We chilled out in Hobart for the rest of the time we had there and then decided to head off for Strahan. It was going to be a long day and we had to set off early. We followed the road LP describes as stunning to get to Mt Field NP. It is not the impressive, but a pleasant drive. We did not have time to do all the things in the park so we just did the short walk to Russell Falls which is not bad, but nothing too special. Then we hopped in the car and shot up the Lyell Highway. Until Lake St Clair there is not a lot to see, but once we got there we stopped for lunch. Its not bad, but nothing too special. Its from here that the road becomes really stunning. It enters Franklin Rivers National Park and the drive is spectacular, passing through fields, forests and mountain valleys. All of the side walks are quite pretty but it is Donaghy's Lookout that you simply have to stop to. Seemingly everyone else skipped it, but it is a beautiful short hike. Its quite amazing that after just 20 minutes of walking you feel like you are in the middle of nowhere. Amazingly peaceful. Its 20 minutes off the highway, but it feels like 20 hours away. Well worth the time. Eventually we rocked up in Queenstown and went up to the viewpoint. Wow. I had not been expecting that. You can see down into the mining pit. Its very beautiful although the wind is super strong up there. People had told us that it was a shithole, but I think its quite a cute little town. We were running out of time so we carried on to Strahan, which is a cute little waterfront town. We stayed in a B and B here and decided to go for a nice meal in the expensive restaurant in town. The oysters were great and the pudding was fantastic, but the rest of the food was somewhat disappointing. Shame as it cost us quite a bit.
In the morning we laid in and chilled out before setting off for Cradle Mountain. The road is the usual winding Tasmanian road and it is quite pretty along the way although there is nothing specific to see. We got to Cradle Mountain around 1.30pm and the woman at reception told us that we should hurry to get down to the mountain that night as the weather was likely to be shit for the next few days and we needed to be able to see the mountain. We dropped off the car and took the free shuttle down to the lake. I found it really beautiful there as we had a clear view and the trees were half orange with the autumn change of colour. Cannelle just thought that it was nice. We went for a little walk around dove lake but we had to get the last bus back which was a shame as it would have been nice to do some hiking. Tomorrow we would go back. If I had known how the weather would have been the next day I think I'd have gone hiking that evening. We saw a few wombats and wallabies in the evening but went to bed early.
The next morning we got up to go hiking but it was caining it down with rain. Shitty. We tried to wait it out for a bit and then just decided to hike anyway. I had wanted to do the Cradle Mountain summit hike but when we got there it was obvious that it was too foggy to do it. We opted to hike to cradle lake, which is probably stunning when you have a clear day. The hiking was still very pleasant even in the rain, so its probably really cool on a good day. We just did a short hour long walk and headed back to the cafe to wait until the end of the day. I really wanted to go looking for a platypus as I know they are almost impossible to see and I was disappointed with my semi view in Canberra. We decided to try down by Ronny Creek as it had been recommended. We didn't see any, but we did see loads of wombats and again a lot of wallabies. On the way back we saw a lot of pademelons around the lodge. In the evening we got chatting with some people in the campsite and they had seen a platypus in the lodge pond so we decided to try there in the morning.
We got up early and braved to rain to see the platypus. When we got there it was close to the bank so we went there quickly only to see it disappear when a loud middle aged group of Australians came and made so much fucking noise that they scared it off. We spent the next 40 minutes silently stalking the pond until we got some great close up shots of the platypus. At last I can say I have seen one and they are super cute in the water. We have seen almost all of the big ticket Australian animals in the wild now. Its nowhere near as difficult as people say it is. We hope to get some of the desert creatures in the outback and the only ones we will miss will be the tree kangaroo and cassowary in queensland as we are not heading over that way. Have to save it for another trip. We left and headed for Sheffield. We decided on the way that we didn't want to go to Mole Creek NP as it was just some caves and we would be pushed for time. Sheffield is a cute town and well worth a stop with all the murals there. The best ones are in the centre of town and its worth stopping by the mural park to see this year's competition. We spent and hour or two looking around. Afterwards we headed back to Launceston, only being a little worried when a piece of plastic hit the car tyre and then it swerved a bit. We though we may have a flat but it looked as though it was just wind. Eventually we got the car back to the airport and took the bus back to Launceston. We went to Burger got Soul which is really good if a little overpriced and then I called the passport people because I was beginning to get worried about why they hadn't received it yet. They told me that they had received it on the friday and so they at least had the paperwork. Lets hope it doesn't take too long. The next day we just headed to the airport and had an hours delay before taking the short flight back to Melbourne. Tasmania is a great place to visit. There is nothing world class, but there is nothing less than great either. Everything is super cute and there is so much to see and do that its definitely an amazing place to go for a two week holiday. Well worth the trip.
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Monday, May 12, 2014
Australia Part 3 (Launceston, Bay of Fires, Freycinet NP, Port Arthur and Hobart)
We arrived in Launceston and got the bus into the city. Everyone so far has been super nice to us in Tasmania. Like the South island of New Zealand. We checked into the beautiful hostel that's in a listed building. Only problem is it has no heating for the winter. We had a wander around the town. Its a very pretty little town and we went down to the gorge for a walk. Saw some pademelons and a wallaby down there, as well as some peacocks while we had devon tea. It reminds me a lot of England here. I guess the landscape is similar even if the wildlife isn't. We had to resend the forms for the tax and did that from office works. That sorted out mine, but Cannelle still had to photocopy all of the pages from her passport and get them signed by a police officer before posting them to the medicare offices to get her medicare exemption back. It never ends lol.
We took care of that in the morning and went to pick up the car. The woman told us that a lot of accidents happen in Tasmania, most cars come back damaged and people often drive without car insurance in Tasmania. Now I have no idea if this is true or not, but I know there is a lot of wildlife on the roads here (we have seen a lot of roadkill) and we were obviously still spooked by our experience of scratching up the car in Victoria. By this point they had given us our $200 deposit back but we were worried that we could knacker this car and it would cost us $4000 in excess. We bit the bullet and paid $150 each to reduce the excess to $440. At least that would be a mild inconvenience and not a holiday crippler that the $4000 would be. This will probably be the last car we hire except one for a day in Broken Hill, maybe one for a day in Adelaide (both of which we may insure) and one from Kalgoorlie to Perth. Its also the reason why we probably won't do the west coast as it will start to burn us too much in the end. Not sure we really needed it so far, but we are only half way so far so its maybe too early to judge and it definitely gives us peace of mind.
We set off at lunchtime from Launceston to head to the north east and all of the roads are windy round here with a wide variety of traffic signs. I am sure that drivers from the mainland will never have seen half of these signs there as the roads are just straight and dull. It takes a while to get anywhere and Tasmania drivers are a little crazy, so perhaps the insurance was a good idea. We decided to divert to the North and that was a bad idea as we ended up crawling along a gravel road where we only saw 4x4s. We quickly decided it wasn't a good idea for us to continue up that way as we had already bashed up one rental car. We got back on the main road and headed down to St Helens. From there you can divert into the Bay of Fires. Cannelle was starting to think that it was a lot of driving and she wasn't sure if it was going to be worth it. When we pulled up alongside these almost Philippine white beaches with their tropical (albeit cold) turquoise water and fiery orange lichen covered boulders we realised it was worth it. What a beautiful place. We spent an hour round there and then drove over to the Gardens which are even more beautiful. Its a stunning stretch of coastline and was the first time I had seen crashing turquoise coloured waves. Great start to the east coast. We wanted to blitz it to have more time for the parks in the west and as I am sitting in Hobart at the moment, we are still thinking about what exactly we will do for the second half.
The next day we drove down the coast (diverting pointlessly to St Marys as LP recommends, though we did see a poteroo and wallaby on the road) to Freycinet NP. The weather was a little overcast which was a shame, but you can still see the beautiful pink and orange granite mountains from Coles Bay. In the summer this must be a beautiful place. I think the beaches at Bay of Fires are more beautiful, but the setting here is maybe superior. We did the hike over to Wineglass Bay. It is a truly marvelous view from the top of the summit and the beach was totally deserted when we got down there and could just chill out. We considered a longer walk but the rain was coming in by this point. We enjoyed it for a bit and got back to the car to continue onwards to Port Arthur. It was going to be touch and go if we made it and there were some roadworks as well. We encountered some shitheads on the road who were abusing and swearing at us because we followed the speed limit. You get dickheads everywhere. I was just worried they may come and smash the car up at night as it was obvious where we were headed. The sunset on the Tasman Peninsula was really beautiful and we rocked into the campsite late, where we watched The Voice Australia and saw all the pademelons on the grounds. There are loads around Port Arthur.
