Last night we had a very rough night as Jake was up, in complete hysterics for at least an hour from about 3am to 4am. This also woke Damian, Toni and myself he was inconsolable for at least half an hour before somehow we managed to get him to calm down. I’d taken the time to clean the kitchen, and by the time everyone had resettled the sun had already started rising. By the time I surfaced, it was 10:30am – the latest start to a day yet this trip.
Despite the theatrics, we decided to continue with our planned itinerary, although in retrospect it was probably not the wisest idea. Toni has come down with some kind of gastro and Jake seems to have a dose of it as well. Damian and I are the healthiest, D is probably the best rested of all of us.
We gathered up our stuff and put the kids in the car and took off east by south east. We passed Wanaka town, the Wanaka airport and beyond through the hamlet of Luggate and through to the shores of Lake Dunstan, ringed with vineyards. We entered central Otago, home to the Pinot grape – and our destination was the former gold rush town of Cromwell.
Cromwell
The town is famous for the wine region surrounding it, and for its gold rush history. Of the two, we were mostly focused on the latter, given the sicknesses and fatigue et al. We stopped first at the visitor’s centre to get some local maps, before driving into the old part of town to see the historic town reserve.
Unfortunately (yet not surprisingly) nearly everything was shut being Boxing Day. Some of the old town was open, but it was quite small and not very busy. There were people racing speed boats on the river and a few tourists poking around. Jake and I went out onto the jetty were a father and his sons were fishing.
We tried to find the gold rush heritage feature, where one may pan for gold but it was either not where the map said it was, or it was also closed. We decided to push on, so we crossed the bridge and stopped briefly to view the town from a lookout, before continuing south to the town of Alexandra.
The route took us past another town (Clyde) which has a dam to the north. The drive followed the edge of the river in what would be a fairly deep gorge. By the time we hit Alexandra we were pretty tired, so we drove directly to some of the historic features, such as the remnants of an old bridge.
The town was quite small but charming, a lot like many small towns back in Australia. We also visited the war monument, located not far from the old courthouse (now a cafe, but closed this day). With time escaping, we drove back to a KFC to buy chips for the kids, before driving to a local park to let the boys climb, crawl and general burn some energy.
It was a little after 3:30pm when we finally departed back for Wanaka. Toni drove as far as Cromwell, but we swapped as Toni was getting worse. I drove as far as the Wanaka town limits, but we had to switch back as I was too fatigued.
When we arrived back at the resort, Toni had to attend to her illness, however I had to lie down for about 45 minutes to resolve my own fatigue issue. When I woke, I took over from Toni and gave her an opportunity to rest. The boys and I spent about an hour in the pool, before I took them back to the room and went through the bath/dinner/bottle and bed routine.
It’s now about 9:30pm and I’ve had some time to put together this article. Hopefully things improve this evening and tomorrow.
Time for a rest day I think. No driving and just relaxation in the pool and surrounds should recharge all your batteries. Otherwise you might overload and burn out.