I got a bit cold because of all the soppy wetness of Invercargill, so, uncharacteristically, I was up before Keiron, and very lively at that!

We took the tent down in record time, as it was, after 24 hours, still raining. We set off at 9.30, stopped at the supermarket, petrol station and bank (especially the last chore is getting more and more painful as our trip progresses. At least we got all twenties, makes it look like a big pile of money...) and took the 'Southern Scenic Route'.

The Southern Scenic Route involves: more sheep, more rolling green hills, but luckily significantly less rain. We wanted to stop at Cathedral Caves, which are on the beach, but as it wasn't low tide, we couldn't go (the caves get flooded at high tide). Instead, we stopped at Florence Hill, which had a great lookout over the coastline.

We took a detour to Purakaunui Falls, where there was a ten minute walk to a scenic waterfall. However, the peaceful trickling thing we saw in the brochure bore little resemblance to the torrent of fierce, muddy water that it was now! The vegetation around formed a mini-rainforest, I never knew New Zealand actually had rainforest... we travel and learn.

Further down the South coast, we drove to Nugget Point, over unsealed and quite scary roads hugging the cliffs. We stopped so I could finally take a sheep photo (most of the sheep we had seen looked like they needed a wash - they looked like old grey socks rather than fluffy white towels), but all the bleating cowards ran away when they saw me coming!

Anyway, Nugget Point was quite spectacular, with a lighthouse at the end and steep cliffs being battered by the waves of the insanely blue sea beneath. A few people pointed at some moving specks of black, which were sealions. I'll have to take their word for it...

We drove past the unfortunately named Kaka Point to Balclutha, where we joined SH1 again to Dunedin. After some sterling navigating from me to the top 10, we were told their tent sites were waterlogged and there was no room at the inn, so we drove to St Kilda Beach, to the Dunedin Holiday Park instead.

Bizarrely, when we arrived, the place was swarming with vintage Beetle cars and vans, it was as if we had stepped into some alternative universe. Turns out there is a kind of car rally going on.

We had a very late lunch (it was about 5!) and sorted ourselves out. In the evening we had a stir fry dinner and a lovely bottle of NZ wine. It was pretty chilly in the tent and I slept in my thermal trousers... They kept me warm though.