wildlife | The Slow Cycling Blog

We started the day on the bus to get through before the road closed. There had been a landslip and the road was closing at midday – so we went early to pick up our boat at the mouth of the Haast river. We were directed onto the jet boat by our driver and guide – a formidable huntin’ shootin’ and fishin’ woman – for the 36km ride upstream. She described how she lived in the tiny township of Haast, proudly told us the entire population numbered 259 and that the nearest supermarket was 2 hour drive away in Wanaka. She said the locals were hugely self-supporting and largely made do with what they could hunt or forage from the sea – mainly fish and crayfish. She said she could take her boat home and in half an hour put on her dive stuff and come back up with 6 crayfish and 10 abalone (a type of sea snail) – the allowed daily quotas. These were not crayfish as we knew them but in her photos looked like enormous lobsters. She told us that she could also shoot dear from her from gate. We decided she was not to be messed with – but she was also informative and great fun.

The Haast is a braided river – a glacial river formed of many channels. The jet boat was invented in New Zealand she claimed to allow navigation through the sometimes very shallow channels. When the boat is at full speed and rising above the water, she only needed 4 inches clearance (she also said the Japanese had stolen the idea to develop jet skis). The river channels can change after every rainfall and we marvelled at her skill as she wove through the river threads at considerable speed.

The Haast river is located along the Alpine Fault, where the Pacific and Australian tectonic plates clash against each other. These plates are responsible for forming the Southern Alps. We were shown the valley where the Pacific plate is on one side and the Australian plate on the other – a rare event on land apparently. They appeared quiet as we passed over.

She stopped the boat after half an hour or so to land on a large stony sandbar, and invited us to disembark to look for Douglas Jade – a rare form of the green stone that is famous in NZ. Needless to say none of us made out fortune by finding any real jade, but we did find a lot of pretty stones!

We got back on the jet boat and zipped up the river, passing numerous waterfalls which formed whenever there was recent rain. ‘Do you want to spin’ she said? As “no” didn’t appear to be an acceptable answer, we were told to hold on tight with both hands and after picking up speed she did the equivalent of a handbrake turn, which had us all squealing like kids on a rollercoaster (with much the same feeling). After four of these, the final turn brought us up opposite the largest waterfall – and with some relief the journey was over!

We continued up the narrowing river valley in the minibus and over the Haast pass. We stopped for a short, wet walk through the forest to a lookout point – but it was rainy and foggy and not much was seen.

We ended the day at the Wonderland Lodge on Lake Makarora – a complex of toy-town like A framed houses. The clouds were clearing so we could see the mountain tops from our bed. Our guides cooked us a delicious barbeque to end the day.

(David) The night was quite cold and the wind blew under our tent. I felt it blowing right onto an exposed patch of my body; one where the sleeping bag appeared to have no effective covering. Adjustments to clothing mostly sorted this and eventually we both slept well – or fairly well at least. We woke, ambled into the hut and were greeted by tea, coffee and breakfast! We could get used to being catered for.

After breakfast we packed up and ambled down the mountain. I have been resistant to out and back walks in the past but we have done quite a few this holiday and my resistance is crumbling. The views are different going the other way, the weather is different and we see the mountains at a different time of the day. It was a delightful hour plod down the hill, with great views of the lake and then back to the minibus.

We put this in because it made us laugh!

We had a bit of free time at Lake Rotoiti again. We and saw again the long finned eels around the jetty and read about their incredible lifecycle. The eels can live up to 100 years of age and only spawn once in their lifetime. Before spawning they leave the lake and head to the Pacific and swim 1000s of miles to near to Tonga where they mate, spawn and die. The baby eels spend 7-10 months drifting back to New Zealand on the ocean currents and as they develop, swim upstream to the lake.

Leaving the lake we had another (tedious) drive of a few hours, heading to the west coast, where we reached the wonderfully named “Cape Foulwind”. We were booked into mini-cabins at this seaside resort. The area was a former quarrying centre where granite was discovered as part of the cliffs, and so these were blasted away to make roads and the like during the C19 and early C20.

The stone was used in a concrete plant which operated here as late as 2016, but there is no evidence of the plant now. Instead, there is a coastal area with some modern (expensive looking) houses probably being second homes for Christchurch’s elite. We walked along the road and then joined a cliff walk at a lighthouse. It was a great walk for a couple of hours to see a seal colony. In typical DOC style, the path was well marked with barriers and signs preventing anyone being tempted to go too close to the cliffs.

This was the Tasman Sea, with waves rolling in every few seconds. It was a peaceful, sunny afternoon but the storms here must be impressive.

The seals were New Zealand fur seals (known as kekeno in maori). They were lolloping about on the rocks, having an occasional spat and then gliding into the sea.