The Great Coast Road

"This'll do," I said to Kevin as we ate our lunch in the warm sunshine, with a pretty cove to look at and the sounds of waves crashing against the rocks. 

The day had started wet and foggy, so we started local: a fun explore of a nearby site, a restored coal mine, perched high up on the top of a hill, with the remains of a gravity-defying track down the amazingly steep incline where the coal buckets would careen down the hill towards the sea. I was standing on a rock at the top, looking down at where the track ran downwards into a sea of fog, when suddenly the clouds lifted, and the landscape below started to glow in the sunshine. It was the start of a beautiful day on the West Coast.

From the mine we went south along the aptly named Great Coast Road; driving this road was a key part of our South Island route planning. Kevin and I have been lucky enough to drive along some wonderful coast roads in various countries and this was up there with the best. Big rolling seas crashing in on our right, one minute at our level, and the next far below us as the road wound up and down the mountains - another green, forested, untouched National Park, the Paparoa National Park in this case. And then Kevin saw a sign off the main road towards the sea; and the next moment we were having our lunch overlooking a pretty beach (obviously a good spot because as we arrived Neil Oliver from Coast was just leaving with his TV crew). A brief play on the sand, and then we were off down the Great Coast Road again.

After more corners with amazing views of sea, rocks, waves and mountains, and even better, more sun, the road ended with a slight anticlimax in unattractive Greymouth; but we carried on through towards pretty Hokitika, and then inland to Hokitika Gorge. After cajoling Jemima through her bad tempered nap wake-up with promises of being able to "jog mummy", we got her down the hill along the rainforest walk to where a swing bridge crossed a wide, startlingly milky-blue river (apparently a combination of rock flour, which I've never heard of, and glacier water). Jemima did her usual fearless crossing while I clung to the handrail (this one really was joggy); and then it was back up the hill, and through the warm evening sunshine to our night stop, and a outdoor dinner of pan-fried prawns and Caprese and potato salads. I know everything looks better in the sunshine, but New Zealand was pretty stunning today.