Invercargill to Te Anau

We had another rain storm and high wind overnight. This time it did not keep us awake although it caused us to re-think our plans for the day. The drive along the Southern Scenic Route to Te Anau was supposed to be spectacular and we did not want to do it in high wind and rain.

The forecast was for clearing by afternoon so we decided to take a diversion south to the town of Bluff and see what we could see there. This is a port town at the southern most tip of mainland New Zealand and was prominent in whaling days and as it is the closest port to Australia. Today it is the ferry terminal for the trip to Stewart Island, about 40 km south, and a still shipping hub for the region, especially timber.

Bluff is a bit of a ramshackle town with abandoned buildings and old warehouses. There is some interesting wall art however.

Here, Monte the Moose is at the southern most point of his trip.

We took a drive up a very steep road to an overlook of the harbour. Luckily we were in-between rain showers but the wind was a pretty steady 75 kph.

After Bluff we had to drive through Invercargill again and decided to have a bit of a look around as we had not had time to do so last night. Very wide streets, low buildings and a streetscape right out of the 60's.

One of the historic attractions is the water tower constructed in 1889 out of 300,000 bricks! It is no longer in use due to earthquake safety concerns.

We then stopped at E Hayes and Sons Ltd. http://www.ehayes.co.nz  The best hardware store I have ever seen! Why you say? The owner is a fanatical collector of all things motorcycle and interspersed among the wide aisles are vintage motorcycles dating back to the early 1900's.

The feature is the original motorcycle that was immortalized in the movie "The World's Fastest Indian" starring Anthony Hopkins. If you haven't seen it, a really great movie (might still be on Netflix). The movie mockup fairing and the original chassis.

I could have spent a couple of hours in the store but the weather was clearing and we started our trek to Te Anau.

Our first stop was Gemstone Beach which sometimes produces semi-precious stones on the beach but it was just too windy to go exploring.

Love the Wicked camper vans! Each one has a unique paint job.

Next pull off was McCrackens Rest. Nothing between here and Antarctica. Still blowing hard with big surf.

Heading north now we had a quick toilet stop at Tuatapere, the sausage capital of NZ.

The next stop was for lunch at the Clifden Suspension Bridge, built in 1898 to replace a punt shuttle used for moving sheep across the river.

Apparently, some sort of engineering achievement.

Let's see, in Canada we were building power plants and in New Zealand sheep bridges??

The mountains were now coming into view with green grazing pastures in the foreground. A great photo op. I learned not to lean on the fence to steady the camera. Electric fence, ouch!

Have I mentioned there are lots of sheep here?

We arrived at our motel/apartment at around 4:00 pm. A nice place right across the street from the lake.

After settling in, we did a short walk downtown. A classy resort town in a beautiful setting. Glad we are here for four nights.

Not only do they have one way streets....

We threw some steaks on the barbie and had a nice relaxing dinner then I went across the street to try a time lapse video of the sunset. Not spectacular tonight but I am improving my video technique.

Click here to view..    http://youtu.be/1mXbQvH1Iww

The Japanese tourists are always entertaining to watch. Is that Gandalf on the right?

A little late posting today due to the limited bandwidth.....