Wilkies Pools & Dawson Falls – Day 50

We are heading to a dairy farm where we’re going to be spending a couple of days learning more about dairy farming in new zealand and also just living and doing a few activities with locals [wwoof hosts] which is always really awesome because they know the best spots.

We are heading down to a farm in Stratford today to spend some time with Andrew and Vanessa and Hamish and Ewan who are the [WWOOF] family that we went on our epic Fossil Canyon mission with a couple of weeks ago on the ghost town. We want to go on a hike with Andrew and Ewan and Hamish so hopefully the weather is not going to turn really bad right now and we can just get on with doing this hike in the Egmont National Park which I’ve been desperate to go and do a hike here. I’ve heard so much about it. It’s like this huge volcano Mt Taranaki in the centre of the [egmont] national park and all around it has some amazing forests and I can’t wait to go and explore this national park.

So we decide to go up to the Wilkies Pools which is about an hour and 20 minutes return. The Wilkies Pools are one of the jewels of the Egmont National Park so the hike is extremely well managed. the path is extremely easy to walk through. The forest is gorgeous it’s kind of like a thick goblin forest with long moss dripping from the trunks. This is by far the coldest hike we’ve done so far.

And the further we go into this forest the more amazing the vegetation looks. There’s trees that are winding their way around each other and there’s branches going in all directions all covered in moss and other various vegetation growing on other vegetation and it just looks like something from a fairy tale. It’s amazing.

And hilariously they find a leaf which has a really spicy flavour to it. Robin is pulling all sorts of crazy faces when he tries that leaf.

No I don’t like it.

Urgh it is hot. That’s a strong flavour.

So we arrive at the Wilkies Pools which is basically a very small stream which is divided into different plateau by giant rocks and boulders. the first thing that strikes me is the depth and the colour of the water which is extremely turquoise and very clear and really really stunning. the waterfall is just slowly falling into making a little stream of bubbles going in and it’s just ideal. It looks like a picture perfect paradise. It’s pretty amazing. the kids who are dressed in camouflage coats run into places to hide and we literally walk past them and we cannot see them what-so-ever. Oh my God I could not find him. Well done. Give me a high five, bro.

Get out. Oh my God. That was really good. I see someone. I see you.

We walk back to the Dawson Falls Visitor Centre and we have a quick lunch and then next we are heading to Dawson Falls. And Dawson Falls is just off the roadside literally five minute track down to the base of the waterfall. And we get down to the bottom and we are met with this about 18 metre waterfall. It looks absolutely stunning. It goes into a boulder stream making some more smaller waterfalls. This is what New Zealand is all about. Everywhere you turn there’s some really stunning spots and really cool places to hang out and we’re kind of taking pictures here for a while but the rain is starting to come down a bit harder now and we’re like Ok, we need to climb back up the steps. there’s a huge amount of steps to get back up to the car park but it’s only like five minutes but it’s literally all steep steps to get there. We are heading back to Andrew and Vanessa’s farm and house. This is where we enjoy some hot chocolate some hot drinks just chill out for a bit. I’m doing a bit of work and Robin is going to go off and do some farm chores with Andrew. Which involves getting in a Gaiter and shovelling some shit. Yeah, he’s having a good time. He’s really keen to learn all these things on the farm and good for him.

Andrew is offering me to follow him and go first explore the farm and second do some farm tasks with him. We doing the fertiliser moving the tubes moving the pipes attaching everything seeing up everything. Playing with basically manure. I had a blast. I love manure it’s my new passion. Manure is amazing.

And the next thing I know, Robin is returning back to the house in an overall with his gumboots on covered in cow shit. Little did we know that the storm that was coming was actually pretty intense and then we had a lot of wind so the camper was moving back and forth the whole night. laura got really scared during the night, she didn’t sleep last night at all.

What did you like about the waterfall? It was in the photos there was all smooth coming down and it wilkies pools the slopes that the water came down the coming in like that and making the little slide come down into the pool into the waterslide. And there was one little waterfall frozen.