The slow road south
Sunday, 8 March 2026
Mike White is a senior writer and columnist.
OPINION: It had poured through the night, and now the Old Dog and I were wading through roadside puddles on our morning walk.
A man wandered out to his ute, thermos in hand, raincoat loosely wrapped round him, and seemed a bit shocked to see me.
“Another lovely day on the Coast,” he greeted us cheerily.
“A beauty,” I smiled. “A real cracker.”
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The man grabbed the frame of the ute’s door and glanced skywards.
“It’ll keep the dust down,” he said, swinging himself into the cab.
He was right about that.
But then, after reading about 70 pages of my book, watching the angle of the rain swing to the south, and having lunch, it did what it always does: Kept on raining.
Eventually it sputtered and petered out, the clouds began to split like factions in a fledgling political movement, and the horizon lightened.
By the next day, the infighting clouds had fled, and the mountains appeared sharp and close.
We headed south, to where the road ended.
But before we got there, we turned on to a gravel road that promised doom for the foolhardy.
“SLOW LONG NARROW ROAD” the sign warned.
If there had been more space, it would have no doubt said: “TURN AROUND NOW, IDIOT TOWNIES IN TWO-WHEEL DRIVES”.
We carried on for a bit until we reached a track that led to a lake.
The river was placid and pretty, and before long the bush broke to a magnificent view of the lake.
Another couple arrived to enjoy the scene.
They were on a two-week trip, no itinerary, no schedule, no rush.
They’d just finished working at Mt Cook, where the mountains were bigger, but you often struggled to get a spot like this to yourself.
We talked about tourists and the increased pressures and reduced solitariness that flowed as a consequence.
We grumbled a bit, ignoring the fact we were all currently tourists in search of views, just as the hordes at Mt Cook.
The couple were going to live near the coast. I imagined them driving out of Mt Cook Village for the last time, the Alps in their rear vision mirror, a lump in their throat.
Of course they’d miss the mountains. Who wouldn’t.
We retraced our steps, and continued on to the bay where the road ran out.
The sun was out, and everyone sought shade under a well-anchored sail outside the colourful café.
Seagulls eyed pushed-aside plates, but they were much more polite than they often are at the seaside, with no raucous smash and grab aerial heists.
A man with a T-shirt from Rarotonga and a tattoo of a turtle on his calf eased his way into the prime picnic table, along with his partner who wore a flouncy summer dress, and sunhat that wouldn’t have been out of place at a trotting carnival.
They ordered crayfish, and sat looking out to the blue, from whence it had come.
A bloke with a beard was at the next table, a plate of fish and chips in front of him, a small dog beside him.
His beard was one of those ones that immediately suggested it had been there for decades, so long, it was in symbiosis with his face, like lichen on a beech trunk.
His dog panted in the sun, waiting for a chip, and was eventually rewarded, before they wandered off along the beach.
We followed a bit later, and found Greybeard hunched over a black motorbike, which had a sidecar for his dog, Mac.
“Not a bad life for a dog?” I ventured.
“Well, it might not be if I can’t get this started,” Greybeard said, motioning to his motionless machine.
“You wouldn’t happen to have a small screwdriver, would you?” he asked. “I’ve got all sorts of them here, but none of them fit this screw,” he said, pointing between his toolbox and a small flap where the bike’s fuses hid.
I screwed up my face, unsure I had anything that would help, but ran back to the car to check. Sure enough, there was an old screwdriver I’d picked up somewhere and thrown in the back, which fitted the fusebox.
But replacing the fuses didn’t get the bike going, so Greybeard went back to scratching his head and wondering where else the problem might lie.
I was absolutely no help in solving that mystery. But I told him to keep the screwdriver, as it would doubtless come in handy again, and wished him a good trip.
It was a long way to a garage, even further to somewhere that might have parts for his bike.
But Greybeard seemed unfazed.
If this was where his journey stalled, it wasn’t a bad spot, with a view across the bay to the mountains, and a place selling spectacular fish and chips just down the road.