Hokitika to the Riwaka River Valley

Hokitika to Riwaka River Valley (the Hayshed)

This morning we awoke to driving rain. Now, I do not mean rain you drive in, I mean DRIVING RAIN! It began pounding the house around 4-5 am, I’m not sure. It was dark but not completely and it kept me from going back to sleep because it was that loud. We had breakfast, got re-packed into Heffi, and off to the northernmost part of the South Island, to the Abel Tasman National Park area. The rain just kept pouring out of the sky for the next 2-3 hours; apparently very “normal” weather for the west coast. We finally got a bit inland and the weather let up into light gray skies which gave way to partly cloudy skies upon arrival in Motueka. Upon arrival here you can tell this is a different part of New Zealand; the cars are more “flash”, the houses less beaten by the weather, and the locals are REALLY tan. Yep, this part of New Zealand is “lifestyle”. The houses have more glass, the vegetation gets a wee bit more sub-tropical, and the prices on the menu at every eatery reflects it. Don’t get me wrong, it is not bad in any way, just different. The accent even changes; we cannot put our finger on it, but the accent here is a bit more understandable here than on the “west side”. We grabbed some supplies and headed out of town (about 10 km) and to our rental house up the Riwaka River Valley. We got there to find our little gem of a rental, an old hayshed converted into a house, replete with buzzing wetas outside, a complement of red-faced ducks, a flock of sheep for side-yard weed maintenance, world-class German Brown trout in the stream out back, and a pair of 3 foot long freshwater eels to boot! This valley used to be covered in commercial tobacco plantations until the mid-80’s and then the government began subsidizing the farmers to plant something else. That eventually led to managed timber plantations and some fruit orchards. The weather on our arrival was warm and humid with a large complement of these tiny black bugs called sand flies. These guys are nasty, well, their bite is nasty. It feels like a small drop of acid got on you as they just penetrate your skin…too late you’ve been gotten. Then the itch starts up in about 5 minutes. You have GOT TO LEAVE IT ALONE! If not it balloons into a huge welt that only gets worse over the next 3-5 days. So to review…burning acid sensation, followed by unignorable itchiness, then festering ugliness if you mess with it….where the heck is my bug juice?! The next problem is that most of New Zealand is clueless to the prevention of access of bugs to our indoors; NO SCREENS;( Warm out? Humid too? What to do but open up all the windows to air out the house, right? Careful, you just let in 250 blood-sucking Chupacabras (Mexican euphamism for legendary “vampire” creature)….eeeeek! So, fitful sleep filled with the occasional self face, ankle and back of hand slapping throughout the night ensued.  More tomorrow!