This is most likely going to be a huge post, be forewarned. And I'm not going to include any photos in this post, as there's so many that I could put in, it would take up too much space! I'll get some on
facebook at some point.
It began 3 weeks ago yesterday, when we picked up our rental car, which then had to be replaced as the tape player wouldn't work (3 weeks in a car and no music = not good!). Once
that'd happened we set off and camped near the
Moeraki boulders. However, this was harder that it seemed. There's free campsites all over NZ, but they are damn hard to find! After taking a lot of wrong roads, seeing a hedgehog (exciting!), and getting the oddest directions from an odd bar, we set up the tents and went to sleep fairly early. We left quite late as people had classes on Friday, so we hadn't planned on doing anything that day. There were 8 of us in total, in 2 tents.
The next morning we got up early and went to the boulders. They are big (up to 3m diameter) boulders which are perfectly spherical with cracks all over them and hollow in side. No-one knows how they got there, or how they were formed and I found them rather interesting. After there we visited a couple of waterfalls (
Purakanui and McLean), a point with a lighthouse on it and cathedral caves, which I think were in Narnia... The caves were huge, and it was possible to walk in one end and out the other. After the caves I went swimming in my boxers, which seemed a good idea at the time, but turned out to be freezing once I'd got out, and also not so good when I realised my towel was in the car, 10 minutes walk away! During the day we also stopped at an amazing art gallery type of thing called the Lost Gypsy. Its a man
who's turned an old, big
VW van thing (not a camper, bigger) into his workshop. He makes the type of art that does awesome things, i.e. turn a crank and watch
wonderous things unfold. He had a big line of coins running through the van, so I gave him a 2 zloty piece which he dad not have. I also bought a necklace there which I actually wear, quite a rare thing for me!
We stayed that night in a park near
Invercargill, which wasn't technically somewhere we
should've stayed, but we were leaving early so we figured it didn't matter. We got up early on Sunday and headed to Bluff, the most southern town in NZ. Its fairly small and, to be honest, has nothing going for it asides from the oysters and seafood which are found there and are pretty famous. We left our cars here and took an hour long ferry to Steward Island, which is south of NZ and the location of one of the countries great walks. We spent three days doing a fairly easy hike through the island,
totalling 36km. It rained a bit, but overall was awesome. The first night was spent at a beautiful beach which was home to some stunning shells, a few of which I've picked up and will be bringing home with me. What I didn't realise however, is that the dead animal thing was still inside one of them, and a few days later caused much gagging when it was brought out of the bag I put it in. All good now though, been soaked and washed out, and animal is out! The second night was spent in a more
foresty campsite. Each night we stayed in two tents, and the other sent saw a kiwi during the night, and sadly we didn't. We finished the day in the rain, and got the ferry back to the south island. I really love the hiking over here, and had a great few days.
Upon arriving back at the mainland we drove to
Invercargill and had a Hell Pizza, which is an awesome NZ pizza company. Then we drove to another free campsite somewhere. I'm not so good with details, just know it was between
Invercargill and
Queenstown! I drove this part, and had an interesting experience. I was going fairly fast as it was night, nothing on the road, and there don't appear to be any police in NZ. So, I came up to a one lane bridge, and part way across it I saw a possum. Not being able to swerve, I slowed to about 60km/h, and went over the possum with the middle of the car. A big 'thunk' noise ensued. I got to the end of the bridge and turned around, to see if it was dead or not, expecting it to be pretty bad and that I should run it over again if it looked as if it was dying. Very surprisingly, the possum was running somewhat haphazardly to the other side of the bridge, albeit with a good few chunks of fur missing on its back. We were pretty surprised that no legs looked broken, and that it just looked dazed, so we left it and carried on to the campsite.
Right, so we stayed at a campsite somewhere on Tuesday night, and drove on the next day to Lake
Manapouri. And I just remembered that the campsite was up a dirt track somewhere, and it was blooming cold when we woke up! Luke and I went for a walk in the night and saw a moonlit lake which was sweet.
