Bluff

Monday 28/02/11 – Sunday 6/03/11


Imagine spending a week in a small town at the end of the earth where nothing happens.
We just have – in Bluff.

On Monday morning we left the anchorage at the Faith, Hope and Charity Islands and went further up Patersons Inlet to have a look at the old whaling station in Prices Inlet.

We anchored at Millars Beach and before going ashore made bread and muffins. The bread is improving and we are getting adventurous putting oats and raisins into this loaf.

 

There is a track through the forest from the beach to the Whalers Base. Walking through here felt like all those childhood tales of enchanted forests and you could expect to see any sort of magical creature. I just want to see a kiwi and they are obviously around but we have not yet managed to see one. We did see and hear Kaka (a native forest parrot) lots of Tuis and woodpigeons.

The whaling station was set up in the 1920’s by Norwegians to maintain and repair their whale chaser boats. Remnants of their time there include concrete foundations of various buildings; the slipway; a large steam boiler out of a ship and some huge old ships propellers on the beach. It is quite fascinating to see these reminders of the past still sitting in this isolated place.

Old Boiler at Whalers Base



Remnants of pottery amongst the ruins at the base

After walking back through the enchanted forest, we picked a bowl load of mussels off the piles of the jetty that the dinghy was tied up to and went back to the boat. We decided to go further up Prices Inlet to an anchorage in Kidney Fern arm. It is a narrow entrance between small islands and rocks but once inside this area it was absolutely beautiful and the dark water was dead calm. We anchored and noticed there were people at a small bach (cabin, cottage, crib) on the shore.

During the day we had been having computer problems and I sat down to try and figure out what the problem was but it was beyond my knowledge and with no internet connection I was stymied.

The weather was due to turn nasty and with gale warnings and storm warnings for areas Fouveaux and Puyseger we decided that we had better head into Bluff to see if we could get the computer problems sorted out before we left for Fiordland.

We left the small inlet early on Tuesday morning in a dead calm and a slight fog – quite an eerie feel to the area but very beautiful.

Fouveaux Strait was almost glassy calm all the way for the 3 ½ hour trip which made up for the pounding that we had on the way down two weeks earlier. We called up Meri at Bluff Fishermans Radio Association (who we have been talking to most nights on the SSB radio) and she kindly arranged a berth for us at the fishermans wharf. Meri does an amazing job keeping in touch with numerous boats – commercial fishermen as well as the likes of us pleasure craft boaties. She gives weather reports for the region twice daily and maintains regular scheds on VHF and SSB radio and all on a voluntary basis. She is certainly a well known identity here in the south with her “Good as Gold” catchphrase and it always good to know that someone knows where we are and takes note if we don’t report in.

1st of March saw the first day of the Oyster season. Bluff oysters are famous (in New Zealand anyway) and the first days catch is rushed off to the main centres. The Bluff oyster seasons runs for a few months or until the quota is reached. The oysters were selling in the local supermarket for $23 per dozen and at restaurants in Wellington they were around $36 per dozen. Seeing as we had been eating plenty of oysters (different variety though) we didn’t bother purchasing any.

On Wednesday, the day after we arrived in Bluff we went to the city of Invercargill to deliver the computers to the tech people we had spoken to the day before. Probably at this point I should mention that Bluff is a fairly small town that seems to exist mostly for the Oysters and for the large Aluminium smelter on the opposite side of the harbour. Being very small (population around 1900) means that services are fairly limited and so too is public transport. The only way to get to Invercargill was by the bus that is operated by the company who runs the Stewart Island ferries. That’s fine but the one way fare per person is $21 so the round trip for two of us cost $84 – they do say that a taxi is about that much one way so guess we cant complain. Distance from Bluff to Invercargill by road is about 22 km.

What else can one say about Bluff. It's name aptly describes the town. It's one of the earliest settlements in NZ and in it's time was an area of considerable wealth. There is a certain grandness in those old buildings still standing but many have been spoilt by attempted modernisation over the times and removal of much of the ornate stone and plaster work on the building facades. Property values are as low as anywhere and consequently there are many vacant sections where demolitions have taken place and many of the houses and commercial buildings are in a state of poor repair. Attempts to brighten up the scene are made by using bright paint colours but once this paint starts to peel off the objective is lost. However the town does retain a certain charm (although it has to be searched for), the people are friendly and you only need to walk a few steps from one pub to the next.

After delivering the computers we wandered around Invercargill checking out some interesting old buildings and then stumbled across a wonderful hardware store – E.Hayes and Sons Ltd which is the home of “the world’s fastest Indian”. I am sure most people will have heard of or seen the movie about Burt Munro’s feats setting world speed records on his motorcycles. We have met a few characters around Stewart Island and here in Bluff that would have fitted into the movie quite well. As well as Burt’s original Indian and another of his bikes there is an incredible collection of old and rare motorbikes and machines.


Thursday, Friday and Saturday have been taken up with getting washing done, making bread cleaning up the boat and restocking supplies and walking from one end of the town to the other and back again.

The day after we arrived in Bluff the weather turned nasty with some very wild winds – consistent 50 knots with gusts of 55 and 60. The westerly winds turning north west then southwest and back again to the north west with a bit of southerly thrown in now and again to keep things nice and cold. We have had rain and hail and I hear that up in one of the Fiords there has even been a bit of snow on the mountains – the joys of summer in the Roaring Forties – we are down at nearly 47º S. At times it was hard to do things on the boat tied up at the wharf with a metre swell and whitecaps roaring down the inner harbour. The oyster boats have not been out since the first day of the season so I guess its not just us being wimps.



Calm after the storm

Its now Sunday and the forecast is looking good for next week. Monday is for 15 knots of SW which is fine but it sounds like there will still be a 3-4 metre swell so we may wait till Tuesday when that should have died down. Wednesday sounds great – Variable 10 knots so we will hopefully be enjoying a great day in Preservation Inlet which will be our first port of call once round Puysegur Point and the Southern start of Fiordland.  Kuri is still at Stewart Island but it looks like they might not be joining us in Fiordland as they may run out of time and opt to go back up the East coast.

Once we leave Bluff we will once again be out of internet and cell phone coverage so don’t expect any more news for a while. We may get stuck in the Fiords for a month or so!