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| Lunch At Lake Pearson |
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| Fair Exchange; Rock Cake For Petrol |
We cowered under the duvet through the early hours, parked next to the railway line in Arthur's Pass. The night was punctuated by the continuous screech of the dreaded Kea monsters.
It was cold and early when we woke but thankfully yesterday's fuel crisis was about to be relieved. There was no petrol station for another 70km but Arthur's Pass Café, of all the unlikely places, sold tea, cakes and 95 octane unleaded. Unfortunately it was limited to a 10 litre allowance which was never going to get us to the next fuel station in Springfield.
Ignoring the advice of a heavily tattooed redneck, who suggested that we fuel up and make a run for the lowlands, I mustered all my charm and set about sweet talking the pump attendant, who double shifted as the cafe waitress, to bend the rules just this once. Ready to beg, plead, argue and even sacrifice Clare's life if it came to a fight, none of this was necessary as she sweetly rolled her eyes and doubled our allowance. She has clearly had seen ill-prepared tourists fall foul of the improbable distances between refuelling stops, many times before.
As a gesture of our thanks we bought a rock cake from her and free wheeled the remaining 150km down the hill to Christchurch. Petrol supplies were becoming more scarce as the miles clocked up and pre payment for limited amounts of fuel were in force. Scuffles in the forecourt queues seemed on the point of breaking out as we were leaving Springfield; Mad Max look alikes roamed the streets and the strains of Tina Turner were clearly audible as we hit the highway.
The full tank neatly illustrated in microcosm, the fickle nature of our relationship to resources. Whilst eking out the last drops, to make it to the summit of Arthur’s Pass the night before, I had deployed every fuel saving tactic I could think of, short of switching off the engine and asking Clare to get out and push.. Now equipped with half a tank, I left the engine running at traffic lights and careered recklessly at speeds of up to 50kmph.
We stopped for lunch on Highway 73 at Lake Pearson.
The lake had been heavily forested to the water’s edge in years gone by, but this time it was the Maori, rather than the white settlers, who deforested large swathes of the district, now known as Craigeburn, by setting fires, to clear paths and camp sites, which got hopelessly out of control. What was left was clearance land on which tussock grasses took root. This proved favourable for grazing the newly imported Merino, until the white settlers committed their own environmental damage and over grazed the land to the point of almost irreversible soil erosion.
Ignoring the advice of a heavily tattooed redneck, who suggested that we fuel up and make a run for the lowlands, I mustered all my charm and set about sweet talking the pump attendant, who double shifted as the cafe waitress, to bend the rules just this once. Ready to beg, plead, argue and even sacrifice Clare's life if it came to a fight, none of this was necessary as she sweetly rolled her eyes and doubled our allowance. She has clearly had seen ill-prepared tourists fall foul of the improbable distances between refuelling stops, many times before.
As a gesture of our thanks we bought a rock cake from her and free wheeled the remaining 150km down the hill to Christchurch. Petrol supplies were becoming more scarce as the miles clocked up and pre payment for limited amounts of fuel were in force. Scuffles in the forecourt queues seemed on the point of breaking out as we were leaving Springfield; Mad Max look alikes roamed the streets and the strains of Tina Turner were clearly audible as we hit the highway.
The full tank neatly illustrated in microcosm, the fickle nature of our relationship to resources. Whilst eking out the last drops, to make it to the summit of Arthur’s Pass the night before, I had deployed every fuel saving tactic I could think of, short of switching off the engine and asking Clare to get out and push.. Now equipped with half a tank, I left the engine running at traffic lights and careered recklessly at speeds of up to 50kmph.
We stopped for lunch on Highway 73 at Lake Pearson.
The lake had been heavily forested to the water’s edge in years gone by, but this time it was the Maori, rather than the white settlers, who deforested large swathes of the district, now known as Craigeburn, by setting fires, to clear paths and camp sites, which got hopelessly out of control. What was left was clearance land on which tussock grasses took root. This proved favourable for grazing the newly imported Merino, until the white settlers committed their own environmental damage and over grazed the land to the point of almost irreversible soil erosion.
In more enlightened times, the vulnerable land on the upper slopes has been retired from grazing and the remainder has been actively managed to encourage regrowth of the tussock grasses but not the native forests.
Improbably well camouflaged sheep wander the lower hill sides, clearly a reaction of natural selection to the predations of the Kea Menace.
Improbably well camouflaged sheep wander the lower hill sides, clearly a reaction of natural selection to the predations of the Kea Menace.
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