To The Southern Alps

It will take a few days to reach the alps, but every mile on this Inland Scenic Highway was new to us, even if today's low cloud ceiling made it less scenic than it might have been.

Here's what I had in mind, Mt Hutt as the backdrop:

 Photo courtesy of Sabine Osthorst

 And here was the reality:

First meal in the car is cheese and raw vegetables, the three-cups-of-color-daily portion of the neuro-protective Dr Terry Wahls protocol (this is the part I rarely achieve). Also possibly a few potato chips, definitely not part of the Wahls recs but delicious nonetheless.

We're reading and hearing about Chicago's extreme heat and humidity. As an antidote, we're happy to be heading toward the mountains, especially the mother of them all, NZ's Mount Cook/Aoraki. 

On our longer-than-usual drive today we passed a cafe/bar in Mayfield (pop. 200) and stopped for a carry-out flat white.

 How does a town of 200 sustain a lovely cafe like this?

This charming woman has relatives in Chicago who visited her in NZ last year. She told me her kids love growing up here and have no interest in moving to the US. She and I talked about how incredibly safe it feels to be a woman in NZ.

I ordered a slab of ribs to go.

The Queen of Flat Whites is on the move

We're spoiled for choice on next destinations. Four years ago we visited the Banks Peninsula and the charming town of Akaroa, but going there is a week's commitment. On our first visit we waited for frozen roads to thaw before driving the perilous road out. Next time...

A favorite picture of Akaroa

Catching up:
A few days back we left Kaikoura with a campsite in mind at Gore Bay. When we arrived there was no wifi and neither of the cell services on our phones worked (all that rock below blocking signals?). We each use a different carrier to provide fairly complete coverage and ability to set up a hotspot, but hey not this time. 36 hours without any online connection was a worthy lesson--have you ever tried it?

Lo-fi Gore Bay, not a bad view to compensate

Our route since Kaikoura (click here to view map if reading in email). Tonight we're in Geraldine, which reminds me of Flip Wilson--do you remember those skits?