In the morning we headed to the Port Arthur historical site. The price is now $35 but its worth it. We got our playing cards to find our historical convict in the basement. Its a nice touch and the museum is informative. We got an hour long guided tour, which we were very lucky to have an interesting tour guide for and they went off script as well. It also included a 20 minute boat trip around the harbour which was nice, though I expect them to be adding that as a separate cost soon. Going all New Zealand on us. The grounds themselves are very beautiful and it does contrast with the convict history there. Its hard to get a handle on what happened there and there is a full spectrum of opinions amongst the tour guides themselves. It guarantees you a unique perspective for your tour. We spent about 4 hours looking around the site before deciding to visit the rest of the peninsula on the way to Hobart. The remarkable cave is well worth the trip, but all the other side trips around Eaglehawk Nest are not worth it really. The peninsula itself is nice enough on its own. We swung by Richmond on the way back and the bridge is nice, but after Port Arthur it doesn't seem quite so colonial. Probably not worth going out of your way for but you may as well visit if if passing. We finally arrived in Hobart and decided that we would do some day trips to the south and west.
The hostel offered a free trip up to Mt Wellington so we took them up on it as we figured it would save us some petrol. We were driven up and the views from the top are really something. You can see out over most of the Tasman Peninsula and the islands south of Hobart. You can even see some of the mountains in Southwest National Park. Everyone walked down, but we didn't think we would have time as we needed to cram so much in. The driver told us to do a 4 hour walk on the Tarn shelf in Mt Field National Park, so we decided to abandon plans to go to the south as it looks very similar. We are concerned about stretching ourselves too thin. After Mt Wellington we went to Salamanca Place and Battery Point to see the historical parts of the city. Its less historical than I expected, but its very cute in its own way. It may be the cutest Australian city we have been to so far. It doesn't take too long to walk around. We got some expensive fish and chips at the docks and they were really disappointing. What we had had in New Zealand had been much cheaper and far better quality. After this disappointment we took the car out to MONA which is horrifically signposted as I guess they want most people to take the ferry. The museum is in a beautiful location and the Derwent river is pretty on the drive North as well. The museum is odd and like most modern art galleries mostly filled with shit. There are some interesting pieces here though and its definitely worth a look. Probably more innovative and interesting than any other art galleries we have been to in Australia. Finally in the evening we headed to Bonorong Wildlife Centre to take the night feeding tour. We paid $179 each for this but it was worth every penny. If you are an animal lover then this is a must. Just the fact that your entrance fee goes towards supporting the work they do there for rescuing and rehabilitating injured animals is enough in itself. We started off feeding the kangaroos. Cannelle was super intimidated by the bigger kangaroos, but they loved the food. We even got to witness two adult males fighting later on in the evening. We went to the wombats first and stayed with Lucy who is a wimpy wombat because she loves human contact and hasn't learnt to be aggressive enough to be released into the wild yet. They do a lot of rehabilitation of injured wildlife on the roads of Tasmania. We did not want to touch many of the animals if it had the risk of distressing them and once he realised that feeding the Tasmanian devils by tug of war was done mostly for tourists we just gave them their food. We were here to learn what they work on and to see the animals, not to touch them. Though the wombats are super cute. We fed, learnt about and observed a wide variety of animals. Wombats, Tasmanian Devils, Koalas, Frogmouths, Potoroos, Bettongs, an albino possum, quolls and the super cute sugar gliders. We learnt a raft of information on these animals in our 2.5 hour tour and it is clear that the carers really know their stuff and our carer could easily answer any question that we put to him. It was a super informative evening, a wonderful experience and a highlight of our trip. If you love wildlife then this is an absolute must. Just do it. Don't worry about the price. You will feel like it was totally worth it and be happy you invested your money in a centre and a project that is definitely worthwhile. After we drove back very slowly in order not to hit anything on the roads.
Today we had planned to do the Tarn walk, but then saw it was a gravel road and Cannelle was feeling tired. In order not to push it too much we decided to take a break and just chill out in Hobart, watch game of thrones and I could catch up on the blog. Tomorrow we will visit the easily accessible parts of Mt Field NP on the way west to Strahan. Should be able to stop at various points along the Franklin river on the way. Looking forward to the west even if most of our time will be in Cradle Mountain NP as its the most accessible. Loving Tasmania so far. Well worth the trip.
We took care of that in the morning and went to pick up the car. The woman told us that a lot of accidents happen in Tasmania, most cars come back damaged and people often drive without car insurance in Tasmania. Now I have no idea if this is true or not, but I know there is a lot of wildlife on the roads here (we have seen a lot of roadkill) and we were obviously still spooked by our experience of scratching up the car in Victoria. By this point they had given us our $200 deposit back but we were worried that we could knacker this car and it would cost us $4000 in excess. We bit the bullet and paid $150 each to reduce the excess to $440. At least that would be a mild inconvenience and not a holiday crippler that the $4000 would be. This will probably be the last car we hire except one for a day in Broken Hill, maybe one for a day in Adelaide (both of which we may insure) and one from Kalgoorlie to Perth. Its also the reason why we probably won't do the west coast as it will start to burn us too much in the end. Not sure we really needed it so far, but we are only half way so far so its maybe too early to judge and it definitely gives us peace of mind.
We set off at lunchtime from Launceston to head to the north east and all of the roads are windy round here with a wide variety of traffic signs. I am sure that drivers from the mainland will never have seen half of these signs there as the roads are just straight and dull. It takes a while to get anywhere and Tasmania drivers are a little crazy, so perhaps the insurance was a good idea. We decided to divert to the North and that was a bad idea as we ended up crawling along a gravel road where we only saw 4x4s. We quickly decided it wasn't a good idea for us to continue up that way as we had already bashed up one rental car. We got back on the main road and headed down to St Helens. From there you can divert into the Bay of Fires. Cannelle was starting to think that it was a lot of driving and she wasn't sure if it was going to be worth it. When we pulled up alongside these almost Philippine white beaches with their tropical (albeit cold) turquoise water and fiery orange lichen covered boulders we realised it was worth it. What a beautiful place. We spent an hour round there and then drove over to the Gardens which are even more beautiful. Its a stunning stretch of coastline and was the first time I had seen crashing turquoise coloured waves. Great start to the east coast. We wanted to blitz it to have more time for the parks in the west and as I am sitting in Hobart at the moment, we are still thinking about what exactly we will do for the second half.
The next day we drove down the coast (diverting pointlessly to St Marys as LP recommends, though we did see a poteroo and wallaby on the road) to Freycinet NP. The weather was a little overcast which was a shame, but you can still see the beautiful pink and orange granite mountains from Coles Bay. In the summer this must be a beautiful place. I think the beaches at Bay of Fires are more beautiful, but the setting here is maybe superior. We did the hike over to Wineglass Bay. It is a truly marvelous view from the top of the summit and the beach was totally deserted when we got down there and could just chill out. We considered a longer walk but the rain was coming in by this point. We enjoyed it for a bit and got back to the car to continue onwards to Port Arthur. It was going to be touch and go if we made it and there were some roadworks as well. We encountered some shitheads on the road who were abusing and swearing at us because we followed the speed limit. You get dickheads everywhere. I was just worried they may come and smash the car up at night as it was obvious where we were headed. The sunset on the Tasman Peninsula was really beautiful and we rocked into the campsite late, where we watched The Voice Australia and saw all the pademelons on the grounds. There are loads around Port Arthur.
In the morning we headed to the Port Arthur historical site. The price is now $35 but its worth it. We got our playing cards to find our historical convict in the basement. Its a nice touch and the museum is informative. We got an hour long guided tour, which we were very lucky to have an interesting tour guide for and they went off script as well. It also included a 20 minute boat trip around the harbour which was nice, though I expect them to be adding that as a separate cost soon. Going all New Zealand on us. The grounds themselves are very beautiful and it does contrast with the convict history there. Its hard to get a handle on what happened there and there is a full spectrum of opinions amongst the tour guides themselves. It guarantees you a unique perspective for your tour. We spent about 4 hours looking around the site before deciding to visit the rest of the peninsula on the way to Hobart. The remarkable cave is well worth the trip, but all the other side trips around Eaglehawk Nest are not worth it really. The peninsula itself is nice enough on its own. We swung by Richmond on the way back and the bridge is nice, but after Port Arthur it doesn't seem quite so colonial. Probably not worth going out of your way for but you may as well visit if if passing. We finally arrived in Hobart and decided that we would do some day trips to the south and west.
