Byron Bay and Brisbane

The beach at Byron Bay

 We got up for free toast again, got ourselves ready, and had to check out at 9.30am but could hang around until our bus was due at mid day. I uploaded all the photos and then we sat out on the veranda with the English girl we had met. Tony had said he’d give us a lift back down to the bus station which was nice of him, and then he waited with us and chatted until the bus came. Having such a great guy running a great hostel makes all the difference. We were buzzing and loved our time in Port Macquarie. We had a 7 and a half bus journey to endure to get to Byron Bay, it went surprisingly quickly, though we only stopped once. We lugged all our stuff and checked into the hostel which looked ultra modern and new. We were only there one night so we didn’t have a chance to do a lot, we cooked our dinner in a packed out and filthy kitchen, and then slept in our non air conditioned room! It was a party hostel despite there being signs saying no noise etc and warning of cameras. And that was probably the noisiest night we’ve had to deal with, when drunk screaming girls rock up in your room at 3am. We wanted to get up early and get to the beach before our bus came so we were up by 7 am and didn’t try to be quiet too much. It was a gorgeous day and we stood in the sea and laid on the sand for an hour or so. It was bliss. At one point we underestimated how far the waves were coming in and where we had laid our stuff got very wet! My jacket got a nice salt wash. Dried very quickly though! We went back and checked out then just sat and waited for a bit in the hostel. We slowly made our way back up to the bus stop and sat in a nice green shady area. There were cockroaches buzzing around with made me edgy every time I felt anything! The bus came and it was absolutely rammed so it wasn’t a comfortable journey the first part, but a lot of people left when we reached Surfers Paradise so Phil and I moved to the front and carried on the journey. It was only a 3 and a half hour journey but that definitely felt like the longest of them all, it just seemed to drag. It turned out to be a 4 hour journey actually, as half way through we went back an hour in time for the time difference between Queensland and New South Wales. We finally reached Brisbane. It is a beautiful city. When we left the bus station we got a bit lost and confused, and it was so hot to be lugging stuff around for too long, so he headed back and got in a very expensive taxi. We were staying in more of a guest house type place, far enough away from the hustle and bustle of the city, but still within walking distance. Lovely. It was nice to have our own space again for a little while too. We sort of had to check ourselves in as there was no one on reception, but they left a note and the key in the door so it was fine. Once we settled in, we went for a walk up to Fortitude Valley and Chinatown. The path took us along the river which gave amazing views of the skyline, it was so nice to be in a proper buzzing city, and not be scared of being mugged. Fortitude Valley was a hub of bars,clubs and restaurants which was really nice. And Chinatown was cool, we went in a Chinese shop to see what it might be like in Hong Kong! Saw some funny things. We wandered back, made use of some free potatoes in the fridge! And relaxed for the evening.

Beautiful Brisbane

 The next day we planned to cover most of the city centre. We had our breakfast and ‘officially’ checked in. The lady was very helpful in showing us some good places to go and how to get round. We walked to the ‘City Cat’ terminal which is a catamaran taxi thing that takes you down the river to the city centre and Southbank. Great alternative to getting the bus! So that was fun. We got off at Southbank and wandered along the river, we came across Streets Beach (Streets is what they call Walls here), which was an amazing man made sandy beach and swimming area, in the middle of the city, it looked like a tropical holiday resort. Such a good idea for a city that doesn’t really have it’s own beach. We planned to do that the next day. Walking along was really nice, we crossed the bridge over to the ’CBD’ and walked through the middle of the main happening streets in Brisbane. It had such a great atmosphere about it, we both sat for a while watching people and their busy lives go by. There were Christmas decorations everywhere which was very strange! We wandered in a few shops and then went into the main shopping mall. It was so hot outside but the air conditioning in the mall was so cold I had goose bumps! We walked by a salon and a poster advertising male hair models needed caught Phil’s eye, he’d been going on about needing a haircut for weeks! He went in and enquired and they said they could fit him in there and then. So Phil sat and had his hair cut by a trainee in a very trendy salon! It took a while but they did it really well, and even gave Phil a big bottle of expensive shampoo for free for being patient. So that was a good move doing that! We headed back after that. It’s a nice walk, right along the river bank, all the way back to the hostel. That took up most of the day and so we went down to make dinner. Just after I put our stuff on the work top, I suddenly saw a gigantic cockroach scurry out from under the cupboards, and then very quickly back again! First encounter with a bug. Yuck. I happened to be in bare feet too, so I had issues going stepping onto the kitchen floor after that, I had to direct Phil to do the things I was going to do! I’ve never really seen a cockroach before, but this was so big.

