Buggered!

Started my journey back home to Nelson early-ish after a visit to the garage to fill up, check tyres, replensih fresh water and dump grey water.  Quite a palaver but thankfully all completed without issue.

On the road I had decided to return via the coast road - SH1 - the same way as I'd come in.  I figured the view would be different from the opposite direction.  Sure enough, the roadworks, stop-go's, traffic lights and damaged road served to slow things down which was fine by me.  The coastal section showed the greatest amount of 'obvious' damage, such as here, at Oaru where the road turns inland but the railway continues straight on.  Or it did.  Now it's not quite so straight!  As I was there taking a few pictures a family pulled up too and a young lad of about 9 or 10 leaped out of the car, raced past me towards the kinky bits waving his ipad ('camera!) enthusiastically and saying to me as he passed: "Wow. These lines are buggered eh?"  Exquisite summary!  I guess railway lines give us all a clear indication of just how much the earth shifted as we all know what they're supposed to look like, unlike trying to figure the changes to the seabed we've been looking at the past couple of days.  Fascinating stuff from a geological perspective - a continued source of frustration to the thousands of truckies who now have to drive cargo the long way from Picton to Christchurch.  And it's unlikely to be fully operational as a railway again for about a year, according to some of the locals.

I knew the drive was going to be long - five and a half hours driving, I'd been told.  But by the time I factored in the kinky railway stop, a slow van, a kitten hunt (almost ran him over at the top of a hill in the middle of nowhere!  He looked very scraggly.  I thought he could well be a quake refugee but, after a couple of sightings, he disappeared), 2 snooze stops, and 2 refreshment stops, it was a full 9 hours before I arrived home.......and by then, just like the railway, I too was buggered!