The hostel offered a free trip up to Mt Wellington so we took them up on it as we figured it would save us some petrol. We were driven up and the views from the top are really something. You can see out over most of the Tasman Peninsula and the islands south of Hobart. You can even see some of the mountains in Southwest National Park. Everyone walked down, but we didn't think we would have time as we needed to cram so much in. The driver told us to do a 4 hour walk on the Tarn shelf in Mt Field National Park, so we decided to abandon plans to go to the south as it looks very similar. We are concerned about stretching ourselves too thin. After Mt Wellington we went to Salamanca Place and Battery Point to see the historical parts of the city. Its less historical than I expected, but its very cute in its own way. It may be the cutest Australian city we have been to so far. It doesn't take too long to walk around. We got some expensive fish and chips at the docks and they were really disappointing. What we had had in New Zealand had been much cheaper and far better quality. After this disappointment we took the car out to MONA which is horrifically signposted as I guess they want most people to take the ferry. The museum is in a beautiful location and the Derwent river is pretty on the drive North as well. The museum is odd and like most modern art galleries mostly filled with shit. There are some interesting pieces here though and its definitely worth a look. Probably more innovative and interesting than any other art galleries we have been to in Australia. Finally in the evening we headed to Bonorong Wildlife Centre to take the night feeding tour. We paid $179 each for this but it was worth every penny. If you are an animal lover then this is a must. Just the fact that your entrance fee goes towards supporting the work they do there for rescuing and rehabilitating injured animals is enough in itself. We started off feeding the kangaroos. Cannelle was super intimidated by the bigger kangaroos, but they loved the food. We even got to witness two adult males fighting later on in the evening. We went to the wombats first and stayed with Lucy who is a wimpy wombat because she loves human contact and hasn't learnt to be aggressive enough to be released into the wild yet. They do a lot of rehabilitation of injured wildlife on the roads of Tasmania. We did not want to touch many of the animals if it had the risk of distressing them and once he realised that feeding the Tasmanian devils by tug of war was done mostly for tourists we just gave them their food. We were here to learn what they work on and to see the animals, not to touch them. Though the wombats are super cute. We fed, learnt about and observed a wide variety of animals. Wombats, Tasmanian Devils, Koalas, Frogmouths, Potoroos, Bettongs, an albino possum, quolls and the super cute sugar gliders. We learnt a raft of information on these animals in our 2.5 hour tour and it is clear that the carers really know their stuff and our carer could easily answer any question that we put to him. It was a super informative evening, a wonderful experience and a highlight of our trip. If you love wildlife then this is an absolute must. Just do it. Don't worry about the price. You will feel like it was totally worth it and be happy you invested your money in a centre and a project that is definitely worthwhile. After we drove back very slowly in order not to hit anything on the roads.
Today we had planned to do the Tarn walk, but then saw it was a gravel road and Cannelle was feeling tired. In order not to push it too much we decided to take a break and just chill out in Hobart, watch game of thrones and I could catch up on the blog. Tomorrow we will visit the easily accessible parts of Mt Field NP on the way west to Strahan. Should be able to stop at various points along the Franklin river on the way. Looking forward to the west even if most of our time will be in Cradle Mountain NP as its the most accessible. Loving Tasmania so far. Well worth the trip.
Australia Part 2: (Great Ocean Road and Grampians National Park)
Now I wasn't that excited for the Great Ocean Road, but it is an Australian institution and we were near Melbourne so it would be silly not to do it. We did the ride down to Geelong, with nothing to see and then got to Torquay. We went to see the famous Bells Beach, which was underwhelming but we expected crashing waves. Apparently its temperamental so maybe we caught it on the wrong day. We then drove on down to the lighthouse where we turned off early and Cannelle scratched up the underside of the car doing a u-turn. Shit. Was a bang and a scratch. We had a look underneath and the paint seemed scratched off and there was a lot of mud underneath where it had removed the mudguard. Way to ruin a trip. Shit. We had taken the minimum insurance and now we had dinged up the car. Apparently a new bumper could run up to $2000 and we had an excess of $3300. Shitty. We drove on and saw the koalas that were sleeping as usual. Some idiots have obviously been feeding the birds for photos as they were quite aggressive in coming for my ice cream. On the way into Apollo Bay we saw a car pull over. We stopped to have a look. A koala had apparently fallen out of a tree and was trying to escape the side of the road. He couldn't make it over. I suggested picking him up and the other driver lifted him over the barrier. The koala was waving his arms and screaming "noooooooo". It was quite funny, but he seemed fine enough when he was on the otther side and walked off. We got to Apollo Bay and tried to clean up the underside of the car as best we could. Not sure what was going to happen when we got it back. The first day on the Great Ocean Road had been very underwhelming. I didn't see why it was so famous. We were hoping for more on the second day.
On the second day we drove on through Cape Otway National Park and into Port Campbell National Park. It was still less impressive than the New Zealand west coast drive, which was also disappointing apart from Punakaiki. Even the twelve apostles are not that impressive. Yes they are nice and I am happy I have seen them, but I am not sure they are worth the drive out here if you are not coming this way. London Bridge, The Arch and the Grotto were all better in my opinion. At last we had found something worth seeing on the Great Ocean Road. I really think it is overblown and the Australians can't seem to see what all the fuss is about either. When we told the rental company we were going to wilsons prom, GOR and Grampians they were only interested in the first and third ones. I think we should just chat to Aussies as they tend to dismiss the overhyped tourist places. Most of them think Queensland is overrated as well. Well the Great Ocean Road certainly won't be a highlight of this trip or even of this 6 day roadtrip. Its nice. Its pleasant. Its not that special. We pushed on up to the Grampians and the mountains at the southern end of the park are really beautiful. What a start. We drove North up to Halls Gap and had a good feeling for the park.
We would stay two days at Halls Gap to visit the Grampians. Its a really nice natonal park. We stayed at Tims Place which is a really nice place and the owner is a nice guy. He was learning French so we chatted together for a while and he told us what to do to make the most of our time there. We did the pinnacles walk via the grand canyon that took us just over 2 hours (rather than four). The first part to Cleopatras Pool is not bad and quite pretty, but the highlight is definitely the walk up through grand canyon and silent street. Really beautiful rock formations and reminded me a little of Slovensky Raj in Slovakia. The view from the top is nice as well, but the climb was more unique. We thought it would be Blue Mountains light and although it is similar, it is also different. More jagged and on a smaller scale than the blue mountains. Lacks the epic feel. After that we drove across the tourist pass to see the lookouts (they are nice) and past the damaged areas from the forest fires. The waterfall looks stunning, but you can't visit it anymore because of the fires. Shame. You can't even stop along the side of the road (I don't know why) and I think we should have done it anyway. Just be aware that the waterfall access is closed. Not sure when they will open it up again. Finally we went to the aboriginal museum, which is informative and well worth stopping in.
On the drive back we decided to visit Ballarat to break up the journey. Its a nice mining town with some cool architecture but its also bitterly cold. We also had to print off our flight tickets and print and sign documents for the taxman as we hadn't done them on the road trip. It would turn out these forms had some errors and we would have to print off new ones in Launceston and do the process all over again. Neverending lol. We were now shitting ourselves about dropping off the damaged car. We ended up dropping off the car early at 2.30pm and looked nonchalant as we dropped off the bags and left him to do the inspection. We had also had a stone flip up and chip the windshield on the way to Ballarat so that was further damage we had to worry about. Luckily the old guy who rented it to us wasn't there and just his moron assistant. He said nothing and gave us our receipt. Great. We escaped out as quickly as we could, but we weren't sure if they could still take the money later, so we spent the afternoon futilely looking for a way to transfer all of Cannelle's money to my account so they wouldn't be able to take it. We were still stressed, but failed miserably in every effort. Cannelle then got a missed call and we were sure it was them so we panicked even more. Eventually she listened to it and it turned out not to be them. We resolved not to stress anymore and just relax a bit. We would wait and see what happened with the $200 deposit. Maybe they would just take that when they found out. We figured the longer it went on the less time they would have for recourse as they wouldn't be able to prove it was us that did the damage. Oh well. We went out in Melbourne and the next day we caught a plane to Tasmania. I was really excited for this part of the trip and we had hired a car with a different company just in case. The flight was really short as it was only 49 minutes in the air. You are up for a bit and then next minute you are coming in to land again. Tasmania at last.