Anyhoo, side note over, we got up and drove to Lake
Manapouri. We had to drive over a pass, and it had snowed the night before meaning that there were a few inches of snow on the road at the top. Luckily I wasn't driving, and Brady saw us over the pass fine! Lake
Manapouri is huge and beautiful; we got breakfast there and continued to a town called Te
Anau. We didn't know it at the time, but we'd be frequenting that town a lot. I skated a bit there, and we wandered around, wrote some postcards, etc. Then onwards to
Queenstown.
At
Queenstown we stayed in a hostel, meaning that we could shower for the first time in 5 days, and also sleep on real beds which was lovely! That night (Wednesday) we went to
Fergburger, which is most likely the best burger place in the world. I got a 'Big Al', which weighed far more than any burger should. This is what was in it (as taken from their site); double serving of prime NZ beef (1/2lb), lashings of bacon, a whole
lotta cheese, 2 eggs, beetroot, lettuce,
tomato, red onion, relish, and a big wad of
aioli (I have no idea what that is...). Needless to say, it was awesome.
After a good nights sleep we all got up bright and early. A few people had decided to go bungee jumping from Nevis, the second highest bungee in the world. I decided not to, as it cost a fair bit and instead climbed
Queenstown hill by myself. I'm glad I did, as the views from the top were incredible. The lake lay before me, and mountains topped with snow made a stunning backdrop. I've been writing and drawing (albeit badly) a lot, and have done a fair bit on this trip if anyone ever fancies seeing it. That night we went to
Fergburger again and got an early night; the next day we were starting the
Routeburn, another of
NZ's great walks.
We got an early bus to the
Routeburn trail from
Queenstown, and set off. The first days hike was only about 1.5 hours long, so we had a lot of time to hang out and enjoy the sun. Until 3 o clock that is, when the sun went behind a mountain and it got cold, really fast. We spent the evening playing card games in tents which was nice. The next day was longer, but still nowhere near the time that the DOC (the NZ national park group type thing) told us. We did a 7 hour day in a bit under 4, excluding side tracks and a really long break as we had so much time. The weather was nowhere near as good on this day, with a lot of mist and rain. The
Routeburn is meant to be one of the harder great walks, so was a bit of a climb, but nothing major. Teddy, Luke and I did a side track which took us to the top of a mountain. The mountain had snow at the top, and on a clear day must
offer some incredible views. Sadly we could only see a few metres in each direction, but it was still worth it in my opinion, just for the sake of doing it!
We carried on, and that night camped at Lake McKenzie. The lake was an emerald green colour, and really nice. There was also a big shelter there, so we
wern't always in the rain. After cooking we all got inside a tent again and played some more cards; mostly a game called Mafia which I'll have to teach everyone at home! After a bit of a soggy evening, we all slept and arose the next morning to more mist, but no rain. The hike out from the lake took around 2.5 hours, but longer for Luke and I as we took another side track to a big bog type thing, and a lookout. Again, we couldn't see anything, but we had time to kill so I'm glad we did it. We arrived back at the bus stop at around 1, and the bus wasn't coming til 3, so a wait ensued. The
Routeburn passes over a mountain range, so to get to and from each end
there's a lengthy bus ride. The one back to
Queenstown took about 3.5 hours, and sucked. We also stopped in Te
Anau, our second visit there.
That completed Sunday, and that night we stayed in a hostel. We all went to bed early as the next day was another early one; the next day we were going to Milford Sound. Milford Sound is one of the most famous places in New Zealand. It is actually a Fjord, carved out by glaciers a long ass time ago! The sides are incredibly steep, and its just awe inspiring. Annoyingly, the only way to get there is to take the same route as how we got back from the
Routeburn, so another long drive, through Te
Anau (third time), and to Milford. We took a tour there, and heard some interesting Maori legends from our driver, who said 'guys' more times that we could count. 'And then guys, guys this happened, guys'! Still, it was very interesting. Although Milford Sound is called a sound (meaning carved from rivers), it is actually a fjord (meaning carved out by glaciers). True story. It also rains there 250/365 days a year, and averages 7-9m of rainfall a year, a fair amount.
