kiwibird: Travelling further south

After leaving Wanaka we travelled first to Clyde in Central Otago, and then on to Invercargill, with lots of family get togethers. We are loving it.

We caught up with David and Catherine at their lovely large holiday house in Clyde. It was also David's 70th birthday too. Yes David and Brian are twins so Brian sent some of his birthday cake along to share with David.

Catherine cooked blue cod and white bait fritters for the birthday dinner. A very special meal. For people who are not New Zealanders, these are local delicacies. The blue cod is a fine fish caught in the deep sea south of here, and the white bait is caught in the local river mouths. The white bait is a very tiny soft white fish, cooked in a light batter.

While in Clyde we went for plenty of long walks, around the streets, down to the cafe for coffee and to look at the old cemetery, with its hundreds of rabbit holes. Apparently the cemetery had this problem a hundred years ago, an ongoing one I think.

We never tire of walking around Clyde, a small place surrounded by mountains, and a fast flowing river. The holiday houses, with some permanent ones, have interesting gardens and lots of ideas for garden designs.

When we walked through the tunnel underneath the main road, it was covered with murals painted by a New Zealand artist. My apologies as I did not write his name down. The paintings were scenes from the bicycle track which starts in Clyde and runs through much of central Otago. They were very good.

We sat in the green and shady gardens of a local cafe and ate delicious ice creams, with raspberries. The sky was a brilliant blue.

The gardens at the cafe. I might add that the temperate climate has brought moisture to my skin and finally healed the battered sun burnt lips.

I thought Walter, Steve, Jackson and Isabel would love the huge courgettes on sale at the fruit and vegetable stall in Clyde. A vegetable that none of them really like. At least I did not let my courgettes grow so large.

We travelled from Clyde down to Invercargill and stayed at David and Catherine's house in Invercargill. Their children and grandchildren came for dinner on two nights and we had a lovely time catching up on all the news. I cannot believe how much the grandchildren have grown during the past two years.

A line up of Catherine, me, Andreena, Margaret, David and Lucy, the cute dog.

David took us for a journey along the south tourist route. The first stop was the museum at Riverton, which is one of the best I have visited. As well as being filled with the history of Riverton, it also provides visual effects that have quite an impact. It makes one really understand about the Maori tribes that lived here, and how they were integrated into the early European settlement.

A view of the Aparima estuary .

The photograph below is of Colac Bay. Not the most flattering photograph of a very beautiful bay. We used to have a holiday house here, and spent many a holiday on the beach, jumping from rock to rock and exploring the local area.

We ate lunch at an upmarket cafe in the ghostly deserted settlement of Orepuki. Orepuki was once, well probably 100 years ago, a thriving small town. Originally it was probably larger than Invercargill, but it has declined somewhat and now houses a pub, a few run down houses, a football field, and derelict shops. Plus the cafe, which is on the tourist trail and has the most delicious food.

The photograph below is of a derelict shop, not the upmarket cafe.

Finally, after much reminiscing, we arrived at the end of the Waiau River, on the western end of the south coast, not far from the town of Tuatapere, where David and Catherine have a shack, which in our terms is more like a holiday house. It can be a wild, stormy area but on the day of our visit it was warm and sunny.

A rest inside the house, which is beautifully appointed and has all the luxuries one would expect from a holiday house.

A view of the mouth of the Waiau River, with the southern ocean behind it. David and his son, James, go whitebaiting at the mouth of this river.

David has a little caravan, very comfortable, plus a toilet trailer, which he places by the river, in order to rest comfortably, while he waits for the white bait to swim into his nets. No sense in roughing it too much.

We went for a walk around Invercargill and took a couple of photographs of the area that is going to be redeveloped during the next few years. The heart has gone out of the shopping area of Invercargill, plus most of the old buildings have been rated as not up to earthquake standards, which means they are not occupied at present. Very sad.

However the flower display in Esk Street was very colourful.

The Cambridge Arcade, with its beautiful tessellated floor, will be no more soon. There are no shops in there anymore. Oh well, progress.

Today we went for a drive through Ryal Bush, which is where I lived for the first 19 years of my life. It is hard to believe that it was once a thriving community, with a shop, garage, hall, church and school. As they were all wooden buildings they have disappeared, with only a new classroom, used by a playgroup, in the grounds of the old school. The school once had tennis courts, football field, and swimming pool, all gone.

The two monkey puzzle trees still stand proud on the front lawn. Funny that the grounds do not seem as large as they were when I was a child. Perspective!

My old home, badly in need of a coat of paint. Again the house seemed tiny compared to the home I remembered.

We celebrated our tour with a lunch of oysters in batter, deep fried with chips, plus coleslaw to make it a healthy meal.

Deep fried oysters in batter are a real Southland delicacy. It is the beginning of the oyster season here, and these ones have been dredged from the sea. No oyster farming here.

A view of the Basilica behind the trees.

A drive to Oreti Beach completed the day. This is where Burt Munro, the World's Fastest Indian, raced his motorcycle during the 1950s.

That is our rental car, which did not get bogged on the beach, by the way. The sand was very hard here.