23.11.13. More searching today - the shore travels still unhelpful. So we visited the Wanaka gallery and the artist there was most helpful. He instantly recognised the mountain depicted as Mount Gold and this rings a bell with us too. A visit to the Aspiring National Park information centre confirmed this - the very helpful assistant told us her bedroom looked out over Mt gold and she showed us where she thought the picture had been painted from. More miles down dirt tracks in the baking sunshine! We have located what we think must be the site but, rather disappointingly, it is all overgrown with trees and so the photos will not show what we want. Honestly, we are not cheating here! We had resorted to thinking that perhaps the lake level had risen or that an earthquake had altered the mountain profile but this is genuine. We are now trying to corroborate that Russell Sr did pioneer Mt Gold. Uninspired ending but it has been fun exploring, and discovering the shore scenery has been breath-taking. 
At 3.30pm we set out on our penultimate leg to Cromwell - not the early start we had intended! 40 miles in scorching sunshine with no shelter. This area is so different - flat arid plains with sun-browned grass. The annual rainfall here is 20 cm which is a stark contrast to where we have been in the west where the rainfall is >5 metres. We understand that there is going to be more of that (5m) in store for us on our treks!

The original painting of 60 or so years ago

View of Mt Gold from across Dublin Bay which we think is close to the original

Some beautiful peaks from the Beacon Head side of Lake Wanaka which we think aren't the subject after all