Highway 6 took me from Cromwell into Queenstown
but not before encountering the Kawarau Gorge chiselled from
the Kawarau river.
This is where you get your extreme sports from
tandem skydiving to whitewater rafting, from jetboating down the
Shotover river to Bungy jumping off the beautiful iron Kawarau
Suspension Bridge to the river below (43 metres). In fact its bungy
jumping that attracts the most attention. You can also jump from
the Skippers Canyon Bridge straddling the Shotover river(71m) or
throw yerself with abandon off the 'Pipeline' (102 metres). I watched
nervous contenders at the Kawarau Gorge for about a half hour.
Nobody seemed to want to jump. I was just about to go over and
show them how its done when, you know, I remembered (just in time)
that that I had put my underwear on the wrong way round and had to
pee badly, so I had to leave them clueless and unaware (or is that
underwear) of my expertise.
Instead I came across the gold mine opportunity of a lifetime.
Pan your own gold!! An answer to my financial prayers at last.
Typically it was all locked up, the owner had posted a sign that
read ' found the last gold nugget, I'm outta here sport! property
to be sold'. Doomed again. I was getting used to it. Queenstown
is compact but I didn't have time to gander (look) as I gunned
down south to Lumsden and my second stay over, Te Anau. On the
South Island you will come across various sheep ,deer and ostrich
farms and I got a curious reaction when I passed a roadside ostrich
farm on my travels. Suddenly all the ostrichs rushed the roadside fence
with heads bobbing up and down like breast stroke swimmers in the
Olympics. For a minute I thought they'd crash through the fence and
then the local newspaper headlines would read " TOURIST CALLOUSLY
MOWS DOWN ENTIRE FARMER"S OSTRICH LIVESTOCK,
PARLIAMENT MOVES TO BAN TOURIST FROM NZ FOR LIFE".
I wonder what the ostrichs were thinking............"What is it?".."What
can you see?"...."Olivia ,your head is in the way again "....."pipe down
at the back, will you?"....."It's a Nissan Bluebird, 4 cylinder overhead
camshaft, auto 4 door, dual airbags, radial types and a lunatic foreign
in the driver's seat, satisfied now?"...."I saw 20 of those last week"...
..."common as muck"...."boring"....."so what'll we do next?"...."how about
we bury our eggs so the farmer can't find them, like we did last month"..
"drove him nuts"..."brilliant idea Timothy"...."all those in favour, raise a
wing"..." motion carried". An ostrich is really a stupid animal, what do
you think? I managed to break just in time to turn onto highway 94 to Te Anau.
Leaving behind the red scrublands, I progressed into forested
hills and the Fjordland National Park area which stretched about
100 kms (75 miles) up to Milford Sound. I stopped for some
petrol, honestly, and while talking to the attendant picked up faint traces
of a Scottish accent. This is not unusual down this neck of the woods
as Scottish settlers have made home in places with names like
Invarcargill and Dunedin. Beyond Invarcargill lies tiny Stewart Island
and beyond that the next landmass, Antarctica at the bottom of the world. 