Streets Beach / lagoon

The next day when we were ready, we did the river walk all the way into central towards Streets Beach again. We went via the botanical gardens which was nice, but a lot of it was cordoned off for some festival so it was a fleeting visit. We went across one of the many bridges to Southbank and walked along there from the other direction until we got to Streets Beach. There was a lot of other water features to swim about in too that we didn’t see the previous day, fountains and other fun stuff. Great idea. So we got to the ’beach’ and got in the water! It was like a tropical paradise! It became pretty cloudy, typically, after we’d had a clear scorching day the previous day but it was still warm so it didn’t really matter. We spent a good part of the afternoon there. It was so nice to just be outside and soaking up the city and beach combination. Afterwards we just took a nice easy stroll all the way back again. It was such an enjoyable walk, even if it did take an hour! We got back and had potatoes again for dinner. While waiting for our food, there was a huge moth on the window on the outside, and we watched two tiny lizards come along, plan their attack, and grab the moth! It was huge, it put up a fight and they had to grapple with it for a while before managing to drag it off to where they wanted to eat it! That was pretty fun to watch. After we’d eaten and it got dark, we decided to walk back up to a little view point over the river of the city skyline that was near the hostel. It was beautiful. It was so nice to see a big cities lights, we never got a proper chance in California, and there wasn’t much in the way of big city lights in New Zealand either! Got a few snaps and then just got an early night really, pretty manic start the next morning.

Brisbane skyline at night time

AUSTRALIA

Our alarms set off at 4.45 am which wasn’t enjoyable, we packed our last bits, ate breakfast, and hit the road for the 5 and a half hour drive back to Christchurch. It was another nice day, which the made drive really lovely and scenic, up over Lewis Pass. There was an ‘A & P show’ on somewhere along our route, and right where I needed to stop to use a loo, the most traffic I’ve seen in our whole time in New Zealand appeared along the road, and it took us ages to get back onto it. It was unbelievable, very frustrating as we’d been worrying about being late. It was worse than trying to reverse off the drive onto the A41 in the mornings! Anyway we still made it to Christchurch in good time, dropped off the tent as we’d arranged, and dropped the car off with no problems. We were a bit worried about our suitcases being over the limit as they seemed to feel a lot heavier than before. They were both slightly over, but not enough to be charged so we’ll have to be careful not to buy anything now that might increase the weight! We got through security, Phil had to have swabs and all sorts taken but only as a random check. We had 2 hours to wait for the flight, but it went quickly, we played on an old school 90’s Simpsons arcade game for 60c which was funny. The flight was good, we had TV screens again which was a nice surprise as we didn’t expect it for a short flight. I watched a nice film called Red Dog which nearly made me cry, only because I miss the dogs.. Glad I didn’t, that would have been embarrassing! We had chosen seats right at the back near the toilets, and the whole plane seemed to need the loo, constantly. The whole plane also thought it was a good idea to lean on the headrest with my screen in it whilst waiting for the loo. It was touch screen so I had people making the controls come up in the middle of my film, wet hands using it for balance to get back to their seats which would drip down, people trying to watch my screen with me while they waited, and I even had a Hindu lady tap me on the shoulder to acknowledge my nose piercing and give me a thumbs up which was funny! We had a delicious lasagne for lunch, with ice cream to follow, which again, was unexpected. The flight went very quickly and we landed in sunny Sydney. We had a fair few things to declare. I had a little free sample of organic plant fertilizer from the nursery in New Plymouth I was going to give to my Nan, I thought it might be trouble, but I thought I may aswell try as I’d checked the website and it didn’t say it was forbidden, they just said that I needed a permit for it and took it, but everything else was fine!