At the sound we took a ferry tour for about 2 hours. Luke and I were the only people who stayed outside the whole time, everyone else went in when the rain got really heavy, but we figured we'd been outside long enough that it didn't matter anymore! We're both
completists, it shows...! Happily it didn't rain for the first hour or so, so we got incredible views of waterfalls and the sound. My camera (which is actually my sisters) didn't do so well here, and got a tad wet, all good now though! The boat tour was awesome, the sound is very mystical; great peaks and cliffs rise straight out of the mist and water, and due to the rain there are waterfalls everywhere.
That's something I forgot to mention. The half hours drive up to the sound was crazy; waterfalls running down the mountains every 15 metres or so, and each one fast and beautiful, really never seen anything else like it. So, the boat tour ended, and we soggily got back on board the bus for another 4-5 hour ride back to
Queenstown, accompanied with our fourth and final visit to Te
Anau.
This is getting
rediculously long, and I'm only about halfway through here, massive congratulations if you're still reading this, hopefully you're finding it interesting!
On Tuesday we headed up towards the Fox and Franz Josef glaciers, with a stop in a picturesque town called
Wanaka. To most of us, it seemed like the nicest town you could possibly live in, ever. The town itself was just about the right size, on a lake, and was surrounded by mountains. The shops were mainly locally owned, with a couple of supermarkets, and it just seemed idyllic. Sadly we had to move on, and we spent the night at a free campsite near the glaciers.
Wednesday involved a days guided hike on the Franz Josef Glacier. The Fox and Franz glaciers were the only tow in the world that were growing, until 8 months ago for the Franz, and last month for the Fox. Most glaciers grow and recede in 5 year cycles, but with global warming and whatnot they may never grow again.At the base we donned crampons, and got on the glacier. Brady, Josh, Teddy, Luke and I opted to go in the front group (there were 6 total), which meant we'd be going faster and over less well made paths. The glaciers is incredible in that it looks small, but is in fact huge. What looked about a kilometre away was in fact around 5. I showed
Rohan a pic of the glacier, and he assumed it was tiny, until he realised that the dots in the middle of it were people! I'll get some pics up at some point. So, we spent the day there, and explored ice caves, and went through channels that were so
narrow your could only just get through them if you went sideways. The blue colour of the the ice is amazing; there is not air in it as it is so compact, and
there's no way to describe it. I tried to come up with different names for the blue with the others, and I don't think we captured it. Some suggested glacial blue, but
that's far too unoriginal!
After another nights sleep at the free campsite we awoke to torrential rain. After packing up very hurriedly and relocating to a petrol station where we repacked we
decided to head north to
Greymouth and see what the weather was like there. It was still raining. We decided to stay the night in a hostel, and ended up staying in a
YHA that used to be a monastery. It was awesome. Not much else happened that day really...
We were planning on staying around til Saturday, but as the weather was bad we decided to head back to Christchurch that day (Friday), via
Arthurs Pass. The weather
cleared up as we went through, so we were able to spend some time climbing at Castle Hill which was nice. I cut my toe which sucked.
And so we returned to Christchurch, 2 weeks later, travels far from complete though!
After a lot of sleep and showering, we arose on Saturday and decided to do nothing, and it was lovely. That night I went out with Rosie and friends. It was her going away party, as she is finished here, and travelling before going to England. We ended up going to a Samoan bar, and I have never felt so white in all my life. I had a fantastic night, certainly a very different to usual one!
Right, this is such a marathon entry I've taken two days so far to write it, onwards into day 3 of writing.
So, Sunday last we went to the town of
Lyttleton, which is near Christchurch. Its a harbour town, and very
prettyful. I had a
huuuge ice cream there for not much, which was lush, and then we went on to a chocolate shop where I had a white chocolate mocha thing, which to be honest wasn't that special. We kept moving around the coast, and got to governors bay, where we walked along a jetty and watched two girls fishing. They were pulling up baby dogfish every few minutes, pretty useless for them, but nice to watch. That finished Sunday off.