On the second day we drove on through Cape Otway National Park and into Port Campbell National Park. It was still less impressive than the New Zealand west coast drive, which was also disappointing apart from Punakaiki. Even the twelve apostles are not that impressive. Yes they are nice and I am happy I have seen them, but I am not sure they are worth the drive out here if you are not coming this way. London Bridge, The Arch and the Grotto were all better in my opinion. At last we had found something worth seeing on the Great Ocean Road. I really think it is overblown and the Australians can't seem to see what all the fuss is about either. When we told the rental company we were going to wilsons prom, GOR and Grampians they were only interested in the first and third ones. I think we should just chat to Aussies as they tend to dismiss the overhyped tourist places. Most of them think Queensland is overrated as well. Well the Great Ocean Road certainly won't be a highlight of this trip or even of this 6 day roadtrip. Its nice. Its pleasant. Its not that special. We pushed on up to the Grampians and the mountains at the southern end of the park are really beautiful. What a start. We drove North up to Halls Gap and had a good feeling for the park.
We would stay two days at Halls Gap to visit the Grampians. Its a really nice natonal park. We stayed at Tims Place which is a really nice place and the owner is a nice guy. He was learning French so we chatted together for a while and he told us what to do to make the most of our time there. We did the pinnacles walk via the grand canyon that took us just over 2 hours (rather than four). The first part to Cleopatras Pool is not bad and quite pretty, but the highlight is definitely the walk up through grand canyon and silent street. Really beautiful rock formations and reminded me a little of Slovensky Raj in Slovakia. The view from the top is nice as well, but the climb was more unique. We thought it would be Blue Mountains light and although it is similar, it is also different. More jagged and on a smaller scale than the blue mountains. Lacks the epic feel. After that we drove across the tourist pass to see the lookouts (they are nice) and past the damaged areas from the forest fires. The waterfall looks stunning, but you can't visit it anymore because of the fires. Shame. You can't even stop along the side of the road (I don't know why) and I think we should have done it anyway. Just be aware that the waterfall access is closed. Not sure when they will open it up again. Finally we went to the aboriginal museum, which is informative and well worth stopping in.
On the drive back we decided to visit Ballarat to break up the journey. Its a nice mining town with some cool architecture but its also bitterly cold. We also had to print off our flight tickets and print and sign documents for the taxman as we hadn't done them on the road trip. It would turn out these forms had some errors and we would have to print off new ones in Launceston and do the process all over again. Neverending lol. We were now shitting ourselves about dropping off the damaged car. We ended up dropping off the car early at 2.30pm and looked nonchalant as we dropped off the bags and left him to do the inspection. We had also had a stone flip up and chip the windshield on the way to Ballarat so that was further damage we had to worry about. Luckily the old guy who rented it to us wasn't there and just his moron assistant. He said nothing and gave us our receipt. Great. We escaped out as quickly as we could, but we weren't sure if they could still take the money later, so we spent the afternoon futilely looking for a way to transfer all of Cannelle's money to my account so they wouldn't be able to take it. We were still stressed, but failed miserably in every effort. Cannelle then got a missed call and we were sure it was them so we panicked even more. Eventually she listened to it and it turned out not to be them. We resolved not to stress anymore and just relax a bit. We would wait and see what happened with the $200 deposit. Maybe they would just take that when they found out. We figured the longer it went on the less time they would have for recourse as they wouldn't be able to prove it was us that did the damage. Oh well. We went out in Melbourne and the next day we caught a plane to Tasmania. I was really excited for this part of the trip and we had hired a car with a different company just in case. The flight was really short as it was only 49 minutes in the air. You are up for a bit and then next minute you are coming in to land again. Tasmania at last.
Australia Part 1 (Melbourne and Wilsons Promontory) Brief Sydney highlights
Well I finally cleared immigration and we were back in Australia. Time to travel the country. I was excited to be in Melbourne as we had originally planned to spend 6 months here and 6 months in Sydney before we decided to end our Australian experience after 7 months. Yet first we had a lot of shit to do. I had locked my bank account when in New Zealand and couldn't unlock it because you need to know the exact amount you used on a transaction. This would be hard because we were in New Zealand. My last transaction was to withdraw money in New Zealand dollars. Without my online banking, which I couldn't access, how the hell was I supposed to know how much that works out in Australian dollars. Even the woman on the phone was sympathetic. So I went to NAB in St Kilda and unlocked it. Following that I had to go and post my application for a new passport to the UK as I would need it in time for when we got to Perth in order to leave. Only this has not arrived in the UK yet 2 weeks later and I am getting a little stressed about it. Will have to call them tonight to try and chase this up as I could be trapped here if it doesn't get processed. More hassle to deal with. Cannelle had to go and scan her French driving license as we needed someone to do a translation in order to rent a car in Australia. Oh the joys. The never ending admin trail of travelling. We also had to speak to the French embassy about getting a new passport, which they couldn't do there and it was not even certain if they would be able to do one. Useless morons. Will see later on. Finally we had to go and see the tax office about getting our tax back, where a rude cocksucker of a man told us that even if we counted as residents according to the tax offices own system he thinks no backpackers are ever tax residents and effectively that we could go and fuck ourselves. Pleasant. He also said that the tax office wa starting to crack down on foreigners getting their tax back. This prompted us to look around for some agents who would get it back for us and so far we have been told that one tax claim was filed for for me for $2850 and for Cannelle for $3500. Lets hope we get this tax as it should come in 8-10 weeks. If I don't get my passport in time we may work in Perth for a bit as will have one month left on the visa and it will be a new tax year. We have been back and forth about Australia and what to do here as well. We decided early on that we would skip Queensland. Most Aussies seem to have a low opinion of it and it seems to be just about beaches and parties. The only areas that really interested us were the Whitsundays (which Babou had said were average and just beaches), the rainforests around Cairns (expensive to get to) and the Barrier Reef (which people had told us you need to use a 5 day liveaboard to get to the interesting parts). We wouldn't be able to get to Mungo either (too far) and probably couldn't afford the West coast. Would still leave us seeing most of the rest of the country. Should be good and enough.
Anyway back to Melbourne. We had high expectations coming to Melbourne. After all it was considered the great rival to Sydney. We have spent 4 nights there and alongside the admin shit we got to take a good look around. Its a lot less pretty than Sydney and doesn't seem to have much more nightlife to compensate, but I think this side of the World is sorely lacking in nightlife. It probably has a better arts scene though. The river running through the middle gives it an undeniably more European feel. St Kilda seems funky and the blue penguins (which we went to see twice) are super cute and we finally got to see them after missing them everywhere in New Zealand. The downtown has some pretty architecture along the river and around the university there are some funky buildings. The cafe street culture is seriously overplayed and bears a very limited resemblance to Europe, while the graffitti walls are similar to ones we had down in St Peters. I would even go so far to say that there doesn't seem to be a big difference between Melbourne and Sydney. Both much of a muchness. Sydney is prettier, has better weather and beaches, while Melbourne probably has a better cultural life. I would pick Sydney as I think its more Australian. Also Melbourne is full of pretentious people. We were there for a few days and especially around Fitzroy we met a lot of downright rude and pretentious people. From people blocking doorways, being super arrogant in claiming tables or bollocking their 8 year old kid for losing a race and making them watch it with running commentary as to why they are useless. Everyone seems super up their arse about cafes, food, coffee etc. We never experienced this once in Sydney in 7 months. I would say Sydney has a lot of superficial people (especially in the Northern and Eastern suburbs) but the pretentious people definitely live in Melbourne. We went to the art gallery and other than that we just wandered around. We are heading back there when we finish in Tasmania to spend a couple of days before heading upwards towards Alice Springs.
With Cannelle now happy to drive we picked up a car from the Eastern suburbs and drove it off to Wilsons Promontory. Its an easy enough 220km drive and gave Cannelle time to get used to driving again. I had been excited to come here for the wombats and the rest of the wildlife. Its definitely a ruggedly beautiful park. Just on the drive in we saw emus and kangaroos. People who say you can't see Australian wildlife in the wild have obviously never looked hard enough. The first night in the campsite we saw loads of wombats. They are so cute. We had come for them and there were so many and they were obviously used to people as they weren't bothered by us. We also saw some possums and a fox. We even saw the shadow of a possum creep past when we were in our tent. It was a bit cold camping there.
In the morning we did the climb up the near mountain which affords great views over the park. There are beautiful little beaches, some impressive sand dunes and lots of short walks around the park. In the morning while walking back from the beach we saw our first wallaby. It bounced right past us and then stayed for a while. I think wallabies are cuter than kangaroos. They are really beautiful with the slight reddish colour. We saw more emus, kangaroos and a wombat in the wild. It is a beautiful coastal park. They have a lot of great parks in Australia. Its a great place and absolutely essential if you want to see Australian wildlife and combine it with some great scenery. We saw wombats galore in the evening again and thoroughly enjoyed the time before driving back towards Melbourne the next day to cross it for the Great Ocean Road.
