Day 147, 148 - Haast & Jackson Bay, South Island - Sunday 11th, Monday 12th March 2012

We spent the majority of the morning cleaning out the van and checking every nook and cranny for our furry little friend. Strangely we didn't see him but we could see where he had been by following his droppings and tiny little patches of wee! They lead us to our little food cupboard where he had knarred through our packet of biscuits and half eaten three of them, greedy little b*****! He also had some muesli and some oats. We had to throw most stuff away and clean the camper from top to bottom. Oh I forgot to mention all this had to be done whilst it was hammering with rain and we had no shelter plus sand-flies were attacking us! Sand-flies are like the mosquitos bigger, tougher brother, these little guys swarm like midges and when one bites you, you know a million of he's mates are right behind him. They also leave a really nasty red spot that seems to last for about 5 days! When the van was clean we headed back off and to our next stop, the small town of Haast. The drive really was beautiful; now you would think that because of all the rain it would be a nightmare but actually the rain made the views better. The reason for this being that there had been so much rain the night before the waterfalls had swelled and doubled in size and they were everywhere. When I say that I truly mean it; the more you looked the more you saw, it was amazing! Once we arrived at Haast we went to the tiny village store to stock up on essentials… we left with a bag which consisted of marshmallows, crisps, 2 chocolate bars, some mocha chocolate sachets oh and a mouse catching mat. 2 minutes from the store was our campsite which had internet, a kitchen and hot showers. We washed, chilled and ate (in that order) and then sat for about 20 minutes to see if the mouse came back… after 2 mins Soph was asleep quickly followed by me!

We had a great night's sleep and we needed it after the mouse keeping us up the night before!! We check the little mouse catcher pads and no mouse, we checked the food and biscuits, no sign of him - I think he was the actor mouse out of the film Mouse Hunt…………either that of a reincarnation of Houdini! We had another shower then checked out to go and explore Jackson Bay. The West Coast and Jackson Bay are famous for catching whitebait and apparently there is a café called "The Cray Pot" that does a whitebait pattie's which apparently are amazing. Well, I haven't had whitebait since I was about 6 when I went on a family holiday to Devon and I hated it then so was a little unsure about trying it again. We arrived at Jackson Bay and luckily the weather was perfect, blue skies and calm waters. We went for an hour walk and then wondered over to the pier and Soph took some great photos. After, we walked back and had our whitebait pattie which cost $10 (£5) - it should be good for that price. When it came out it was the size of a tennis ball and was basically an omelette with whitebait mixed in. None the less we tucked in, Soph loved it, I thought it was surprisingly good too - nothing like I remembered all those years ago. With whitebait now ticked off the things I don't like list we pushed on to Franz Josef, where we plan to do a 9 hour climb to, nearly, the top of it!!