February 9, 2004 - Back North

Got up. Drove. Stopped to look at some seals on the rocks just to the side of the road (Route 1 is drawn as being near the coast, which it's not in many places, it's five feet or less from the cliff/water). Got to Picton in plenty of time to ferry across from 1:30-4:30. Got our new rental car and checked in, and got dinner at the Curry Club again. Had plans to do some other things, but everything closes up around 6, so I bought a bottle of NZ wine to open and that's that.

It was actually sunny the whole day so far, and in the 70s (F). Didn't burn this time although I was on the top deck the whole time. Hopefully I'll get some photos developed tomorrow! Hope some of them at least came out.

On some of the more fun high-mountain passes, as we discussed the lack of many guard rails, we came around a bend on a cliff, and we noticed a missing section of a sorta-fence that I suppose was meant to stop cars from going off into the ravine below. It was about a car's width of a stretch ripped out. As we drove around the horseshoe shaped ridge, I looked back. And spotted the Jeep that had gone through, wedged nose first into the steep, sharp valley below. I doubt it touched ground at all between takeoff and landing. From the looks of it, it may have caught fire, too. Then I put it out of my mind until we got to PictOn.


Overnight: James Cook Hotel Grand Chancellor, Wellington
Words and images Copyright 2004 Bill J. Jerome
Maps Copyright 2004 Multimap.com