Invercargill

Drove down to Invercargill without stopping. There isn't much to see, just beautiful rolling countryside with sheep and a few cows. No towering mountains, thundering rivers or primeval forests. There doesn't seem much to do at Invercargill either, so we stopped just outside Queens Park (the main green area in the town) and headed out for a wander around. A bit of a chilly wind forced out all the jackets. It must be pretty mild for the locals though, many were wearing short sleeves.

There may not be much going on in Invercargill in general, but there is plenty to to in Queens Park. After throwing autumn leaves at each other for a bit we stopped at the playground for a picnic. Then we saw the cacti at the summer gardens, all sorts of parrots at the aviary, farm animals at the enclosure, before rounding off the visit at Alice's Castle (a fortress for children, with slides coming out of the turrets).

After Invercargill we headed further South. Out here there are a few roads which are just gravel. We ended up on one on our way to tonight's campsite. It is the perfect combination of DOC and commercial. For only a few bucks more than a DOC campsite you get a powered site, together with showers and a common room and kitchen. The only thing it was missing was a dump station, but we can do that at some petrol stations and other places on the way. They also have a few sheep, which we will investigate tomorrow. There is a Spanish guy stating here, he has been hitch-hiking round New Zealand for 7 months doing a sort of travel guide. He has given us loads of tips for the Catlins area as well as the South island in general.