs weren’t at all sure what to make of the noise.

We finally got to the Mt Lyford Lodge, which is the second largest log house in the southern hemisphere. We thought we might stay there a night, but it didn’t suit them as they had been without electricity all day. We were joined in the carpark by a fellow group of travellers, some of whom had also come from Beach Hop. They had really fancy cars – corvettes and AC Cobras, but because of the electricity issue, they also decided to move on.

Just down the road, about 8 kilometres on, was the Terako Downs Park Over Property, and we pulled in there for the night. The place was quirky to say the least but the birdsong was out of this world. I thought I had been spoilt at home when I had a chorus of 2 bellbirds, but it could not compare to a whole hillside of them, plus some tuis adding some harmony. It made me remember the song that my sister and I used to sing when we were younger _ so ring your bell bellbirds you’re calling me back home, to my home up in the mountains, no more I will roam, for there will be contentment, and my heart will be at ease, at home up in the mountains, close on the mountain breeze. (Hope I have remembered it correctly)

The camp had a little foxy, that Beau was quite friendly with, but little did Beau know that while he wasn’t watching, the foxy stole his bone!. The camp also bordered on the Wandle River, and supposedly, there was a swimming hole, and as it was a hot day we had to go and investigate. No swimming hole could be found, but Bruce had a great time trying to build rock fjords (and getting his feet wet) trying to get to the other side. It was just as well he didn’t because a short time later, some of the young men staying at the camp went across to the paddock on the other side to test their rifle sights, as they planned to head out for a four day deer hunt tomorrow. The very loud shots had Hunter in his customary state of shivery, shaky, panting mess but fortunately it wasn’t prolonged and peace was restored not long after.

Heading South (with a few stops along the way)

by awayfromhomenz

We have been looking forward to heading back to the South Island, especially as our last trip there wasn’t all that we had hoped in could be thanks to us both getting Covid. The lead up to the trip was pretty busy with Judy’s 70th celebrations (see our previous blog), and the frenzy leading up to Beach Hop.

For those of you who don’t know, Beach Hop is an American Muscle Car festival, held in Whangamata every year. This year was different in that it was the 25th Anniversary, so lots of people and cars were coming to help in the celebrations. There were 2000 cars booked in, as well as classic caravans, and some fancy trucks as well.

Judy takes the bookings for those Caravans and Motorhomes visiting the event who want to park on the Whangamata Area School grounds – parking around 200 RV’s and 18 Beach Hop muscle cars.

So it was off to Whangamata for the first leg of our trip – to get the parking set out and to receive the incoming motorhomes. We went from an empty sports field to this….

By the time we left, more than half the vehicles had arrived and all was going well, and we were thankful to those, especially Rod, who agreed to take over so we could get away a bit earlier.

From Whangamata we headed straight down country. Our friends Dianne and Gary were flying to Europe on Monday, so we wanted to get to their place as soon as possible to spend a bit of time with them before they went. We grabbed a coffee and drove, not stopping until we reached Lake Whakamaru (thanks to NZTA blocking off State Highway 1). We pulled in to the freedom camping area on the side of the lake for dinner. We had not been there before but it was beautiful and clearly popular – there were lots of motor homes there, including an NZMCA rally.

It was nice to stretch our legs and refresh ourselves. The bottom of the lake looked muddy, and had that not been the case I might have had a swim. That wasn’t to be so after dinner we kept driving until we reached Turangi.

We had intended to leave by 8am the next morning, but in true Philpott style, we left an hour and a half late, but arrived to Dianne and Garry’s place, in Paraparaumu, just before 3pm. We had the grand tour of their new house, a coffee, and then jumped into their pool – very refreshing.

We had a great few days with them, but the boys didn’t enjoy it so much. Their dog Teddy was so pleased to have company he wanted to play and play, and when it didn’t happen he would either nip or nudge their butts to encourage them to play. Beau wasn’t keen on this at all. Garry had an electronic gadget that was supposed to be heard only by Teddy to get him to behave and mostly it did, but it also made Bruce behave (because he could hear it in his hearing aids) and it made the other dogs anxious because they could also hear it and had no idea what was going on! At one stage I had a shaking Foxy on my knee (belonging to a visitor), Bruce had a shaking schnauzer on his knee, the house sitter had another, and Bruce was calling out “what have I done wrong!” Teddy, all this time, was having a great time!

Anyway, it was a great, but too brief, catch up. Sunday we went on our way and stopped in for lunch with Brendon and Helen and had the grand tour of inspection of their new Dethleffs Alpa – a very impressive machine. I couldn’t believe the amount of storage that was in that motorhome.

From there we headed to Plimmerton NZMCA Park to wait until our ferry crossing. This is a big park, very well set up, with a big dog park next door. The first time we went there, one of the enclosures had 6 schnauzers running around. Hunter and Beau had a great time and wore themselves out. I had to admit though, that two of the schnauzers had very funny haircuts – designed to look like lions I think, and they were terrible barkers , which made me feel quite good about ours.

We leave here at 6am tomorrow to catch the ferry – South Island here we come!