Dinosaurs, Blue Pools, Revisited.

One of our stops on the way down the coast was at Ship Cove or Tauperikaka, it's beautiful beach with sand dunes, and many dolphins or similar playing off the coast, just too far and fast to see properly. There's also a boarded walkway through swamp forest, a rare habitat now, almost unchanged since dinosaur times. The giant podocarps were initially harvested for ships' timbers, but the wood was too soft, sadly they didn't escape and were mostly cut down to be used as boxes for exporting butter and cheese, a bit ignominious for such a stately tree.
Next stop, the Blue Pools, possible starting point for the Gillespie Pass Circuit, other choices are wading or jetboat taxi across the river. The whole track is four days, including a day up to the mysterious Crucible Lake: the guidebook just says it's brilliant, but won't spoil the surprise!
Finally Wanaka, we were here at the same excellent accommodation, River Run , last year. Much of the building uses recycled farm materials either structurally or as artworks. A real treasure of a place, a hot-tub with a view too.

Fairydust, gems and sandflies.

Bit grey this morning, but no rain. Retraced our steps, surprising how different the track looks from the other direction. No more whio, but mad tui singing most of the way, still invisible. Many of the rocks are schist, with more-golden-than-usual mica, my boots now sparkle, apart from that, half-baked garnets in it make a very good non-slip surface. If the rocks had keen cooked a little deeper in the Earth's crust they would have been gem quality. They really need 25 Km worth of pressure.
The sandflies missed us, a swarm swamped us as we stopped at the last river to take our boots off. Some perverse evolutionary quirk means they're so heavy footed you can feel most of them land before they bite, but you're swamped by numbers.

Copland, songs and smells.

Off up the Copland Track, graded as easy-to-moderate, so I wonder why the 17Km is estimated to take seven hours, 2.5Km/hr, usually manage 4. Found out quite soon! Steep, quite rough path, lots of exciting bridges, many 1 person at a time, and quite apart from when the path runs up a stream, many streams to cross. Mostly hopping over stones, but two or three needed de-booting. Altogether an excellent walk, ridiculously green and exuberant forest, ferns growing in moss growing on tree and tree-fern trunks. Filmy ferns 18" long, often a dozen different types of moss and fern in as many square inches.
Bird-wise, the usual suspects, invisible tui sounding  as though they have Tourette's syndrome: gently tuneful bubbly whistles, then sudden raucous squawks. They're great mimics. Fanatics have ADHD, and love to taunt you by flying down, sitting quite close showing off their beautiful black and while tails, until they see a camera, then off... I saw one rarity, a whio ("fio", "wh" is "f" in Maori) or blue duck, endangered as most chicks and eggs eaten by foreign predators.
Eventually got to Welcome Flat Hut, relatively new, nearly demolished by a mudslide a few months after it first opened, had to be dug out. A few minutes away is a bridge up to the the next bit of track, really for nutters and climbers. It's 18Km as the crow flies to Mount Cook Village, where we were last year, but not this time, it's about 500 by road. This site was chosen in part for the hot springs, one luxurious hot pools, fed by red irony rivulets, lined with soft green mud where you can soak in faintly sulphurous bliss!

Glaciers and lakes.

Brilliantly clear start to the day, continued south, confusingly away from the sun. Stopped at Lake Ilanthe, beautiful, flat calm surrounded by forested hills. Watched a cormorant dive and come up with an eel or similar, at least as long as him. Interestingly he dived back down with it, not what I would have expected, swallowing while underwater must be a bit dodgy.
We wandered up the tourist path to the base of Fox Glacier, no time for proper walks by the time we'd sorted out tomorrow's hut. A bit crowded, but interesting to see signs showing where the glacier ended in the past, a bit scary!
After that, very little time as our lovely B&B, Misty Peaks, has all the guests for wine&cheese at six, so a quick sprint to look at Lake Matheson, well worth more time.
Mussels for supper.

Pancakes, Blow-holes and pub.

Off to west coast, greyer and gloomier as we got there. By lunchtime it was car-picnic weather, on what should have been a spectacularly beautiful beach, signs said take care of penguins, but too wet even for them.
Punakaika is famed for pancake rocks, limestone layers eroded into stacks of pancakes and blow-holes, with unnatural sound effects. We braved it at top speed, but were still drenched. By the time we'd dried off at our B&B 30Km down  the road the sky was innocently blue, so we went all the way back, well worth until we had to make a dash to beat the looming storm.
The next village down the road has 20 or so houses, and a pub on the beach, best fish&chips ever, delicately thin batter, lots of salad with really good French dressing. Locals very chatty, and happy to recommend and serve drinks if the barmaid's busy.

Early, Civilisation

Alarm at 5.30, set off in starlight, bright but not quite enough. Gradually lost all the height we'd gained, as the sun came up, reversing the change in flora back to tree ferns and warmth. Admired a weka chick on the way, lurking in the undergrowth until its parents came from the other side of the path to feed it.
Caught the shuttle bus back to Nelson, got clean then out for real food.
Off down the coast tomorrow.

Rain, more rain and... Trailwalker.

Rain as we set off, persisted until we got to Perry Saddle Hut, drenched to the undies. A pity as said to be some of the best scenery in NZ. (Bit like the WWA trip to the Ring of Kerry a few years ago). On the bright side, we saw a Powellephanta, giant carnivorous snail, nocturnal unless very wet and good rainbows shortly after settling in our warm & luxurious hut. Lots of tiny sundew, much smaller than ours, some round and very red, some elongated and greener, possibly as in shady places, possibly a different species.
As an afterthought, the whole four day tramp is less in distance and height gained than the Oxfam Trailwalker we did a few years ago. I can't imagine how we did it in 24hours 42minutes 54seconds!