At 09.30 we were off for the final leg of our journey with the motorhome back to Christchurch. We headed around Lake Brunner and continued until we joined Highway 73 which crosses the South Island via Arthur's Pass. We quickly started to climb as we headed into the Aurthurs Pass National Park with the road generally following the Otira River, there were quite a lot of heavy lorries with trailers on the road making slow progress up the steep slopes and U bends, thankfully passing places were quite frequent so we were not held up although we stopped a number of times to take in the dramatic scenery and take photos. At one of the stops we had our first encounter with a Kea, a large parrot type bird which is native to the area and can be a menace causing a lot of damage with there sharp beak and claws. Finally through the pass and stopped to take pictures again looking back where we had come. We stopped in the small village of Aurthurs Pass for coffee and went for a walk up to the Devils Punchbowl Falls, an hours walk up the side of the mountains but the spectacle when we got there was well worth it. We continued on through amazing countryside climbing mountains, then down the other side crossing river valleys, really fun driving but would have been better still in a sports car! Finally the land levelled into more agricultural areas as we headed into Christchurch to get packed up to be ready to begin our epic return journey via Singapore

Distance travelled - 210km