"Wanaka-racking place!"
Trip Start
Feb 11, 2008
1
50
58
Trip End
Jun 30, 2008
Wanaka,
South Island,
New Zealand
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Really, the most incredible scenery we have seen (Abel Tasman National Park as the exception) in the South Island has been between Haas and the town of Wanaka, situated at the southern end of the huge, long Lake Wanaka. The town is wonderful, quaint, is very friendly and the air smelt of wood smoke fires from the smoking chimneys of the villas and homes in the town. We saw some lovely sunsets over the lake, lighting up the snow clad peaks behind in inks, mauves and reds. Wanaka really comes to life in the winter and summer when folks take to the ski slopes and take to the water sports on the lake in the summer, but we saw the town at its quiet time, the deep breath before the rush of winter, and we really liked it! We discussed the fact that if we had our arms twisted and were told that we HAD to live in New Zealand, we'd choose either the Abel Tasman area or Wannake in which to settle as this town really felt welcoming and felt a little like home as the silver birch trees were yellow with autumn leaf.
We stayed in Wannake for three days and on the second we went horse riding in the beautiful valleys amongst the hills between Wannaka and Queenstown, Jo (now feeling somewhat better after her dose of antibiotics) was a little nervous about ridding a horse on a trek, but I assured her that the horses had western saddles on them and these were a lot harder to fall out of! Anyway, we had a two hour ride on palomino horses amongst some lovely scenery; I went off with five other more experienced riders for a canter and met up with an aching, sore Jo walking around like John Wayne with a contorted face and a distinct limp to the left leg. I was sooo glad to get off the horse myself and I copied Jo's gambling crouched walk from the stable sot the van, before we downed a couple of nurofen and headed back to the campsite for a soak in the hot tub before walking the 20 minutes to the pub in town to watch the semi final rugby match of the Super 14's tournament between the Highlanders (from Dunedin) and the Crusaders (from Christchurch) with Chris and Lisa, a delightful, funny and entertaining couple from Bristol (of all places, although Lisa is from Sydney, Australia originally) - thanks for a great night guys!! By the way, the Highlanders stuffed the Crusaders for a crack at the championship next weekend!!
We left Wannaka with the intention of driving all the way to Christchurch for Tuesday as we want to sell Tilly and get ourselves back to Malaysia for some "top up tan" time in the East of the Peninsular for our last 4-5 weeks of this trip, so we'll let you know when we've waved goodbye to our beloved, trustworthy and dependable home and have flown back to the tropics for some SUN!!!!.
Lake Hawea
