Where in the World is Saura

We are sitting in a cafe surrounded by a wireless hotspot, in Twizel of all places. The town does have an interesting history. It was founded in 1966 as a construction town to build the dam and hydro system in the area, and was slated for destruction upon the completion of the project in 1985. To the protests of the town, it was saved and acts as a stopoff spot for tourists seeking the majesty of Mt Cook.

We began just a few days ago, and spent our first night at Lake Coleridge. I liked it even better the second time, and we had the pleasure of viewing a night sky that had been previously obscured by a full moon. The stars were so amazing, and bright, and numerous. We’ve never seen the Milky Way in such detail, and there were millions more stars than I’ve ever been able to view in the States. With this amazing view came extremely strong winds, which continued to the morning. We quickly packed up and headed off. Oh, and we finally christened our van. I knew her name would come to us once we got on the road, and her name is now Betty. Good ole Betty hasn’t let us down.

       

Our next stop, after making lunch at a picnic stop at the Rakia Gorge, was Timaru. That stay was fairly uneventful. It is on a bay and the town seems to shut down about five o’clock. This is where we spent our second night before moving on again. We went to Lake Tekapo and met up with the other caravans and charter busses at the Church of the Good Shepherd, touted as the most photographed church in New Zealand. On a clear day a window at the back of the church frames Mt Cook over the lake. Unfortunatley it was cloudy and we missed out on that one.
   

We thought briefly about staying in Tekapo for the night. There is an observatory there and a company does star gazing tours. We really wanted to do this, but it was expensive, and since it was overcast we decided it may not be worth it. Best to experience somthing like this on a crisp and clear night. Plus, we figured that Dad would love to do this, so we’ll just take you when you come over. Since the star gazing was out, there didn’t seem to be enough left to do to get us through the day, so we kept on trucking to Lake Pukaki. There was a free campsite by the lake waiting for us there.

I’ll just throw this one up on the blog and continue in a new entry, just to split things up. I also want to apologize about the small picture size. We haven’t been able to figure out how to manage them since the site that hosts out blog changed the software, but we’ll get them changed as soon as possible.

We are finally off on our road trip around the south island.  We were put off our schedule a bit on Sunday when we went to an outdoor concert at the university, but it was worth it.  As all the Ashevillians will understand, dreadlocks and the smell of cloves really made me feel at home.  It was a beautiful day without a cloud in the sky, and with all the great music, we really could have been in WNC at a show.  I guess that style translates well here.  Anyway, now we are set to go.  Alan is packing up the van, I’m seasoning our new little dutch oven, and we’ll soon be on our way.

First we are heading inland to Lake Coleridge, then we’ll make our way down to the coast to Timaru, then we’ll head back inland to Mt Cook.  Our grand scheme is to go down the east coast, around the southern tip, then up the west coast in a month before Alan has to be back for the poker championships.  We just found out that the Australian who won the World Series is playing at the event, as well as a few other big name pros.  So this will be a great experience for Al.  Well, we must be going, kia ora mates!

Al wanted to get some pics of our trip to Lake Coleridge up before we leave for Wellington tomorrow, so here's another update.  Over Valentine's Day we decided to go on a short camping trip to test out the van ... [Continue reading this entry]

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These first few posts will be a synopsis of my first few days in Christchurch. We've been so busy running errands, adjusting, putting the house together, exploring, and meeting family that this is the first ... [Continue reading this entry]