Day 17 - Now what?

Slow getting out of bed this morning, despite the potential attractions of a mountain dawn - watched it through the side window! It's not so windy initially, nor so hot of course. The shower is a strange Heath-Robinson arrangement, with a chain to be hooked on a nail to keep it running, but it's rather like warm rain, splashy and comforting, and there's a stool to keep your stuff dry on.

Our plans today are not made at all. We're supposed to be meeting Charles up at Lake Clearwater tomorrow - he'll be there 11.30-12ish, and we're not too far from there now…

*** Some time later... ***

What, as ever, an interesting day! Sitting beside Lake Clearwater, which is true to its name, watching the changing light, clouds and rainy mist over the mountains in the distance. Right now, they are milkily obscured, but with the potential for a band of sunlight from the distant brightening sky to light up the furthest slopes. It's actually raining here, in s very desultory and uncommitted way, just enough to smell like rain and dampen the grass underfoot. How did we get here? Headed for Hakatere and kept going is the simple answer…

But before that we turned right out of the Pudding Hill Road, back on Hwy 72, with a plan to maybe visit Alford Scenic Reserve, but we must have missed the turn. Instead, we ended up visiting Alford cafe, a very smart roadside venue that would be incongruous if it weren't for the rural chiller installed in the corridor to the unisex single-seat toilet, and the cosy front room with comfy chairs in which we drank coffee, ate the inevitable date scone, and read the local(-ish) newspaper. The English guy who runs it, presumably with his apparently equally English wife, came here, or more specifically Ashburton, because of the quality of the schools and the proximity to Christchurch International Airport. No six hour drive for him from further South! We also found some wire mesh moas, and the Alford Rural fire fighting equipment store, and that a boy is missing presumed dead after disappearing swimming in a river in Christchurch.

From there, having missed our opportunity with one Scenic Reserve, and found coffee, we chanced it with Sharplin Falls. Approached via a single track dirt road, leading into woods with twists and turns, the car park offers several destinations - Sharplin Falls, The Mt Somers Sub-Alpine Walkway, with optional accommodation in Pinnacles Hut or the Woolshed Hut, or ascending to Mt Somers' peak itself. Since the latter are 4-5 hours minimum, we settled for the 45 minute trek to the falls - good choice. A serious bit of ascending, made easier by a well-laid path and constructed steps, leads via a cantilevered gantry or gallery under rocks and a final scramble over broken boulders, to a beautiful pair of waterfalls (over missus). Jen clambered down to the water, and back up to the track, with a great smile of satisfaction to be so engaged in the bush. (Probably an old Fairport Convention song, were truth e'er told). We met some folk as we walked back, parents, child and grandparents (g-mum struggling down steps, God alone knows how she managed going up that many!), a young couple, an older couple whose female bent our ears on the subject of the 179 steps she'd so far encountered, like we might be interested having already met them and more, and a pair of elderly female companions who were scampering down the early part of the track as we had before we met the steps!! Jen confessed that she'd been counting the steps in the flights, and revealed that very often staircases have an odd number - these were often 25, with some at 29 made up of 11+11+7, three primes. And who says people aren't secretly obsessive?

We didn't stay longer than for a cup of tea, because the black flies were beginning to zero in, with me getting hit and Jen a couple of times. Pass the anti-histamine cream, honey! From there, we drove through Staveley and turned to go through the village of Mount Somers - a place there sells diesel, handy - and we hit the dirt road some 10km from Lake Clearwater itself. Driving on dirt is hard - we did about 30 klicks, which seems to be a reasonable compromise of speed versus vehicular self-disassembly, and has the advantage of not raising too much dust. We were passed early on by a Porsche Cayenne Turbo, which was probably doing 70 or more, huge dust cloud, yawn. The problem is the little "stutter bumps", and I tried to damp them by driving on the loose gravel, which seemed smoother and had the effect of also not having the wheels in the ruts and the ridge banging the underside about. 

Lake Cave precedes Clearwater - for "boaties" Charles declared when I spoke to him yesterday. The Cayenne was casually parked at the lake edge, with its presumable occupants hanging around. It's not there now, so who knows what that rush was about. Clearwater is bigger, and reached, along with the notional campsite, by driving past the "huts" or baches (pronounced "batches" in case you've not heard that…), which are hugely varied in size and pretentiousness. The one in the most prominent position is enormous, built of grey-painted concrete blocks with large windows and insanely tidy turf and picnic benches outside. Others are little more than corrugated shacks - one looks like a large brick-built pizza oven with a shed attached!

The sun was burning down and the wind was truly howling, a NWester, when we arrived. I parked the van to shelter the side door, which was very nice while we had lunch. Since then, the wind has come and gone, the rain and sun have come and gone and come (and gone!), a rainbow blessed us for maybe ten minutes, Alma, Low Peak, Myrmidon, The Thumbs and Split Peak have been visible or shrouded in mist - you name it. I love this place! I thought it was dry and arid when we arrived, but it's not. The rain has damped the dust, the tui is making its elusive, enigmatic music over in the trees (if that's what it is, Charles says later there aren't any here), and I'm really hoping that I'll be able to sail the lake when Charles arrives tomorrow. Someone was totally blasting on it today earlier, some nice double duck gybes (yup, that's turn the sail twice - eat that, Wolfgang!). On the way back from our reconnaissance walk, I stopped to look at a plywood and fibreglass Formula board knock-off, and was startled by a missel thrush staring up at me from about 2 feet away. We sat and studied each other until we mutually decided we were done, then went on our separate ways, me with a headshake, thrushie with a admonishing cluck. I can't wait to see what the stars look like from here, and what tomorrow brings.