Southland and east through the Catlins

Big Bogies at Kingston

Leaving Queenstown to head southward, more snow had come through in the past 2 days making the mountains look beautiful but not too low to make it overly cold. 
We went down the side of Lake Wakatipu and into Kingston for lunch. It was good to see the Kingston Flyer looking like it might be up and running again for the summer – with new investors. The same Trust who are running the Blenheim to Picton Steamer. Fingers crossed they can make a go of it. For now the line is just to Fairlight and needs extensive renovation. The Cafe was at least open with a few clients enjoying this picturesque spot. Bill hopes they check the line out thoroughly as he has a few spikes in his collection from previous visits. 

Southlands rolling hills

On to Lumsden to the NZMCA camp for the night. It's lovely and quiet here and the trees had grown so much in 18 months since we last called in. There is a St John’s Op shop in the town where it is good to be able to restock our books. And when they are between $1 and $3 each, why wouldn't you? A great way to share your books around the country.
Onto Piano Flat to reminisce Bill’s childhood memories of being pack horses for a family friend who was gold fossicking (using a sluicing riffle boxs) and the family camping holidays that were had up here from Invercargill.

Purakaunui Bay with natural art 

We drove through beautiful back country roads – lovely rural scenery with the lush spring growth. We passed Waikaia Gold Limited's equipment parked up just out of Waikaia. In the past five years they have been dredging and extracted over 2 tonnes of gold over 5km of old river bed, only winding up last April 2019.

Waikaia Bottle House (Museum)

They are now remediating the land to flat pastoral farm land.
Up the valley following the Waikaia river and onto Piano Flat Doc Camp named after the piano player Harry Salek who entertained the early settlers and miners in mid to the late 1800s. Amazing how in those early days people could be so mobile with pianos!
It is a lovely Doc camp, there was only one other camper up here at this time of year. The sandflies were just loving the three of us! 
As it was sooooo wet the next day, it was great day for reading. When the sun came out in the afternoon we were able to walk the Piano Flat Track through the Beech Forest. It was very muddy but picturesque. Old water races from the gold mining days are throughout this forest. 

Piano Flat Waikaia River

We realised this week we had been 5 years on the road since leaving Nelson on the 27th of August 2014. It has been a great experience and who knows where or when it will finish. 
We woke the next morning to our windows frosted over on the inside! Very white outside with a heavy frost but beautiful and clear. We were to move on south but when we went to leave…… our double set of tyres at the rear of the bus had sunk into the very wet ground after yesterday's rain. Even trying to push it out with the Suzuki didn't work till Bill put a couple of bucket loads of gravel into the wheel tracks. Then I had another go pushing and we were out thankfully as there were not a lot of people around to help.

Piano Flat water supply! Ex Goldmining days

Not that it was a problem as we had plenty of food on board.😊 But it is the end of the month and I did have some work to get done that required cell coverage which there was very little of up here. Time to move on. 

Another lovely days travel through rural Southland and past remediated pastures mainly for dairy by the gold company.

A crisp morning at Piano Flat

We called in to the Croydon Air Museum at Mandeville for Bill to spend a few hours while I worked on the computer. The museum focused on wood and fabric De Havilland and Tiger moth planes. Amazing craftmanship, still flying today. As a bonus they are restoring a railway siding to commemorate the Lumsden Gore railway. Bill was in his element ✈
Moving onto Gore, where we haven't spent much time previously, to have a bit of a look around. We had the night at the AMP Show Grounds to enable us to visit the museums in the morning. The great Hokonui Moonshine Museum and Gore Museum and the lovely Carnegie Public Library building. Philanthropist Andrew Carnegie sponsored 18 libraries in New Zealand between 1908 and 1916 – one of these being in Gore. This building is now the Eastern Southland Gallery – having had a $1.2 million dollar make over back in 2002. It is a magnificent building – well worth a visit even if you aren’t into art.

Gore's Icon

An interesting period of Prohibition in this area and it’s illicit whisky making is well covered in the Hokonui Moonshine Museum – where the new Scottish Settlers came up against some police opposition. But with their canny ingenuity, they often outfoxed the Custom Men of the time. Some great stories. This museum is attached to Gore’s local area history museum which covers the likes of the Creamoata Factory and Sargent Dan. 

