The rain started some time in the middle of the night. Not surprising in a rain forest, and it was forecast, but still it is the most rain I've experienced since I've come to New Zealand (yes, Tom, even compared to our trip). Alex and I had talked about a "hiking" day should this occur and it did.
We headed off to Punakaiki where they have the "pancake rocks" shown here and below. Somehow (anyone?) a softer "mudstone" (what the sign called it) was pretty uniformly distributed with limestone and the "mudstone" is, of course, eroding differently showing the "pancake" layers in the rocks. It is pretty spectacular and cool to see that you can identify areas nearby that are clearly different.
Then we headed off to the Fox river cave. We luckily met two other women with two headlamps since we forgot ours.
Continuing on we eventually reached the Ballroom overhang. I took this picture because it notes the river crossings. One our way in most of them were at our knees and doable by ourselves. However, by the time we turned around to head out, the relentless rain at the headwaters and elsewhere meant waist deep crossings requiring linking up. It was a good lesson in New Zealand rivers in the rain!
But, we got to finish to a rainbow. We could see both ends, but I couldn't get them both in the photo.
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