NEW ZEALAND CAMPING 2013: DAY #10

Sunday April 28, 2013

Another good night, dropping off with the city lights winking below us. The dawn was not quite as spectacular as yesterday’s – the cloud formations making the difference – and possibly the fact I woke a little later this morning than I had yesterday. Still pretty good though.

Peg was up and about when we ascended the stairs for breakfast. Today there was a fresh fruit salad and Peg offering scrambled eggs, which we accepted with pleasure. She cooked it in the microwave, which was a first for us.

That butterfly's chrysalis is so pretty

Among the items on the breakfast table were some lovely flowers, freshly picked, and another bunch of pods releasing the fluffy white dandelion like seeds. There was another chrysalis attached to the stem of one of these giving a photo opportunity I tried to capture, with limited success.

Peg was interested in the shirt I was wearing, from Donny’s Bar on St Helena Island. Like most people Peg had no idea where the island was but was very interested in what we told her about it and the mail ship run that got us there six or seven times. She got down her old atlas – you could tell it was old by the names of the countries and it was fascinating to see that every page she opened had notes in her spidery handwriting, in the margins and on the maps themselves. She said they reminded her of the places she had visited or the places her guests told her about. So we are now immortalised in her note about St Helena.

I thought this might be the butterfly but it wasn't.

Breakfast and chatting over, I hauled the cases back up the narrow staircase – easier this time going up than coming down – one step at a time. Loaded up, we moved off with Peg’s farewell instructions in how to get to the N1 ringing in our ears. Down the hill we wound our way and managed to find our route to Taupo, our intended stop for the night. We were glad we had stopped off in Wellington. It is a very pleasant city, if a little windy.

As we drove, we tuned in to the weather report. The forecast for Fjordland and Southland, the two areas where we spent most of our time, was for gale force winds, heavy rain and hail. The news report also carried items about the hailstorm that had hit Christchurch yesterday, delaying flights and causing millions of dollars of damage. We were lucky indeed, as were Matt and family. They had great weather down in Akaroa on Friday and had a good flight home to Melbourne yesterday. Matt had the same feeling of sitting in a sports car when he first got into the family car – so low on the ground!

It was about 370 km to Taupo, our next destination – about four and a half hours driving. The roads were good, but with more traffic than South Island. Initially the countryside was steeply wooded and dark green but it gradually softened a bit to rolling green grassed hills, dotted with woods. This in turn changed again to a dry dusty look as we hit the area, which is also probably in a rain shadow where the tussock grass grows and which, so we were told, never goes fully green. Although this area is known as the Rangipo Desert it doesn’t quite come up to my expectations of a desert, but I guess it might well be, technically speaking.

One of the small towns we passed through was Bulls. Certainly one of the stranger place names we’ve come across and giving rise to a number of corny advertising billboards on the approaches to the town such as “The Only Place You Can Get Milk From Bulls.” Beyond Bulls we saw a striking snow covered peak rising ahead of us. I think it must have been Mount Ruhapeu. 

 

Mount Ruhapeu

Mt Ngauruhoe

Behind that was the unmistakable volcanic cone of Ngauruhoe which last erupted in 1977 but caused a bit of angst in 2006 when it was rumbling and giving signs of demonstrating that it is still technically an active volcano. As we headed north, the countryside changed quite dramatically and we found ourselves winding through some beautiful, heavily wooded country with some pretty dramatic bluffs and cliffs bordering the river below.

We thought we might stop off for lunch at Rangipo because we thought there was a lake nearby and our plan was to pick up a sandwich and have our meal on the lakeside. Well, no – no lake, no sandwich shop, so we settled, foolishly for a Hungry Jack burger. I don’t like fast food burgers at the best of times and this wasn’t the best.

We were not far from the Lake Taupo turnoff as it turned out, so it would have been better to keep our appetites for the wider variety of food available there. Pausing only to try and get a good shot of Mount Ruhapeu which looked dramatic in the distance we went on to explore what had been a one horse village when we were here on our first visit. 

 

Both mountains in the distance with Lake Taupo in the forground

As was the case with Queenstown, there had been almost unbelievable growth and there were now many hotels lining both sides of the road as it wound its way around the lakeside to the entertainment centre where a plethora of restaurants and bars offered a  wide variety of options. We had thought we might try to get a cabin at the Top 10 campsite, but it was quite a way out of town and there was a long queue of cars waiting to get in, so we went back to look at the lakeside hotels. I fancied one in particular which was on a small promontory with great views of the lake, but the asking price made it a very pricey outlook.

There was a very nice place across the road and about half the price and we were very comfortable there. I was a bit wary when I saw a coach load of young people arriving on a tour, but they were either remarkably quiet, or we slept remarkably soundly. Perhaps it was the magnificent meal we enjoyed back in the village at a place called Dixie Brown’s. I have always said that the best ribs I ever had were those we ate at Branson Missouri, with the second best at Constantia, outside of Cape Town, but these were even better. Just melted off the bone. Rab had one of her favourites – belly pork and pronounced it excellent and possibly one of the best examples she had eaten too. Washed down with a couple of local beers – what more could we ask for?