Arthur's Pass

Devil’s Punchbowl

January 10, 2021 by NZ Filbruns 4 Comments

We arrived home a few days ago from a family road trip. Warning: There will be many posts over the next few weeks with pictures from our trip! I took over 400 pictures on my camera, and am borrowing pictures from three or four other cameras! I just spent a couple of hours sorting and organizing pictures, and have only finished the first day. This may take awhile.

Anyway, on with the story! We left here around 3:00 in the afternoon on Monday, the 28th of December. We had decided to only drive an hour and a half the first day, to allow time to pack and get everything wrapped up here. It’s a massive undertaking to get ten people ready for a 12-day trip, and organize care for all the animals, as well. Everyone worked together well, though, and we were ready earlier than I had originally hoped. We traveled in two vans, ours and Simon’s. Elijah had spent a few days taking the back seats out of both vans and building beds in them. That left four seats in our gray van, and six in Simon’s red van. We packed our luggage and food under the beds, and figured out how to fit the entire family into the two vehicles to sleep at night.

Off we go toward the mountains!

The pohutukawa was in bloom in the mountains. This tree is often called the New Zealand Christmas tree. It is beautiful!

The road up the Otira Gorge to Arthur’s Pass is always stunning.

I don’t necessarily like driving up the 16% grade, but the Otira Viaduct is an incredible feat of engineering.

The old road is up there. Can you see why they built the viaduct?

Since we had extra time, we decided to walk up to the Devil’s Punchbowl. We’ve been wanting to do that for several years. Mom, we thought of you when we went up this track!This is the view from the carpark. See the train? It was the TranzAlpine passenger train, just coming out of the tunnel that goes under the pass. The tunnel is 8.5 kilometers long, with a steep grade.

We soon set off on our tramp. Most of the children ended up way ahead of us. Here they were regrouping in a meadow.

This is the view downriver from the bridge.The waterfall comes through the “V” between the mountains.

Here are some of the 401 steps that make the track a little easier!I had not done very much physically for a month, because of a health problem, and the climb up those 401 steps was quite challenging!

The children went past the viewing platform on a track that took them to the base of the falls. I didn’t go there!

Mr. Diligence got this view looking downstream from the base of the falls.

Esther took a video of the falls. It can’t compare to actually being there, but maybe it will help give an idea of what we saw.

I like this one! Elijah is to the left, and Simon is holding Miss Joy. She was not happy up there—she didn’t like the cold, wet spray, and was calling for “Mama, Mama!”

Miss Joy was quite happy to be reunited with her daddy and I.

She wanted to walk down the steps by herself. They let her walk a little, but a 16-month-old is rather slow! Little Miss enjoyed jumping down several steps at once for a short ways.

See Arthur’s Pass Village at the base of the mountain?

Everyone stopped in the little meadow again when they reached it, and waited for us slow ones to arrive. We all rested in the warm sunshine for awhile, and just enjoyed being together.

Little Miss wanted her picture taken as we were walking back to the vans.

We parked for the night in the driveway of some friends who live in the village. They weren’t home, but had kindly allowed us to use their driveway and the needed facilities in the house. This is the view we saw from the van, across their yard, as the sun was getting low.

We cooked hamburgers on a campstove in the driveway. It was getting rather chilly!

After supper, and getting set up for sleeping for the night, some of us played a game of Ricochet Robots on the bed in the gray van.That was a fun, novel experience!

Gayle and Little Miss walked to a small waterfall behind the house. Mom, this is the one we walked to from the visitor’s center several years ago.Then, as it got dark, we settled in to sleep for the night. One or two people slept under the queen bed on the platform in each van, Miss Joy slept on her cot mattress on the floor in ours, and Mr. Sweetie and Mr. Imagination slept on a mattress on a plywood platform set over the front bench seat in the red van. Everyone was comfortable, and everyone slept well that night.

Traveling in January (and the canoe)

February 1, 2020 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

We had several visitors from other places in January. Practically every time someone comes to visit, we take them to Pancake Rocks. I ended up staying home from the last two trips there; I have a baby who does not like to go away from home, so I stay here and prepare meals.

