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Stan woke us up at around 7 a.m. He was already up gathering breakfast items together. Craig and Stan had leftover pasta pesto for breakfast, and I had a leftover peanut butter and jelly sandwich. We saw the sun coming up over the mountains. It was gorgeous. After breakfast, we packed everything up, put on our icy boots (which weren't as cold as I had feared), packed up the tent, and started hiking at around 9:15. At first the snow was icy and crusty. Soon the sun hit it and it became slushy, melted, and muddy.
We stopped on a hill overlooking Island Lake and ate a lunch of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and Raro. The weather was gorgeous. It was sunny and very warm, and we needed to shed a bunch of layers. We hiked back down through the forest and returned to the van at about 1:30. We sorted the gear, put our boots under the bungy cord on the roof of the trailer, and we tied our wet socks to the sides of the trailers so that they could dry in the breeze while we were on the road. We were heading toward Invercargill. I wrote in the journal on the ride, and we stopped at a lovely lookout point over the ocean. We drove to Riverton and got ice cream to go. I got hokey pokey (which is like butter crunch at home) and Craig and Stan had creamy cookie. We arrived in Invercargill hoping we could download our photos onto a cd to free yup our memory card, but the Kiwis celebrate Easter on Friday through Monday, so specialty shops like that were closed. We stopped at the supermarket to top off our supplies (mostly stuff for our Maori hangi feast for tomorrow's dinner). Stan was wandering the supermarket looking all bohemian in bare feet. We just kept getting a kick out of it because nobody hassled him; it was just accepted and allowed. Not so at home: no shirts, no shoes, no service! We were wondering what we should do for dinner tonight, as time was getting kind of late and we were hoping to find accommodations before it got too late. The beach house in Curio Bay that they usually use was booked due to the Easter holiday, and several other places were booked as well. Stan had managed to get a hold of the Slope Point Backpackers (aka Popes Place) and they said that they had room for us, so we didn't want to push our luck. Stan had been talking about a Chinese restaurant all day, so when Craig fielded the idea of going out to eat, Stan thought the Chinese place was a good choice. Craig and I were sort of on the fence, hoping to have some NZ cuisine (meat pies? lamb?) but Chinese was pretty agreeable to all of us so we said ok. We pulled up at the Moon Chinese restaurant just as the sun was setting over Invercargill at around 6 p.m. The takeaway section of the restaurant was hopping, but we were the only ones in the dining room. A rather grumpy hostess showed us to our table. We were all rather overtired from our night crammed in the tent, and we all had a serious case of the giggles. I completely lost it over the music - Chinese language versions of '60's and '70's pop hits. Del Shannon's "Runaway" was just too much. In between giggle fits about the music, we looked at the menu, and Stan said that he'd have something small because he wasn't really all that hungry. That sent Craig and myself into another fit of hysterics. The guy who had been hyping up this restaurant all day wasn't even hungry now that we were here. Craig got beef mushroom, I got sweet and sour wontons, and Stan got soup and spring rolls. We drank some Chinese tea and continued laughing until the conclusion of the meal. We found it very funny that we arrived at the Moon restaurant at sunset, and we left shortly before moonrise. We pulled over to get some pictures (I stood on the trailer hitch and put my tripod on the roof of the van). The moon was spectacular - so huge and orange - and the clouds looked gorgeous. We saw our first honest-to-God live possum while we were driving. So far all possums we saw had been road kill. They are a big problem in NZ (as an introduced species) and they are often poisoned by the government and hunted by hunters (and it looks like they may be purposely run over sometimes as well). About an hour later (8:30 p.m.) we arrived at the Slope Point Backpackers farmstay. The proprietress was very friendly and showed us to the little compound where we would be staying. There was a lounge, a kitchen, and a bunkroom with two sets of bunk beds. In a separate building there were more bunkrooms, a shower, and a toilet. There were a bunch of other backpackers there, but none of them were particularly friendly to us. So we settled in our bunkroom. Craig and I got bottom bunks, and Stan slept above Craig. There were rumors that two other guests were expected, and that they would share the 4th bed. I hoped this was not the case, because if two people tried to sleep on the bunk above me, I am sure the whole flimsy structure would collapse. We had a drink and some sour cream and chive chippies, and took turns going to the shower while the other two looked at the digital photos. The sheep were very noisy. |
 Sunrise  Ice reflected in a tarn  Mountains reflected in Stan's glasses  Lunch  Steph in the forest at the end of the Borland hike 
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