West of South

The West Coast of the South Island is notorious and notable; notorious for the sand flies (no-see-ems) and notable for its wild beauty.  When I was here in 1981, it was also notorious - to hitchhikers - for the paucity of cars.  A car an hour if you were lucky.  We didn't see many hitchhikers, but we did experience the other two attributes ... big time!

We picked up a campervan in Christchurch and headed into the mountains, with our first van-camping experience near Arthur's Pass. (A number of you have some or a lot of experience with this kind of living, but we are neophytes.)

We stayed in so-called holiday parks, privately owned places with communal kitchens, bathrooms, and showers, some even with playgrounds for kids and ping pong tables. Importantly for old travelers of the modern era, they also provided mostly adequate wifi and plug-ins to power our lights and chargers (see the tangle of cords in the photo below!).

At night, we would roll out the double bed and put up shades for a wee bit of privacy.  Despite our trepidations about being in such close quarters, it was kind of fun and, in a way, convenient, having all our cloths and other stuff with us at all times.  No need to worry about whether we forgot to bring a warm sweater or something, wherever we went, we always had all our stuff.  It also had a fridge (which ran off the car battery), so we could buy and have a decent amount of perishables.

Anyway, after a night at Arthur's Pass, we wound down the west side of the mountains that form the spine of the South Island.  The coastline and coastal highway are beautiful, comparable to US 101 in California and the Great Ocean Road in Victoria, Australia.

 

 

 

 

 

Our first destination on the coast was Punikaki or "Pancake Rocks" (no, Punikaki doesn't mean "pancake" in Maori language, it just sounds like it should).  I wanted us to see this place, as it is one of the few vivid memories I have of my previous visit.

Though very touristy now, the rock formations - limestone layers deposited tens of millions of years ago when this area was deep under the sea - and blow holes are still awesome to see. 

More highlights soon.