4th May Sunday Arthurs Pass to Hokitika

Carried on with a round trip back to the West coast, this time we travelled via Arthurs Pass which is to the South of Lewis Pass.

When we left Ashley Gorge, going towards Oxford, the mountain range was in front of us – snow capped and all! The view was just simply stunning – a row of mountains all covered with snow!

There was a farmers market in Oxford but we didn’t stop, there were a few stalls but nothing interesting unfortunately.

That was generally the case with all the small towns and villages in New Zealand – two rows of shops down the main through road, at the most twenty shops. But very few of the chain shops, certainly unlike the UK where every street has a Boots, a WH Smith, Specsavers etc, etc.

We stopped at the supermarket for grocery and fuel. Groceries were not cheap. Lamb and beef were reasonable. Chicken were expensive. Fuel, especially diesel was 1.56 (40p)a litre. And the New Zealanders were complaining.

Before we left Oxford, Richard and I went for a walk along the river with his fishing rod.

Arthur Pass was interesting; you get to drive very close to the mountains. They were high. We stopped by Pearson Lake. Richard tried his rod again for brown trout. But we fished and saw nothing.

We came along a viaduct, but before we drove across, we went up to the lookout point to take a look. It was scary. The viaduct is called Dead Man Drive, indeed it was. The road was not flat, it was very steep going downhill.

We stopped by a hotel called Hotel Otira. It was run by an Englishman from the up north. It was the worst hotel ever I visited. The coffee was cold and it took forever and the state of the hotel was bad!

Along the way to our camp site at Hokitika, we could see the glacier in front of us. The view again was stunning. From our campsite we could see Arthur Pass on our left and the Tasman Sea on our right. We later went for a walk into town and on the beach. We were very tired. Richard with his driving and us with our cold and cough.