The first visitors for the month were two young men and their sister. Gayle and the children took them to Pancake Rocks on New Year’s Day. They stopped at the Brunner Mine first; this is the Grey River from there.

After checking out Pancake Rocks, they went to Punakaiki Caverns. It’s apparently very beautiful! I’ve never been there myself.

They also took the Truman Track down to the beach. I have been there! Here are Mr. Diligence and Mr. Intellectual climbing a rock.

Our other visitors arrived towards the end of the month. This was two young ladies Esther’s age from Germany. Esther took several trips with them. The first trip was to Pancake Rocks; I didn’t save any of her pictures. Later that week, she, Mr. Diligence and Mr. Sweetie went along to the glaciers with them. Here they are walking up to Franz Josef.

They also went to Fox Glacier, but couldn’t drive up as we did the last time. In fact, the road on both sides of the river that goes away from Fox Glacier has been washed out from the record-breaking rainfalls we’ve had this year. They walked up the road on the side away from the glacier; it’s closed to vehicles because of the slips. They walked a total of two hours there!

In between trips, the boys took the German girls down to the creek and gave them a ride in the boat.

Mr. Sweetie, Mr. Imagination, and Little Miss enjoyed the water and mud!

Esther and Mr. Sweetie also went with the girls to Arthur’s Pass. They stopped at Lake Brunner on the way.

This is a waterfall on the Millenium Walk, near the visitor’s centre.

These pictures were taken at the Devil’s Punchbowl Falls.

We have enjoyed having visitors!

Now that we’re home for a Saturday with no visitors, however, this happened:

The canoe has been sitting for the past year, waiting for the fibreglass. Mr. Intellectual got the sanding done awhile ago, and he patched up the holes. Now, the fibreglass is on, with the first coat of epoxy. Doesn’t it look good?

Timaru Trip

May 4, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

We went to Timaru over Easter weekend, as we have since 2014. As always, it was a wonderful time of worshipping and hearing the Word preached, and spending time with many friends, both people we have known for a long time and those we just met for the first time. I took a few pictures of the spectacular scenery on the way and on the way home—but never took the time to pull my camera out of my purse while we were down there!

The sun rose while we were going through the mountains; here we are starting to head up toward Arthur’s Pass from the west.

After we went over Arthur’s Pass, as we approached Porter’s Pass, we noticed a thin line of snow just along the tops of the mountains.

Awhile later, once we were down on the plains, we looked back, and could see the other side of those same mountains!

We took a route we haven’t taken before, and got to enjoy the gorgeous Rakaia Gorge.

On our way home, we enjoyed the spectacular scenery again. This is between Porter’s and Arthur’s Passes, again.

Arthur’s Pass

December 15, 2018 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

About a month ago, the children and I had to go to Christchurch to renew our American passports. We left the city in good time and headed back across the mountains to our side of the island. The plan was to drop the older four children off at a Bible Study we often attend, to go home with Gayle, while I took the younger ones home. We thought we had some extra time, so when we reached the top of Arthur’s Pass we decided to stop at a nature walk we had enjoyed a couple of years ago. The older ones all went ahead, and I stayed behind at Little Miss’s slower pace. We thoroughly enjoyed the scenery and the flowers, and the break from the city and the van where we had been all day—but ended up arriving half an hour late at the Bible Study. It was worth taking the time to stop anyway!

Some of the scenery we enjoyed driving up to the pass:

This is a very noisy creek we crossed on the way from the carpark to the walking track.

The road had only reopened that morning after a rain storm washed out bridges a few days before. I think they got 3-400 mm of rain in two days (that’s about 12-16 inches). Normally, we would have driven through here to another car park, but we decided the van wouldn’t handle this washout very well!

We enjoyed the many alpine flowers that were in bloom.

These huge leaves belong to the Mount Cook lily, which was in bloom farther along the track than I reached.

Looking back along the highway towards the Canterbury side of the pass.

Little Miss ran ahead of me. She was enjoying her freedom!

