Hunting for a Hoar Frost- Mackenzie Country; Part 1

Real-time

Was I going to be too late to catch my hoar frost? That was the million dollar question. We left Fairlie late morning on a beautiful sunny day. There would be no dilly-dallying on this trip; straight through Burkes Pass and down into the beautiful Mackenzie Basin, the snow capped Southern Alps forming a stunning backdrop. I love catching that first sight of the mountains, they are jaw-dropping spectacular no matter what time of the year it is.

Through a busy Lake Tekapo village with Mt John directly ahead and not a scrap of snow in sight. It's hard to believe that Tekapo has already had a good dumping of snow this winter, I missed that too.

Then it's along the straights, dry tussocks grasslands stretching off into the distance and not a flowering lupin in sight...

...up over a hill and then around the corner and the first sighting of beautiful Lake Pukaki and it's turquoise blue waters.

As we head over the spillway and past the lookout carpark I ask David to put his window down and snap a shot of a beautiful Aoraki/Mt Cook standing proudly at the head of lake; it's not often you see her without her head in the clouds. It's just as well I have a few dozen similar photos, we'll not be stopping to take in the view today.

By the time we reach our destination, the NZMCA camp at Ohau B Canal, I'm pretty much certain if there was a hoar frost it has now melted back into the land. There's a patch of frosty grass in the shaded lee of the small hill behind the camp and I also spied a shaded row of heavily frosted pines along the main road but that's it, it's now a brilliantly fine sunny day, although the temperature is a very brisk 4 degrees. 

I check a Facebook page I follow and see stunning photos of a blue sky hoar frost taken near Twizel this morning! I'm gutted, it looks like I'm six hours too late. If only the tyres had arrived on time. Later in the afternoon I check back on Facebook and see that someone has mentioned that the willows at Lake Benmore's boat ramp were covered in frost this morning and it may still be there.

As I loaded up the ute with my gear, I stopped to take a photo of an Australasian Crested Grebe as he paddles past the rig. This is my favourite South Island lake bird and I'm happy to see another three birds floating around the salmon farm across from the camp.

I headed off down the canal road towards the lake, keen to also see how many anglers were trying their luck along Ohau C canal. Two weeks prior, 3000 salmon- due to be harvested later in the year- had escaped from their pen at the salmon farm. They had been providing a fishing bonanza for anglers that had come from far & wide to try their luck. 

I had seen photos, during the early days of the escape, of shoulder to shoulder anglers on the banks of the canal near the farm. There were still dozens fishing this afternoon but they were a little more spread out. At this time of the year you would usually only see maybe two or three anglers along this stretch of canal.

I carried on down to the Ohau C power station, the last power station on the canal before Lake Benmore.

It wasn't a surprise to find a couple of dozen anglers fishing on both sides of the canal and along the dam wall here either. I'm no fishing expert but I've learnt from a lot of time spent observing, that salmon (and trout) either hang out around the farm, feeding on the excess food that escapes the nets that contain the farmed fish, or swim to either end of the canal (looking for an escape or to spawn?) 

There is no escape for Ohau C fish, it's one long canal. Ohau B fish at least have a change of scenery available to them via Lake Ruataniwha and Wairepo Arm.

There's maybe 5 or 6 kilometres of canal between the farm and Ohau C power station so you would expect there to be some fish in between but it's very rare to see an angler in that middle ground, on any of the canals. 

I left the happy fisher people behind and headed down to the lake (I saw several large fish discreetly placed in bins near vehicles- I say discreet but how do you hide a large fish tail when it's obviously taller than the bucket. Fold it in half?) 

Sadly the willows along the boat ramp harbour weren't dripping in icicles either although the reflections made up for that a teeny weeny bit... 

... and the large pond in the centre of the campground was also devoid of frost. It was still bitterly cold so maybe if I found some shaded trees I might have a chance...

I drove quickly back up the canal. Actually not that quick really, because I find it quite off putting driving along the edge of the canals. It feels like I'm suddenly going to veer off the road and disappear under the deep blue water never to be seen again. I focus on the centre line.

I pass the anglers, the power stations, and David sitting in the van at the camp site and then I'm back out on the main road. And heading to one of my favourite- and most photogenic- places in the Mackenzie Basin, no matter what season it is. Wairepo Arm is a large body of water that joins the Ohau B Canal and is fed from Lake Ruataniwha. Wairepo Arm is just opposite our camp and another salmon farm sits on the corner of the canal and the pond. 

Wairepo Arm reflections are spectacular, especially during autumn when the colours on the willows and poplars are vivid yellow, although winter isn't half bad either! No hoar frost here though.

