The Great Escape- Coromandel

Catch-up

Port Jackson did at least put on 4 or 5 days of calm, sunny weather towards the end of our three week stay. But the weather turned to custard once again on the Friday before the long Queens Birthday weekend.

Port Jackson

It rained on and off for most of the day on the Friday and then throughout the night when the wind also joined the party. We pulled the slide out in early on Saturday morning as the wind increased. It was blowing straight down the beach and catching the slide out awning which is sprung loaded; it tends to tug at it and release it with a thump and a bang.

We do quite often pull the slide out in when it's really rough weather, we don't like the stress and strain the wind puts on the slide; it is a relatively large (and long) slide-out compared with some and we have room inside to carry on 'living' so it's not an issue. We also sleep better at night knowing we are fairly stable no matter what the weather throws at us. We've had a few wild rides during our time on the road, none more so than one particular night at Elaine Bay in the Marlborough Sounds.

By late afternoon we were debating whether to shift off the beach site and move to the back of the camp to get some shelter from the small trees but in the end decided to stay put. By 10pm the wind was a howling gale and the noise on the roof from the rain was horrendous. But when we looked outside and caught the horizontal 'rain' in the torch beam it turned out it wasn't rain at all, we were being sand-blasted by the sand off the dunes. We quickly decided to shift before it got worse as real rain had now joined the melee. It was pitch-black outside but we managed to get ship-shape and hitched up within 15 minutes and quickly moved over to trees where we rocked and rolled the night away (luckily David had already packed the Takacat away before the weather changed).

The rain bucketed down during the night and it didn't let up until late Sunday morning. I decided to take a drive down to see how the Pahi Stream had coped with the deluge. The usually gentle flowing stream crosses a shallow ford and flows out into Port Jackson Bay near the start of the camp.

Never mind the stream, what about the ford! It was a raging torrent; and it had already dropped quite a lot leaving a tide line of debris along the grass and across the road. 

The two 'rooster tails' you can see on the far side in the photo above (click to enlarge) and below are the marker posts for vehicles to cross the ford.

As I watched, a couple of fairly large logs and an uprooted small tree went bobbing past and disappeared under the frothing water  at the bottom of the ford.

The stock fence, hanging off a wire across the stream, was taking a beating as the water and debris rushed past on its way to the sea.

Just in case you're thinking "Well, that doesn't look like too much water, I'd be able to drive through it", take a look at this video I did. Pretty impressive huh?  

Down on the beach near the mouth of the stream uninviting waves of  'brown soup' carried some of the debris back into shore.

As I drove back towards camp I though I'd go and see how the other ford was fairing (the one on the way to Fletcher Bay that can cause trouble for bigger vehicles). I stopped on the rise above the beach, to take a photo of the dirty water line creeping across the bay. By late afternoon the whole bay was brown.

It was no surprise to find the Fletcher Bay ford overflowing too. A couple of tourists are stuck on the other side; they've been at the Fletcher Bay camp and were heading back to Auckland. They'll not get through this one today, luckily they have a campervan and supplies and are quite happy staying where they are.

I tell them more rain is due so to cross as soon as they're able to. I leave them kicking a hacky sack about and head back to camp.

The weather forecast for the coming week is not the best with more wind, thunderstorms and heavy rain due from Tuesday onwards. We think we'll leave in the morning (Monday) but decide for sure when we wake up.

The morning dawns fine and calm although it looks like the rain is on it's way; we are in two minds about leaving but in the end decide we'll go. We don't want to be caught up here until the end of the week once the weather packs up. By the time we're ready to leave it's late morning and the rain starts (big fat plops) just as we say farewell to Ursula & Frederick at the camp office. And there's a couple of far away claps of thunder. Ominous signs...

The camp ford has dropped dramatically...

...and we head on through and turn left to head up the long haul to the top...

...when all hell breaks lose! A weather bomb hits directly over the top of us, lightening flashes through the gloom and the thunder booms not a half second later, wind whips around the rig and it's bucketing down; the wipers can hardly keep up.

David has the Ranger in 4WD & low range and it slowly hauls the van up the steep (and now slippery) incline- as dozens of flashes and thunder claps carrying on around us. We get a slight reprieve from the rain as we pass under the trees and then near the top the rain is suddenly replaced by dirty great hail stones! There's nowhere to pull over and David daren't risk stopping in case he can't get away again. 

The relief at finally reaching the top is short-lived as we round the corner and start to head down. We nearly get wiped out by a speeding car. Luckily we're only just moving and have stopped well before she slams on her brakes and skids towards us. She backs up and we shout at her to slow down, the conditions are treacherous. And to put her bloody lights on too!  

The road is awash with rivers of water...

...as we crawl towards the 'big drop off corner'. We round it safely and heave another sigh of relief.