Making Hokonui Moonshine 

Onto Invercargill to park up at Dorothy Young’s once again, this time meeting up with sons Peter, Paul and Mark (it was 45 years ago Bill last caught up with them).
With it being whitebaiting season we were given a feed that Paul had brought for dinner but it got a bit late so was put in our freezer for another day😊
We also caught up with Bills nieces again, after our last visit 18 months ago. Natasha and Davinna and their husbands George & Malcolm. Bill's sister Sue had sadly passed away 10 years ago, so it's important to keep that family link with her family all living down here in Invercargill. We all meet up for lunch including Sue's husband Lennox.

Grid lock at the Youngs Invercargill

Luxury Motorhoming at Bill Richardson's Transport
 Museum -a must Do!

Our plan while down here was to visit Stewart Island which has been on our bucket list for some time. But unfortunately the weather did not play its part once again, so we will go away and come back another day.
While in Invercargill we visited Bill Richardson's Transport World. If you are ever in Invercargill this is a must-visit. Bill and I managed to spend 5 hours at the Museum (including lunch at their quirky Cafe).
From Invercargill we headed up the Catlins once again, this time from the southern end. Calling in to Fortrose (but realised we could get bogged in again and being up on a cliff - too far away for some gravel if needed) and onto Slope Point (Weir Reserve). We passed many whitebaiters along the way but not overly friendly. I guess they saw us as a threat thinking we were fellow fishers. They are quite possessive of their areas even though they are public lands.A parochial lot when it comes to whitebait. Tho true of the whole country we understand.😏

Oreti Beach - not so many bathers today😉

Slope Point Light House

NZ's most southern point - Slope Point

On to Niagara falls through Curio Bay,( the Petrified Forest) and  Porpoise Bay. With the penguins starting to Nest, Doc people were roping off sections of the beach to protect the area for them.
We continued to travelling up every dead end road (because it was there!) in the Waikawa area. A few were closed before the end which we were told was due to vandalism and theft - people stealing batteries out of tractors etc. A shame as the roads are slowly being closed for casual public use.
Lovely rural rolling paddocks lush green and full of lambs which are really bouncy with their little tails wagging. 
Coverage was a bit marginal in this area so we had to go back to Curio Bay to do some work before doing the Waikawa museum which was full of the Districts farming origin - Flax, Sawmills, goldmining, whaling, and the areas schooling history. The Niagara Falls school is now a lovely Cafe. Logging started in this region for Dunedin’s housing boom in the gold rush years in the mid to late 1800s - there were sawmills still operating here in the early 1950's.

It was on to Papatowai Doc camp for the next couple of nights to do the walks in the area. McLean's Falls would have to be one of the better Falls we have seen in our time. Beautiful bushwalk through to the Falls which had been recently cleaned up after a huge rock fall.

Curio Bay - petrified forest (Bus in the background)

Niagara Falls School Cafe

Walkway through wetlands on the Tautuku River Estuary

Bill sharing wisdom with young men (Adam & Wills)

Southern Man. Purakaunui Bay

Rock formations Purakaunui Bay

Purakaunui Bay with Sealions in the sand dunes.

Calling into Owaka  to refresh supplies and water and had a lovely meal fish & chips for lunch. While here  with some phone reception we caught up with family and a bit of work. We then headed into Purakaunui Beach - another remote Doc Camp with a beautiful beach, huge cliffs and sea lions. Amazing rock formations but a freezing cold wind straight across from the Antarctic.  We met two young lads camping here too, Adam and Wills, who are rafting guides working in Queenstown (I know! Who would go on the rivers at this time of year!! Aussies! And other mad people!). They were spending their two days off in here to do some surfing.
We did a walk up the steep hillside to get onto the top of the cliffs. I know! Very brave of me. But I let Bill go out and do the edges!
It was a lovely wee spot to have some time out in. Apparently over the summer break it's pretty busy so will leave it for the tourists then.
NZ is lucky to have such an organisation as DOC who look after and protect these areas for all to enjoy. Long may it last.

Southern Man at McLeans Falls Catlins- another must do!