I have one last port of call in mind before the light fades; several narrow coves near a small island close to shore on Lake Ruataniwha, and beside the Lake Ruataniwha Holiday Park. 

It's very cold here as the reserve is tucked into a pine forest and sits below a natural river terrace so the sun only reaches into it's depths for a few short hours during winter.

But the calm milky blue water provides some beautiful reflections, even better than Wairepo Arm on this day.

But sadly there's still no hoar frost or even remnants of one so it's time to head home and see what tomorrow brings...

Lake Ruataniwha- looking towards SH8, the salmon farm (and our camp) are the white patches on the right.

Later on that evening I check the Facebook page again and my disappointment was intensified when I saw hoar frost photos from some of the places I had visited in the afternoon.

Many thanks to Nikki Adams who lives in Twizel for allowing me to use her gorgeous photos. Look familiar? And just a few hours separate the shots. I've included mine again so you can compare, click on the photo to enlarge.

Lake Ruataniwha-

Wairepo Arm-

To be continued...Part 2

A Fairlie Cold Place- Part 2

Real-time

Contined on from Part 1

While at Fairlie we did a day trip to Timaru to visit, of all places, Super Cheap Auto & Briscoes. David needed a new heavier duty jack, he'd bent the head of the last one awhile ago and it had been a problem when we'd had the blow-out and we also needed a new electric heater, our old one had been dropped and made an annoying whirring noise and then it blew blue smoke (there's a theme going on here....)

After visiting the shops, we drove down to Caroline Bay, apparently the most popular beach in the South Island (it's lovely but I think there must have been some parochial voting going on). It looks nice & sunny in these photos but boy was it bitterly cold.  

And as if to rub salt into the wound, I heard a whole lot of noise coming from a group of people near the container wharf in the far corner of the bay.

The mid winter Polar Plunge was about to happen....brrrrr....

...and just as I zoomed in on the people the countdown started and then a roar went up to go as a small group of people clad in a varying array of costumes and swimsuits raced for the water. After a quick dunk under the water most exited it just as fast. Some very brave people indeed!

We did a loop on our way home, taking some of the back roads behind Pleasant Point looking for a couple of places of interest (as highlighted in one of my map books); Hanging Rock Bridge was a non event. But it wasn't until I got home that I realised it wasn't the bridge that was of interest it was the nearby 'Hanging Rock', a huge lump of limestone overhanging the riverbed (which of course I didn't see). Duh! 

But in my defence, the map book did say 'Bridge', if it had left that out I'd have looked further for the Hanging Rock.

I did love the sign that was nearby. Some wag has hung a rock (in it's own little string bag) off the road sign. 

The other place of interest was the Kakahu Kiln...

... a huge lime kiln that's sitting in the middle of farmland and bush out in the middle of nowhere. This kiln was built in 1876 and was used until about 1900. Lime from the surrounding area was burnt- using coal from the area too- in the kiln. The burnt lime was used for agriculture & in the building industry.

Click on the photo to read more about this fascinating industry and why it didn't last.

There is a 3 hour, 8km part-loop track up behind the kiln, it follows part of the old tramway which brought the limestone chip down to the kiln, passes Balancing Rock (they like naming their rocks around here) and finishes at the Pinnacle Lookout. I walked up the track to check the top of the kiln where I could see a small tree growing out of the centre, along with some long grass. I hope they clear the tree before it does any damage.

We decided the 20 minute Escarpment Walk just down the road would be far enough for us today.

We followed the sheep track across the paddock, dodging piles of poo as we went, to the escarpment where huge boulders are scattered like giant's marbles around the base.

Up close the large boulders are mushroom shaped and eroded around their base, apparently this happened thousands of years ago (and I thought it was the sheep). The area is of great spiritual significance to local Maori. I had a quick look for Maori paintings, similar to the ones we were shown at a secret site when we stayed at nearby Albury Station, but didn't find any. There could possibly be some up in the rocks and caves further up the slope but the ground was very boggy so I didn't explore further.

From Kakahu we continued on along the gravel road until we popped back out onto the main road not far north of Geraldine. And then it was a smooth ride home back along the highway with a quick stop at the viewpoint high above the Fairlie valley. The township is behind those trees, centre right.

Lake Opuha, a man-made irrigation reservoir is just 12km from Fairlie, it's very popular during the summer for water sports and fishing and there are also three freedom camping areas, one we stayed at the last time we visited this area (again in the middle of winter). We drove up to the dam face, we hadn't actually visited here the last time. The water was silky smooth.

