Off on holiday

Feb 14th: St Valentine’s Day and Steve’s 40th birthday. We finished packing the motorhome with everything we own, it seemed, and were finally ready to leave on holiday at midday! Now since we will be travelling through amazing scenery I thought I might treat you to more than one photo. You might want to get a map out to follow our route. There’s only ever one road that goes anywhere so I don’t think you’ll get lost.
From Waimate we drove inland to Kurow and then turned right. We passed through Otematata (this is pronounced oh-tee-ma-tar-ter, and fits in well to the rhythm of ‘Waltzing Matilda’, we have found) and before Omarama (pronounced oh-ma-re-mar) we stopped at a boat ramp and informal campsite to have lunch and first half of birthday cake, a coffee and chocolate layer cake Edward made yesterday. The first photo is of the view here. The place is known as Sailor’s Cutting, you can probably find it on Google maps.
We turned left at Omarama and drove through the Lindis Pass and after about an hour came to the next house/fuel/coffee stop at Tarras (population about 10!). Just after here we turned right and then took a few back roads to Lake Hawea. The campsite is on the southwest of the lake and is peaceful and the view stunning. The second photo is a view up the lake with birthday boy – just look at how clear the water is.
For the younger followers of our blog we have included a photo of the playground at the campsite. The playgrounds in NZ are great and are all different from each other. We’ll try to include some more as we travel.
After tea we went exploring along the bank of the lake, and after the boys went to bed Steve went fishing.
Now you know I have described homes here as being rather shed-like? Well, the final photo is of a holiday “cottage” here on the campsite. This is about $40 for the night and has only a double bed and a fridge in it. But just look at the reflection of the view you get from it! Our motorhome is a few yards (metres for you youngsters) away from it and we have an uninterrupted view of the lake too.