Now the school holidays have drawn to a close, it is time to take the chance to do some travelling again. Our destination is Aoraki, Mount Cook, New Zealand's highest mountain at just over 12,000 feet. Situated around the middle of the South Island in the Southern Alps, Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park is a UNESCO World Heritage site and contains more than 140 peaks standing over 2,000 metres (6,600 ft) and 72 named glaciers, which cover 40 percent of its 700 square kilometres (170,000 acres). Also a manageable 3 hour drive from Wanaka, we felt it would be a great place to visit in the winter and then return in the summer months.
And of course, as we set off from home, there's low cloud and a forecast of rain later. Hmmm. We make our way towards the Lindis Pass (think on a par with the Cat & Fiddle, or Drumochter - it's closed in bad weather) which had only re-opened after heavy snowfall a couple of days earlier. As you drop out of the stern hills and cliffs towering above the road, you enter MacKenzie Country. Named after James of that ilk, a Gaelic-speaking Scottish immigrant of uncertain background, MacKenzie is believed to have spent only a couple of years in New Zealand but his legend lives on. He was arrested in 1855 for stealing over 1,000 sheep, most of them from the Rhodes brothers’ Levels Run station near Timaru, and grazing them in the basin of rich high-country pastureland, with the assistance of a single dog, Friday. MacKenzie escaped from prison three times during the first year of his five-year sentence, and when holding him became too much trouble, he was given a free pardon, after which he quietly disappeared.
We stop for coffee in Poppies Cafe, Twizel (they pronounce it Twy-zel) with both the caff and the town offering pure joy, for those who sometimes feel a downer on their place of dwelling.
Twizel was a town constructed in 1969 specifically to house the workers involved in a massive hydro-electric power project linking 5 lakes and a range of mountains. At the end of construction, in 1980, the town was due to be torn down, but the resident Twizalites loved their new borough so much that the local provincial council decided to sell lottery tickets at $100 each with a draw to allow winners to have the right to own a property. As you can see, it's a beauty of a location:
But on a more serious note, I am told by Wanaka local, Andrew, that the town has a fabulous reputation as a summer destination - great walking, cycling, fly-fishing and is situated within the Aoraki Mackenzie International Dark Sky reserve – the largest reserve of its kind in the whole world. When viewed from the reserve the night sky is almost totally free of light pollution, making this area one of the best stargazing sites on earth. It has a pretty fail-safe climate of long sunny days and temperatures in those months of between 23-30C.
And if you are Lord of the Rings fan, the area immediately surrounding the town was used as the location of Gondor and the Pelennor Fields (!) Apparently, if you are really really keen, you can take a location tour with local outfit OneRing Tours. Glad that was made clear to me. I was worried I might walk with a limp for weeks.
We drive on and miraculously emerge from under the fog bank just as we enter the National Park. It's a one-road in-out to the base of Aoraki, but what a drive in both directions! When we posted on our last trip of the sheer scale and beauty of Milford Sound, where mere amateur photography simply cannot do justice to the stunning scenery; this was just the same.
The road draws to its end close to the Sir Edmund Hillary Alpine Centre. An homage to the conquerer of Everest, the centre showcases the Aoraki Mount Cook region, its people and its place in the universe.
Such was the magnificence of the road, the skies and the mountains, I will do no more than post the pictures we took. There's a few, but well worth perusing:
Canterbury has received record amounts of snow this winter which lends to the magical scenery all around. We travel over from Lake Pukaki on the Mount Cook side to Lake Tekapo where we stay overnight in an instantly forgettable hotel resort. Good beer at the local bar, The Tin Kitchen, though.
A drive up to the local club ski field at Round Hill is another beaut. Up the hill another interesting NZ ski experience. One tow rope up the slopes - folk "skinning" (walking uphill in skis), to the summit thereafter arcing down the untouched powder; kids on the lower slopes and (mainly) mums with portable picnic tables covered in food and wine. A real communal meet.
The plan to stay on another night is scunnered by dire warnings of an imminent storm arriving from the North. And oh yes, it arrives with the full venting of gales, torrential rain, flooding, landslips and power cuts. Thankfully, at home our roof stays in place and intact but stretches and moans all night long on the Friday. Trees are down everywhere, there has been an invasion of garden trampolines all over the roads in town, but we get away relatively unscathed. South Otago suffers badly in 'The Great Deluge of 2017', as termed by the Otago Times.
And then the weather becomes benign again. Otis gets cosy in the front pack and off we go for fresh air.
This brings a great thirst upon everyone, so off we go to the local brewery where the boy makes a first Saturday night pub visit.
...followed by a take-away burger from Red Star.
Otis quite impressed by this and rounds off the evening by getting Diane to fall for the old "pull my finger" gag, much to everyone's amusement. (sorry it's a bit blurry, we all had the giggles)
