Pictures from day three

The next morning we woke up to one of the most beautiful vistas I've ever seen. We popped open the camper door and the entire cove and beach were laid out before us. The wind was whipping a bit on top of the hill so it was a little chilly but it wasn't too bad. The surf was up, though, and there were about two dozen surfers in the water. Oh that water is cold too! Having grown up with the Gulf of Mexico just down the road practically, I have gotten very used to warm oceans. I still find cold oceans odd even though they are more "the norm" than the warm water oceans.

We packed up and got ready to leave only to discover our first hurdle of the day. It had rained over night and the "road" we had come up was now even more of a mess than it had been the day before. When I say this sucker was rutted, imagine ruts a two year old could stand in and not reach the top. These were what ordinary ruts want to be when they grow up. So, we had two choices: Stay on top of the mountain until such time as a road crew came and fixed the road or actually drive down it and take our chances. As you can imagine, the second was the option we chose. I was very impressed with Shannon's driving. We managed to slip and slide our way down the hill without once falling into a giant crevasse or sliding off the other side into the ocean. And there were only slight dents in the steering wheel where her fingers had been when we got to the bottom.

After leaving the campground, we drove over to Purakanui Falls. Well to the parking area and then we hiked in the short distance to the falls. We could hear the water before we actually reached it. A few switchbacks down a hill and then we were there. A small viewing platform had been built overlooking the falls so we had a great view of it. A couple of other people were there taking pictures as well. At first it was cloudy. Shannon's pictures were turning out okay but not spectacular. Then the clouds all moved aside and the sun beamed down on the falls. It was gorgeous. By the time we got ready to leave, she had stored away several really good pictures.

The next stop was a town called Invercargill. It was here I finally got my first Internet fix. I had not checked my email for three days as this point and was starting to have withdrawals! It wasn't like I was waiting for anything in particular. It's just the not knowing what could be there. Being cut off from contact with the outside world. I have always known I was an Internet addict but this trip really brought it home. I wasn't able to go more than a few days without jonesing for my Internet. We found computers at the Information Center that were $2 for a half hour of Internet. Not too bad. I probably would have paid $5, lol.

We had some lunch in the parking lot and then headed over to the store to buy more supplies. We actually did pretty well on food for the trip. There were some staples we ate everyday like cereal and muffins. We also ate a lot of these pre-cooked hot dogs that came in a big bag. We had discovered them at the BBQ her flatmates had a few days before we left. There were a variety of flavors to choose from and they were actually pretty good. Although by the end of the trip, I wasn't able to get down another bite of those things. It'll be a long time before I can eat them again, lol. We also cooked some ramen and ate PB&J sandwiches a lot. And as big of a coffee junkie I am, we also found a way to make coffee everyday. We couldn't find a percolator and we didn't have room to pack the coffee press so we went in search of something cheap to use. We found a tea brewer that actually worked quite nicely. We also saw the absolute best business sign in Invercargill after we left the grocery store. It was a tire place called Kumho Tyres with the slogan: "We'll get you there and back again!" Priceless!

Towards the end of the day, we decided to take a detour before we got to Te Anau. Lake Haukoro was about a 30 mile round trip and since it's the deepest lake in New Zealand, and the guide book highly recommended it, we decided to go have a look. And was it worth it! It's tucked well back off the beaten path and we were the only ones there. A short walk from the car park brought us to a dock that stretched out into the lake. We walked out as far as we could, the last bit of it was underwater, and stood staring in awe at the beauty around us. The whole thing was pretty much surrounded by mountains with the part we were on being the exception. Shannon got some great pictures of the mountains.

Back on the main road, we arrived at the Te Anau Lake View Holiday Park in short order. This was our first night at an actual campground with facilities and we were stoked. Hot showers! Flush toilets! Laundry facilities! It was great! These campgrounds are different from ones I have stayed out in the US. Usually those have spots for tent camping, car camping, and RV hookups with laundry, hot showers and toilets which the ones in New Zealand had but the ones in NZ also had full kitchens, TV rooms, game rooms, kid parks, and Internet bars. We could have cooked our dinner on a real stove but we didn't realize until we'd already used the one attached to ET. We were able to wash our dishes in a real sink though! It's funny the basic things you miss when you don't have them everyday, lol. We were also able to do laundry which was a necessity for me. I only had two pairs of jeans and one pair of hiking pants for the whole trip. This being day three, I had already worn my allotment of clothes and was in dire need of fresh ones. We set up in the laundry room after dinner waiting for our clothes to get done. We had a deck of cards but were chagrined to discover neither one of us remembered how to play a single card game! We were trying to remember how the cards were set up on the computer version of Solitaire and couldn't remember that either. It was hilarious.

Once the clothes were done, we headed back to our camper to discover two other Spaceships parked next to us: Ming and Cylon. We were super jealous over the Cylon, lol. How cool to get to drive Cylon! Ah well, ET was cool too. Ming was set up for more than two people. It had a tent that went on the roof so a third person could sleep up there. It was really neat. In the dark, though it looked like the car was wearing a big top hat, lol.