Tuesday, February 10, 2009

10th February 2009- Time to leave here

Gosh it was cold again overnight and we awoke with both the outside and also the inside of the tent quite wet as it had rained yesterday and I am not sure I mentioned it before.
So we had a slow breakfast and waited untill the sun surfaced which mostly dried the tent and then we loosely packed it so as to let the sun dry it out whilst it was in the boot of the car. We believe the temperature went down to about eight degrees centigrade which is a little chilly in a tent. However us old ones can cope.
We left Te Anau camp site at about eleven thirty and headed of towards Wanaka via Queenstown. We stopped for lunch at a wayside rest area overlooking the Lake Wakatipu near Queenstown where a German couple had just about all their clothes and sleeping bags hanging up to dry in the warm fresh air. We guess they must have got wet somewhere
We drove through the outskirts of Queenstown and took the mountain route via Cardrona (which is a skiing resort) to Wanaka which takes you high up in to the hills and then down in to the dales and we arrived in Wanaka at about four in the afternoon.
Our camp site this time is about six kilometres outside of town and on a hill overlooking Lake Wanaka and the site that we have has a nice view. This site is not as modern as the last one but is certainly very quiet and also fairly empty as we had a good choice of locations. It took us about an hour to set up everything, we are getting used to this now and its getting quicker each time we do it, and then headed down town for a quick walk around and grab a bite to eat in a local pub of Blue Cod and Chips and a couple of glasses of wine.
It is a full moon tonight so we do not need torches around the site as it is quite bright enough without. And so to bed.