The drive over to Okain’s Bay on the Summit Road was every bit as “fun” as the first day. After Barb and I had a little, “come to Jesus” discussion about how hard the driving was for me without her extra help and encouragement, I was able to relax just enough to really begin to see how beautiful it all was.
The campground at Okains Bay was a little different than our night at Pigeon’s Bay. Where Pigeon’s Bay was small without many people, Okain’s was much bigger and pretty crowded with lots of families. It had a great vibe, and would be a great place to bring kids. There was a lot of campsites that were tucked away and private, but all that was left when we got there was basically a large gravel lot. It did have a view of the ocean though. The picture they chose for the header on this page captures pretty accurately what you are signing up for.
The drive to our next stop was pretty uneventful, with a quick detour to Geraldine to check out Barker’s, a shop famous for its preserves. It was a pretty heavy tourist stop, but the preserves, and drinks were pretty delicious, and we stocked up on some tasty treats.
That night was spent at the Peel Forest campground. Our first Department of Conservation (DOC) campsite of the trip. We weren’t sure how long the house battery would last in the van, and if it would charge sufficiently as we drove, so we figured we should get a camp spot with power for our third night. I believe it was also the end of the reservations we had made prior to our trip. We had a rough plan of the route we were going to take, but nothing was set in stone. We did have reservations for the Kepler Great Walk, but it was looking more and more like our plans were not going to allow for it. It was going to keep us on the South Island longer than we were going to want to stay. It’s tricky to figure out what you are going to do when you have never been to a place. We had made the Kepler reservation, largely because it was the only time that was available to do any of the Great Walks. Even that was not ideal – we were unable to get a spot to sleep for the last night of the trek, and if we did it, we would have to hike a big chunk on the last day to get out.
Camping the first two nights was pretty basic, Pigeon Bay just had bathrooms, Okain’s had a kitchen and showers, but we didn’t make use of it. Peel Forest was a really nice DOC site. The campsites were spacious, the showers hot, and the kitchen was a pretty nice spot to hang out and socialize. We even did our laundry.
It did pay off for us to get the DOC Campsite Pass. A lot of the basic DOC campgrounds are free with the pass, and the premium sites – those with electricity and nicer facilities – are half off.
There was great hiking from the campground into Peel Forest that featured a Big Tree Walk. It was a great introduction to the big trees of the South Island.
Easy morning and short drive to Lake Tekapo.
Lake Tekapo didn’t hold a lot for us, so we headed up the road to look for our evenings camp. Lake Alexandrina was our next stop. Great spot to spend the afternoon, lazing by the lake and napping.
NZ instant coffee is aces
We had thought about hitting Aoraki/Mt Cook a bit later, but the weather was looking a bit rough for our original plan, so we decided to make that our next stop. We had pretty good luck making our reservations online the day before, or even in the morning before we would arrive at a destination. We didn’t test our luck by pulling into places in the evening without any reservations very often. Even though it was technically the beginning of the off season, things were filling up pretty tight every evening.
We like camping off on our own, little did we know that we would be leaving the quieter areas of NZ, and the next couple of weeks would be quite a bit more crowded and popular.