I promised a brief highlight of Sydney. We had a nice time there for 7 months. While the city lacks in culture and nightlife, the beaches of Manly, Bondi and Coogee are really nice. The Manly-Spit Junction and Bondi-Coogee walks are both great. Newtown, Glebe and Marrickville are probably the coolest neighbourhoods to hang out in. The coastal walk of Royal National Park is stunning. The landscape diversity is truly impressive and we saw and echidna there as well. The Blue Mountains are also really nice. Not as nice as Royal National Park but still worth a visit.
Anyway back to Melbourne. We had high expectations coming to Melbourne. After all it was considered the great rival to Sydney. We have spent 4 nights there and alongside the admin shit we got to take a good look around. Its a lot less pretty than Sydney and doesn't seem to have much more nightlife to compensate, but I think this side of the World is sorely lacking in nightlife. It probably has a better arts scene though. The river running through the middle gives it an undeniably more European feel. St Kilda seems funky and the blue penguins (which we went to see twice) are super cute and we finally got to see them after missing them everywhere in New Zealand. The downtown has some pretty architecture along the river and around the university there are some funky buildings. The cafe street culture is seriously overplayed and bears a very limited resemblance to Europe, while the graffitti walls are similar to ones we had down in St Peters. I would even go so far to say that there doesn't seem to be a big difference between Melbourne and Sydney. Both much of a muchness. Sydney is prettier, has better weather and beaches, while Melbourne probably has a better cultural life. I would pick Sydney as I think its more Australian. Also Melbourne is full of pretentious people. We were there for a few days and especially around Fitzroy we met a lot of downright rude and pretentious people. From people blocking doorways, being super arrogant in claiming tables or bollocking their 8 year old kid for losing a race and making them watch it with running commentary as to why they are useless. Everyone seems super up their arse about cafes, food, coffee etc. We never experienced this once in Sydney in 7 months. I would say Sydney has a lot of superficial people (especially in the Northern and Eastern suburbs) but the pretentious people definitely live in Melbourne. We went to the art gallery and other than that we just wandered around. We are heading back there when we finish in Tasmania to spend a couple of days before heading upwards towards Alice Springs.
With Cannelle now happy to drive we picked up a car from the Eastern suburbs and drove it off to Wilsons Promontory. Its an easy enough 220km drive and gave Cannelle time to get used to driving again. I had been excited to come here for the wombats and the rest of the wildlife. Its definitely a ruggedly beautiful park. Just on the drive in we saw emus and kangaroos. People who say you can't see Australian wildlife in the wild have obviously never looked hard enough. The first night in the campsite we saw loads of wombats. They are so cute. We had come for them and there were so many and they were obviously used to people as they weren't bothered by us. We also saw some possums and a fox. We even saw the shadow of a possum creep past when we were in our tent. It was a bit cold camping there.
In the morning we did the climb up the near mountain which affords great views over the park. There are beautiful little beaches, some impressive sand dunes and lots of short walks around the park. In the morning while walking back from the beach we saw our first wallaby. It bounced right past us and then stayed for a while. I think wallabies are cuter than kangaroos. They are really beautiful with the slight reddish colour. We saw more emus, kangaroos and a wombat in the wild. It is a beautiful coastal park. They have a lot of great parks in Australia. Its a great place and absolutely essential if you want to see Australian wildlife and combine it with some great scenery. We saw wombats galore in the evening again and thoroughly enjoyed the time before driving back towards Melbourne the next day to cross it for the Great Ocean Road.
I promised a brief highlight of Sydney. We had a nice time there for 7 months. While the city lacks in culture and nightlife, the beaches of Manly, Bondi and Coogee are really nice. The Manly-Spit Junction and Bondi-Coogee walks are both great. Newtown, Glebe and Marrickville are probably the coolest neighbourhoods to hang out in. The coastal walk of Royal National Park is stunning. The landscape diversity is truly impressive and we saw and echidna there as well. The Blue Mountains are also really nice. Not as nice as Royal National Park but still worth a visit.
Tuesday, May 6, 2014
New Zealand Part 8 (Auckland)
This will be a bit of a weird review as it can be partially about Auckland and partially about the passport problems. As most people won't be too interested in the passport problems I will give a summary of Auckland and what we did there even if its intrinsically linked.
Our first port of call was the airport where I was told by the supervisor that he wouldn't let me fly with my green faced passport. He said others might let me, but he wouldn't. Unless I could get a letter from the Australian consulate saying it was ok. Next stop UK consulate. Bear in mind they had just moved the passport making abilities from the Wellington consulate in January so that everyone has to send them to the UK. Dammit. UK consulate said they thought it would be ok to travel but they understood my problems and that I could do an emergency passport to go to Australia if I wanted one. I had to check if they accept them. Off to the Australian consulate. Only some armed guards intercepted us and sent us to a visa place instead. They said that (after 24 hours) that I should be fine to enter but they couldn't write me a letter. Well that was as good as useless. Though the confirmed Australia will accept an emergency passport but I needed 5 working days to link up my working holiday visa. I didn't have that so I had to e-mail Tasmania who never got back to me on time. So I was sweating on if I could get into Oz. I also wanted to post my passport to the Darwin consulate but they didn't exist anymore so I would have to send it to a friend and would now need to go to Perth. To do that we needed a train. The Australian trains said you can't take a train pass without a foreign passport. Eventually they confirmed the emergency passport was fine. Thank God. Ok now I would have to justify not being able to pick up my passport and I needed a countersignatory. I didn't have anyone in Melbourne so Cisco would have to act as my countersignatory and sign the paperwork in Auckland to post it in Melbourne. I was stressed all the way up to the flight but ended up getting to Australia without any problems. Both New Zealand and Australia customs wondered why I got a new one when they can see my face. Ask Virgin Australia. Long story short, it seems you can fly with a partial green face but that its at the airlines discretion and you would be taking a risk. I am in Oz now and have posted the application. One week later and it still hasn't reached Liverpool. Fuck sake. The stress just continues. Still have my passport warning from the UK government as well about losing and damaging too many but this one was not my fault.
So now I had to sort out the emergency passport and this meant we were tied down to Auckland. Nothing was exciting me too much about the rest of New Zealand and Joe kept saying everything was underwhelming so we decided to stay put. Auckland is kind of like a mini Sydney with shitter weather. We kind of just bummed around and enjoyed being in an urban setting. We went to the Easter weekend fair, which was ok and did the coast to coast walk. That's really nice, especially Eden Park which is probably better than One Tree Hill. Its definitely something to do if you are in town. We went to the media centre and watched Once Were Warriors as well. Its a cool place to watch Kiwi films for free. The weather was still toilet. We went to see the Lego Movie, which was weird and funny in parts. That damn song is addictive. The sushi in this city is really good and I like the pick and mix options. We went to some couchsurfing drinks and met an English couple and a German girl called Alex. We hung out with them in cafes and went for drinks while in the city. We also caught up with Joe when he came through and also with Laura (who we had missed in Wanaka and was in town). I don't actually know what we did with 2 weeks there. Not much seemingly. Lastly we caught up with Cisco, who I hadn't seen for ages and he signed the paperwork for us while taking us to a great vegetarian Indian restaurant in the summer. Cannelle also took a driving lesson and realised it was not too bad. More on car problems next time. We have scratched up the car and hoping that they won't notice tomorrow and charge us any damages on the rental car. Yet more stress and given our bad luck recently I don't hold out much hope. We were beginning to figure that some force of fate was trying to prevent us from taking our flight to Oz. This was reinforced when we got to the airport. What are the words you don't want to hear when you are afraid of flying. "There is going to be a 20 minute delay because one of the engineers has found a fault with the plane". What the fuck? A fault with the plane? Even if that is true why would you say it. Lie dammit. I spent the next 4 hours of flying time wondering what the fault was. Maybe it was aerodynamics as we had a lot of turbulence and the landing was downright weird as if it was undercooked and then revving the engine to get over the line. Needless to say we were happy to touch down in Melbourne and the first day would involve a lot of bollocks that we needed to take care of. Onwards to Oz. Its a shame the last 3 weeks in New Zealand had been fairly average because we had really liked the first 5 weeks. Tom was definitely right. The South Island is much better than the North Island. Only really need to see Tongariro and Rotorua in the North.
