Tuesday 15th February

We looked out of our window; such a contrast to the previous evening!

We breakfasted in The Wood Shack which was one of the first buildings in Hanmer Springs.  It still looked the same as in the early photos of Hanmer Springs which were displayed inside.  There was a rally of veteran cars setting off from the centre of the town so we managed to take quite a few photos.

We drove South from Hanmer Springs and then joined the main road from Christchurch.  Driving westwards we drove through Hanmer Forest Park which was a broad river valley and the road allowed us glimpses of the river.  There is very little traffic around and we had good panoramic views as despite the name there is not much forest.

Linda had problems videoing/photographing birds of prey as we drove along, so has finally been given instructions on how to use the video camera.  Lots of practising going on but Linda is not very successful yet.

Just past the small settlement of Boyle, at the beginning of the Lewis Pass National Reserve we pulled off the road to find the track beside the Lewis River where warm water bubbles up and mixes with the cold river water to create refreshing thermal pools.  Unfortunately, the sand flies seem to like this area and decided that we made a nice breakfast for them so we beat a hasty retreat and didn’t get to paddle.

We had been hardly aware how high we had climbed until we crossed over the Lewis Pass itself and the road dropped down a steep winding incline for 8km to the valley bottom at Maruia Springs.  A few km further, we reached Springs Junction where the road split.  We drove west through a forested area to Reefton where we stopped for morning coffee.

Reefton is located beside the Inungahua River where the roads for Westport, Greymouth and Christchurch intersect.  It was called Reefton as it owes its existence to rich gold-bearing quartz reefs  Reefton was considered by some to be “the most brisk and business like place in the colony”.  The frenzy of financial speculation put Reefton in the vanguard and it was the first place in New Zealand and one of the first places in the world to install electric road lights powered by hydroelectricity.   The buildings on the main street reminded us of the Wild West.

After driving north for some distance, we drove down the Buller Gorge where there were tantalising glimpses of the Buller River.  We stopped for our customary lunch at Hawks Crag where there was a lovely view of the river and we were parked on a bend.   There were lots of photo opportunities at this point as we could see the overhang in the rock where the river had eroded the rock during the floods in 1926 (several metres above the road level indicating the volume of water that must have flowed through the gorge).  At this point the road is only wide enough for one vehicle at a time so drivers have to be courteous and give way.  The cicadas are back, Yeah.

We drove into Westport which is a holiday town.  We stopped at the harbour to take some photos before driving back through the town and buying some petrol.  A sign tells us that there are no petrol stations for 100km, so that will be 50 km after Punakaiki

Following the coast road we stopped at the seal sanctuary at Cape Foulwind (thankfully the wind was in the right direction and we didn’t smell anything untoward).  The scenery was superb and we both indulged in a great deal of videoing and photography.  There were not as many seals as we had seen on the East Coast but the rollers and the rocks made up for it.

We spotted a brown bird about the size of a pheasant and tried to get a photograph but it went into the bushes.  On the way back to the car we met it again and it stayed on the path for us to photograph it.  At one look out point we heard a very loud noise and realised that there were two of these birds.  Back at the ice cream kiosk we bought Goldrush ice-creams, which are caramel ice-cream with chocolate covered honeycomb pieces.  We asked the lady serving the ice-cream what the birds were and she told us that they were Western Wekas, a type of flightless rail.   While we were eating the ice-creams we gained an audience of three Wekas as they were waiting for the crumbs!  (We didn’t give them any as the information board asked people not to feed them human food!)

Then it was back to following the coast road down to Punakaiki. 

Our stay tonight is at The Rocks which turns out to be a Bed and Breakfast stop with a charming Swiss couple.  They are very into art, birds, the environment and ecology.  The house has huge windows and a verandah on two sides.  We saw and photographed some cicadas on the veranda.

There are beautiful wooden floors in the main rooms and we were asked to remove our shoes when indoors.  We have been asked to keep the verandah doors closed at night to stop the opossums getting in, although we notice the mosquitoes are a more immediate threat.

After showering and changing we went into Punaikaiki for our evening meal.  Apparently there are only two places to eat, one was very up market and we needed to have booked, the other was The Punaikaiki Tavern.  We went to the Tavern and it was very full so we had quite a wait for our evening meal, which was adequate but not sensational.  Then it was back to The Rocks for coffee with our hosts and Ian had some Chocolate Mousse.