Stepping out the airport was beautiful. The heat hit us immediately, so nice to be in summer clothes again. I pretty much fell in love with Sydney before we had even stepped foot in it. Phil’s step Sister, who we were staying with, came and picked us up. She drove us right across the harbour bridge which was amazing. It really was beautiful. I have always wanted to go to Australia, so it was pretty magical to be there finally! It was so nice to be staying with someone again, we did a load of washing, had showers, and then a bottle of champagne was cracked open. It was just so nice. They told us they were taking us out for a meal, what a treat, we couldn’t have thanked them enough. It was delicious, and it was buzzing in Neutral Bay where they live. Later in the night, Phil’s step Sister let us both call home which was very special! Mum was out, but I spoke to Dad which was nice as he hasn’t been in contact while I’ve been gone(!!) I could’ve chatted all night, but Phil needed to ring home too so we rang off. I went online and got an email from the Whitsunday cruise company we had booked with, saying they had to cancel our booking due to some private event booked for the same day. The alternate dates they offered were either side of our time in Airlie Beach, so I asked for a full refund immediately as I’d want to book another cruise as soon as possible. They came back with, ‘yes but you will incur a $25 cancellation fee’. Outrageous! I said I wouldn’t pay it, they had offered an alternative tour which would work our cheaper than what I booked, so I said I’d take that if I was refunded the difference, we‘ll see what happens about that. Anyway, we crashed out and awoke the next day nice and early at 6am to catch our first bus! We both felt a little weary, but we had a good journey to Port Macquarie, it took about 5 and a half hours, it went fairly quickly though. I saw a gigantic lizard at the side of the road which scuttled away as we drove by. That was really cool. The driver put ‘Sleepless in Seattle’ and ‘What happens in Vegas’ on which passed some time! When we arrived, I needed to step to the side to get my bearings. A guy came up to us asking if I was Jess, I said yes and then he shoved our suitcases in the back of a mini bus and whisked us up to the hostel I had booked. I had no idea we were being collected or how he even knew what time we’d be arriving so it was a bit confusing, but great! He was a really great host, Tony, and knew how to run a good hostel. We were very tired, so after settling in and popping to the supermarket for supplies,  we just snoozed for the afternoon. So good to be in a bed again! A massive storm woke us up, the loudest thunder I have ever heard! It was right over the hostel. It was raining so hard too, typical for the weather to be bad, but it was still warm, and it was quite cool watching it. I haven’t seen a good storm in years! Later on after dinner, we played pool for a while which was fun. The walls in the pool room were written all over by guests, we both got hooked reading everyone’s messages and where they were from. Phil found two separate drawings on the wall about Nottingham Forest so he was happy! We added our names and then went back to our room to figure out what to do the next day. One of our room mates came in and started talking to us, he was from Chicago and was 38 but looked and acted like he was our age! He was interesting to talk to and we ended up talking most the night, then two Dutch girls game in who were also lovely and we were all talking for ages, until Phil and I both dropped off and left them to it, we were still very tired and it had gone midnight by this point!

A wild sleepy pygmy possum in Kooloonburg Creek Park

A koala having his formula

Kaylee the 3-legged koala

 We slept well. There was free toast in the hostel in the morning, so we got up in time for that to take advantage of it. When we were ready, we headed out to town to have a wander. Walked up to one of the many beaches Port Macquarie has, and just sat for ages. It was so nice just to be able to sit on a beach again and feel like we are on holiday. It was scorching too, and only 9.30am. We saw some interesting birds, and then took a wander up to Kooloonbung Creek Park which Tony told us was home to koala bears and water dragons (the ones that can run along the top of the water) amongst other things. A boardwalk took us over swampy land, through trees and around the big lake. I started to become very edgy about bugs and things as there was a chorus of all sorts of noises! I was jumping at everything but we managed to make it all the way round the walk, and it was very nice. We didn't see any koalas or water dragons, but we did see a lizard, a pygmy possum snoozing in a tree, and absolutely thousands of huge fruit bats hanging from the trees. There were a few getting rowdy, they sounded like fighting cats, and some were flying and swooping around, so we decided to move along in case they were going to attack us! I couldn't believe my eyes when we saw them all, I’ve never seen such a big bat, or that many of them in perfect view, hanging upside down from the branches. Incredible. We went back to the hostel for some lunch, and then walked briskly back towards town again to get to the koala hospital in time for feeding at 3pm. We made it, and it was amazing. We had a really enthusiastic guy take a group of us round and tell us the stories of all the koalas, some of the stories were very funny. They are all wild and whilst in the hospital they live in a very natural habitat. They do some amazing work there and it was so great to see the koalas, they are very cute! There were lots of kookaburras about too, pretty tame. I got up quite close to one, it wasn't going to budge and it was giving me a funny look so I slowly moved away! We went back to the hostel again, just before we got to the door, Tony pulled out the drive with a mini bus load of people and asked us if we wanted to hop in to go and see some kangaroos that hang out near the golf course of an evening. What a nice guy, didn't want any money, but just genuinely wants all his guests to get the most out of their stay in Port Macquarie. So we pulled up and sure enough, there were some kangaroos bouncing around a field, they were very suspicious and a bit shy so we weren't able to get too close to the fence otherwise they’d run off. One of the males stood up really tall and Tony said when they do that they mean business and you should back off. They use their tails to push themselves up as tall as they can get. And he was big! We left them to it and went back. We went and got a pizza from Dominoes for dinner with our American room mate, and met a nice English girl who was just leaving to go as we were, so we got chatty with her. She was lovely, and the 4 of us sat on the veranda at the front of the hostel to eat our pizza, while another storm came over. We chatted for a while then decided to move inside because there was a big bug buzzing around and none of us liked it, then a bug thing landed right on my chest, urgh! We were sat in the kitchen for a while, then Tony came in with a MASSIVE huntsman spider he had just caught in his house bit. I completely freaked out and even though it was in a container, I didn't want to be in the same room as it! But he encouraged us all to go over and have a look, I kept my distance at first and made Phil get a close up picture, but eventually I got up to it. Still makes me feel funny now to think about it, but my God that is the biggest spider I have ever seen. So glad that was in his bit, not ours! He said he hasn't seen one in years, so that was reassuring. A big, wildlife filled day again! We were leaving the next day, and realised the English girl and her friend were catching the same bus as us, to the same place, and staying in the same hostel! How funny. So we went and sorted all our stuff out, and got to bed.

