Haast Pass

Trip Start Nov 06, 2003
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Trip End Jan 24, 2004


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Saturday, December 13, 2003

In the morning's fine light, our fears of sandflies seem ludicrous. We venture south off the highway until the road becomes wet red mud, then saunter into nature (and another World Heritage area) on the intimate Hapuka Estuary Walk. The paths and raised boardwalk guide us through forests of rimu and kahikatea to a tidal estuary. The earthy colours and chorus of vegetation make a nice change from the singular icy grandeur of the glaciers.

Looping back to Haast, we stop and gawk at the visitor centre displays on native wildlife (becoming scarce), fisheries (threatened) and vegetation (chopped down), then leave the west coast through the Haast Pass.

A truism of travel: the fullest days with the most spectacular scenery get short-shrift in journals. One can say only so much about landscape. Normally the pictures are left to paint the thousand eloquences, but our Nikon lies relatively idyll as we range from wetlands up alongside the confused and numbing water of the Haast River to Mt. Aspiring National Park.

One reason for the lack of photos has to do with our first stop at a river gorge to gawk and eat our melting ice cream. A few campervans are already drawn up to the edge, their occupants taking in the vista. We leap out into ankle-high grass, already warming in the sun.

Dammit, a sandfly bite! And another! The things are massing in the grass!

We leap back into the car, panting noisily in the hush of the interior, the gorge's roar suddenly silenced by the slamming doors. Then Julie looks at her legs and cries, "Aaaah! They're in the car!" I open the door to shoo some out, and another regiment pours in along the baseboards.

The next few minutes must look hysterical to the occupants of the campervans. It is certainly hysteria in the car as the three of us stomp and poke our way to dominance. Through this all, and indeed for the duration of the trip, I am the only recipient of a sandfly bite.

After, we gain sustenance from the softened ice cream, then set off once more on what I think is the most variable few hours of scenery in New Zealand. The road skips along from the lush green of the river gorges to another collection of snow-topped sentinels, then threads between the glacial sheen of Wanaka and Hawea lakes - mountains jutting up from their shores - leveling out on the vast plains of the interior. The light works down these long avenues of lesser peaks, drawing us on through farm land to Wanaka.
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