Waitangi Day Roadtrip to Manapouri

Friday 6 February

After 4 nights at Albert Town and with Russ on leave for Waitangi Day, we were set to board our whare-waka and set sail southish on the long journey to Manapouri. Louis and I popped into Scroggin again to stock up with amazing croissants for lunch 🥐 (Pembroke Patisserie was closed for the holiday but somehow Scroggin had a fresh delivery of their amazing pastries!) then we said sad farewells to Albert Town and swung by McKeowns to fill up with diesel before hitting the road. - where would we be without McKeown’s Card Fuel deal?!? Diesel from truck stops at special NZMCA member rates - saves us a fortune!

The route was really lovely, crossing farmland, plains, trekking down the side of Lake Dunstan, through the Kawerau Gorge, a crawl through Frankton, then off again down the eastern edge of Lake Wakatipu, into Southland and across to Fiordland. We stopped at Jackson's Orchards in Cromwell for fruit & ice cream (biggest real fruit ice cream ever!!!) then again at Roaring Meg (AKA Moaring Reg, eh, Jeremy?!?) to watch the wild waters.

Headed on out of the Kawerau Gorge, through Gibbston and a wee while later we detoured to Arrow Town and, after almost losing the Fernandivan in a too tiny carpark, set up at a reserve to have lunch by the Arrow River. Russ got the Weber out and cooked us up bacon & eggs - they had them in croissants 🥐 , I added them to a salad 🥗

We found a beautiful spot by the Arrow River for lunch in the sun - with a visit from lovely Luna, a springer/collie mix who wanted to be our friend 🖤

The push south from overly busy Queenstown, along the eastern shore of Lake Wakatipu was stunning in the dappled sunshine, and our final pit stop was Five Rivers in Lowther for tea & a scone (newly purchased and reopened since we cycled here from Lumsden last year) then the final push to Manapouri where we arrived to grey skies and plenty of space at the NZMCA.

Settled in, had a wee walk about at Home Creek and then Russ BBQed steak for dinner before we retired for an early night after almost 6 hours on the road.