South Island day 13: Te Anau to Invercargill

We had another day where the weather was mostly the opposite from what the rest of the country has been having – apart from a few spits just before lunchtime, we didn’t see any rain today. But it was quite windy and the wind was very cold.

After a week of being kind of stuck (in a nice way) in room 29 at the Lakeside Motel, Te Anau, we were on the move again. The day began by packing up the car, picking up the bikes from Te Anau Downs, and hitting the road. We took the ‘Southern Scenic’ route from Te Anau to Invercargill via Tuatapere and Riverton – SH99.


View at Te Waewae Bay. It was a lot colder than the photo looks!

We arrived in Invercargill at around lunchtime, and decided to drive to Bluff and have lunch there. Bluff is either the end or the start of SH1, depending on how you look at it.


Us at Bluff


Plaque at Bluff that kind of sums up our trip so far!


Today was to be the only day we would have to look around Invercargill, so we visited the Southland Museum (with tuatara enclosure) and Hayes hardware store before heading out for a short-ish bike ride to test our current state of riding ability. Bearing in mind that at the motel we have been given an accessible unit for guests with mobility challenges, complete with disabled carpark, a lounge the size of my entire house (which turns out to be quite good for storing bikes in), and a bathroom that is so big it echoes. We managed just under 8 km on our bikes, which I thought was pretty good seeing as the average temperature was around 8°C.


Not everything in the hardware store is for sale, but many things are...


Specialised hammers


Custom bolts


Tuatara at Southland Museum


Tomorrow we have another early start as we are going to Stewart Island for a day trip.