The Pub at the End of the Road

Fun & Frivolity:

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At the north-western tip of the South Island of New Zealand, nestled between mountains, sea and rainforest, is a magical place called Karamea. It's quite remote - Westport, the nearest major settlement, is an hour and a half's drive away down the only road connecting the town to the outside world. Follow that road north and it ends just a few kilometres out of Karamea at the coastal wilderness that marks the start of the Heaphy Track. This was to be our home for the next two weeks as we'd arranged to do some wwoofing for Dee and Dan, proprieters of Saracen's Cafe and the hub of town life - the Bush Lounge.

When we arrived things weren't exactly as we expected. Dee was unwell, Dan needed to be at work in Christchurch for the two weeks of our stay and the cafe and bar were temporarily closed until things got back to normal. At first we wondered whether we'd be more in the way than of use, but we soon learned that out on the West Coast everything has a way of sorting itself out and within a couple of days we felt more like we were at home than working as wwoofers.

This was due in no small part to Dee and Ruth, a fellow wwoofer from Darlington who had arrived in Karamea some months ago and, in her words, "never found a reason to leave." Life was good - work started when we were up and ready, the Bush Lounge's well stocked bar and the cafe's ice cream stand were at our disposal and Dee and Ruth were incredibly easy people to spend time with. Work was never dull, or unduly onerous. We fed the pigs, split and chopped firewood, picked tamarillos amid beautiful scenery and glorious sunshine, cleaned the cafe and bar, learned how to make a decent cup of coffee, rode around on the quad bike, did a spot of gardening when the weather was nice and watched DVDs with Dee when it wasn't. The food was amazing - the good people of Karamea's loss was our gain as with the bar closed we had Dee, the Bush Lounge's chef extraordinnaire, whipping up hearty homecooked fare just for us every evening.

We also spent some time getting to know the people and places of Karamea, something we never would have been able to do as passing backpackers. Living at the Bush Lounge meant there was always someone calling in to see Dee and soon we had a pretty good idea of who was who and what was going on in the town. Every Thursday we'd head down the road to Little Wanganui for the pub quiz night which introduced us to yet more friendly locals and the surprise taste of victory as we won the quiz two weeks running.

Our two weeks passed in a flash and before we knew it it was time to leave. Like Ruth I could easily have stayed longer - in such a small, friendly town you really come to feel part of the place after even a short stay and there are few more beautiful parts of the world you could have all to yourself. But the open road and a farm near Invercargill beckoned and we knew we had some travelling to do. As we left we also realised, for the first time, that coming back to New Zealand again might not be such a bad idea...