Down South

And so we set out at Wednesday lunchtime to meet up at the bach near Ohakhune. We had thought that we would spend some time exploring Taupo and the area around Lake Taupo. There was less publicity for sightseeing in the area, and given the available time we simply drove straight through, though enjoyed the beauty of the lake and its surrounding scenery, and puzzled at the seeming lack of tourist development apart from in Taupo itself. It was quite difficult to even find a café for a pitstop, though the small village and marina where we chose to picnic, was blissfully peaceful, with black swans, whose presence was not thought by the locals to be as welcome as we felt.

Following Pam’s expert cartographic layout, we had no trouble finding the remote dwelling though I doubt it would have been easy just by a verbal briefing. It was even difficult to make out the track across the field, and although not isolated, because there were other baches in the vicinity, it did make us think of Bilbo, without roads. The view from the sitting room was of Mount Ruapehu, the largest mountain in the North Island, and a dormant volcano. It was shrouded in cloud for most of our time there, and though early on Thursday morning it revealed itself, sadly the single photographic record was blurred as the camera decided to focus on something on the window instead.

We spent the next 36 hours in a totally relaxed indigenous environment, enjoying gentle walks, local café food (the coffees in NZ have been, without exception, really good), driving up into the cloud to the local ski resort, reminiscing about the past and families, playing parlour games, and generally having stimulating conversation with 2 incredibly intelligent and vibrant ladies. We couldn’t get over how forward looking and thinking Elizabeth, who is approaching 87 and has very poor eyesight, was. She is coming to Europe in May and maintains enormous vigour and independence. She enjoys coming to her bach because she can use the oven for baking cakes and bread, only having a microwave in her apartment in Auckland. We took her there (more anon) when we got back. It has the most spectacular views, and she maintains about 18 gardens for the benefit of all the residents. Truly, a wonderful lady to be admired.

The local farmer, whose land was bought many years ago to build the bach on, popped in for tea and biscuits, before moving the cattle from one adjacent field to another. Don’t for heavens sake let the Australian authorities know that we were anywhere near a farm – we would probably be turned back from the immigration.