Loos with Views, and... An Aurora at Last!

Saturday 18 April

With wet weather in the forecast, we’d hopped onto BookMe.co.nz the night before & picked up tix for the Highlands Motorsports Museum for just $5 each!

So despite the grey, blustery day we got a wiggle on, threw on our warmest clothes and went to check out "Highlands - Experience the Exceptional" with its cool motor racing circuit and accompanying museum & attractions.

Loads of fab cars & motorcycles, mostly with local connection, fascinating autosport facts & photos, go karting, crazy golf and the funkiest toilets ever!

There were all manner of exciting cars - road cars & racing cars, old cars & new - and a weird & wonderful selection - the Stig (sorry, Stag), a snow-ped, Transformer, a toothpick style dragster, a SIX wheeler race car and … “nice beaver!” 🦫 with tenuous connection to cars as we know them! In that same category - a gull winged DeLorean - cue “Roads? Where we're going, we don't need roads!” in Christopher Lloyd's voice!

The racing Hillman Imp made me giggle - my grandpa drove one of these and once got a speeding ticket for doing 36 in a 30mph zone… we were shocked it could get over 30mph!!! An LA Highway Patrol car had been bought as an almost empty shell and gradually reconstructed over several years… love the donuts on the dash board! The classic red of the Ferrari grabbed your attention - all shiny & polished up, and decorated all over with the iconic dancing horse. The Formula Ford car brought happy memories of cheering on Andrew Gilbert Scott winning the Formula Ford Festival at Brands Hatch in 1983 in something like this! And then there was the fabulous three-wheeler Morgan - Andrew Gilbert Scott’s mum’s family created these astonishingly classic vehicles which were handcrafted individually in Malvern until well into the 1990s!

Although we are in the heart of wine country, you really shouldn't drink and drive, but you can visit the wine aroma room - each bottle had a scent by it of one of the key aroma notes, which you had to guess… I failed miserably, but Louis, the wine drinker, did better! I would have been better at sampling the cookies in the cafe!

No visit to the Highlands Motorsport Park is complete without a visit to the "Loo with a View!" and there are several to choose from, each with a one way window looking out over the track!!! Naturally I chose The Royal Suite, though TBH it's golden opulence owed more to DT (who was honoured in the urinals 😂) than to Buckingham Palace!

We wandered down to check out the go-karting and the main track and were impressed by the apocalyptic clouds fighting for dominance in the skies overhead - East meets West, and who will win?

Back at the entrance I checked out the gardens and the spooky installation - I guess there is a pun in here about a bug? But do spiders count? Either way - it’s weird and creepy!!! We'd spent a leisurely morning at the museum & track, so from there it was back to Banjo for lunch and a snooze while the wind still roared around us. Wind was still whipping up the waters & driving waves into the shore of Lake Dunstan when we woke, but the sun was finding holes in the clouds to peep through.

Late afternoon we set out for a stroll to explore around Lowburn inlet & village - where we met two lovely dogs and marvelled at the house prices for new builds that appeared to be perched up on giant rabbit warrens!! Quite a nice wee spot though, with views over the lake and the inlet as well as the glacial terraces. I was very taken with the ANZAC memorial soldier on the side of one of the houses.

Dinner in Banjo - crispy pork belly chunks (slightly over the food budget, but well worth it!) - as the clouds turned a gentle pastel shade over the lake and we watched the latest video from Leopards Go Wild.

Then around 8pm, I wandered over to the toilet block and realised something was up… literally! The sky was a strange shade and a cloud arced overhead with an odd tinge & texture. Quickly consulted the online Aurora Alert for the area and it confirmed my suspicions - we were in the midst of an aurora! Rushed back to tell Louis and the campers parked on either side of us and we all spent the next hour trying to capture it or simply viewing it through our phone lenses.

It was absolutely spectacular! Messaged Jenny & Leanne as they, like us, had not yet seen an aurora and Leanne managed to catch it from Pinders Pond too. What an awesome treat to finally see a full colour, glowing, shimmering, arcing Aurora Australis! 🥰