Down the West Coast

Posted on by

Wednesday 4th June

Didn’t get to see the Glaciers as the weather is to bad, very low cloud so we are going to push on down the coast, heading to Haast, see what we can see along the way hoping of course that it stops raining. It wasn’t to far and it did stop raining and cloud lifted as the day went on, we can live with overcast not a problem. By the time we got to Ship Creek it wasn’t to bad so we stopped, just love this place, the beach is usually full of drift wood all shapes and size’s. The sea is always rough being on the west. Makes for nice photography.

Ship Creek This is what the area is like, pools of water with perfect reflections, the fauna is native and beautiful.

Coast Road at Ship Creek The trees in the back ground are called kahitkatea native to NZ.

Ocean West Coast NZ This is how the beach is and I feel this is quiet calm today. From here we carried on down to Haast and the weather is turning again to rain so decided to get as far as we could hoping for Hawea over the Haast Pass. Saw some of the waterfall’s but just not good for photo’s. As we were travelling along through Makaroa it started snowing behind us as you can see in the image below.Snowing in the hillsOld ShedThis old shed is just down from the image above, a wee bit of sunlight coming through. We arrived at Lake Hawea and stayed in the camping ground as we needed power for heating, very cold. The camp ground is ordinary and hot water is scarce but got the washing and drying all done so was grateful for that.  A lot of Autumn colours are still around on some trees and laying on the ground, very pretty.

Lake Matheson

Posted on by

Sunday 1st June

The weather has turned wet and very cold, very low cloud so not much visibility. We spent the day catching up with other family members, people coming and going all day, perfect weather for just catching up. We got to bed at 9 pm, earliest in 3 days. A wonderful day.

Monday 2nd June

Queens birthday weekend in NZ today, looks like a fine day and we are heading off to Lake Matheson down the west coast, also looking in at the glaciers. When we got to Lake Matheson we did the walk right around as needed to find the best spot for early morning shots of the Mt Cook and Mt Tasman, if the clouds are king to us. The walk was 1 1/2 hours very pretty in the bush and the sounds of the birds.

Lake Matheson Beech ForestTuesday 3rd June

This is the track into the area we wanted to go, but we did it in the dark at 6 am, I had forgotten that the sun rose much later in NZ winter, we were up at 4 am cooking breakfast of bacon, sausages, eggs and toast as I knew it was going to be some time before we got back to the camper and in the cold you need heaps of fuel for the body to last the distance.  It took us 45 min to do the walk in the dark, it was very steep tracks in places and in the bush area’s was slippery and finally we got to Reflection Island and waited patiently.

IMG_6559

This is what all the fuss was for, one is pretty lucky to get the clouds to move away and you need to be quick about it to capture the mountain. This is Mt Cook, Mt Tasman is in cloud to the right.

Farm on the flats

This is the view we had on the return from our morning shoot. Fog as the sun tried to shine through the clouds, it was extremely cold at first light this morning but no wind so that was helpful.

Heading off over the Arthur’s Pass

Posted on by

Saturday 31st May

We are heading off and going over the Arthur ‘s Pass to the West Coast. Left the family at 10 am our first sighting of snow on the Southern Alps was at Darfield. We made heaps of stops taking photo’s along the way, had lunch at Lake Pearson. We had just finished eating and packing everything away when I noticed the big storm clouds rolling in over the Alps from the West Coast, I knew from old that we better get moving, so we did just that. Got to Broken River and the road was closed for maintenance so we took photo’s from up the tops. Just before Greymouth we turned off and headed for Hokitika where there was a family member having a 70th birthday. I had a Koru to pick up in at the Greenstone Center which I had made for me. We got to my family place at 4.15 pm. Caught up, chatting taking photos, the party went well and heaps of great stories were told of the good old hunting days from which we all did for many years, so many laughs and I think the heads on the deer get better every year. Such a good laugh.

Southern Alps  Taken from Darfield, so majestic are these Southern Alps.

Broken River area This is the Broken River area, some of the filming was done here for the Lord of the Rings I have been told.

Arrival Christchurch

Posted on by

Thursday 29th May

We got into Christchurch at 11 pm, very cold 1.1 deg, my cousin’s had been waiting for us since 10 pm, our plane was late leaving Brisbane.

We went to my Aunties place and chattered until 1.30 am, so tired but so neat to catch up and see family members.

Friday 30th May

Had a good nights sleep, up at 8.15 am it was still quiet dark, I’d forgotten how it is in winter, temperature was very cool 2.1 deg frost, we have a lot to do today, get the groceries and go over to pick up the campervan for our travels. Once the girls dropped us off at the Maui camper hire center we then did some looking around at Scarborough, Antigua boat sheds on the Avon, saw Shag Rock The Cave all very nice. Went back to my Auntie’s and we had a big gathering of Whanau ( family ) and got to bed late again, it was worth it so neat to see my Whanau.

Antigua Boat Sheds

Shag Rock

The top image is of the Antigua Boat Sheds, very well known in Christchurch on the Avon River, this river runs through the city.

The second image is of the Shag Rock out form the peninsula at Scarborough Park and foot of the Port Hills.