Our first port of call was the airport where I was told by the supervisor that he wouldn't let me fly with my green faced passport. He said others might let me, but he wouldn't. Unless I could get a letter from the Australian consulate saying it was ok. Next stop UK consulate. Bear in mind they had just moved the passport making abilities from the Wellington consulate in January so that everyone has to send them to the UK. Dammit. UK consulate said they thought it would be ok to travel but they understood my problems and that I could do an emergency passport to go to Australia if I wanted one. I had to check if they accept them. Off to the Australian consulate. Only some armed guards intercepted us and sent us to a visa place instead. They said that (after 24 hours) that I should be fine to enter but they couldn't write me a letter. Well that was as good as useless. Though the confirmed Australia will accept an emergency passport but I needed 5 working days to link up my working holiday visa. I didn't have that so I had to e-mail Tasmania who never got back to me on time. So I was sweating on if I could get into Oz. I also wanted to post my passport to the Darwin consulate but they didn't exist anymore so I would have to send it to a friend and would now need to go to Perth. To do that we needed a train. The Australian trains said you can't take a train pass without a foreign passport. Eventually they confirmed the emergency passport was fine. Thank God. Ok now I would have to justify not being able to pick up my passport and I needed a countersignatory. I didn't have anyone in Melbourne so Cisco would have to act as my countersignatory and sign the paperwork in Auckland to post it in Melbourne. I was stressed all the way up to the flight but ended up getting to Australia without any problems. Both New Zealand and Australia customs wondered why I got a new one when they can see my face. Ask Virgin Australia. Long story short, it seems you can fly with a partial green face but that its at the airlines discretion and you would be taking a risk. I am in Oz now and have posted the application. One week later and it still hasn't reached Liverpool. Fuck sake. The stress just continues. Still have my passport warning from the UK government as well about losing and damaging too many but this one was not my fault.
So now I had to sort out the emergency passport and this meant we were tied down to Auckland. Nothing was exciting me too much about the rest of New Zealand and Joe kept saying everything was underwhelming so we decided to stay put. Auckland is kind of like a mini Sydney with shitter weather. We kind of just bummed around and enjoyed being in an urban setting. We went to the Easter weekend fair, which was ok and did the coast to coast walk. That's really nice, especially Eden Park which is probably better than One Tree Hill. Its definitely something to do if you are in town. We went to the media centre and watched Once Were Warriors as well. Its a cool place to watch Kiwi films for free. The weather was still toilet. We went to see the Lego Movie, which was weird and funny in parts. That damn song is addictive. The sushi in this city is really good and I like the pick and mix options. We went to some couchsurfing drinks and met an English couple and a German girl called Alex. We hung out with them in cafes and went for drinks while in the city. We also caught up with Joe when he came through and also with Laura (who we had missed in Wanaka and was in town). I don't actually know what we did with 2 weeks there. Not much seemingly. Lastly we caught up with Cisco, who I hadn't seen for ages and he signed the paperwork for us while taking us to a great vegetarian Indian restaurant in the summer. Cannelle also took a driving lesson and realised it was not too bad. More on car problems next time. We have scratched up the car and hoping that they won't notice tomorrow and charge us any damages on the rental car. Yet more stress and given our bad luck recently I don't hold out much hope. We were beginning to figure that some force of fate was trying to prevent us from taking our flight to Oz. This was reinforced when we got to the airport. What are the words you don't want to hear when you are afraid of flying. "There is going to be a 20 minute delay because one of the engineers has found a fault with the plane". What the fuck? A fault with the plane? Even if that is true why would you say it. Lie dammit. I spent the next 4 hours of flying time wondering what the fault was. Maybe it was aerodynamics as we had a lot of turbulence and the landing was downright weird as if it was undercooked and then revving the engine to get over the line. Needless to say we were happy to touch down in Melbourne and the first day would involve a lot of bollocks that we needed to take care of. Onwards to Oz. Its a shame the last 3 weeks in New Zealand had been fairly average because we had really liked the first 5 weeks. Tom was definitely right. The South Island is much better than the North Island. Only really need to see Tongariro and Rotorua in the North.
New Zealand Part 7 (Rotorua, Taupo and Tongariro Alpine Crossing)
Too much time and too many disasters since I last wrote. At least that keeps it entertaining lol. This was where our previous good luck started to turn to shit. The bad weather continued to dog us on the North island and I think it rained virtually every day we were there for 3 weeks. Oh well. More on that later. We arrived in Rotorua and booked in for 3 nights as we still had a lot of time on our hands. We wanted to go cycling in the redwoods and to visit stuff, but as it was still caining down we decided to just visit the thermal parks in the city and the small Maori village they have there. Both of these are free and really nice. It was a pleasant way to spend the afternoon and an enjoyable start to the place. The guy in the hostel wanted to upgrade us to a 4 bed dorm, but that we pay the difference. We said no it was ok and then he charged us for it anyway. I had to correct him and in the end Cannelle ended up in the four bed dorm. It was obvious they had made a fuck up and now wanted us to pay for the difference. Nice try. Oh well. Other than that the hostel was nice. Everything in Rotorua is very expensive so you kind of have to pick what to do. Everyone had told us that Hobbiton was a total waste of money, but only Cannelle had wanted to go in the first place. The rafting looked cool, but expensive given the bad weather. Kind of wish I had done that now. The only good weather was for the sunday so we decided to go and see Wai-O-Tapu that day and just chill on the saturday.
The hostel was a little bit of a party hostel and every morning you could find a used condom in the bathroom so somebody was having fun lol. Saturday came and we were bored so we decided to take what is now an ill fated walk to the Redwoods forest. For some unknown reason I brought my passport along with me and Cannelle had the camera but without a case. You can guess what happened next. Yep. We got hammered by a storm on our way to the Redwoods and had to abandon the walk halfway. Didn't even see them. When we got back the camera lens was jammed and it just whirred, said error and died. Shit. Then I looked at my passport. Just a little water damage, but some green ink had leaked and now one quarter of my face was green. Shit. Oh well maybe it will be gone by the morning. The priority at the time was the camera. We went out and bought a new one for about $250. Hopefully its an upgrade. We would test it the next day.
In the morning I had a look at my passport and my face was still green. After a bit of research it looked like this may be a problem for travelling. Hmm. Ok we would do the Tongariro as we were close and then go and see the airline in Auckland to check as we may need to get cracking on a new passport in the worst case scenario. Damn it. Not a passport problem again. They haunt me everywhere. We went to Wai-O-Tapu and what a beautiful place it is. Its well worth the money. Beautiful colours and just a stunning place. One of my students had been to 5 of them and said this was the best. Its really cool. Probably easily the highlight of the North island for us. You have the little terraces, the champagne pool and such an amazing range of colours that people mostly thought we had been editing our photos on photoshop. That is even with the shitty camera we had. We really didn't like the new camera and seemed to be paying money for an inferior new camera. That was depressing so we went back to the shop and swapped it for a $300 sony camera. That's what we have now and it was a great decision as for just $50 extra we got a significant upgrade on our old camera. Had a much better zoom, is equal on colours and can shoot in lowlight, which were the two weaknesses of our old camera. I was starting to panic a little regarding the passport now, but we were off to Taupo the next day. Have to wait and see.
We got to Taupo, which is not very impressive. Its just a large lake. I have no idea why it is so famous except for the fact that its a lake and its big. We booked transport for the Tongariro Alpine Crossing the next day as we had wanted to do the full Northern Circuit, but there was no point with this crappy weather. Then we walked to Huka Falls, which is really beautiful and well worth the walk. The water colour is really pretty and the new camera got a good workout. We then walked all the way to a hot springs and decided not to go in as it was too expensive. Having walked back to town we went to bed early as we had to get up at 5.30am for the Tongariro Crossing.
We got up at 5am and went out to wait for the bus. We were with a German guy and a girl from Hong Kong. 5.30am came and went. Oh well we will be picked up after. 5.45am. Ok its a little late. 6am. Ok now I am worried. I went and called the girl working. Where was the bus? She came back sheepishly 5 minutes later and said
"I'm really sorry, I forgot to phone it through". What? "Can the bus come back?" "No". What?
She offered us a free night of accommodation but that was no good as we all had to leave the next day and I had the passport to sort out. Then we had a little conversation like this.
"Well can't you find someone to drive us to the start?"
"Erm, no I can't drive"
"Then whose truck is that out the front?"
"The owners"
"Well can't you phone him to see if he can drive us?"
"I would prefer to pay for a taxi to get you there"
"Ok well you will have to as its not good enough otherwise"
Apparently I forced her to book the taxi and Cannelle reckoned that noone else would have pushed it for her to sort us out with a ride. The taxi cost $300 one way to the start of the route. It was definitely the most expensive taxi ride that I have ever taken. I think she paid with her own money as well but I am not sure. When we got in the taxi, the taxi driver asked if we knew how much it was going to cost. I said yeah $300 but its not our money. He said that he was super lucky. Yeah. One hours work for $300. Nice work if you can get it. Anyway we got the taxi ride out there and we only started the trek about 30 minutes after everyone else and we would catch and overtake almost all of them on the trail. Now I had been super pumped for this walk as it looked stunning and I had really high expectations for it along with the Routeburn. The Routeburn did not disappoint. How would this walk be?
