We're Back in the South Island- Blenheim; Part 1

Real-time

Our first night in the South Island was spent parked beside a vineyard, on the side of a river and all by ourselves. It was good to back.

Damfam Vineyard

But first we had to cross Cook Strait. It rained for much of the night and with a 9am sailing and 13kms to travel from Petone in the morning rush hour, we were pleased when we were ready to leave ahead of schedule. There was a moment of panic though when we found the exit gate at the Workingmen's Club locked. Luckily we were able to squeeze the rig around the sharp corner of the building and exit through the entry gate which was open. In typical Evans style we were first in the queue at the closed gate just before 7am. And first in line to board (although they took the row beside us first).

With a winter storm behind us and another one forecast ahead of us, I had picked a small window of calm weather to cross and thankfully my careful scanning of wind warnings and wave height predictions proved correct and we had a very smooth crossing even though it rained all the way. The mist hung low over the hills as we cruised down Queen Charlotte Sound and when I did venture outside just to check I wasn't missing anything, a pod of dolphins surfaced nearby and rode the wake for a short time! Great timing.

We took the Interislander Lounge Plus option ($45pp) for the second time, which we're finding is a great way to travel. All food & drink is free (we had breakfast, morning tea & lunch), there's a comfy lounge, free wifi and no children. The cost is not much more than we'd spend anyway because we usually purchase breakfast and a coffee.

From Picton we drove the short distance to Damfam Vineyard (CAP #7011) on the banks of  Wairau River near Blenheim. 

We were the only ones staying and it was a lovely peaceful start to our South Island travels. The cooler morning temperatures also reminded us of the cold winter ahead.

 I was also pleased to be back 'Out There' in the open shooting magnificent sunsets again.

We were thrilled to see a bird feeding platform beside the vineyard & not too far from the van. Our hosts feed the local hawks regularly over winter and occasionally during summer to encourage them to stay and scare off the small birds that feed on the grapes during the season. 

Australasian Hawks/Kahu are notoriously shy and are often very hard to get close up photos of. I was able to sneak up on them a couple of times as they were otherwise occupied. They also didn't like eating off the high platform, in the wild it's safer for them to eat on the ground and they can also hide from other birds after their food. Occasionally they'd manage to pull pieces off the carcass and carry it off to the long grass or between the rows of vines to eat.

I followed the Wairau River down to the end of the road where it flows into a huge lagoon and crosses the Wairau Bar into Cloudy Bay. Alongside the track the rusting hull of the TSS Kennedy (1864-1929) provides a good lookout for the local flock of Pied Shags/Kawau. The Kennedy was scuttled to form part of the breakwater for what was once a wharf; rotting piles are now all that's left.

I walked to the end of the breakwater and onto the rocks and was amazed at the amount of water flowing out to sea. I'm not a fan of rushing water and here was no exception. It was very scary watching how fast it was travelling, swirling around in angry pools and catching on the rocks just below me before rushing out over the bar.

Next I went to check out the mouth of the Wairau Diversion which was completed in 1963 to help with Wairau River's flood control. The Diversion carries the water directly across country to the sea whereas the river meanders for several kilometres before it reaches the Bar. There's a large freedom camping site at the Diversion and during the whitebait season the area is full of seasoned campers.

As I was leaving the reserve I spotted alot of activity out in the middle of the river. A large flock of shags; I counted at least 30, were swimming downstream, ducking and diving, chasing & fighting their way very fast towards the outlet. 

They were chasing a school of fish (they look like yellow-eyed mullet) and nearly everytime a shag surfaced it had a large fish in it's bill. And if it didn't it chased its neighbour across the water for his. These are not good photos, I was quite a distance from the birds and they were moving very fast in the flow but look at the photo bottom left, 3 birds with a fish each and one shag behind chasing fast.

Back on the main road at Tuamarina is a memorial and information board in a road side reserve. In 1843 a nortorious & tragic incident occured here. Known as The Wairau Affray or The Wairau Incident it was the first significant armed conflict between Maori & British settlers after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840. Twenty two Europeans (18 killed as utu after surrendering) and four Maori were killed in the conflict. Click on the photo to enlarge if you wish to read about the incident.

Afterwards I crossed the road and drove up to the cemetery on the hill above the memorial to find another memorial to some of those killed (I'm not sure if they are buried here). Be warned if you do visit, it's a tiny narrow road with a couple of  sharp corners & not suitable for anything other than a car. The multi layered cemetery itself must be one of the most well tended and tidy cemeteries I've visited, it also has a stunning outlook over the farmland and vineyards below and out to the coast.

I found another interesting memorial opposite the primary school at the bottom of the hill as I left the cemetery. Beside the memorial were a couple of bench seats where people could sit quietly or perhaps read a book, very fitting considering Eileen Duggan was a poet & writer. It's always interesting finding out where New Zealand's famous sons & daughters have come from. Not that I'd heard of Eileen before seeing the memorial, but then it's fun to learn of their history.