Wild kangaroos!

A harmless hunstman..

Final stops in New Zealand

We woke up to rain (again!). We left at check out and got on our way to Punakaiki. Before we got to where we were staying, we went to see the ‘pancake rocks’ and ‘blowholes’ that Punakaiki is famous for. It was pretty interesting, the rocks had all sorts of peculiar formations, some of it looked like the set off a pirate film or something. To see the blow holes in action, shooting water out like a whale’s blow hole, we had to be there at high tide, so we missed out on that. We got to our accommodation, which was a sweet little rustic retreat, sitting amongst the forest. We were staying in a ’stargazer’ which was a little wooden hut  in the thick of the rainforest, with a glass roof to look up through the trees and see the sky. I really loved it! They had a coal fire in the main building and they sold home baked bread and muffins, freshly baked every morning. I had to buy one, they looked so tasty and I had been craving something like that for weeks! Later in the afternoon we went for a little walk through the forest and came out to the beach the other side. Despite the rain that was really nice, it was a little private cove and it had big caved out rocks and a waterfall coming down off the cliff on to the beach. Quite strange. We were both still very tired, not having slept very well for ages, so we just relaxed for the evening, caught up on the internet, and then walked into the forest to our hut at about 9ish. It was quite complicated to find in the darkness, but we got there. We arrived to find a load of candles lit (which we immediately thought was a nice gesture) and then found a man laying in our bed!! It completely freaked us out. I went and double checked we were in the right place, we were, so Phil asked him if he’d booked it aswell, and he said ‘Well I work here and I was told I could come here tonight‘ .. Well we booked and paid for it and got shown to it earlier that day! Seeing as he worked there, we asked if we could speak to someone about it and he mumbled ‘not really’ and said ‘no worries, ay’ and then packed up his stuff and went off. No apology or anything! He made us feel bad for making him leave! It really unsettled us because it was pitch black and it was a really awkward situation. And I felt weird sleeping in a bed he’d arranged to make comfortable for himself and had been laying in for God knows how long. Anyway, we slept like babies through the night, so nice to be on a mattress again, able to stretch out. Phil woke me up at one point, apparently I was snoring, (I wasn’t!). When we woke up in the morning, one of the little doors on the hut was wide open. Creepy, because I’d pulled the rock up against one of the doors and that was the one that had opened. I checked to see if the possibility of a breeze could have blown it open, so with out moving the rock, I tried to pull the door back up, and sure enough it couldn’t get past the rock. So something or someone must have opened it in the night! And I don’t think even a possum would be clever enough to have moved the rock to open the door, but then move it back again.. Hmm!

The 'Stargazer'!

