15/8/9 Invercargill to Te Anau

Thankfully we had a late pick up and only left Invercargill at 10am so ahd a little lie in. we visited Invercargill museum where there are Tuatara, the only surviving members of sphenodontians, lizard like creatures that flourished 200 million years ago. They are said to live up to 250 years old but the ones at the museum were only 125 !!! Henry one of the lizards had just become a father at 120 years old. We were able to see the baby ones in a case but the older ones were inside burrows so we only caught a glimpse of a head. The rest of the museum was pretty good to and free of course. We trravelled to Riverton where we visited a Paua factory and bought some shells from Puysegar point right on the South West tip of NZ. Paua is the polished shell of the Abalone shell fish and the outer crust layer is ground away to reveal the irridescent layer underneath and makes really nice jewellery. The town had a huge Paua shell sculpture which we stopped at for pictures. Riverton is one of NZ oldest settlements and was a whaling and sealing station and now relies on fishing. Just outside Riverton we made a quick stop on the coast for pictures with a huge concrete whale !!! Next we travelled into Fiordland and Tuatapere with spectacular views of the Southern Alps and Southern Ocean. We stopped at a viewpoint called McCrackens Rest where Phil got his bum out for the comedy shot !! Along the road we pulled in for Skip to show us damaged trees. They were damaged by the strong Arctic winds which constantly blow through the area. There was no vegetation on the sea side of the trees and they were leaning right over despite there being no wind that day. Take a look at the photo it really shows the power of nature. In the townof Tuatapere we stopped for a fish and chip lunch in a local bar and passed by NZ award winning sausage butchers which was tiny but supplies sausage to most of NZ. We had great views of Takitimu Mountain said to be an ancient Waka in Maori legend. We stopped again to take in the view of Lake Manapuri and the mountain views, before heading to Te Anau for our overnight stop. Te Anau is the gateway for tourism in Fiordland and has trips and tourists calling through all year round en route to visit the Sounds. It sits on a lake and we had lovely views from our hostel . We took a walk into the small quiet town to see a film that Skip had advised us to see. Kim Hollows a local helicopter pilot had spent 10 years filming scenes of unspoilt, rugged fiordland from his helicopter and had set the clips to music for a half hour film. He even had the small cinema built to show it so that it could stay in the local area for ever. The film was called Ata Whenua Shadowlands and we sat and watched the amazing cinematography including views of waterfalls, fiords, coasts, wildlife, forests and native bush. It was really fantastic to watch and gave a preview of tomorrows visit to Milford Sound. After the film we shared some chilli wedges in the local pub where we had a free beer too. The waiter had the most amazing mullett too!! We went to bed pretty early to be ready for the trip to Milford.