On Monday Brady and I went surfing at Sumner. The surf was 3ft and beautifully clean. I had some fantastic waves that just kept going and going, no closeouts at all. There was a
longboard club there as well, and some of the guys who
must've been 50 or so we're crazy good. In the evening we wandered into town, and I got a message from a friend from Auckland saying he was in town, so we met up for a bit, then I went to see Rosie again, and went to bed. This was the last time I'd see her in NZ, and it was really sad, and made me realise what a good friend she'd become. It also made me realise that I only had two more months left here, a scary thought.
Monday night heralded the return of our friends who'd gone to Australia for the break, and we all met up on Tuesday to catch up, and go to a place called
Akaroa, which is at the end of the Christchurch peninsula. The main reason for going was that most of the Americans had vouchers o go swimming with dolphins there; I just wanted to see the town and have a wander around. Over an hours drive later, and we arrived only to find that they'd cancelled the boat out as the sea was too rough outside of the harbour; fairly shitty on the companies behalf not to tell anyone. Instead we looked around for a while, then went to Sumner to have a surf, only to find that there was none. Shitty dude.
On Wednesday 9 of us drove to Mt Cook. We figured we'd done all the outside of the south island, but not the middle, hence the Mt Cook trip. Mt Cook is the highest mountain in the country, at 3700m or so. We got there Wednesday night fairly late and spent some time playing tent games, before falling asleep.
I woke up fairly early on Thursday and went for a walk for a couple of hours and got back at around 10, to find most
of the others just waking up. Once everyone was up and had eaten breakfast we set out on a 3 hour round trip to a glacial lake. Being the clever kids we are, Brady and I decided to go swimming in this lake; how often do you get the
chance to swim in a lake with a glacier in it!? It was
rediculously cold. It took us a while to actually get the courage to do it, and we had planned to swim to a block of ice about 15m from the shore, but as soon as we fully submerged we both came up gasping for air it was so cold, and promptly ran to shore! After warming up we carried on walking for a while. Teddy and I did some extreme skipping over boulders and whatnot, and ended up a way ahead of the others, who ended up turning back. We plowed on
towards the glacier across some very steep rocky slopes, and reached the glacier in time to see a massive boulder fly from the top of it into the lake which was sweet to see. We sat watching the glacier for a while; every couple of minutes or so pieces of ice or rocks from the top would fall off of it, so it made for interesting viewing!
Whilst we were sitting there we heard rocks starting to fall a long way above us, and turned to see a mountain goat bounding along the top of the ridge far above us. Luckily it had only dislodged a few rocks and they didn't fall very far. We returned to the campsite, ate and played more tent games. We played one called 'pigs in a blanket', which involves one person leaving the tent, and one of the others getting inside a sleeping bag. The person outside the tent returns blindfolded and proceeds to poke the person in the bag, who in turn oinks like a pig and the blindfolded person has to guess who it is. It sounds pretty weird, but is hilarious.
The next day Brady, Emily, Teddy, Josh and I climbed to the Mueller hut, which is around 1900m up, about a 1000m climb from where we were camped. It took around 3 hour to do, and at the top we were rewarded some of the most amazing views of the surrounding area; this ranged from Mt Cook, snow capped mountains, to lakes and plains below. Now and again we'd hear a massive 'crack' noise and look at the mountain across the valley and watch avalanches flow down them, something I don't think any of us had ever seen before. At the top we met a Californian man who
must've been about 60 who had been there for two nights
and was simply sleeping on a
thermarest in his sleeping bag outside - proper hardcore! We chilled at the top for a couple of
hours and Brady and I
climbed another 100m or so to the top of Mt
Olliver, apparently the first mountain Sir Edmund Hillary climbed. We then went down, which went far faster than the going up and returned to Christchurch where our trip ended.
All in all, the trip was fantastic, and pretty much everything went according to plan. I am so glad I chose to come here, I can't ever see myself having this experience again.
Since I began writing this I haven't done much; just watched movies and seen friends. Yesterday (Sunday) I went to a very good church service which I was happy about, and tonight we're doing a pot luck where everyone brings a dish and shares. I've made cheesecake,
yay!
I hope if you've read this its managed to stay interesting and you haven't nodded off too many times!
Miss you all, and see you in a couple of months,
Rob xxx
