Feb 27, 2020

 

Didn’t head off until just before 8.30am this morning in fine weather and throughout the day we had drizzle, rain and mist in no particular order until we were almost into Cromwell when we ended up with strong winds, dust storms, tumbleweed and a sudden spike in temperature to the point we were nearly all ready to fall down by the time we got our many layers off at the servo. Talk about one extreme to the other, now we just need to get everything which isn’t dry, dry before the morning. Should be doable. It’s been a day of extreme sights from rain forest with dense canopies over the roads, massive rock slides where literally sides of mountains have slid off (many of these over the last couple of days), wind torn beaches, kilometres and kilometres of turquoise lakes and now pretty intensive farming land. Incredible.

 

 

Yet another one way bridge.

 

Barry Bay and a sign on the road which says to beware of debris when there are high seas and you can see how it cuts up the road … some of the debris on the shore was a tree trunk complete with a lot of the root ball minus dirt!

 

Salmon farm for a yummy breakfast.

 

Longest single lane bridge in New Zealand (and we’re told the southern hemisphere) 737 m long with 2 passing bays and here it is with us coming.

 

And going, and the second passing bay is still beyond us.

 

Knights Creek lookout.

 

It’s official we were up Ship Creek …. thus named after a large chunk of a ship’s hull discovered there in 1867 which turned out to have been washed there from a shipwreck in 1855 in Victoria, Australia (the Schonberg) so how’s that for an awesome current across the Tasman!

 

Thunder Creek Falls.

 

Lots of water up and down, From the car park at the Blue Pools, given the weather we didn't go any further..

 

Lake Wanaka.

 

Lake Hawea.

 

A lot of wind meant a lot of whitecaps on a lot of the lakes and milky sediment along the shores.

 

More beautiful lake views. The waves were nearly washing completely over the small island to the left.

 

A solid outcrop of rock in an otherwise flat valley not long before we got in. Curious.

 

Our accommodation for the night, the Colonial Manor Motel, Cromwell. Nice spacious rooms well laid out and comfortable. A good find.