What's up Doc?

Wednesday 18 December

After a good night’s sleep (thanks still to the Sealegs drugs!) we awoke to a sunny but still extremely chilly morning in Waikawa, just outside Picton. We packed up slowly and headed into town with time to kill before heading to the next campsite.

Louis did some slightly frustrating camping chores while I perused op shops and a gallery. Loved the Fat Face Christmas sweater at the Hospice shop but was good and left it there! At the Artofact Gallery I became slightly obsessed by Black River (the circle painting below) - it was so evocative and eye catching... the gallery owner tried to sell it to us but there's nowhere to hang it in Banjo! We dibbled in the chilly waters of the Sound and had a stroll along the Picton waterfront.

Back in February coming down to collect the hoodlum hounds we had stopped into Toastie Lords to get Louis a coffee - ever since then I have had a craving for their fabulous toasties so we popped in there for lunch. Louis had the Ivan (pastrami & pickle with their trademark 4 cheeses) while I went classic with Bruce (ham and 4 cheeses). Watching the melted butter being slathered onto the sarnies before they hit the panini/toastie press, you just knew they would be all crunchy & delicious! We sat at the waterfront to eat them and waved away the gulls and sparrows who were pretty keen to join us for lunch!

The road to Momorangi Bay was pretty steep, narrow and windy so not ideal for a big caravan - but Louis guided Banjo safely round the Sounds and we arrived with time to spare before check in.

This was to be our first DOC (Department of Conservation) campsite - I had presumed the DOC sites would be quite basic and back to nature, but the facilities here are great and we were able to get a powered site too.

A sign at the campsite warns that there are 161 bends between here and Picton to make sure to have a sick bag for the kid... what about us grown-ups?

We were allocated the biggest site in the camp, right by the waters edge. An amazing spot!

Louis popped in for a swim which turned out to be a wee bit chillier than he anticipated and I wandered down to the jetty in the glorious sunshine.

We spotted a path running out to the left of the bay and decided to see where that went. It was a lovely 2km stroll along the cliff path to The Grove via Aussie Bay, which was just perfect in the dappled sunlight of the surrounding bush. Stopping at Aussie Bay we were almost ambushed by a very brave hen like creature who turned out to be a Weka which is a Maori hen and lives wild in various parts of Aotearoa, mainly the South Island. There seemed to be Weka territorial wars going on as 2 younger Weka burst out of the copse and ran around comically like a cartoon chicken!tThere were roadworks going on along the road above the path and at one point we came across a walkway below an enormous retaining wall - quite a feat of engineering.

We braved the midges to have dinner down by the waterfront then watched as the sun tried to set, but kept getting trapped behind clouds.. Who could ask for a better start to this South Island adventure? Well, maybe a little more warmth - the sun was glorious but the winds have been icy most of the day!