Wednesday 23rd February - Arthur's Pass to Hokitika
Aurora_b
Mike and Liz Downing
Fri 25 Mar 2011 10:20
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Continuing our drive through Arthur's Pass to the west took
us to the pass summit, at 3,030ft above sea level, and then over the
Otira Viaduct. Once over the pass there was a sudden and dramatic
change in the scenery. It changed from spectacular scree covered
mountains with little vegetation other than golden coloured
tussock grass on their slopes, to mountains covered in dense
rainforest right up to the tree line. The rainforests here are not tropical
rainforests, it's much too cold (the temperature had dropped to below 10 degrees
C in the pass), but temperate rainforests. Temperate they may be, but they
are as dense and lush as any we saw in the tropics and with an abundance of
tree ferns, looked quite tropical. The temperature though was definitely
not tropical. With very high rainfall the whole west coast of NZ is covered
in these very old rainforests.
Eventually the west coast and the Tasman
Sea appeared and we turned south to run along the coast to Hokitika, our
next stop for just 1 night. The afternoon was spent visiting the Hokitika River
Gorge, about an hour's drive inland, and walking over our very first
swingbridge. The evening was spent walking along the long, wide
beach and waiting for penguins - the Little Blue Penguin. They come up the
beach at dusk, so they say, but not tonight. So we didn't see penguins, but we
did see driftwood - the beach was driftwood heaven! It was covered in
driftwood of all shapes and sizes, from small handy sized bits
to huge tree trunks, all weathered white and just perfect for
selling to garden centres back home! When in flood the fast mountain
rivers here are incredibly powerful and carry fallen trees down to the
sea and they eventually get washed up on
the beach.
 Just over the summit and on the way down, but this
is looking back towards Arthur's pass as the clouds
descend. The weather changes very quickly here and
the mountain sides are much greener.
 Over the Otira Viaduct onwards towards
the west coast.
 The Hokitika River Gorge - blue, milky coloured
water as the river brings down powdered rock from
the mountains.
 The gorge and
swingbridge ........
 .... which we all crossed. Get more than 2 people
walking on it at
the same time and
it really does
swing!
 Tree Ferns in the temperate
rainforest.
 Driftwood - the beach at Hokitika was
covered in both directions as far as the eye could
see.
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