10:41pm, High Country Lodge, Twizel.
From this afternoon: Wendy: "What's the name of this place?" Matt: "Twizel" (pronouced Twy-zel) Wendy: "Then Twizel is the place a hate the most here`" Our room at Old Bones (the highest rated backpacker in NZ) was toasty with the radiant heating, and fire burning stove in the main room. We slept well, and were up at 8:30am to pack and have yogurt with bananas for breakfast. It was heavily cloudy again today, with mist developing as we departed ~10am. The weather forecast for Mt Cook looked adequate for our Mueller hut trek tomorrow, but before leaving the east coast, we made a return trip (20km) to the Moeraki Boulders, to visit them during low tide. Similar to yesterday, the wind and light rain were in force along the beach, but this time we had lots of sandy real estate available to explore the round smooth boulders.
Much more room to play around today...
Pop goes the Wendy...
Wendy really liked the boulders...
Cool formations on the rocks...
This one kinda looks like the earth...
We were glad we came back for a 2nd visit...
After an enjoyable visit (and a chance to test out our rain gear), we drove north, stopping at the same fish market we bought our fish at yesterday, and loaded up on some sole and "something else starting with G". Then Wendy realized the hot thermos was missing, so we drove back to Old Bones hostel to retrieve it.
Since we were close to Oamura again, we decided to drive through town and visit the Whitestone Cheese Factory for some cheese sampling. The tasting tray came with: Brie, "Farmhouse" (NZ original), Creamy Havarti, Totara Tasty (aged cheddar), Mt Kyeborn (smoked cheddar), and their signature Windsor Blue (most award winning cheese in NZ). It was good. Would have been even better with some wine and crackers. We peeked into some windows to watch workers packing cheese curds.
I filled up on some cheap east coast gas, while Wendy went to New World and bought some groceries. Then we drove west with a low blanket of cloud covering north to south, with sporadic soup dripping form the skies. The terrain was plain by NZ standards. Eventually we passed by a large green lake, and stopped to check out a hydro-dam releasing beautiful symmetrical waterfalls.
Shortly before Twizel, we stopped at a salmon farm, and I saw a huge fish jump ~15 inches in the air (Wendy missed it).
Then we arrived in Twizel, a small town that was originally built to house construction workers for a dam. I called the Mt Cook DOC, and inquired about the weather. They said visibility would be poor all weekend, so looks like Mueller Hut is out. Wendy's foot is feeling better, so we're going to try the 5 day Rees-Dart track on Sunday. We had 1 day of padding to spare, so looks like that will be used up today. The weather is decent down south for the Rees-Dart.
Our hostel (High Country Lodge) is part of a huge complex. Our room has a TV (useless to us), sink, double and twin bed. Pretty roomy, which is great, since we're finalizing our backpacks for the trek (treks are called tramps here). At 7pm we walked to the kitchen to make dinner, but there was a girls rowing camp that occupied the entire kitchen, so we delayed our dinner 40 minutes. The kitchen was still a circus with people cooking their dinners. There should be more kitchens at this place.Overall, this hostel is not high on my list to return to, in part by the drab small town. Wendy cooked up the fish again, to astounding success. We had salad (minus tomatoes and some lettuce that we left in the last hostel), yams, and cooked mushrooms. There was a pretty amusing family from the US at the table next to us, with 3 young boys who were quite a handful, and a little loud, but funny.
Finally time for dinner, after the big girls' crew camp cleared the kitchen. Our room was big, which came in handy for our backpack prepping...
Planning to stay at Glenorchy tomorrow night, near the start of the Rees Dart track. Wendy did laundry tonight. Waiting for the dryer…
Cold out these days… Can't remember what sunny warm weather looks like. Been near a lot of beaches, but haven't seen a sunny one since I proposed to Wendy a week ago at Abel Tasman.