Yesterday was rained off. If I’m not mistaken, the only day in eight months. We stayed indoors and caught up with various chores, did some reading, and when the rain eventually stopped late afternoon we went for a walk just to get out.
However, while it was raining on us it was snowing on the mountains and today New Zealand is looking even more splendidly beautiful than before. The only problem being that we had a 6+ hour drive to Queenstown which ended up being even longer when we sadly came upon a road accident that kept the road closed for 2 hours. On the west coast of New Zealand’s south island there is only one road, so we had to wait.
Heading south from the glaciers we passed through vibrantly green rainforests of moss and towering white pine trees, dense and dark and secret. The winding road met the coast at X’s Bay where a rough cobble beach is strewn with driftwood. Powerful waves were rolling ashore, the late afternoon sun enamelling each wave beautifully like the polished inside of a paua shell. We continued south to Haast with a forest of stately windswept trees on one side, the view softened by a sea-spray haze off the crashing ocean on the other.
At Haast we swept inland up towards the high Southern Alps. The road followed a broad river valley deep into the mountains until we could see snow-capped peaks in all directions. Glacial streams braided and twisted across the valley, and whenever the roadside trees parted to show another view of this pristine wilderness I fully expected to see wolves padding across the rough grass or an elk standing by the river. Eventually we climbed up and over the pass, leaving the west of the island for the east.
Definitely our favourite drive of the whole month, and saved for our final day. We don’t really want to leave New Zealand yet. Ah well.
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The fact the final sentence of your description remarked on the peaks surrounding Queenstown is quite apt bein as then there peaks are called the Remarkables 🙂
Lovely country to drive through, your description took me back to our experience driving through Arthur’s pass with the violet sea of Lupins carpeting the valley below us and those meandering turquoise streams that wend their way languidly through the countryside. It’s an oil painting of a country all right.