Day 13 – Thursday 19th December

Day 13 – Thursday 19th December

No Whales for the Welsh - On to Arthur’s Pass

Funny old day. Last night the wind blew up and the heavens opened. So at around 2am this morning I was out in my boxers retracting our awning as the wind blew. Then half an hour later as the heavens opened out again recovering the washing. An extra night time shower I could have done without.

So when we awoke I ran the Whale Watch company expecting them to have cancelled but we were told to turn up at 12.15pm. So we hung around until 12.15 pm – turned up and they cancelled. Bloody great. So we have rearranged this to try again on the 27^th. That means doubling back on ourselves the day before we fly out to Auckland. It also means we have to get a shift on. So as soon as we were cancelled we hit the road and drove. And drove.

We are caped 15 miles beyond this

We are now camped up the West side of Arthur’s Pass – one of the few crossing points of the Southern Alpine range.  The drive through these mountains was spectacular. We stopped at Arthur’s pass village and walked up to a waterfall called the Devil’s punch bowl. The walk up to it was the Devil’s arse-hole – plenty of steps.

The Devil's Punch Bowl

After a feed in the village we carried and were advised that is we wanted to see keas there was a good spot at the lookout point some 6 miles up the road. Indeed it was. The Keas soon appeared. We were very good and didn’t feed them. In revenge the keas started pulling the silicone sealant off the camper roof! We escaped and headed on. www.rankers.co.nz reviews all the camp sites in NZ. You will see my reviews here too. We are now at Jacksons camping ground. They also have the GPS coordinates is you want a satellite view.

No bread = we eat your vehicle

So write this. Drink wine. Try and plan tomorrow and hot the sack. Nos da pawb.

Thing I learned today:

• Don’t mess with Keas