Anyway, we just got up and had our breakfast. When Phil saw the manager on her own, he went over just to quietly mention what had happened, not to complain, but just to make her aware. She was absolutely mortified that had happened, and could only think that her assistant had said he could go in there for the evening with out checking the book, and was very frustrated at the thought of it and said she‘d be having words. She was extremely thankful that we weren't angry about it and offered a refund, but instead, Phil just asked if we could have some of the freshly cooked muffins that had just been put out, for free!! That is how much are missing good food! She was very surprised that was all we wanted and just said ‘absolutely, just take the lot!’ and asked if we wanted to hang around until the bread was done so we could take that too, but we declined as we had bread that needed eating before the Friday! We just took 4 of the 6 muffins, they were pretty big anyway. Being paid in muffins for the blunder was brilliant. We ate them both that day and they were so delicious! Anyway, we got on our way to the final stop of this part of the trip, Motueka (Abel Tasman National Park). On the way, the road took us along the edge of Nelson Lakes National Park, so we stopped at Lake Rotoroa. It was really beautiful. Before long, hundreds of sandflies were bothering us, so we went back to the car and sat and had lunch while looking over the lake. Such a lovely place. We carried on and reached our campsite, I had planned to go for a scenic drive, but we figured we could probably do everything we had wanted to do the next day. Instead we scrapped Lonely Planet’s recommendations for Motueka, and decided to be massive kids and play on the huge ’jumping pillow’ (like a trampoline/bouncy castle) that the campsite had! Absolutely jumped ourselves silly on it, we must have looked ridiculous, but it was a lot of fun! Then we played big garden chess in the rain (which I won, twice), and settled into the TV room for the evening. We got stuck chatting to a guy from Birmingham who had lived in New Zealand for 30 years. He very much enjoyed letting us know how many flash experiences he’d had in his life, how clever his daughters were, and how we’d always ‘missed the best bit’ when talking about what we have done on our travels. Nice. Anyway it was a really decent campsite and had a nice swimming pool too. We had almost decided to put the tent up as there was a lot of shelter from trees, but it was hammering it down by the afternoon, so we were glad we didn't!

Nelson Lakes National Park: Lake Rotoroa

Back to sleeping in the car again, we had a nice lay in. It had been one night stops for a while by this point, it was nice not to have to be up and out by checkout. We really lounged around all morning and eventually got ready for the day. We decided to have lunch before venturing out, and also wait until we could check in online for our flight the following day. Just after 2ish, we headed out for our day’s doings. We took a drive up to Takaka Hill, along extremely bendy roads, good fun to drive, and stopped at Hawkes Bay lookout point once we got to the top, which had breath taking views over the national park and the Tasman Sea. We headed back down again and then went to the closest parking spot to the Abel Tasman National Park that we could. It is not accessible by car, only boat and foot. We weren’t planning on doing a lot there, but we just wandered to Sandy Bay and walked about on the beach. It was one of the hottest and nicest days of our whole time in New Zealand, shame it was our last day! It really was beautiful anyway, even though we didn’t really experience the most part of the national park. There were loads of shells, and we saw a crab moving about which ended up heading for my feet! Afterwards we just headed back towards town, topped up petrol so we didn’t have to the next morning, grabbed a milkshake, and went back to the camp site. It pretty much took us all evening to sort out the car, the suitcases, the tent, everything, so we didn’t have to do it in the morning. And we slept in the car for the final time, very ready for Australia by this point.

Us at the Hawkes Bay viewpoint

Abel Tasman National Park: Sandy Bay

We had about a total of 7 proper sunny days out of 40, and because of this I think unfortunately we found a little too much of New Zealand to be under whelming. We were on such a high on our first week there, and then our second week we hit such a low when I got ill and the weather changed for the worst, that I think it was hard to shake the negative feelings after that, especially when the weather continued to be bad. I’ve since seen other people’s photos from New Zealand who had good weather and saw it all as it should be, so now I feel like I need to go back and do it again because I don’t want to be left feeling at all negative about the place. Despite all that, we did have some incredible experiences that I will probably never experience again. And the South Island’s West coast and Southland really is spectacular and very worth seeing, even if it is grey and miserable!

On to part 3 we go…

Snow and the rainy West

We're in Australia now, but here is one of the last blogs from New Zealand!

The morning we left Queenstown, it snowed. We couldn’t believe it! And we were going to be camping for the final 7 nights in New Zealand. We were aware it’d be colder than anywhere else we were going on this trip, but we definitely didn’t pack for snow and freezing temperatures. The weather always turned when we were due to camp! Anyway we set off, the way we were due to go was right over the Southern alps, but when we turned onto the road, the warning sign was up saying there was snow on the road you needed to have snow chains, which we didn’t have. So after still having to climb a fairly steep hill in the car, we managed to find a good place to turn around and we had to scrap that idea and take a different route. We had to go the longer way which was a little annoying, the drive over the mountains would have been spectacular, but we had some nice scenery along the way and we made it to Wanaka. It was a very cold day and even with two warm jumpers and a raincoat, I was still cold. It snowed and sleeted on and off all day. We sat in the TV lounge at the campsite to try and warm up a little bit. We didn’t really warm up but we just decided to go into town and wander around, see Lake Wanaka. We parked by the lake which was surrounded by snowy mountains, but when we stepped out the car it was blowing an absolute gale, a freezing cold gale. So we sort of hurriedly walked around town, and just went in the supermarket to get some final supplies for the final leg! We went back to the campsite, had some dinner, and spent a while contemplating whether we’d get away with sleeping in the TV lounge that evening.. I got my sleeping bag to take in anyway to try and get warm, and headed down there after we’d eaten. One of the people who owned the place was getting the log burner going, (which was bliss), but he saw my sleeping bag and we figured he may be inclined to come back and check if we were sleeping in there later on. Shortly after we’d settled in, a nice Belgian guy came in and we ended up getting chatty with him and we pretty much chatted all evening. He was biking in New Zealand for 3 months and had some interesting stories to tell about his travels on a bike! We decided on just sleeping in the car at about 11pm.