Dobson Nature Walk

November 23, 2016 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Our last stop before heading home was at the very top of Arthur’s Pass. The Dobson Nature Walk goes up a hillside over the highway. We didn’t see a lot of wildflowers, as it’s still early spring, but the scenery was dramatic. These flowers are the largest buttercup in the world. They were gorgeous!

Little Miss was being independent again. We let her walk one way, but her daddy carried her most of the way back.

This is the highest point of the highway going over the pass.

That bump on her forehead is a sandfly bite.

Bealey Valley Trail

November 22, 2016 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

After leaving the cottage on our last day, we drove back up to Arthur’s Pass. We still wanted to go on a couple of walks we’d heard about, and look for mountain wildflowers. We found the Bealey Valley track first.

The trail led to a bridge over this rapids; it was a lot more impressive in real life than the picture can show! I ended up spending a lot of time on the bridge with Little Miss, while the rest of the family (except Grandma) went up a pretty rugged track. Little Miss looked at the water on both sides, over and over, and then looked through the cracks in the floor to see the water go under. I think she was trying to figure out what the water was doing.

This was a tiny mushroom; the cap was about the size of my thumbnail!

It’s almost a rainforest up there at the top of the pass. So much moss!

Lake Sarah

November 21, 2016 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Our second full day at Cass was rainy most of the day, but toward evening it cleared. We decided to walk the mile to Lake Sarah. The scenery was spectacular. Little Miss was being particular about who carried her or held her hand; she wanted Mommy or no one. Of course, she didn’t get her way all the way,although we did let her walk by herself some.

Little Miss in front of broom.

Lake Sarah

Gorse

Arthur’s Pass—A Waterfall

November 20, 2016 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

Late in the afternoon of our first full day in Cass, we went up to Arthur’s Pass to try to find a walk that we’d been told about. Here we are paralleling the Waimakariri River.

A mountain near the pass.

After learning about some local walks in the visitor’s center, we decided all we really had time for was a 10-minute walk to a waterfall near the center. We couldn’t find the right trail to it for a long time, but the boys finally located it. So beautiful! Here is Mr. Intellectual in front of the lower fall.

Grandma and Mr. Sweetie at the viewing platform for the upper fall.

Some of the boys found a semblance of a trail to the upper fall, and of course they had to explore that.

The bridge from which we viewed the lower fall.

Cave Stream

November 19, 2016 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

Gayle has been wanting to explore Cave Stream ever since a week or so after we moved to New Zealand, in 2009. He finally had the chance to do it! The first day we were in the cabin at Cass, he took Mr. Inventor, Mr. Intellectual, and Mr. Diligence to Cave Stream, while the rest of us stayed at the cabin and read, wrote, cooked lunch, or played. The younger two boys weren’t excited about going through the cave and getting soaked in icy water, so just Gayle and Mr. Inventor went through. The cave is over 500 meters long, with a creek flowing through it. In places, the water was waist deep on Gayle, and in other places they had to scramble up waterfalls. It was pitch black in the cave, so they were glad for their headlamps. The other boys carried their shoes around to the end of the cave for them, and explored the trails on the surface.

The adventurers enter the cave!

You can see the cave entrance at the base of the cliff, just on the right side of the river.

This is the exit to the cave. A ladder comes up at the left end of the crack; the water starts plunging down a 3-meter waterfall here. After climbing the ladder, you crawl along the ledge above the water, holding on to a chain.

They have emerged from the cave!

Castle Hill

November 18, 2016 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

We stopped on our way to Cass to eat a late lunch at Castle Hill and explore the rocks. The boys had a lot of fun! This is the view down the valley as we walked out to the hill.

Looking the other direction from the trail.

We were heading toward those huge rocks directly ahead of us. There were a lot of tourists, mostly Oriental, there when we arrived, and then a busload of them arrived as we started walking.

This rock is out in the paddock by itself.

We were amused, watching the tourists. This pose seemed to be the favorite of the day. Most of the people from the bus just walked out here, took pictures all around, and headed right back to the bus. One or two, though went up into the rocks, then had to run back before they got left behind.

Our boys wasted no time climbing up into the rocks. There are all four of them, at least a hundred feet up. It was a lot easier climbing the backside of this rock than it looks from this side!