Well we never really found out. We had a mist with us for the whole walk. That meant we never had more than 50-100m visibility although this moved with us. Until we hit the top. Then it dropped to 20-50m and we could barely see anything. You could see the volcanic landscape and it looked nice, but to see how bad it was I can tell you that we couldn't even see Mt Doom. This is a mountain that sticks up 500m above us, just off the route and we couldn't see it. We couldn't see the red crater very well either. We saw some of the turquoise lakes and they are stunning. At least we got something. The wind and rain whipping us around the top was unpleasant and I began to suffer from mild hypothermia. This was not pleasant at all. Everyone was moving super fast. We walked alongside the blue lake and couldn't even see it was blue. The mist was down as a wall. Shitty. It was the German guys first hiking experience, but I told him not to worry as this was the worst hike for conditions that I had ever done. We wouldn't have done it that day if it wasn't for the fact that the weather forecast for the next two weeks was equally shitty and we had the pressing issue of the passport to deal with. We got to the final shelter and holed up for 2 hours to avoid the rain, though we couldn't avoid the cold. It was freezing. Horrendous. We had to hole up there as we were far too early for the buses. When we finished we shot down to the carpark and had done the whole crossing in around 4 hours. Shit weather gives you wings. The bus driver told us we didn't have to pay because the hostel had fucked up. At least that was a bonus. We had paid just the deposit of $5 for a taxi ride and a bus back to Taupo. Made up a bit for the shitty conditions, but what a shame. We didn't see much, the weather was awful, I froze to death and I would still say it was worth it. Now imagine how good the walk would be if you had great weather. So many people said it was the highlight for them. I would imagine its an awesome walk and maybe one day I will get the chance to do it again. Go and do it. Just wait for good weather as it takes away about 80% of the appeal. Now it was time to head to Auckland and see what would happen with my green face. Cannelle thought it would be fine to fly. I was not so sure, but hopeful. We had thought about leaving for Australia early as New Zealand was boring us on the North island but of course it was Easter and the flights were astronomically expensive. At least I had read that I could maybe get an emergency passport to get to Australia and apply for a new one there. This was not certain but at least if the airline said no, we wouldn't be stuck there. Lets see.
The hostel was a little bit of a party hostel and every morning you could find a used condom in the bathroom so somebody was having fun lol. Saturday came and we were bored so we decided to take what is now an ill fated walk to the Redwoods forest. For some unknown reason I brought my passport along with me and Cannelle had the camera but without a case. You can guess what happened next. Yep. We got hammered by a storm on our way to the Redwoods and had to abandon the walk halfway. Didn't even see them. When we got back the camera lens was jammed and it just whirred, said error and died. Shit. Then I looked at my passport. Just a little water damage, but some green ink had leaked and now one quarter of my face was green. Shit. Oh well maybe it will be gone by the morning. The priority at the time was the camera. We went out and bought a new one for about $250. Hopefully its an upgrade. We would test it the next day.
In the morning I had a look at my passport and my face was still green. After a bit of research it looked like this may be a problem for travelling. Hmm. Ok we would do the Tongariro as we were close and then go and see the airline in Auckland to check as we may need to get cracking on a new passport in the worst case scenario. Damn it. Not a passport problem again. They haunt me everywhere. We went to Wai-O-Tapu and what a beautiful place it is. Its well worth the money. Beautiful colours and just a stunning place. One of my students had been to 5 of them and said this was the best. Its really cool. Probably easily the highlight of the North island for us. You have the little terraces, the champagne pool and such an amazing range of colours that people mostly thought we had been editing our photos on photoshop. That is even with the shitty camera we had. We really didn't like the new camera and seemed to be paying money for an inferior new camera. That was depressing so we went back to the shop and swapped it for a $300 sony camera. That's what we have now and it was a great decision as for just $50 extra we got a significant upgrade on our old camera. Had a much better zoom, is equal on colours and can shoot in lowlight, which were the two weaknesses of our old camera. I was starting to panic a little regarding the passport now, but we were off to Taupo the next day. Have to wait and see.
We got to Taupo, which is not very impressive. Its just a large lake. I have no idea why it is so famous except for the fact that its a lake and its big. We booked transport for the Tongariro Alpine Crossing the next day as we had wanted to do the full Northern Circuit, but there was no point with this crappy weather. Then we walked to Huka Falls, which is really beautiful and well worth the walk. The water colour is really pretty and the new camera got a good workout. We then walked all the way to a hot springs and decided not to go in as it was too expensive. Having walked back to town we went to bed early as we had to get up at 5.30am for the Tongariro Crossing.
We got up at 5am and went out to wait for the bus. We were with a German guy and a girl from Hong Kong. 5.30am came and went. Oh well we will be picked up after. 5.45am. Ok its a little late. 6am. Ok now I am worried. I went and called the girl working. Where was the bus? She came back sheepishly 5 minutes later and said
"I'm really sorry, I forgot to phone it through". What? "Can the bus come back?" "No". What?
She offered us a free night of accommodation but that was no good as we all had to leave the next day and I had the passport to sort out. Then we had a little conversation like this.
"Well can't you find someone to drive us to the start?"
"Erm, no I can't drive"
"Then whose truck is that out the front?"
"The owners"
"Well can't you phone him to see if he can drive us?"
"I would prefer to pay for a taxi to get you there"
"Ok well you will have to as its not good enough otherwise"
Apparently I forced her to book the taxi and Cannelle reckoned that noone else would have pushed it for her to sort us out with a ride. The taxi cost $300 one way to the start of the route. It was definitely the most expensive taxi ride that I have ever taken. I think she paid with her own money as well but I am not sure. When we got in the taxi, the taxi driver asked if we knew how much it was going to cost. I said yeah $300 but its not our money. He said that he was super lucky. Yeah. One hours work for $300. Nice work if you can get it. Anyway we got the taxi ride out there and we only started the trek about 30 minutes after everyone else and we would catch and overtake almost all of them on the trail. Now I had been super pumped for this walk as it looked stunning and I had really high expectations for it along with the Routeburn. The Routeburn did not disappoint. How would this walk be?
Well we never really found out. We had a mist with us for the whole walk. That meant we never had more than 50-100m visibility although this moved with us. Until we hit the top. Then it dropped to 20-50m and we could barely see anything. You could see the volcanic landscape and it looked nice, but to see how bad it was I can tell you that we couldn't even see Mt Doom. This is a mountain that sticks up 500m above us, just off the route and we couldn't see it. We couldn't see the red crater very well either. We saw some of the turquoise lakes and they are stunning. At least we got something. The wind and rain whipping us around the top was unpleasant and I began to suffer from mild hypothermia. This was not pleasant at all. Everyone was moving super fast. We walked alongside the blue lake and couldn't even see it was blue. The mist was down as a wall. Shitty. It was the German guys first hiking experience, but I told him not to worry as this was the worst hike for conditions that I had ever done. We wouldn't have done it that day if it wasn't for the fact that the weather forecast for the next two weeks was equally shitty and we had the pressing issue of the passport to deal with. We got to the final shelter and holed up for 2 hours to avoid the rain, though we couldn't avoid the cold. It was freezing. Horrendous. We had to hole up there as we were far too early for the buses. When we finished we shot down to the carpark and had done the whole crossing in around 4 hours. Shit weather gives you wings. The bus driver told us we didn't have to pay because the hostel had fucked up. At least that was a bonus. We had paid just the deposit of $5 for a taxi ride and a bus back to Taupo. Made up a bit for the shitty conditions, but what a shame. We didn't see much, the weather was awful, I froze to death and I would still say it was worth it. Now imagine how good the walk would be if you had great weather. So many people said it was the highlight for them. I would imagine its an awesome walk and maybe one day I will get the chance to do it again. Go and do it. Just wait for good weather as it takes away about 80% of the appeal. Now it was time to head to Auckland and see what would happen with my green face. Cannelle thought it would be fine to fly. I was not so sure, but hopeful. We had thought about leaving for Australia early as New Zealand was boring us on the North island but of course it was Easter and the flights were astronomically expensive. At least I had read that I could maybe get an emergency passport to get to Australia and apply for a new one there. This was not certain but at least if the airline said no, we wouldn't be stuck there. Lets see.
