Bluff

Invercargill is not very exciting, so it's worth getting down to Bluff – not least because it’s the most southerly town in New Zealand. What's there is a mix of dirty/scruffy fishing/container port and up-market swanky places to live, which I guess is typical of these places. You might compare it to Blyth in Northumberland, or North Shields: pick the right spot and you’ll get a million-dollar view; pick the wrong one and you’ll be downwind of the oyster factory. Yes, this is where Bluff oysters come from… which is all that I plan to say about oysters.

After a quick look around I headed back to Invercargill and then on toward Dunedin - but in the event nature intervened and by the end of the day I was back here again. All the roads further north were closed by floods and I had a desperate search for a bed for the night, culminating in me going back – purely by chance – to exactly where I’d been earlier in the day. The process had been stressful, though the view rather made up for it.

Back in Bluff itself, I had earlier had some amusement at the prices of beds at the Backpackers. I should have borne this in mind as I was desperately phoning round for a bed that afternoon, but somehow it slipped my mind that I could have had somewhere for $25…

Perhaps one thing the emergency taught me is that the people who run these places mean well and are generally doing their best. They’re often juggling a poorly-paid job with other responsibilities and pressures, in a way I’m just not aware of. And it’s also worth saying that there are people who can only afford this much. Anyway, here is a little more of Bluff, captured once again in its (roughly) Art Deco buildings…