Gentle Annie Camp to Karamea

The next morning (Monday) was overcast and drizzly so a perfect day to recharge our batteries with some R&R - crosswords, sudokus, kakuros, reading and catching up on the blog. Len did a bit of spinning in the river again but the fish must have all packed their bags and gone on their summer holidays. 

Preparing fishing tackle with aquatic helper.

Gentle Annie cafe 

The campsite was a friendly, casual place to stay with free WiFi available in their large lounge/cafe area and delicious baking especially the caramel filled anzac biscuits - yum!
$20 a night to stay with showers an extra $2.

Cloud, mist and light rain greeted us the next morning and conditions remained the same as we did the serious drive over the hilly, windy Karamea Bluffs to Karamea itself. 

Not much of a view today 

Our first stop was to do the half hour return walk to Lake Hanlon which is known for it's beautiful reflections. Not so amazing when it's grey overhead but a pleasant climb up (surprisingly) and then down. No-one else about.

Not the best view here either!

At Little Wanganui, with the weather clearing, we drove out to the river mouth where there were a couple of motorhomers from Nelson fishing - no luck for them either. You can stay overnight here but you would need to choose your parking spot carefully with lots of soft sand about and reviews telling of people who have got stuck. So it was on the road again to Karamea, a little settlement with a population of 575  but with a busyness about it, being close to the Heaphy track and the Oparara Basin with it's walks to the arches and caves. It has a petrol station, a 4 square with more expensive groceries than normal, some cafes, a variety of accommodation and walks around the vast estuary circling the river mouth.

We passed through Karamea to get to the Karamea Golf Course - a nine hole links course which is very lumpy, bumpy, dry and with few trees, typical of many links courses.

The only green patches were greens!

The 2nd fairway called "Swan Lake" and running alongside a marshy area was absolutely covered with duck feathers and there seemed to be a birdscarer there to frighten birds away which contradicted my thoughts that it was a duck killing-field - maybe a roosting area instead. With a membership of only 30 and the members themselves maintaining the course it is remarkable that they have been able to keep it going. They are looking after the greens which are actually green with hoses winding across every one to keep them watered but making landing and putting on the green a complicated business! So really it wasn't that enjoyable to play especially with the midges attacking me the whole way round. Len said there were colonies of them on the back of my white shirt but there were even more on my arms and legs and even in my ears! Needless to say I had my worst game for a while, Len having soundly beaten me by the 13th hole.

Golf club security again!

I had rung the lady's captain to ask if there was a possibility of us staying there the night and of course that was all good with them. We become the security for the club. There was not another sole playing and no one turned up before we left the next morning.