We drove through the countryside, past grazing sheep and cattle, along straight roads down to the south coast. Our first view of the sea was at McCrackens Rest where we looked out to Te Waewae Bay, hoping to see Hector Dolphins, but were not lucky on this occasion. Further on we stopped at a free camping spot overlooking Monkey Island.
We sat on the beach with a cup of tea, then at low tide managed to reach the island, although we were a little caught short on the way back … maybe we shouldn’t monkey about with the tides!
It was also great to be able to be out early evening without being worried by sandflies which have bitten us both, but as ever, Chris suffered worst. Another camper curry and sunset.
Next day we reached Invercargill, passing the water tower on the way into town, a stopping point for two reasons.
The first is that we had to go to Stirling Point in Bluff, another 27km further on down a peninsular to the end or beginning, depending on how you look at it, of the State Highway 1.
It also has a signpost to match the one at Cape Reinga, despite not quite being the most southerly point (just as CR isn’t quite the most northerly). We took a photo, but it seemed a rather an anticlimax.
Just then, a young girl came hiking round the corner to great excitement from her three friends waiting for her. They have all been here, from Holland, since October, and have hiked all the way from Cape Reinga, covering some 3000km in all and their sense of huge achievement was palpable. Travelling by campervan obviously just doesn’t give the same sense of achievement!
The other reason was to see a famous Indian Scout. Burt Munro is Invercargill’s local hero, a mechanic who in 1967 aged 68, went to the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah and set the under 1000cc speed record of 183mph (which still stands) on a 1920 Indian Scout bike he had modified and tested locally on Oreti Beach.
In The World’s Fastest Indian, Burt was portrayed by Anthony Hopkins and it inspired us to visit Oreti beach ourselves. The guidebook mentioned that driving on the sand, a regular pastime of the locals, negates rental agreements, so that won’t be our campervan on the sand then will it!
We also went to see a collection of Burt Munro memorabilia including his winning motorcycle in a family-run hardware shop in Invercargill. The bike is fitted inside a streamlined moulding for racing as shown in a statue to him in town.
This company is called E Hayes! It was started by Ernest Hayes in the late 1800s who used his pioneering engineering skills to invent products like the Hayes permanent fence strainer, a product still manufactured today and used on nearly every farm in New Zealand … how exciting is that?
Our campsite was in town, easier to collect our Hell’s Pizza.
Tomorrow will will continue along the south coast, a region called the Catlins.
Off Travelling Together 