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Wutheringbikes Home -- New Zealand
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9th Jan 2011 - Hasta La Vista Haast!
 A superb day of mountains and waterfalls, in which we covered about 80kms or 50 miles. The day started briskly with breakfast and a conversation with a lady, whose husband was off fishing, about Maori. We had been puzzled about how to pronounce long series of vowels in Maori placenames and the lady was a Maori language teacher at Middle School. She said the phrase 'are there three or two' (aeiou) gives you the pronunciation and then you just have to remember to pronounce each vowel in the word - that they don't combine to make a different sound.
 We were running short of cash because we haven't seen an ATM since Franz Josef and so our purchases before leaving were frugal. Then we headed off, shouting 'Haast is Past', the road initially flat to undulating along the Haast River with beautiful views of mountain and river. A short walk at one point to see the woods and the waterfall Roaring Billy. The leaves against the sun were something special - mistletoe and tree ferns and palms - as above. Click on the image to the see the full image which I've been using as a screensaver. Then we had lunch at, I think, Pleasant Flat Camping and Scenic Reserve where we met Phillip who is a Maori evangelist on a bike. He travels by bike and lives to preach the gospel. There something very appropriate about a bike as his means of transport - he himself reminded us of Wesley's travels by horse. He has a website at http://philkeelan.info though he warned us that he doesn't worry about updating it often. The view from Pleasant Flat Camping and Scenic Reserve is pretty good - Mount Hooker was in the distance, covered in snow - the photo above.Then up the Haast Pass - some initial steep climbs to the Gates of Haast followed by some more gentle ascents to the final rather unimpressive summit, or col, at about 574m. Well there's ascents in Yorkshire that reach that height. Then down the pass pretty rapidly with a short diversion for the Blue Pool walk - ok but we've seen lots of pools of this turquoise colour recently.Then down to Makorora where there's a campground / holiday park ($25 camping for two). Met up again with Carol and Steve and drank a pint of local draught bitter - pretty standard.
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Wutheringbikes Home -- New Zealand
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