From Bendigo to a Bed-we-go!

Life has been very busy recently (more of that later), hence, our blog has been a little neglected recently! But, we’re back and I’m on a mission to get all of our photos uploaded over the next week or so, so apologies in advance if you subscribe to this blog. Your inbox will be INUNDATED!
One of the things I love about New Zealand, is that Mrs. E and I are able to do lots of things together. This is probably a combination of several different factors, better weather, more energy, more time, but it is great spending quality time together.

A month (or so… I won’t disclose the date as it will show how lax I have been), we had a fabulous day when we fitted in 3 activities in one day; yup, three!

Activity 1 – we headed out to the Luggate Creek Track a few kilometres from our house, which is part of a whole network of river walks in our area set up by the Upper Clutha Track Trust. We walked a few kilometres taking in the views towards Cromwell, the Pisa mountain range, and the turquoise clear water, while The Spaniel enjoyed chasing wabbits. And then we were ready for brunch…

Activity 2 – we head out to the Tarras Country Café for a slap up fried breakfast with homemade bread, sausages, free range eggs and crispy bacon, topped off with a cappuccino each. We needed to roll out of the café before we ate anything else, so we tipped ourselves out of our chairs and rolled into The Shrek museum. Shrek was a merino sheep belonging to Bendigo station (a farm near Tarras), who shot to fame after not being caught and shorn for 6 years! Apparently he hid in caves to avoid being captured. Apparently he became a national icon and even met Helen Clark, the prime minister at the time, in Wellington. This was great, but boy we had to burn off some calories, hence, our next activity…

Activity 3 – walk around Bendigo Historic Reserve http://www.doc.govt.nz/conservation/historic/by-region/otago/central-otago/bendigo-historic-reserve/ which, contains Welshtown an old gold-and quartz-mining village, now a ghost town. It was fascinating to walk around the ruins and think about how things were back then.
By this point we were well and truly pooped, so we headed back to the ranch for a rest, and then off to a Bed-we-go… (<—– do you see what I did there?)
What an awesome day.

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Journey South Part 2: Kaikoura to Lake Hawea

I’ve neglected the blog recently, life has been a little hectic since we moved down here to Lake Hawea, and I had a little bit of writer’s block. The good news is, I have been collecting photos and making notes and there are lots of posts to come!

The second part of road trip south took us from Kaikoura to Christchurch. We were on a tight schedule but a friend told us that Christchurch needed visitors after the earthquake, so we duly paid a visit. We were duly rewarded by a quaint, historic old city. Yes it is a bit of a mess, but you can still see historic old buildings, and you can almost feel the resilience of the Christchurch residents. After a fleeting visit to the Botanic gardens, and a walk around (we will be back Christchurch), we hoofed it across the Cantebury plains and over the hills and mountains to Twizel in the MacKenzie country. Twizel is high country farming land, and full of merino sheep from what we could see. From Twizel we drove to Lake Tekapo with it’s deep turquoise-colour water and the Church of the Good Shepherd, a little chapel on the lakeside.
Our final leg was to our new home in Lake Hawea . We had never visited Lake Hawea, so as we drove down the Lindis Pass we eagerly looked out for Wanaka and neighbouring Lake Hawea. I won’t give too much away, as I will be blogging about our new life here, but check out the very last photo of the pink sunset, which greeted us on our first evening.

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