Southern Scenic Route (15) Invercargill to Te Anua Day 7

We left Papatowai and headed onto Invercargill via McLean falls braving the weather in the process. The trip itself was not particularly long, around 120 kms, but it felt a lot longer.

By the time we got to the Cabbage Tree restaurant just outside Invercargill I was finding it hard to walk without having my arms outstretched and my fists clinched as I had spent the majority of the trip fighting the camper van. Or, put another way, I had acted as an intermediary between the gale force winds and our not so aerodynamic camper van. Pushing a rigid sail perpendicularly through a mild hurricane would have been easier in my opinion! I was constantly correcting the position of the van on the road and bracing myself every time we came to a narrow bridge especially if there was on coming traffic.

We arrived in Invercargill safe and sound and a little relieved to still be in one piece. It was only the following day that we caught the headlines of the local papers and the descriptions of how the gale force winds had literally blown roofs of houses! With hindsight we might have been better off staying another night in the Catlins.

By the time we sat down for our lunch in the Cabbage Tree the torrential rains, driven by the high winds, had put a stop to any notion of exploring the area. The girls settled down into cafes and Internet bars for the afternoon and I went to bed to rest my weary arms! I met up with the girls that night in Thai Dee where we had a nice Thai meal after which we got a taxi back to the holiday park and tried to make the most of the TV Room.

It was a difficult few days in the camper van and the mood wasn't great. To make matters worse we faced another long 180km journey to Te Anau the following morning. We were hoping the storm would have past by then.

We had been couped up in the van for almost three consecutive days and what little appeal it had was quickly disappearing. We decided, for the sake of our sanity, to get out of the camper van for a few hours the next day on the way to Te Anua.

We booked ourselves in for some well earned pampering at a Day Spa in a lovely town called Winton, approx. 30km north of Invergargill. The town had a lovely scale to it and some nice restaurants too. The Day Spa did us all some good and helped break up our journey. The detour took us off the Southern Scenic Route but it was either that or a severe bout of group depression!

The weather had also picked up by the time we left Winton and we were getting that bit closer to the most anticipated part of our trip, the west part of the Southland region. It being the main part of the World Heritage Site mentioned in a previous post.

We arrived into Te Anau, gateway to Doubtful (2) and Milford Sounds (1) late in the afternoon. We settled into a Top 10 holiday park for the next three nights. We ate that night in a nice, cheap and cheerful, Italian Restaurant and Pizzeria called Toscana's.

We had an early enough start the next day as we were heading to Doubtful Sound.

What follows in the next few posts is the top two places to go and visit in New Zealand and although the weather was typical of the sub tropical rain forest we had entered, it didn't dampen the spirits!

Cathal

Southern Scenic Route (15) Catlins to Invergargil Day 6

We spent the night in Papatowai listening to the rain beat down while being rocked back and forth by gale force winds. The rain was so bad at times it woke us all up.

We travelled in May which is technically winter here, and if it didn't get dark early you would be forgiven for thinking that we had actually traveled during the summer, well maybe spring. We were more or less blessed with the weather and, if for no other reason but to ensure we appreciated it, mother nature decided to send us a stark reminder of what things could really be like in this part of the world!

We consulted the local map of the Catlins and decided to keep going as the weather was unfortunately not conducive to sight seeing. As we headed through the Catlins we kept coming across signs for various water falls. Not wanting to miss out on anything and risking eviction from the "small brother house" I suggested that we might stop for a short tramp if we came across one.

We eventually saw a sign for McLean Falls and drove down to the public car park. Where the ubiquitous signs stating "lock it or lose it" were there as stark reminders of one of the less appealing pass times of some Kiwi's, thieving! ( I assume Kiwi's but it could of course be fellow campers!).



We dressed up for bad weather. I resembled someone from a SWAT team- you'll see the picture later on- and we headed on the 30 minute tramp through part of the Catlin forest to the water fall. It was an unexpected treat and gave us an insight into the appeal of the Catlins, something we would have obviously missed had we drove on. Hurray to me!!!!!!

It was raining lightly during the tramp but you only got wet in the few clearings along the way. If anything the wet weather added to the atmosphere as we could appreciate the smells of the mosses and foliage that you associate with wet forest walks. Here's a few pics taken along the tramp.

In order to get to the water fall you have to cross the stream/ river associated with it. Here's a few pics of the river and the girls on the bridge.

The pic above is Annette being escorted by here SWAT personal body guard. AKA me.

There are two water falls that precede the main event and add to the suspense You have to climb a set of steps to reach the McLean fall itself. Here's a few pics of the smaller waterfalls.

And here's one of the sister's in front of the main one.

And one of the McLean waterfall by itself.

We continued from the falls directly to Invercargill and you will read more about the weather we experienced on the next post. We were literally blown away!

Cathal

Southern Scenic Route (15) Dunedin to the Catlins via Lake Waihola Day 5

Sharon told me that if I didn't blog about the South Island again soon people would think I had lost the plot. So in the interests of the blog I have put my "pursuit of happiness" to one side and decided to do a second post today.

The Southern Scenic Route runs for 400 km from Dunedin to Te Anau, via the Catlins and Invercargill. Te Anua being the gateway to Doubtful and Milford Sounds. The map below shows the route we more or less travelled.

The Southern Scenic Route was not the best road journey we took in my opinion, but it did offer up some treats, some of which were quite unexpected. What it did offer in abundance however was high winds and driving rain but we will have more on that in the next post.


Here's a pic of one of NZ's native birds, the Pekeko, that we spotted on our travels. I "borrowed" the picture from the Internet. They like wet marsh lands so it was no surprise that we spotted them along the South West Coast.




We were driving towards the Catlins when we came across a sign for a look out ahead and decided to pull over and have a look. Here's a pic from the lookout.

We thought the village in the distance, in the picture above, looked promising and as it was getting near Annette's feeding time- sorry Annette couldn't resist- we decided to head down to the lake and have some well earned beans on toast.

We pulled into a public car park beside Lake Waihola and I reversed the van so we had a good view of the lake from the "dining area" in the back of the camper van. As you can see I sort of reversed into a big pot hole so the camper van isn't exactly level. Well at least I didn't hit anything!

It was here I noticed the light was missing over the door and the few scrapes along the side of the van. See the Dunedin post to find out more. With views like the ones below however it didn't dampen my spirits for long.

As we were leaving we drove down past a holiday park and I thought the names on some of the vans were worth a pic.

Whether any of us would have called our camper van "our dream home" is debatable but it had it's moments. We headed from Lake Waihola onto Papatowai passing the picturesque down of Balclutha on the way.

We pulled into the camper van site in literally the middle of nowhere and settled in for the night. If parts of the south island are remote then the Catlins is the epitome of the South Island.

We battened down the hatches and settled in for a stormy night on NZ's south east coast.

Cathal