The Tides Run Up The Wairau – Eileen Duggan 

The tides run up the Wairau 

That fights against their flow. 

My heart and it together 

Are running salt and snow. 

For though I cannot love you, 

Yet, heavy, deep, and far, 

Your tide of love comes swinging, 

Too swift for me to bar. 

Some thought of you must linger, 

A salt of pain in me 

For oh what running river 

Can stand against the sea? 

After a pleasant few days at Damfam Vineyard we headed off towards Kaikoura, keen to drive SH1 for the first time since it had reopened after repairs following the devastating November 2016 Kaikoura earthquake. 

We did have to pull over for a photo stop just south of Blenheim though. The last few times we have passed by this historic Cob Cottage it has been surrounded by scaffolding as it was painted (it survived the earthquake undamaged). The cottage was built between 1854 & 1868 for the local Riverlands runholder and has been used as a farm cottage, shearers’ quarters, school, a store room and hay shed during its lifetime.

To be continued...

Kaikoura to Winter Warmth

Real-time

With fine weather forecast for the next couple of days we left Kaikoura heading for one of our favourite spots, the DOC Campground at Marfells Beach. Over summer it's usually a toss up between Marfells and Ward Beach which isn't too far away. But over winter when the sun drops behind the hill early at Ward Beach the choice is a lot easier....unless it's blowing a gale. But then neither sites would be very nice.

Being the weekend, there were a few other like minder people already set up on the front row sites.

This didn't worry us as our favoured site is right at the end of the camping ground, which is a long thin area between the road and the beach. 

Except that our spot was fenced off so we went and made a mess in the next section. Actually we didn't but somebody had made a bit of a mess in the mud behind us.

Our site doesn't have any shelter shrubs so if the wind does get up we can get a bit of a battering. We were staying hitched up this time, so it would have been no issue to move if the wind did arrive.

It was great to be beside the ocean again, and lovely to have such warm weather; it almost felt like summer. Sunrise the next morning was beautiful as it rose up behind Cape Palliser across the Strait providing us with a silhouetted view of the North Island, our first sight in a quite a few months.

While I was taking my sunrise photos, a large dog came bounding up the beach barking it's head off at me, like this was her patch and what the hell was I doing in it. Her owner had slept in his car in the boat trailer carpark and we'd seen the dog wandering about the evening before. 

Being a DOC camp, dogs are banned, but once again there are people out there that choose to ignore the rules. I thumped my hand on the picnic table and told her to 'get home' in my gruffest voice. She did turn around but when I next looked she was making her way up a nearby track towards me. I made a hasty retreat inside.

Sunday morning in the fast lane.

There's also a couple of camping areas behind the front row and up on a rise overlooking the beach. It's here that I found Judy & Len who had already stopped by to say hello. They've been following my blog for awhile and got a surprise to see us arrive. It was lovely to meet you both and I hope you enjoyed Ward Beach.

I usually walk east along the beach to Mussel Point from where you can see Cape Campbell and lighthouse in the distance, but the first morning I walked west. There's a large jetty sticking out into Clifford Bay off in the distance and I've been meaning to walk to it everytime we've stopped at Marfells. It was such a lovely day I decided today was the day. 

You can certainly see where the prevailing wind comes from here on the bluff above the road, just before the camp. Part of these clay cliffs came down onto the road, closing it for a number of days, during the August, 2013 Seddon earthquake. There was a 4.3 magnitude earthquake near Seddon while we were at Marfells this time- we were walking on the beach and never felt it luckily.

I knew it was going to be quite a walk even though the jetty looked to be closer than it was. It turned out to be just over 3kms one way. Usually that wouldn't be a problem, but unfortunately I'd left my run too late and the tide was about 2/3rds of the way in. The nice firm sand I started walking on soon turned to 'very hard to walk on' soft, sinking sand as the tide pushed me up the beach. It was hard going.

Beach shelter

Half way along I made my way up into the dunes and found a 4WD track which was a tiny bit easier to walk along. And then that ran onto a firm farm track which followed the fence-line along the back of the dunes. Lake Grassmere and Dominion Salt's, salt ponds are on the other side of the fence. The ponds aren't the gorgeous pink colour that they are in late spring and early summer when the algae blooms. The link above is to a blog I did on the ponds and Marfells when we first visited the area over two years ago.

I knew I was getting close to the jetty when I popped up near this cool Land Rover. I'd seen it atop the dunes from way back. A guy was teaching his partner to surf cast.

It was then just a short walk to the jetty where another fisherman was trying his luck off the end of the structure. This is the old Dominion Salt Works jetty and it looks rather out of place, high and dry and stuck on a beach in the middle of a very large bay.

