Food glorious food

 
November 18th

Our journey up the west coast continued, with a brief stop in Hokatiki – famous for NZ Greenstone (or Jade) where we did a little window shopping and had lunch on the beach. I opted to try out a NZ pie – they are famed for them, apparently - a tasty chicken satay number.

This is another gold rush area, and the largest NZ nugget was found in nearby Westport. But it seems the gold prospectors here are not too enterprising – the fist sized nugget was used as a door stop in the local pub for a few years, then someone had the bright idea of giving it to the Queen. Bad idea. She had it melted down and put into a tea set.

At Punakaiki we took a look at the famous pancake rocks – which really do look like layers of black pancakes. No-one knows why they have this appearance, but geologists say they were pushed up out of the sea.

It had been a pretty staid morning by Active New Zealand standards, so another uphill hike was in order – but first we had to link arms and cross the fast-flowing Punakaiki River… in our walking boots. I tried rolling my trousers up above my knees, but they still got wet. Fortunately our socks acted like mini-wetsuits keeping our feet warm in our boots. The first half of the hike was up over a muddy pass, through a subtropical forest with palm trees mixed with tree ferns and beech trees, then down the other side to the Porari River, where we encountered our first weka – another of NZ’s flightless birds. The final section of the hike was flat, and could have been tackled by mum’s in flip flops, pushing prams. But my poor old boots, which I bought years ago to do the Inca Train and which had been patched up by a very nice man at Timpsons in Twickenham before this trip – had finally had it. I left them in the van for out guides to tie them to one of the boot fences we had passed earlier in our journey. A fitting tribute – to the boots and this trip.

Back in Punakaiki we had our second culinary treat of the day – FISH AND CHIPS! Not sure the American contingent new what to make of it, as they smothered theirs with tomato sauce, but the Brits agreed these were far better than those you get at home – fresher fish and a lighter batter. De-lic-ious!