Lake Wanaka

It was a very cold night, and the car froze over, as did the condensation on the inside, the chilly night we had in Yosemite didn’t compare! But actually despite that, we did both manage to remain reasonably warm. We both slept in until 10am which was the latest we have slept in this whole trip! And I only awoke because the I was sweltering, for once the sun was out and blazing through the car straight onto the bit I was sleeping. It felt like a greenhouse in there with a jumper on and wrapped in a thermal sleeping bag. That was too much heat to handle despite having been freezing the previous day! We needed the extra sleep. We got ourselves ready for the day eventually, and set out to drive to Mount Cook. It was going to be a fairly long drive, but that was all I’d planned for the day so it didn’t matter that we were late setting off. It was a nice day so we were lucky with that, but it didn’t last for too long, the further we got, the cloudier it became. We got to the turning for the final 50km on the journey, and we stopped at a view point over  Lake Pukaki which was lovely. But there was a big grey cloud lingering over the highest peaks of the mountains, so we decided that it wasn’t going to be worth the extra petrol to get to Mount Cook and not be able to see the thing. We figured the view we were getting over the lake and of the snowy mountains wouldn’t get much better with the clouds looming, so we turned back. Again, the driving took up most of the day and it was pretty much time for dinner when we got back.

It was another cold night but it didn’t freeze. It was a lovely sunny morning, but we had to leave for Fox Glacier, arriving by lunchtime. The drive was incredible, starting off surrounded by mountains and driving along side a piercing blue lake, along creeks and passing waterfalls, and then into thick forest clad mountains, up and down hills, tightly curling roads, that was one of the best drives of the trip. We got to the camp site and chose our parking spot for where we’d be sleeping in the car again! And then we drove out to see the glacier. It was only a few miles from town, we parked up and then it was a short walk to the terminal face, (which crossed a creek that didn’t have big enough stepping stones so got wet feet)! It was really fascinating seeing a glacier, and seeing all the points it had once been years ago. It was fairly small compared to what I had imagined, it didn’t stand very tall and didn’t look like there was a lot of it left! But it was really cool seeing something that has existed since the ice age. After that we drove to a lake which was supposed to have reflections of Mount Cook in it. It was a nice lake but it was a typically cloudy day and we couldn’t see Mount Cook, so we resided in the camp site again for the evening.

Franz Josef Glacier

Next morning was still pretty cloudy, so we never got to see Mount Cook at all in the end! We left for Hokitika, stopping by Franz Josef Glacier on the way. This glacier was a more impressive, standing tall against the mountains surrounding it, and equally as fascinating. Natural history in front of our eyes. We carried on and made it to Hokitika, the campsite we were in was very nice. We went into town and had some lunch, then went into the National Kiwi Centre as it was our final chance to see a Kiwi whilst in New Zealand! It was a nicely run little place. We saw lots of native creatures, some eels, and then went into the kiwi house. We had to be totally quiet, and they are so light sensitive it is very dark in there, but we were lucky to see both kiwis feeding from their bowls close to the window! They are incredible animals, very cute, and very interesting. They are a ‘biological wonder’, crossed between a mammal and a bird. They are about the size of a small chicken and have long beaks with nostrils in the end which they poke straight into the ground like a tent peg in search for food! We watched them for ages. Then we were lucky again to be around for the eel’s feeding time. We went up and the lady feeding them gave us a talk and then let us feed them ourselves! They are meat eaters and come right out the water to get to the food! I had no idea how interesting they were. They breed in a trench somewhere 6000km from New Zealand. Born about 3mm long, after nearly 20 years, growing a couple of inches per year, they make their way to New Zealand where they are fully protected but you are permitted to feed eels if you see them in a lake. When put into the sanctuary, they remain there for up to 100 years! They are all blind, and it is only females than live on past 20 or so. They begin to change shape and stop eating when they are ready to breed. They are then released, and they travel the 6000km back to the trench to give birth, and then they die. Most of the eels in the tank were over 50 years old, one of which was over 100 years and had a large bend in her back from arthritis, but they will be keeping an eye on her for when she begins to change as she’ll be next to leave. After that we went back to the camp site which was sat next to a beach with black sand, so we had a wander on that. There were signs saying the blue penguins bred in the area so we decided we’d go back again at dusk, in the hope of seeing some more penguins! There was a little farmyard on site so we had a look round that too, saw a pig, goats, alpacas, etc! By the evening there were weka birds wandering around everywhere, they are a bit similar to kiwis, but there were some cats roaming about aswell, hopefully none were successful in catching a weka. Once we had dinner and it was getting dark, we headed back to the beach. We waited about half an hour and it was almost pitch black before we decided that there wasn’t going to be any, even if there were some that came a little later, we wouldn’t have seen them anyway. So we headed across the road to a glow worm dell instead, which was absolutely amazing! There were thousands of them, just a short walk from the road. I’ve never seen anything like it, they were beautiful. It was like looking at a starry sky. That was a fascinating day, much like the one we had in Dunedin.