Below the dam a narrow gorge channeled the water down to a small pond. We watched a car head down the narrow track over the top of the spillway and then diagonally down the face of the dam and along a dirt road to the pond, it returned soon afterwards. I wondered if there was a picnic, swimming area there. We didn't check it out.

We drove back around to the Bennetts Road boat ramp/camping & picnic area and had afternoon tea just as the sun was about to disappear behind Two Thumb Range.

While we were there two locals arrived and unloaded their jet skies. Our peace & tranquility were shattered as they blasted their way around the lake.

Several days later I drove the loop back out to Lake Opuha hoping to shoot some reflection photos in the late afternoon sun, and also find some rolling farmland before the sun went down. Some of you may recall my reflection photos from our last visit, here's one from the latest visit; pretty similar if you check that link. It's a great spot to visit.

On the way home I stopped on the road beside a newly sown paddock that I'd spotted while driving past with David a few days earlier. I loved the rolling landscape and the shadows cast by the setting sun. 

This one is of the farm buildings, how I would have loved to have actually got into the paddock and found a spot where the composition in both photos could have been better.

I did head around to a side road to see if I could get some better shots but unfortunately the sun had disappeared off the front paddock.  Time to head home...

...although I couldn't help stopping for one last photo at the lookout again, just as the sun disappeared behind the mountains.

As I mentioned in the previous blog, we were due to leave Fairlie on Wednesday afternoon, after the last two tyres had arrived from the North Island and been fitted. Unfortunately there was a hiccup with the delivery and they weren't now going to arrive until Friday morning. One whole week from when we arrived in Fairlie.

Which wouldn't have been a problem had word not got to me that due to the severe cold temperatures and a few days of pea soup fog, a hoar frost was building up in Twizel. Darn! Darn! Double Darn!

Just 100km stood between me and my bucket list photo. For four winters over the last seven years I have hoped for a hoar frost, I've captured a few mini frosts but never the big one, the money shot; bright blue sky and white frosted trees dripping in icicles. They have happened but always where we've not been at the time. And because the roads are usually treacherous to drive during the frost you need to be Johnny-on-the spot to be in with a chance.

As we headed out late Friday morning past Mt Dobson (tyres arrived and fitted), I wondered if I was going to be in time.

A Fairlie Big Bang- Part 1

Real-time

We left Weedons, south of Christchurch, and headed west towards Darfield, we'd decided to take the scenic route to MacKenzie Country. SH77 runs along the foot of the mountains that form the backdrop to the vast Canterbury Plains. 

We've spent quite a bit of time exploring along this road previously, today we just enjoyed the open road with very little traffic. Mt Hutt, with very little snow for this time of the year, filled the view ahead of us for quite some distance as we passed through Glentunnel, Windwhistle and dropped down into the Rakaia Gorge before popping back up onto the straight roads past Methven, Staveley, Mt Somers & Mayfield.

Just past Staveley we stopped for lunch at a very wet Bowyers Stream rest area...

.... this is also a free camping area but it's often boggy or flooded during winter. 

Back on the road and there we were crusin' along at 90kph on a gloriously sunny day without a care in the world when there was an almighty huge boom followed by 'whack, whack, whack', the rig wobbled a bit and a large cloud of blue smoke poured out behind us. David quickly brought the rig to a halt, I jumped out to check and saw that we'd had a blow-out on the back left hand side of the 5th-wheeler. 

There was nowhere to pull off the road on our side of the road but luckily there was a wide grass berm on the other side. David carefully drove the rig over to it. 

Yes, that's definitely a blow out, there'll be no repairing that tyre! Our first (and hopefully last) blow-out to add to the two punctures on the ute & one on the van in over 88,000kms and 7 years on the road. The ground underneath was soft and it took several stages to jack it up, block, release, jack, add another block, release, jack.... Eventually there were enough blocks under the axle to get the wheel off and the spare back on. And in case you're wondering these aren't retreads, they were new tyres 3.5 years ago.

At least 100 vehicles passed us while we were changing the wheel,  many of them work vehicles and farm utes with burly young men in them, yet not one person stopped to offer help or check that we were ok. It didn't matter because David had it under control (with some help from yours truly) and if we had needed help I would have flagged someone down but it did surprise me that not one person stopped. I know any motorhomer passing would have checked on us but unusually not one of the vehicles passing was a motorhome. 

Ninety minutes and a few nasty scratches from the protruding wire later and David had it changed and we were back on the road. 