This is the same view on a more pleasant day!

The rain eases a little and the gap between the lightening and thunder grows so we know the storm is moving away. Dozens of dirty brown streaks flow into the sea as old & new waterfalls and streams cascade down the hillside.

David has to avoid several small slips and a lot of debris that has fallen onto the road along the way, and we have to stop to move this fallen branch. 

This ford has reasonably clear water still flowing over it, the rain storm mustn't have hit up in the range above yet, although it's raining lightly down here.

We pass more vehicles coming towards us than we've ever passed on this road before, all heading towards Port Jackson. I know we were mad but I wonder what has possessed all those others to drive to Port Jackson on a day like today- Queens Birthday Monday of course!

The ford before the camp would have been raging again and no one would have been able to drive over it. In fact the woman who slid to a halt at the top of the hill has now caught us up coming back; we let her pass, she still has no lights on and is driving way too fast.

The storm hasn't finished with us yet, it catches us up and it's bucketing down again (along with lightening & thunder). Its the first time I've seen water over this small ford.

But many of the culverts are blocked by debris and the road has started to flood in areas...

There are several larger slips closer to the road end although they look like they might have happened earlier in the weekend. Unless someone is carrying road cones on their back seat.

Finally and with a great sense of relief we reach Colville. Talk about testing our nerve, David did a grand job driving but we both comment that we'd not want to do that trip again in a hurry. Talk about extreme conditions, at least we know we could do it if we did get caught out somewhere. 

And so much for shooting the Colville Store on a fine day. Oh well, I'm sure we'll be back again....just earlier in summer next time.

It rained all the way to Coromandel Town and in fact there was more debris over the road on this last section than we'd seen on the Port Jackson Road. The rain was still torrential as we pulled into the NZMCA Park, the grounds saturated and flooding so we backed in beside another motorhome on the little bit of hard still available. We had a cup of tea and then looked at each other and said 'Bugger this, let's get out of here'.

We pulled out and headed around to the nearby Long Bay Motor Camp, where we'd also stayed on our last Coromandel visit. And where we'd be able to plug back into the grid and not have to worry about our power usage. Generators aren't allowed at the Coromandel NZMCA Park and we were low on energy and with the sun certainly not looking like it was going to show itself anytime soon this was the best option. And in fact we stayed for 6 days in the end, enjoying a bit of sun after the storm cleared.

And we were once again parked up in the perfect spot for some magic sunsets...

From Long Bay we headed back to Mt Maunganui for a few days to catch up with the family.  This time parking in the Ocean Camp section and having the place very nearly to ourselves for the four days of our stay. Hard to believe I know!

Then is was on to the NZMCA Park at Taupo for a few days...

...to catch up with good friends Amanda & Paul who we hadn't seen in a long while. They were heading through to Tauranga for a few weeks.

We were lucky enough to be given a rainbow trout by a passing fisherman, so David smoked it and we had trout and bubbles for lunch. Never mind that it was bitterly cold outside; good food, fine wine and great company were worth the discomfort. Truth be told, neither of us wanted smoked fish smell inside the van; I was still trying to rid ours from the fish I'd cooked a few nights previous.

From Taupo it was back to Napier where we're now parked up on the concrete pad beside Mum & Dads' once again. Once we return from Melbourne we'll stay put as we have a couple of important family functions happening so it'll be a few weeks before we're on the move again.

This'll be the last blog for a short while- travel well, stay safe and keep warm!

The Long & Dusty Rainbow Road- Part 1

While we're at Lake Rotoiti it was an ideal opportunity to drive the Rainbow Road, a 112km partly private gravel road that connects St Arnaud to Hanmer Springs. Originally we were going to drive the loop- the Rainbow Road & the Molesworth Road together, staying in Hanmer overnight. But the Molesworth has been closed for the season due to the extreme fire risk in Marlborough. The Rainbow Road was still open and as it’s only open from late December until Easter each year it made sense to drive it now.

We had already driven a section of the Rainbow Road; from Hanmer to Lake Tennyson, when we were in Hanmer Springs last July. This time we would drive the 73km to Lake Tennyson from the St Arnaud end, have lunch and then return via the same route, making it a very long 146km road trip.

We had also driven to the Rainbow Skifield turnoff when we were here at the Lakes last November so we knew that the first 26km of the road was sealed.

Along the way we came across the Rainbow Station farm manager shifting a large flock of sheep, we stopped to talk to him and he told us he shifts them everyday. He pushes them high up the valley in the morning and by the next morning they are back down at the homestead having found their way around the ends of a couple of fences (over the river & up in the bush) that should be blocking their path. He tells us that the feed is much better down at the homestead but he wants them up the top to clear it out before winter. Why he doesn't just add to the fence ends I have no idea. It will be interesting to see where the sheep are when we return later in the afternoon.

