Term Break – the Trip Home

The last leg of our term break adventure allowed us one final quintessential Kiwi experience. As we were leaving Aoraki Mt. Cook I noticed that the road way started to look quite dirty. Then as some other cars approached they flashed their lights at us. We knew something was happening up the road – Mark was just hoping it wasn’t a police officer waiting for speeders.

What we saw instead was a Kiwi shepherd, his 4 sheep dogs, and many hundred head of sheep being herded down the highway. Of course this meant that we’d need to drive through the sheep, slowly, to get out of the valley, and that’s just what we did. Much to the delight of all of us, we crept along as the herd sometimes parted in front of us, and sometimes seemed determined to slow our progress even further. Several “tourists” got out of their cars to take pictures. That confused the sheep quite a bit, and they started to bottle-neck. Fortunately some of the sheep finally got the courage to move on, so that we could too.

Oh, I forgot about the real last bit of Kiwiana we saw. A giant salmon structure just outside of Ashburton.

Being on a trip, even a vacation, can be exhausting and it sure is nice to be home regardless of how many wonderful experiences we had. We are all happy to be sleeping in our own beds. But it’s put me behind in my blogging. Thanks for hanging in there.