Clifford Bay was where the Government was looking at sending the Cook Strait ferries, shifting the terminal from Picton to the bay. Perhaps 'the powers that be' were thinking of using the jetty as part of the ferry terminal! 

Photos taken (another jetty to add to my bridge/jetty collection), it's time to retrace my steps. This time, all the way along the fence-line back to the road. The Land Rover was still in the dunes.

The only other people I saw on the walk were these two on their horses out for a lovely Sunday afternoon trek.

I found their vehicle back on the road. I'm not sure whether they stayed overnight but what a great way to see the countryside. A float to transport your steeds and a campervan to meet your needs. 

The sunset was stunning, a warm golden glow bathing the bay and silhouetting the Norfolk Pines in camp. It also highlighted how much salt spray was in the air.

The next morning I walked to Mussel Point (you can see the point in the breakfast photo) just a short 1.5km away but making sure I had plenty of firm sand this time!

Looking back towards camp

Along the way I spied this White-faced Heron/Matuku checking out clumps of seaweed...

...and a hundred or so Red-billed Gulls/Tarapunga squawking and squabbling as they sorted through a large patch of exposed seaweed. 

By the time I reached Mussel Point, the tide was on its way back in. There are good sized mussels on the rocks near the back, David has managed to get a good few when we've visited during the summer.

Further on from the point, the bay sweeps around to Cape Campbell and the prominent lighthouse on it's point.

That walk is also on my 'to-do list' but it'll have to wait until summer, it's another 5kms to the Cape and you have to time it right with the tides. The beach is blocked by the tide beneath the bluffs that I've just passed on my way to Mussel Point.

The weather clouded over mid afternoon so we decided to head to Blenheim, just a short distance away. We parked up at our regular stop-over, the Blenheim Racecourse where we have a 'secret' spot to park. It's sheltered and private....except on darts night which happened to be last night (through that door beneath the grandstand!). It's also not so good during winter as it takes awhile for the sun to make an appearance around the front of the grandstand. 

It was lovely to meet two Blenheim couples (separately) who went out of their way to come and say hello to us while we were parked at the racecourse. They follow my blog and belong to a couple of motorhome Facebook pages I contribute to. 

Hi Diane & Roger and Brenda & Robert, many thanks for stopping by and hopefully we'll meet up on the road somewhere in the future- and next time, hopefully, we'll be prepared for visitors!  We had a bit of a late start and I was still in the shower when the first couple came knocking and David was in the shower for the next couple! Such is life on the road. Where there's not much room to hide! 

The sunset that night was spectacular...

I love the way the swirl of the clouds mirrors the sweep of the branches; it's like the tree is painting the colours across the sky.

And today we've shifted again, we're now parked at a NZMCA CAP in Koromiko, which is just a short 8kms from Picton and a 3 hour ferry ride to some winter warmth! Now that was a surprise wasn't it? 

We're heading back to the North Island for a couple of months, to catch up with family and friends. We're a couple of months ahead of our original schedule but decided we'd visit over winter and come back south in early spring when nature will be all bright and breezy and hopefully the weather will be a little more settled. 

See you on the other side.

Do Not Feed the Ducks

Can you guess where we are then?

A virtual chocolate fish for you, if you guessed Lake Rotoiti. We’re back in the Nelson Lakes again where I had all that trouble and distress with the duckling families last time. Now the ones that survived are all grown up and still up to their begging antics. They do the rounds around the camp sites every morning and evening. So far I have resisted.

We had a great time at Ward Beach (and I’ll hopefully post some more photos from there when I get them processed) although on the last day after a brilliantly fine, still and hot afternoon, a wild southerly blew in and gave us all (7 vans) a rough 30 minutes as tables and chairs, awnings and anything not tied down turned itself inside out. This was right on low tide and just after most of the men from the other vans had gone down to the water to retrieve cray pots and go paua (abalone) diving.

Once we were sorted with our awning, I left David to stow everything while I went to help the other women who were wrestling with their awnings and to shut doors & windows of unoccupied vans and to retrieve gear that had blown off into the scrub. Owners of one of the vans bought me a fillet of rig (shark) for my troubles. Amazing how it tasted just like the fish from brought ‘fish ‘n chips’.

Going by the size of the empty paua shells by their van I had my fingers crossed for some tasty paua!
After Ward Beach we headed to Waikawa Bay in Picton to meet up with friends John & Jan who had been away for a few days. We stopped at Parklands Marina Holiday Park in Waikawa Bay for the second time in our travels and were just as impressed as the first time. It’s a really lovely park with huge mature trees and lots of space. You just have to ignore the slightly eccentric owner (he is extremely nice and always has a smile on his face), he has a problem with a couple of Paradise ducks that think his camp is their territory. He thinks that if he chases them every time he spots them they’ll get the message and set up home base somewhere else. The first time I saw him, I thought he was chasing people who had used the showers without staying.

