Day 22: Back on track
Geraldine has been nice to us!
A lovely breakfast with muesli and pancakes, together with sunshine and blue skies: one could easily forget we are firmly off course.
Yet we are still. We needed to cover about 400kms today to get to Glenorchy, instead of the 160 it would have been if we slept in Wanaka where we should have been.
This detour is now 450kms extra over the 290 it should have been. Together with the distances to and from the Haast Pass we drove 700 kms extra thus totalling 1150kms in just two days.
But, those were 1150kms of wonderful scenery and we even got sunshine and blue skies in the latter part!
The original trajectory was Fox Glacier -> Haast -> Wanaka -> Cromwell -> Glenorchy
We did Fox Glacier -> Haast -> Fox Glacier -> Hokitika -> Arthur’s Pass -> Mt Hutt -> Geraldine -> Twizel -> Tarras -> Glenorchy
All that because the Haast Pass was closed. I didn’t dare to check it today. 😉
We are in a little settlement called Kinloch which is on the other side of Lake Wakatipa opposite to Glenorchy. It takes 30 minutes to get here via really small roads and the final 10km is dirt road. The settlement has 4 houses, of which one is the Lodge we are staying in. There is no shop, no gas, no nothing. 3 other houses and the lodge.
And a boat ramp.
It is really out there!
If the weather stays fine, we’ll be out for a walk, as the girl who checked us in described the land over here as ‘hikers heaven’. The views are stunning everywhere you look, and there is not a soul in sight.
Let’s hope for some more sunshine!
Dat ziet er erg fraai uit. En ook verlaten. Flinke klonten op de achtergrond. Gaan jullie daar (door) heen?
Je ziet de Southern Alps, en daar zijn we omheen en overheen gereden via de Arthur’s Pass. Inderdaad flink hoog, Mount Cook is de hoogste met 3750 meter.