Beach in Hokitika

Me feeding eels

Te Anau and Queenstown

On the way to Te Anau, we stopped by in Manapouri. Doubtful Sound is there, but you can only access it via a tour. We arrived in the village, approaching a junction to turn and carry on our way to Te Anau or turn into the village, and I had just said ah there isn’t much here, lets just get to Te Anau. But when we got up to the junction, we suddenly, and luckily, caught a glimpse of Lake Manapouri. The most stunning and awe inspiring lake I have ever set eyes on. It was so blue, so still, so clear, so tranquil and surrounded by mountains, it was breath taking. So we parked up and walked down to Frasers Beach, which runs round the edge of the lake, to take it in. I paddled in it, but it was freezing! Before long sand flies were bothering us, so we decided to move on. Sand flies are the most annoying things. The only flesh I had on show was my feet, and if I stood still for one second I’d have about 20 buzzing around both my feet. They give the most itchy bites, they are still driving me crazy four days on, glad I’ve got long nails at the moment! We got to the campsite in Te Anau which was lovely. We stayed in a really nice little cabin to have a break from camping. We were both so tired so rested up for a bit, and then grabbed some fish and chips for dinner. It was delicious. So good to eat something other than packets/tins/pot noodles.

Lake Manapouri

The next day we got up and slowly got ready for the day to do the Te Anau - Milford drive. Unfortunately it was another grey day but it wasn’t raining to we figured it’d still be better to do it that day. It was a 4 hour round trip (with out stops). Phil has done pretty much all the driving here, but he wanted me to drive this one as we’d read a lot about how dodgy it can be and risks of avalanches, etc! On the way, we stopped at Lake Mistletoe which was a fairly standard lake through a little wooded walk. Next stop was Mackay Creek which was a lovely river running along the base of the mountains, very green. The image reminded us a little bit of Yosemite. Mirror Lakes was after that, they had nice reflections the mountains, and we saw rainbow trout swimming around. We carried on for a bit and I suddenly saw a massive bird sat in a lay by so I pulled over to get a picture, and then it flew and landed on the roof! All of a sudden another 2 came out of no where and both got on the car, looking in the windows at us and then started pecking and trying to destroy bits of the car! Couldn’t believe it, the cheeky things. They were Keas and they are ‘Alpine parrots’, nice looking birds but (after reading an information board) realised they are notorious for being curious and destructive to human belongings! They are fully protected as the Southern New Zealand Alps are the only place that they are found to live. Before they did any serious damage I decided to pull away, we drove off with 2 still on the roof, eventually they flew off! We quickly realised they had chewed a bit of the rubber seal round the window, which now flaps in the wind! We got to a huge tunnel which goes straight through a mountain, but just before that we stopped and there was loads of snow and more Keas (on other people’s cars!). We got out and walked in the snow - me in flip flops still! As we went back to the car a Kea came over and landed on the roof, I was saying ‘No… No..’ ‘Off. Get, off!’ and pointing, like I was talking to my dogs! It didn’t listen, but I just opened my door and it flew off. We went through the tunnel which was really cool. Came out the other side to amazing views, and the steepest and windiest road down. It was great fun to drive, but I knew we had to get back up it later! We got to Milford eventually and saw Milford Sound, and Mitre peak, minus the peak though thanks to clouds. The whole drive was fantastic, right through the Alps. We walked up to a little view point, and saw a flightless bird called a Weka, who was also very curious! It was very sweet and would come as close as it dared to us, but as soon as we’d move and it’d run off, so we’d stop again and the same process kept happening. We didn’t go on a cruise or a tour or anything on the sound, so we just headed back to Te Anau. The driving was fine anyway, Phil would’ve been OK to do it. That pretty much took our full day so we just ate and caught up on the internet for the evening.