There are around a dozen ford crossings along the sealed section of the road, there are some interesting names and we stop to take a photo at the best one. Most of the crossings are dry at this time of the year with just a bit of rubble over the concrete pad.

It’s about here that I need to mention that the Rainbow Road is a hydro road and has only come about because of the route that the pylons take carrying power from Canterbury through to the Nelson & Buller regions, and as such, there are plenty of pylons in the photos. There’s very little chance of taking a photo without at least one making an appearance so I figured it’s best to embrace the pylons rather than try to shoot around them.

It might now be a hydro road (built in the 1950s) but a very long time ago it was part of the overland routes used by Maori and later used by high country graziers moving mobs of sheep between the regions.

This is as far as we traveled the last time, the first rocky ford crossing without a concrete pad and with a lot of boulders. The stream was quite a lot higher then and there wasn’t a nicely smoothed out loop to drive around just a deep crossing straight over. That was still there but we took the easier option, why go looking for trouble?

The gates that are locked in the off season are just past the ford but it’s another 10kms to the old Rainbow Station homestead where you pay a toll to drive the road. The road is good, although there are a few rocky patches, as it follows the Wairau River upstream. Along the way we pass a portaloo all on it’s lonesome & very strategically placed, we decide after a quick stop (and two cups of tea before we left).

Then we come across a working party up one of the pylons, they are blasting off rust and/or algae growth. They have their work cut out for them going by the number and precarious positions of the pylons we see further on. It would take them years to finish the job and I then I'm sure they would have to start at the beginning again. I’m now wondering if the portaloo might have been for them although it was a few kilometres away.

Finally the old homestead appears- a kilometre on a gravel road always seems to be twice as long. Dogs bark a warning and a lovely lady appears to take our money at the ‘toll booth’ which doubles as a wood shed, the wood pile acting as a high point for a boisterous puppy trying to see what his mistress is up to. We pay our $25 and the lady opens the gate for us. We tell her we’ll be returning later in the afternoon and she warns us it must be by 6pm when the gate is locked overnight.

We’re still driving along the river flats but the mountains loom off to the side and ahead of us.

We stop to open the first of the half dozen or so closed gates along the road and find another set of wagon wheels, there’s a similar set at the beginning of the road near the new homestead.

The Rainbow Road is advertised as a ‘wilderness driving experience’ only suitable for high-clearance 4WD vehicles. Drivers need to be self-sufficient and prepared for sudden changes in weather. So far it’s been a relatively easy road (except for the rocky ford). I think the real Rainbow experience is about to begin.

We see our first car approaching from the other direction, David pulls over to the side to let him pass once he’s crossed a ford. We see another 4 or 5 cars during the day along with a motorbike & four cyclists (who had stayed at Kerr Bay with us the night before) and who had set up camp at the Coldwater Creek camping area- a little less than the half way mark.

A colourful barn comes into view as we approach Hells Gate, a very narrow gorge that the road hugs through a gap in the mountains.

We cross the Wairau River close to where the Rainbow River joins it, the river after which the road and station are named.

We come across a parked vehicle just before the gorge, a guy is checking & measuring the water level. They must be power employees as we let them pass later on and they take a track up to a pylon above us.

The river has narrowed down a lot as it comes out of the gorge although it’s still very shallow.

We enter ‘Hells Gate’ and take our time driving through, stopping at one point to take in the impressive rocky mountain bluffs overhead. The road again isn’t too bad, just narrow in a few places with a couple of blind corners.

Towards the end of the gorge we come across a couple of cheerful chaps having their lunch on the side of the road. They’ve been out here for the last 3-4 days fishing, they have a Landrover camper with them although they told us they’ve been whiling away their evenings drinking with the DOC guys at a hut further up the valley!

The scenery is spectacular, the mountains surround us on all sides and those pylons take centre stage in the narrow gorge.

At the end of the gorge the road turns right and the landscape opens up as we continue to follow the river up stream.

There are a couple of huge rock slides off the mountains above us and one of them has wiped the road out. A track looks to have been bulldozed through lower down but water has washed that away. We take a narrow, higher up track which also crosses the water course but is not as deep (I took this on the way back in case it throws your bearings).

The road crosses over the next scree slide and then over another bridge across the Waiau…

…and along the side and to the top of the valley. You can see a couple of roads, the higher one is a service track to those ever present pylons. And even though it may not look like it from here, this is one huge impressive valley, the cattle grazing down below looking like ants.

At the top of the valley we come to another closed gate and the Rainbow/Molesworth Station boundary. The road now becomes a public road & it’s here that the gate is locked in the off season.

To be continued……

Part 2- Lake Sedgemere, Island Saddle to Lake Tennyson
Part 3- The Return Journey