So if you see a white ute racing through the camp ground it’ll be him chasing the ducks. And if he happens to be in his Volvo, he’ll chase them with that too. I don’t think they’re getting the message though as they fly in every morning as regular as clock work. It doesn’t help that some of the camp occupants feed them (no, not me!)

We had such a lovely time with John & Jan; drinks and a catch up with another couple we know on Friday,  out for lunch in Picton on Saturday, watching cricket (NZ v Aussie) and generally relaxing, which is why I didn’t take any photos all weekend!

We left Waikawa on Monday and stayed at the Blenheim Racecourse (again) that night, stocking up on groceries and topping up with water, diesel and solar power (lovely and sunny) before heading towards the West Coast the next morning. This time we pulled into the grassed area beside the grandstand where we’d seen a caravan parked the last time instead of on the hard. There were at least 20 vans in and around the racecourse that night, it’s a very busy place at this time of the year.

The next morning we headed out back along the very long and straight road down the Wairau Valley towards the Nelson Lakes. We decided we'd stop at the DOC camp at Kerr Bay on Lake Rotoiti again, David wanted to get the boat out and do some fishing.

Having driven the road before (twice) I had a couple of places in mind to stop at and take some photos, one being the historic 131 year old Wairau Valley Tavern, a favourite watering hole & restaurant for locals & travelers alike.

I’d seen a sign to Lake Argyle and a large water canal nearby on our way past last time but didn’t stop, this time we pulled in to check it out. It’s actually a dam that feeds the Argyle Power Scheme which opened in 1983. The Branch River, which is a tributary of the Wairau River, feeds the lake. The colour is really unusual for this area, it’s the teal green colour of glacier fed rivers, more like the water around the Mt Cook area. Unfortunately the picnic area and boat ramp at the far end of the lake were closed because of the extreme fire risk in the area (on the way we saw the blackened hillsides where a big fire swept through a few weeks ago). We climbed to the top of the dam wall to check the lake out from top end.

And, since when have we had opossums in New Zealand? Opossums belong in the USA, our possums are Aussie imports!

And this time I took note of how far the vineyards stretched up the Wairau Valley. It's 100kms to St Arnaud & Lake Rotoiti from Blenheim, down a near straight road for about 70kms. The last vineyard finished 52kms from Blenheim! That's a bloody long ride on a bike if you're doing a vineyard tour don't you think?

The DOC camp at Kerr Bay has been under a lot of pressure, it’s that time of the year. Along with the tourist traffic every evening, there is a Classic Boat Regatta this weekend and most of the sites are booked through until Sunday. We decided we’d stay until Monday (the weather forecast for the West Coast didn’t look too hot for the next few days), I managed to sweet talk the DOC lady into booking the one available ‘tent’ site through until then- the available powered site was too small for us. Last night most of the sites were taken up with sleeper-vans and tents, tonight it’s campervans & motorhomes. A few classic boats and their owners have already set up camp nearby.

Lake Rotoiti is looking just as lovely as our last visit but I doubt there’ll be any snow this time. There's a number of school camps in the area and plenty of kids enjoying the lake, swimming and boating.

It’s not only the classic boats that visit the lake, last weekend it was the Powerboat Regatta (now that would have shattered the peace and quiet), I think they left something behind….

I was keen to see if the lone (& lonely) Mandarin Duck was still in residence. Sure enough five months later he is still here although looking a lot less conspicuous than he did last October. He’s lost his mojo big time. Amazing to think that this is the same bird. I wonder if his colours will reappear in spring or if he needs a female to get the dye (juices) running?

One final note- I have to thank my wonderful husband big time tonight. My computer has been playing up these past 3 days and I haven’t been able to connect to the internet- hence no blog posts. At first I thought it was because there was limited internet access in the areas we’ve been but I knew we had access here at the Lakes last time so then it became apparent that I had a bug of some sort. David has the patience of a saint and has slowly worked through every avenue trying to repair the problem and finally cracked it tonight! I am very thankful that I have a knowledgeable IT technician at hand whenever I have a problem, I can’t imagine what would happen if we both didn’t have a clue. It may take time (which I’m no good at) but he gets there in the end.

I know another lady who is very thankful too- we have a jar of home-made jam in our fridge to prove it. David sorted out Gill’s iPad at Ward Beach and she was ever so grateful (hi Gill). And it’s not only computers he looks after; last night a German couple locked their car keys inside their car. We now have a block of chocolate in the fridge too. Add to that my fillet of rig and it’s just like the suburbs where neighbours look out for each other, we have mobile neighbours who appreciate each other too.