Skiing!

Saturday 18th July: It had been cold overnight, especially as we are now in the ‘High Country’ but we were cosy with the heating in the motorhome. The 8 o’clock news told us that Roundhill Skifield was open, so we ate, got dressed and packed the truck and were ready to leave at 9.30. To get to the skifield you drive back through Tekapo and turn left along Lilybank Road and follow a gravel track along the edge of the lake for 25km or so. Then you turn right and climb for 8km to the car park. It is a great skifield for families and all the runs go down into the car park. There is a lift pass ‘ticket office, a ski hire shed and another shed that serves hot drinks. Amazingly, as it is so far from anywhere there are flushing toilets!!! The ski runs are all in the sun all day and today there was no wind and hardly any cloud so it was beautiful. Just the other side of the mountains, between Fairlie and Burke’s Pass, is Dobson Skifield, but this was shut due to high winds, so the weather is very local. The views from everywhere up there are stunning. From the very top there is a view across to Mount Cook, but it was the only thing that had cloud on it today.
We skied from 10.30am until 4pm with a short stop for lunch. Everyone eats on the edge of the ski runs. You just open up the back of your car and set up your pitch there. We take a picnic table and fold-out gas cooker and do burgers and boil a kettle for a cup of tea, then enjoy a packet of choc chippies. The people next to us (also English) got out a gas barbecue and did sausages. The Kiwis had sandwiches, and always comment on what an amazing set-up we have!
On the 45 minute drive back to the campsite we enjoyed our usual post-ski bar of chocolate. Back at the campsite we foraged for more pine cones. Although there has been snow here the pine cones are dry under the trees so we are collecting plenty.
For dinner I cooked a curry and then we enjoyed the rest of the chocolate rum’n’raisin pudding with custard.
The photos are of us at lunch; the ticket office, café and main freeway with T-bar; the view of Lake Tekapo from the bottom of the T-bar; and the view of the sun setting over the lake from our motorhome.