Weekend catch up

Having reviewed the few photos I took over the weekend, I'd have to say that they're not particularly brilliant. But a good time was had by all. It was very hot driving up to Lake Daniels on Saturday but perfect for camping. We just stayed at the turn off, rather than walking in the 2 hours to the lake, partly because when we're away on our Peking to Paris we'll be camping with the cars and partly because that area is renown for break-ins into cars that are left unsupervised. There was another group of walkers there who camped as well but when they walked in to the lake on Sun they left a couple of people at the campsite.

Because Saturday was so hot when I was packing, I almost didn't throw a warm jacket in but I was glad I had. I tend to forget about the altitude making a difference and there's still some snow around on the tops which means it got downright chilly when the sun went down. I think we were all in bed by about 9.30pm.

When we were packing out on Sun morning quite a few horse floats cruised in. They'd been at an endurance event in Canterbury some where and most of them were on their way back to Nelson and were using the area to let the horses out and move around. It looked as though quite a few of them camped in their floats.

We'd had virtually no wind at the campsite and even the sandflies weren't too bad. I got bitten a couple of times on my ankles but I think that was from not applying the repellent well enough. The lavender repellent seemed to work quite well and I certainly smelt better than some of the others after they'd put their concoctions on! Had a huge nor'west wind driving home - pushed the car all over the road. We decided to stop off at Hanmer Springs for lunch which was a great decision as it meant we were able to get a decent coffee (and fit in a little shopping). The wind was so strong it was blowing the pine cones off the conifers.

All in all, a great weekend.