Moments in Time and Friends

We discovered that special place during the preparation for our first trip to NZ SI five years ago. Karamea Lodge, a very decent (which is rather an understatement), perfectly located in Karamea, the gateway to several large river systems in the distant north west of NZ SI. Best of all the offered accommodation was absolutely fair priced. We were amazed by the lodge and the friendly owners. Two years ago (as far as I remember we did not go towards Karamea during our second trip) we went back to the lodge for a couple of days for Ines with Tobias exploring the nature around Karamea while I was fishing at a river in the bush and for me as the day after coming out of the bush. The owners were so exceptionally guest oriented that they reserved the whole lodge for us – unbelievable!

Before I continue with that 'too good to be true' story: the lodge was closed due to personal reasons by the owners’ just weeks after we were there early 2013. Sad for many many satisfied guests.

Back to the current trip and me returning from the bush: flying over the lodge I saw several cars there, thus there must be somebody at home. Unloading my stuff from the chopper at Karamea 'airport', paying the bill, a quick side trip to the beach and the ocean, where three locals fished with their Kontiki longline fishing device, catching several red snapper.

After the beach I passed the the former accommodation and appreciated restaurant Riverstone, I learned that this venue was closed as well... (later I was told that a divorce was the reason for that sad situation. The homepage is still up but as of 01/2015 the location is closed, check if you are interested)

The welcome by Jenny and Mark, the owners of the former lodge, was exceptionally warm and friendly. It felt like home from home! I was immediately invited to take seat between a bunch of family and friends. And the best of all – if everything works out, they might visit Bavaria in the not so distant future!

A similar situation of friendship turned up some days later in Queenstown with guide Bruce and again in Te Anau – those are the very special moments you only experience when you travel destinations several times. Traveling this way,  you come to places that developed a meaning to you, not just tourists’ attractions and points of interest but real connection to a place, a landscape, the people and ultimately friends living there, locations and memories that cause highly intense emotions. 

After four trips many places in New Zealand SI hold such a special meaning for me.

Too bad that I had to deny the friendly offer to stay for the night as I was on the road towards some flowing water further south that called… would have loved to stay but with just four weeks you should better have an eye on the outlined rough route.

Reefton was the destination of that afternoon. Ending up there in a Motel, but to my delight the favored Tilly’s Place crib / bach / holiday home would be vacant from Sunday onwards for two nights. Saturday found me driving via Springs Junction to one of the rivers around Lewis Pass. Millions of cars drove towards me as it was the first day of the holiday season. Every second car with a boat or other device behind its hitch. 

At the trail head to the river, I packed my gear and started to walk in. Right in that moment a guy jumped out of a motor-home parked at the main road and announced that they “wanted” to fish that river as well. Did they? No they were parking and having a late breakfast. I offered them to give them a day of fishing from the mouth upwards and I would walk further as intended upstream. A burden for me as my left food reminded me every single step. Anyhow, the day was rather windy and overcast. At the first significant pool where the track comes close to the river I immediately spotted a very good fish but resisted the temptation to fish for it. As I said I would walk further upstream. Fish were few. Only in the obvious pools I could spot a couple, mostly one brown in the tail and two rainbows further up the pool. In one good pool at the end of a short gorge I spooked them all by bad and lazy habits and bad casting in the wind funneling through the tight valley. Several pools and some fish later I finally landed a nice and strong 7lbs rainbow, another one was lost. Not much for that day, but at least not blank. The motor-home was long gone as I arrived. Might have been some bloody European fishing tourists ; )

PS: I was wondering about the tramped grass on that particular river while tramping and fishing up. Later somebody told me the reason for that: a trophy was caught there recently and thus everybody went there. If I would have known that... Do not tell anybody not trustworthy where you catch big fish! BTW I caught my trophy in the river XXXXX!

Late on the way back towards Reefton I was lucky to make arrangements for two nights at the mentioned place. Strange feeling to be back in a holiday home after 1 ¾ years. Sunday, sleep in, a couple of useless kilometers, less than two hours on a river close by (lots of stones were in the riverbed) the way back to the car was mega bush bashing to get through a distance of just 50 meters. A machete would have been handy or better a rotary cuter to open a tunnel in the dense new plantation scrub, black berry and stuff. If you get lost in such a piece of vegetation - nightmare … better not to think about it.

But I had some promising plans for Monday I was looking forward for: a challenging but frequently rewarding river. Sunday was tying some special flies, cooking dinner or going to a local restaurant / pub, think I went to a restaurant that night, relaxing, taking care of the washing, writing …

Karamea to Hanmer Springs - Easter on the Rainbow Road

After that cracker of four days in the bush in a convenient hut, with challenging but rewarding fishing and lots of walking, my feet were two sizes bigger and there was no need to move too much. 

I asked Ines to show me the Oparara Basin with the Moria Gate that Karamea is famous for. It was pretty much the excursion she ‘rehearsed’ on the day before with Tobias. So she went there again and I for the first time. The loop walk combines the arch / kind of cave and the tarn. It was a little longer than her estimation of ‘around 10 minutes’ – more to an hour. The Moria Gate provided some nice motives for pictures, especially a rock structure inside with its wave shaped erosion patterns glowed like gold in the low light of this semi-cave. 

