Day 19 Monday
Waking up on Cape Foulwind, it was, surprise surprise, raining again. We had planned to go back to the seal colony on our way to our next stop, but the thought of spending 2 hours driving to our next destination in soaking wet clothes, just didn’t seem terribly appealing. There was also the sumptuous breakfast to consider. All manner of cereals, home made jams, bread and home made cakes were on offer, plus as soon as we appeared, Karen popped her head out of the kitchen to ask if we wanted some scrambled eggs. So walking in the rain to see a few bedraggled seals, lost out to a long, very filling, lovely breakfast. In Wellington, we had felt like we were stealing, when we hid some of our breakfast pastries in our bag. Here, Karen was literally forcing bags of her home made cakes on everyone as they were leaving!
Our next stop was a town, recommended by Hellie and with a fab web site that proclaims Hokitika - the cool little town. http://www.hokitika.org/
However to get there we would be driving down "The Great Coast Road”, which is one of the Top 10 Coastal Drives in the world according to Lonely Planet. Now to most people, that would have instant appeal, but unfortunately, I am a bit of a worrier and so felt compelled to find out why. This how one web site described it…..Do you know those bags on aeroplanes that are designed to throw up in? Take some of these if you plan on driving on the west coast. It’s like driving on a roller coaster, sort of, except you’re probably going faster, it lasts hours and hours and your chances of vomiting are much higher. Sounds great I know!!!! But driving through what's known as “Glacier County” is a once in a lifetime experience.
So to say I was apprehensive would be the understatement of the century - I was pooing my pants and we hadn’t even got there yet.
As it happens, despite the ever present rain, it was so breathtakingly beautiful, we were rendered speechless ( which made a change - we Pergande women can babble on for hours).
We made frequent stops, so that Lottie could enjoy it too - taking her eyes off the road, to enjoy the scenery, even for a split second, could have resulted in a Thelma and Louise moment.
We took pictures, lots of them, but they will never do justice to the sheer magnificence of that coastline.
My trusty research had thrown up another place of stunning natural beauty that was on our route to Hokitika - the Pancake rocks.
They were not hard to miss because after miles and miles of nothing except rugged coastline flanked by huge mountains, we came across a large car park, with 2 cafe’s and 3 gift shops. It was still raining, but we were fairly close to our final destination of the day and so felt it was worth getting a bit wet, to see this unusual natural phenomenon.
We were so used to having incredible beauty spots all to ourselves, we were a bit put out by the amount of people crowding around the viewing areas. However, we were starting to realise that an awful 📷lot of people have the attention span of a goldfish and presumably, just want to tick these amazing sites off a “things you have to do/see/experience in New Zealand”
So just a little patience and the ability to pick the best spot to hover, guarentees you the best view in the house within a minute or two.
We did read all the notices and signs explaining how the rocks and stacks form in this unique pancake fashion, but I’m afraid my ability to retain anything Geology related is non-existent. (It was the same in the Galapagos) So all I can say is that they were pretty spectacular and well worth the stop.
Also worth stopping for, was the yummy coffee and cake we had after we had seen the rocks and the delightful gift shops.
On arriving at Hokitika, we discovered that it is indeed a “cool little town”.
Our accommodation was perfectly fine - clean, serviceable and walking distance to the town. We were also able to park Bertha so that her rear end was right in front of our door, which made the ever popular boot emptying ritual so much easier.
Having relieved Bertha of her burden, we left her there to recuperate and went off the discover more about what makes Holitika so cool.
We managed to find a very cute cafe that was still serving food after 2.30pm (a rarity based on our experience to date), a shop that just sells socks and more Jade crafting places than you can shake a stick at. We thought we might like to buy something made from Jade (as a little reminder) until we saw the prices. I mean it’s lovely and all that - but I think diamonds are nicer and some of the Jade pieces were giving well cut, small, diamonds a run for their money. Initially, we made the mistake of going into a small shop, but literally ran back out as soon as we realised that a small necklace would soak up literally all our remaining spending money.
However, there was one place that was huge, had an interesting workshop at the back and was flooded with Chinese tourists. So we figured we could creep in, have a quick look round and get out before anyone noticed. As it happens the lady behind the counter was having a bit of a nightmare with a particularly loud (and possible stroppy - it was hard to tell because they were all shouting) group of people. First problem was the language barrier; they spoke no English and her Mandarin was sorely lacking. The tourists clearly subscribed to the view that if you shout really loudly, you will be understood (they didn’t get the bit about speaking slowly though). Being pretty nosey, we wanted to see what was going on and so casually wandered in that general direction, pretending to examine some of the displays.
From what we could gather ( later confirmed by the harassed shop lady) the tourists were trying to haggle over the price of the offcuts. Unlike the rather upmarket stores with ideas and prices above their station, this establishment had realised that not everyone wants to pay stupid sums of money for a bit of jade. So they had taken all the bits left over from the crafting of the posh stuff, which were very unusual shapes, smoothed them down and were selling them for a couple of dollars on a necklace cord. Brilliant idea and very clever marketing - until that is, you get a bunch of clueless tourists who don’t know a bargain when they see one.
At the point in the proceedings when it really looked like she would punch the loudest one in the face, they suddenly all stopped shouting, opened their purses and wallets and paid the asking price.
The benifit for us of course was that
1. They had drawn our attention to some very affordable Jade that was ( in my opinion) much nicer and definitely more unusual than the good stuff.
2. The lady in the shop was so relieved they had gone and she now had 2 polite English language speakers to deal with, she insisted we take a tour of her Jade workshop even when we told her we only wanted to buy a couple of the offcuts.
It was actually really “cool” to watch the craftspeople at work and they were so passionate about what they do, their enthusiasm was infectious.
As promised, we bought an offcut necklace each and there is something rather lovely about owning a totally unique piece - especially when it only cost about £1.50.
By now we had reached the end of the main street and the beach across the road beckoned.
There was a “cool” driftwood sign saying Hokitika, at the walkway through to the beach. Rather stating the obvious, we thought, but very lovely all the same.
Once on the beach it was clear where the inspiration for the sign came from. There was driftwood everywhere, ranging from tiny twiglets to massive branches, all twisted into interesting shapes. Some bright spark had decided to make some art and it looked like everyone else had jumped on the bandwagon so there were some gorgeous wood sculptures in all shapes and sizes all over the beach.
Our contribution was slightly more modest but still lovely all the same.
Continuing our pattern of early dinners and early nights, so we could get up bright eyed and bushy tailed, ready for the driving and sights ahead, we considered our options.
Hokitika may be a “Cool little town”, but it is remarkably short of early dinner options. There was a pub that looked decidedly tatty and seemed to be letting the side down a bit, on the “Cool-o-meter”
There was a nouvelle cuisine bistro that had taken the “Coolness” a tad too far, in our opinion and an Indian restaurant that Lottie vetoed on the basis that we were going to be sharing a room and a car for the next 24 hours. So we opted for the last remaining choice, which just happened to occupy the top spot on Trip Advisor - A Pizza restaurant.
Actually, calling it a restaurant was a bit of a stretch, but it’s number one spot was well deserved as the pizzas were delicious. As we were on foot, we shared a bottle of “Sav”, (Sauvingon Blanc) with our meal, watched the sun go down over the beach and made our way back to our lodge.
