Friday 5th November: An early start this morning as we had a ferry to catch! It had been raining since the early hours and was still raining when we left the campsite heading for Bluff, the ‘Lands End’ of New Zealand. By the time we got to the Ferry it was more showery but was blowing somewhat and the swell was at about 1.5m. The catamaran to Stewart Island (population about 400) took about 100 but there were only half that on board; the ride across was about an hour long at about 25 knots through choppy seas.... exhilarating if your breakfast behaved!
It was dry on arrival but with grey skies though we only had a few showers during the day. We opted for coffee at the ‘Just Cafe’ before deciding on the plan of action, it was then on to the Ruggedy Range Wilderness Experience booking office where we opted for the island tour with the two Dutch people who were already there. After a quick conversation all four agreed that a tour modified to allow us a walk back round one of the many headlands would be ideal, with an opt out option if the weather deteriorated drastically!
There are only 26km of roads on the island (most of it is a conservation area, the Rakiura National Park) so we had a tour of the only township (Oban) before heading to all the extremities possible including Leask Bay, Deep Bay, round Back Road and across to Lee Bay. The sky was looking rather grey when our driver stated that it was decision time regarding the walk, but with nobody being brave enough to wimp out the walk was on!
The Horseshoe Point Track keeps (very!) close to the edge of the headland which sits between Horseshoe Bay and Halfmoon Bay, which through a quirk of history have had their names transposed and hence each one’s name best describes the other. The path climbed high and then plunged to sea level repeatedly through the 1.5hr walk, sections of path were quite vertigo inducing dirt tracks close to the cliff tops, other parts crossed golden sandy beaches. At the end of the track we joined the road and wandered onto a few beaches (devoid of people) until at Butterfield Beach we came across a large male Fur Seal. On our approach he raised his head and promptly put it back down, clearly seeing us as no threat; we did report it to the Department of Conservation office in case he was in trouble but apparently it is quite normal for them to just sleep on the beach for hours before returning to the sea; clearly they have few enemies in the locality....
We finished our visit with a walk over the headland closest to the ferry terminal which gave us superb views of the harbour from one side and led us down to more golden beaches on the other. We explored a few rock pools before passing back over the headland to catch the return ferry; the trip back was quite a bit calmer and included sighting a leaping dolphin which was a great bonus.
Before heading back to the campsite we headed to the end of the Bluff Peninsula which is apparently 18,958km from London!
Saturday we had no plans other than the need to stock up on provisions so we wandered in to Invercargill, shopped, and then spent some time in Queens Park which included a ‘winter garden’ (hot house), an aviary with a wide range of rescued native birds, animal areas, ponds, and gardens. We then headed off on a circular tour along the coast to Riverton where we had lunch at The Rocks overlooking the Bluff Peninsula. We then continued through Orepoki heading inland through Te Tua, Pikopiko and returning via Otautau and Isla Bank.
Tomorrow we plan to head off to Manapouri on the edge of the Fiordland National Park where we expect to have views of Mount Titiroa, the Flat Mountain and Cathedral Peaks.
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