(Might be anybody did recognize the frequently usage of the term 'semi' - it is more or less about making fun on a NZ butter brand that describes its product as "semi spreadable" but in fact it is the worst butter to spread I ever encountered. Other terms to make fun about would be 'retreat' or 'boutique'.) (... oh and the text in the brackets before was only inserted due to typograhpic reasons making the text more appropriate to the pictures) 

 

 

This night we had a reservation at the Riverstone Restaurant in Karamea. The best location for a dinner in the north west corner of SI. The food was very delicious and for the first time we had some whitebait (very small fish). It was served in an omelet as appetizer and tasted surprisingly good. This place can be recommended absolutely! Riverstone even offers two chalets as an accommodation option for the time after the beloved Karamea Lodge.

The next day meant to leave Karamea. We drove over the winding road – luckily Tobias was sleeping – towards Westport, up the Buller Valley. There I saw a group of three, one girl and two boys coming out of the bush with rods in their hands, right as we passed on a place where it was clear that they fished a river that we were fishing two years ago. I slammed the brakes, jumped out of the car and had the trout-bum interview: where, what, how far, how many, what size….? They did not do well (no fish) as they did not walk up far enough. We back then made pretty much the same mistake, nevertheless we had some fish contact. Our fishing there some years ago was kind of adventure. We walked in partly on the riverbed with very little local knowledge, camped around two hours in on a  good camping spot there. As we did not walk in far enough we had hard times fishing and only hooked/landed some fish on the first day. That night the rain started hard and it rained and rained and in the morning the only option was to break camp and rush out as the river was close to not fishable and the water rising fast. Around late morning we arrived at a little side creek that was on the way in just a creek of might be 0,5cums. Now it was a small river of boisterous 15-25cums with a very unclear main current. We had to set camp and pitch the tent again, found a good spot just 100 meters bush bashing up that creek. The plan was to wait for the creek to drop again. The rain eased but still it was raining. I defined the deadline with 7pm and a drop of the creek of 30 centimeters - in that case we would rush and head out the same evening. We spent a boring wet day in a tent, not much to read (Ines had something), not much food left for an additional night. Luckily it worked out, the rain stooped, the creek drooped exactly by the defined amount, we managed to cross the creek without losing control, headed out found the kind of track most of the time, luckily we had one good headlamp and finally arrived at the car at 21:45 close to pitch black - we were happy! The late meal in Greymouth we got in a bar tasted delicious! And we found dry accommodation! I pretty much realized my miss-planning: food, weather and did not go far enough : ) Still it was a good adventure to be told in future years. For this trip this kind of adventure was no option.

The other drivers on the road were not so happy about my parking in the middle of the road, so I ended the brief interview and we headed off. Reefton (hello cottage!), Springs Junction, Lewis Pass, and finally Hanmer Springs. Tobias was screaming around one and a half hour – so I could not fall as leap while driving. On the way towards Hanmer we booked the very last accommodation. A funny 60es style motel/cabin. Good for one night and reasonably cheap. We arrived close to dark.

It was Easter weekend. The worst place is to be on Easter is Hanmer. It was no intention it just happened and could not be avoided. Ines wanted to go to the Hot Pools. Not for me. As she saw the 100m queue she revised here intention. We did the groceries to drive the Rainbow Road north of Hanmer (take care to be informed about the access restrictions and rules on this 4WD metaled road, do not try it with a motor-home or a 2WD!) for a couple of days and to fish some rivers and lakes there. Due to the expected traffic and possible fishing pressure we drove right to basic Coldwater Creek camp and omitted some 4WD-river access. We passed the highest pass in New Zealand - pretty much without stopping as the landscape was of rather low attraction. At the camp there were two other groups at the campsite. A couple from NI that was just about to discover SI after traveling the whole world and a family celebrating their anniversary with both we had some friendly conversation.

This night rain started and the next morning looked everything else but friendly. The lakes where no option due to lack of visibility, wind and some gusts so we drove to a stream / tributary of the main river to check it out. But with an overcast sky spotting is very hard. It still rained and I was far less than motivated. We decided to head out immediately as the weather was not clear for the next days and I did not want to lose a day sitting in a wet tent. We continued further north towards the middle part of the Wairau valley, passed the Rainbow valley road and arrived in St. Arnaud without any plan where to drive afterwards and no accommodation for the night. Thus the next step was to find a cup of cappuccino as at least its handle would provide some hold. We found that and I had an awful time to figure out what to do and where to go. This really gave me and headache as the options where Blenheim, Nelson or St. Arnaud. After a while of checking out availability of accommodation and prices we ended up to book a night at our usual place in Nelson. The Rutherford Hotel in the big ugly building. But it offered again reasonable prices and high standard (btw the owner of the Hotel is famous for his nature destroying river dam projects – please do not support this and book somewhere else in case you are more sensitive than we were). That night the dinner was special: room cooked tortellini with a decent fresh ready-made sauce. The sprinkler did not start.