To Nelson Lakes National Park

We stopped off at Te Waikoropupu Springs (doesn't that just roll off the tongue?) on our way out of the Golden Bay area.  It's the largest freshwater spring in Australasia - water bubbles up through rock into pools - about 14,000 litres/second.  It's also some of the clearest water around.

Gold miners used to wash the gold off rocks, then stack them in piles like this.  Back in those days they also cleared all the trees in the area, so you can see the forest in various stages of recovery with - wait for it - interpretive signs.  Just like back home. :-)

Those plants are all underwater

But the water is the main attraction.  You're not allowed to touch it, let alone fill up a water bottle.

You can see the water vents churning the surface.

After negotiating the crazy winding road out of Golden Bay, we stopped for a quick look at some New Zealand hop vines near Riwaka, then it was off to Nelson Lakes National Park.

It was pretty darned nice.  Clear lakes set in nice mountain scenery - not totally unlike the Kootenays in BC.  (Sorry for the endless comparisons to BC, but it's the easiest way to describe the flavour of an area.)

Here I am "calling my shot" for the Mt. Robert hike I would take the next day.  It goes up along the edge of the trees on the right, over the peak, then winds around the left and across the front, back to the start.

You'll also notice it looks warm, but I'm wearing pants and a long sleeve shirt.  Very un-Chad-like; what gives?  Well, this was our first encounter with New Zealand's sand flies.

New Zealand doesn't advertise them in their tourist brochures, and with good reason.  They are a pain.  They're bigger than noseeums but smaller than mosquitoes, and you can't really feel them when they land on you, until they bite.  They mostly hug the ground and bite your feet and legs, though they occasionally go for an arm.  But the big problem is, the bites ITCH like you wouldn't believe, for DAYS.  I can generally handle normal numbers of mosquitoes, noseeums and black flies.  We have an understanding.  But these sand flies are ghostly and almost unstoppable.  And they infest the whole western side of the island.  I guess I won't get dengue fever from them, but I might claw my bites until the skin comes off...

But I digress.  We stayed at the rougher of two Department of Conservation campsites a few kilometres from the visitor centre.  But it was great - brand new kitchen with screens against the sand flies, brand new toilets and (cold) showers.  And all for $6/person/day.  Also came with free sand fly bites.

Evening on the jetty was still pretty good.

And there were more friendly eels looking for a handout.

Yes, the eels are our friends - no catching them!

The next day we went off to the Mt. Robert hike for some better views.  Sarah did a bit of out-and-back walking, while I did the whole loop.  Sarah probably could have come, though - the so-called 5 hour hike took me just under 2 hours, and I wasn't going all that quickly.

View down on the lake from near the top.  The jetty is at the back left of the left bay, and our campsite is in the trees just left of that.

I wish I'd had more time to explore this area - once on top, there is a mostly flat, well-graded trail following a broad ridge for a long time - to a few backcountry huts.  It would have been an easy hike (in Kiwi, a "tramp"), with nice views all along the way.  And these NZ huts are very well equipped.

Now here's some Lord Of The Rings style terrain on top.  (Remember Aragorn, Gimley and Legolas chasing the kidnapped hobbits across the grassy/rocky valleys?)

Passed along a relatively narrow ridge where you can look back on the lake to the left, or further up the valley to the right.

Nice cloud reflection

Loose rock on the ridge - you don't want to start heading down there.

A historic ski hut (first in the area - around the 1930s), but off-limits to the public.  There is a much more well-equipped public hut just down the trail.

This is apparently typical of NZ backcountry huts.  Wow.  Wood stove with a good supply of wood (and an axe), big kitchen, vestibule between doors to keep out the draft, mattresses provided, nice view...

And the trail winds down towards the lake, then left to the trailhead.

Fun twisties on the downhill.

And you cross some typical New Zealand rockslide areas on the trail back to the parking area.

Nelson Lakes was definitely worth more time, and has some wonderful multi-night treks via great huts, but we were already running behind and had to head out to the west coast.