North By Northwest

From the Kawarau we drove on back north, then northwest, then west across the Haast Pass, which we'd also seen in 2009. The giant montane lakes along the route, Lake Hawea and then Lake Wanaka, again, were impressive. Our campsite at Cameron Flat was scenic. The sand flies were more numerous and aggressive than we've seen anywhere but Milford. I'll do a separate post on sand flies, the South Island's largest bio-mass, a bit later.

Lake Hawea; giant, beautiful blue, almost no one in sight

Ditto

Ditto again

You round a corner and cross a little ridge, and there is Lake
Wanaka, another giant lake east of the Mt. Aspiring range,
one we've seen lots of before

We camped that night, along with one or two other parties, at the DOC campground
at Cameron Flat; scenic enough, but the sand flies were awful; the scores of them
trapped between out (nylon mesh) tent and its fly made such a racket we thought it
was raining

At the cooking pavilion that DOC campgrounds often provide, a spider's web
has netted half a dozen sand flies

In this amazing sequence, the spider (Shelob), devours one hapless sand fly

And then heads off to another

Vicki takes refuge in the car until nightfall, when the accursed sand flies go away