Day 26: Te Anau to Mavora Lakes

Matt woke up especially early this morning, and I’m glad, because it meant we got going and on the road early. It was very chilly as we left the campground, and we were both bundled up pretty much as much as we could get. We stopped at an ATM for some cash, and then headed out of town. We left early enough that it was quite a while before we were joined on the road by tour busses, but eventually they did join us. Thankfully, we only had about 30 km on the main highway before we turned off onto a very lightly traveled gravel road toward Mavora Lakes.

It wasn’t a terribly exciting ride today, just a continuous gradual climb up to the lakes. Very gradual. In fact, I wasn’t sure we were actually climbing, but we were. We made it 50 km before we stopped for lunch, which is a new record for us on this trip. I kept saying we should try to get as far as we could before we stopped and the bad weather caught up with us. That seems to be the pattern with us. If we start off with nice weather, we’re able to stay in front of it until we stop for lunch, and then the wind catches us, or it cools down. Today was no different. We stopped, and the wind started to blow in our faces, and it felt like it got 5 degrees colder (even though the temperature didn’t change).

There were a total of about 10 cars that passed us on the gravel road. We passed paddocks of sheep and cows, and it looked like they were getting ready to move the cows in one paddock to another, right as we were passing. As usual, the sheep run away from us, and the cows run toward us or along with us. It still makes me laugh. As a bicycle tourist you spend an amazing amount of time talking at livestock animals.

By the time we got to the turnoff to Mavora Lakes, the temperature had once again climbed back up, and we had to shed a few layers of clothes. Of course, that was shortlived, but hey, who’s keeping track? We knew that the Mavora area was used in a few of the scenes in Lord of the Rings, so we found a few of the places and took some of our own pictures. We tried to imagine what it looked like in the movie, but it always looks a little different. Still very cool that we finally connected with the movie. This whole trip I’ve been feeling like we’ve been traveling through Middle Earth, just the vibe that you get as you travel around and see the awesome landscape, and the fact that there are not many other people here. It’s a pretty amazing place.

It was early when we arrived at the lakes, and we talked to a gentleman who was fly fishing on the lake, just heading down to the water. He told us about a good spot to camp, but it ended up being a “no camping” spot. Instead, we found a campsite a little further down by the water, paid our entry fee, and since there was no drop box for the fee, we had to walk it all the way back to the entrance. That was good, because it killed some time, and made us hungry. We cooked dinner, washed up, and crawled into the tent. We’re hiding from the sandflies, biting midges that are particularly vicious. This is our first real experience with them, and I’m not too excited to be dealing with them. The good news is, because it’s so cold, they’re not quite as bad as they would be. That’s small comfort, though.

There’s no showers here, but that’s ok. There’s a toilet not too far away, which is good. There is a water tap, but it’s unfiltered stream water, and we had to treat it before we could drink it or cook with it. This campground is in a really pretty spot, and I can see why the woman at the museum in Riverton said it is her favorite.

Tomorrow’s ride is about 50 km on gravel, and then we get to take a steam ship across the lake to Queenstown. The steam ship uses coal, and should be pretty cool. I’m sure it will be cold in the morning, so we’ll have to make sure to get going early so we can make it in time for the steamship. There may be a couple river fordings, but we’ll take those as they come.

Now it’s off to bed, this will get uploaded tomorrow or the next day.

Distance: 76.57km

Time: 5:17

Avg: 14.46kmh

Max: 31.5kmh

Climb: 682m

View while riding

Lake Mavora Road, surface is decent

South Mavora Lakes where the fellowship leaves Lothlórien.

General forest area where the Hobbits hid from the Uruk-hai

North Mavora Lake, from this point of view is where Frodo pushed off the boat and and Sam followed him.

View of the shore line itself, with the trees right up to it. It was interesting because both Pam and I thought, ohh they must have added gravel since the movie, or in the movie they covered it with dirt, because our memory of the movie didn't have gravel. However looking at the screen captures it actually is gravel.