A Kea on the bonnet

We left for Queenstown the next morning, but stopped at the DOC’s bird life park on the way out to see some rare and protected birds. There didn’t seem to be many birds there but we saw the some cheeky Keas amongst other nice birds and then got on our way. Arriving in Queenstown, I immediately fell in love with it. It was just so lovely. The town hugs a beautiful lake and is surrounded by mountains. It has a real buzz about it. The hostel we checked into was great, and free soup every night! We got settled in and then went out to wander around the town. There were so many little cafes and lovely pubs and bars, wish our budget allowed us to enjoy them! I got stuck looking in a sweet shop and ended up spending more money than I should’ve on sweets.. We went down to the bay and absorbed the views, then just headed back up the hostel. The free soup was very tasty so we made the most of that!

We had a slow morning the next day, and went to town in search of a supermarket, but realised we’d have to drive to the nearest one, so we went out and did that. We got back to the hostel and made a lunch to go back out with, then headed up to the Skyline gondola! It was so steep and really scary dangling in the little cart the higher and higher we were getting, but the views were incredible! We stood at the top on the viewing deck for a while to take in all the surroundings, I felt pretty dizzy looking down! We were lucky to catch a dry spell whilst out, as it rained pretty much the rest of the day. We watched people do the ’luge’ a couple of times, and then went off on a little loop walk, which took us into the woods and up some steep hills. There was surprisingly an ‘extreme’ fire danger that day, despite it being very cool and damp. On the way back to the main area, we watched a couple of people take off the side of the hill hang gliding. It looked so much fun, but I think I’d still be too scared to do it! We got back on the gondola to go back down to town which was just as scary, and then went back to the hostel. We still haven’t really caught up on sleep so I had an afternoon snooze before it was soup time again!

Going up the sky gondola

We had an earlier start the next morning. I’d booked for us to go jet boating! I’d seen a few people doing it since being here and it looked great fun, so we were very excited to get going. After breakfast, we wandered down to the bay. We checked in for the boat we booked, but most people tended to just rock up and hope for the best rather than book in advance. We’d just seen the previous boat pull up and it was rammed, but no one was turning up wanting to do the time we’d booked, and they needed a minimum of 6 people to do the trip, so they said to come back the next hour and see if more people turned up. We went for a wander into the Queenstown Gardens to pass some time, it was a nice little walk, extremely windy though! We sat by a duck pond for a bit before heading back to the jetty. Still not enough people to take the trip, so they just told us they can book us onto an afternoon one which already had enough people booked on, so we’d be guaranteed to go then. So we went with that and went for a wander round the shops before heading back to the hostel for a bite to eat. So, back to the jetty we go, and we get given some gear to put on, a huge rain coat and life jacket. It is so windy now, the lake is very, very choppy! We all boarded the boat and we got going, we were warned it’d be pretty rough while he went across the lake but once we got to the river it’d be calmer. Well rough it definitely was! The jet boat bumped over the waves and the wind blew all the spray all over us, which was just like having a huge wind turbine blowing crushed ice at us! The wind was so strong, we were going so fast and we were getting so cold and wet I couldn’t breathe or even see where we were going! I just kept laughing, for some reason I found it hilarious! We turn off the lake eventually and really got going. It was extremely intense, and I loved it. We did a few spins and he’d take us unnervingly close to bridges and trees, etc. But best of all was the scenery, it was just beautiful and lovely to really be out on the river. At times we’d get some spray on us which was absolutely freezing, or he’d go so fast we couldn’t open our eyes and it felt like the skin was ripping off of our faces!! But over all it was fantastic. We were pretty cold by the time we got back, and they let us go down to the underwater observatory to dry off. That was a nice bonus as we saw lots of fish swimming around in the lake, and we saw the photos the company had taken of us all before hand, but we decided not to purchase any! We both had very wind burnt faces for the rest of the day. We had pretty much done all we’d came to do in Queenstown, so we just went to the internet café for the afternoon until it was time for soup.