We were very pleased to see Carters Tyre Service as we rolled into Fairlie township just before dusk on a Friday afternoon. David popped over to see them Saturday morning and they were able to order a replacement tyre and would have it for us on Tuesday morning which we were very pleased about. As it happened, we were intending to stop in Fairlie- the gateway to MacKenzie Country- for a night or two anyway, a couple more nights wasn't going to be a problem.

Fairlie Holiday Park is part of the NZMCA (NZ Motor Caravan Association) new CampSaver winter camping initiative where members can stay at participating campgrounds for $20 a night, this includes power. This has to be a win/win situation; members get cheaper camping sites and in return camping grounds get some winter turnover. Hopefully camping grounds will find that it's worth their while being involved, I know that during our week long stay at Fairlie there were two to four other members staying each night that usually wouldn't have come to a campground.

We thoroughly enjoyed our extended stay, we had a relatively sunny spot in an area that didn't see many other campers; most preferring to park on the hard on the otherside of the small stream that ran through the campground. 

With heavy frosts every day, temperatures at -5c to -8c overnight and hovering around zero for most of the day, with the occasional morning of fog, and bitterly cold temperatures all day, everyday, we began to wonder if we'd made the right decision to come south again for winter. 

We wondered if we were getting soft in our old age; 18 months has passed since we were last down here. Or maybe we'd acclimatized to the brilliant 6 months of warm sunshine we'd had up north over the long hot summer. All I can say is thank God for out diesel heaters, they certainly earnt their keep keeping us toasty warm inside, and also for the luxury of being plugged into the grid. The electric blanket kept the chill away overnight.

But we did have frozen water pipes three days running which didn't defrost until early afternoon. I think we've only had frozen pipes for 3 days in total over the whole of winter previously. We always turn the water off and open the taps at night so no damage is done but it's frustrating when you don't have water when you want it. And even colder when you've got to visit the campground showers instead of your own one in a warm van.

We were a bit perplexed about how cold is was until we read about a very unusual weather system at play. The severe cold temps were caused by very high air pressure which went as high as 1036hpa, this was well above the average for June and nearly a record. If it had been summer it would have been a very hot week. The highest air pressure ever recorded in New Zealand was 1045.9 in Wellington in 1889. Since then the closest near record was 1040hpa recorded in 2010. Little did I know it but this weather system was also hard at work mixing up a hoar frost in Twizel. A hoar frost that I am determined to photograph this winter and one of the main reasons we are in the South Island.

Over the weekend David decided that we really should replace all four tyres on the 5th-wheeler; the remaining three had a fair bit of tread on them but he wanted to keep the tyres uniform & consistent. So on Monday morning he called over to Carters again and ordered the other three tyres. Unfortunately two of them had to come down from the North Island and wouldn't be here until Wednesday morning (which actually wasn't too bad a service) That was ok by us, we were happy to wait. We had power. And we had pies to sample! 

Fairlie Bakehouse is well known for it's tasty pies, 'Bakers not Manufacturers' is their tag line. Ask on-line where the best pie is in New Zealand and you're not only bound to start a riot but everyone thinks they know who bakes the best. Fairlie Bakehouse is consistently up there at the top of the list with one or two others. And especially their signature pie (actually they have a few)- Pork Belly with Apple Sauce & Crackling. And yes, that is a piece of crunchy crackling on top of the pastry. 

In summary, let's just say the Pork Belly wasn't our favourite, it came a close third behind the Venison & Cranberry and the Salmon & Bacon Pie (an odd combination but it works). Although the traditional mince & cheese was pretty tasty too....then again, the butter chicken or creamy free range chicken.....

Suffice to say we were all 'pie-ed' out by the time we left Fairlie. And I don't even like pies!! 

While in Fairlie we spent most of our time in doors keeping warm, catching up on computer work (and sampling pies!) We did try to walk some of them off by taking the riverside track beside the camping ground but found it to be rather muddy and not too inspiring with bare willows, overgrown blackberry and old mans beard covering everything in sight. The walk was over 6kms long to the end and then you could walk back along the main road to the town. 

After a couple of kilometres we turned around and walked back the way we came although we did loop through the Domain on the other side of the campground and found a frozen ice skating rink which doesn't look like it's been very well loved in recent years.

In fact the last time the ice was thick enough to skate on was 2015 and that was three years after the previous time.  The rink needs a constant -10c to keep a solid base, which, with the temperatures we'd been having, explains why it was quite firm at the moment. The stuff you can see on the surface is  weeds of some sort that were growing in the base of the pond and are now stuck in the ice. 

To be continued... Part 2