New Zealand Part 6 (Interislander, Wellington and Napier)
In the morning we took the bus to Picton to take the interislander. We
had been told that the crossing was extremely rough, but we got lucky
and sea like glass for our voyage. It probably helps that the 2pm
crossing is the biggest boat they have and dwarfs the others so it
doesn't suffer from rocking too much. The trip through the Marlborough
Sounds was nice, but nothing spectacular. I am very glad we didn't stay
in Picton as there is no need. When we got close to the open sea we
went below deck as the wind was whipping through the top deck. That was
a real big mistake. Halfway across the crossing the captain said orcas
were off the port side (Very helpful. Is port right or left. I had
no idea). Anyway when we ran up the stairs they had already
disappeared. Fuck sake. One of the two animals I most wanted to see
and we had missed them for an ice cream. That ice cream is right up
there with the damn hot chocolate that caused me to miss the explosion
of Old Faithful geyser in Yellowstone. Damn it. Orcas. Damn it.
After an uneventful journey we rocked up in Wellington. Ooh. Traffic.
A real city. The walk in from the port doesn't fill you with awe as
its shitty out there, but the downtown is nice. That night we went to
see Captain America:Winter Soldier which is a solid blockbuster.
In the morning we met up with my friend Andy after a brief stint in Te Papa. Was the first time I had seen him since just before this blog started way back with my US trip. Full circle. He had been living in Wellington for nearly 6 years now. Time flies. He took us around the port area which is really cute at the weekend. It looks a little forlorn and dead in the week when the rain comes. Wellington really is two different cities depending on the weather. We climbed the hill to see the town and the views up there are really nice. He then walked us through Cuba Street, down to Parliament and a loop back down the harbour. Was cool to catch up and really enjoyed the walking tour of the highlights of the city. In the evening we went to see The Raid 2, which is a good film, even if its not as tight and thrilling as the first one. We were enjoying being able to kick back. We bumped into the English girl from Queenstown and she was there to work. In our room there was an Argentinean guy and he was working in sales there. Still seems like a shitty deal if you are on a working holiday visa here.
In the morning the weather was shitty so we went back to Te Papa to finish it off. Its a truly remarkable museum. Well worth a visit. Went on the earthquake simulator, saw the giant squid, played a few of the games (lifting rocks, sailing boats, seeing what animals to take when you colonise a new planet etc). Its a cool interactive museum and can suck up your time. We spent a total of around 5 hours in there. The only downside was having to do a stupid exit survey for a robotic woman at the end. Seriously she had no human emotions whatsoever. Then we walked over to Parliament and Andy sent us a text to invite us over for dinner to his place. We took the ridiculously expensive local bus ($5 one way) to his place and had a look around. Its a nice place. They were cooking us spaghetti bolognaise when Andy said he had forgotten one small ingredient. We asked him what it was and he said the pasta. Small ingredient indeed lol. He ran down the hill to get some and we had dinner. Was really nice. We met his wife Marpesa and chatted about everything and nothing. Was a really nice evening. Has been good to catch up with friends on this trip.
The next day it was still shitty so we went to the Museum of the City and Sea. Its not bad, but its nowhere near as interesting as Te Papa. We did nothing with the rest of the day and just chilled in the hostel. In the evening was when we got chatting with Varun about the outback roadtrip and organised the whole thing. Its all now sorted and fixed.
The next day was our last day and we went to meet Andy for a hot chocolate and scone near his work. Following that we went to see Nymphomaniac at the cinema. Its a really complex and interesting film. The story is interesting, but the real time conversation is cheesy and thinks it is cleverer than it is. Its a real mixed back of a film and definitely worth seeing. I don't see how it can be seen as controversial though. Its quite funny and some parts are really good, while others are quite trite. In the evening we just chilled again. Its going to be a long time of shitty weather.
After 5 days of chilling in Wellington we finally set off to take the bus to Napier. We had heard it was art deco and Gaudi esque. Well its art deco. The bus ride was really long and we bumped into the German guy who had been in our hostel in Christchurch. There was a fuck up in Palmerston North and one bus drove off without passengers, so we had to chase it to Bulls to drop off passengers. We ended up being 1.5 hours late but it didn't matter as there is not much to see in Napier. Its nice. Nothing more. Some of the architecture is cute, but I wouldn't go out of my way to see it. We did the walk up the cliff and were rewarded with a nice view out over the port. Was insightful to watch the ships being loaded and unloaded. We only had half a day and it proved sufficient for what we needed to do. North island was not blowing me away so far, though now it was onwards to Rotorua where I am sitting and it seems more interesting here, even if the rain is continuing to hammer down.
In the morning we met up with my friend Andy after a brief stint in Te Papa. Was the first time I had seen him since just before this blog started way back with my US trip. Full circle. He had been living in Wellington for nearly 6 years now. Time flies. He took us around the port area which is really cute at the weekend. It looks a little forlorn and dead in the week when the rain comes. Wellington really is two different cities depending on the weather. We climbed the hill to see the town and the views up there are really nice. He then walked us through Cuba Street, down to Parliament and a loop back down the harbour. Was cool to catch up and really enjoyed the walking tour of the highlights of the city. In the evening we went to see The Raid 2, which is a good film, even if its not as tight and thrilling as the first one. We were enjoying being able to kick back. We bumped into the English girl from Queenstown and she was there to work. In our room there was an Argentinean guy and he was working in sales there. Still seems like a shitty deal if you are on a working holiday visa here.
In the morning the weather was shitty so we went back to Te Papa to finish it off. Its a truly remarkable museum. Well worth a visit. Went on the earthquake simulator, saw the giant squid, played a few of the games (lifting rocks, sailing boats, seeing what animals to take when you colonise a new planet etc). Its a cool interactive museum and can suck up your time. We spent a total of around 5 hours in there. The only downside was having to do a stupid exit survey for a robotic woman at the end. Seriously she had no human emotions whatsoever. Then we walked over to Parliament and Andy sent us a text to invite us over for dinner to his place. We took the ridiculously expensive local bus ($5 one way) to his place and had a look around. Its a nice place. They were cooking us spaghetti bolognaise when Andy said he had forgotten one small ingredient. We asked him what it was and he said the pasta. Small ingredient indeed lol. He ran down the hill to get some and we had dinner. Was really nice. We met his wife Marpesa and chatted about everything and nothing. Was a really nice evening. Has been good to catch up with friends on this trip.
The next day it was still shitty so we went to the Museum of the City and Sea. Its not bad, but its nowhere near as interesting as Te Papa. We did nothing with the rest of the day and just chilled in the hostel. In the evening was when we got chatting with Varun about the outback roadtrip and organised the whole thing. Its all now sorted and fixed.
The next day was our last day and we went to meet Andy for a hot chocolate and scone near his work. Following that we went to see Nymphomaniac at the cinema. Its a really complex and interesting film. The story is interesting, but the real time conversation is cheesy and thinks it is cleverer than it is. Its a real mixed back of a film and definitely worth seeing. I don't see how it can be seen as controversial though. Its quite funny and some parts are really good, while others are quite trite. In the evening we just chilled again. Its going to be a long time of shitty weather.
After 5 days of chilling in Wellington we finally set off to take the bus to Napier. We had heard it was art deco and Gaudi esque. Well its art deco. The bus ride was really long and we bumped into the German guy who had been in our hostel in Christchurch. There was a fuck up in Palmerston North and one bus drove off without passengers, so we had to chase it to Bulls to drop off passengers. We ended up being 1.5 hours late but it didn't matter as there is not much to see in Napier. Its nice. Nothing more. Some of the architecture is cute, but I wouldn't go out of my way to see it. We did the walk up the cliff and were rewarded with a nice view out over the port. Was insightful to watch the ships being loaded and unloaded. We only had half a day and it proved sufficient for what we needed to do. North island was not blowing me away so far, though now it was onwards to Rotorua where I am sitting and it seems more interesting here, even if the rain is continuing to hammer down.
New Zealand Part 5 (Nelson, Nelson Lakes National Park, Motueka, Abel Tasman National Park and Kaikoura)
Cannelle has said that I forget to mention the little small things that
make the trip funny on this blog. Maybe. Resolved to keep a small
diary again as I have been writing this from my memory as I have been
travelling and so sometimes I forget the small things. After all its
the small things in life that apparently make it worth living. Been
looking at that with regards to Australia. Just planned out a 3 week
road trip round the outback, Kimberley, NT and South Australia. Should
be fucking awesome. Queensland on the other hand looks overrated and
just having seen the photos from Cannelle's sister from the Whitsundays
it looks nice but maybe not even on par with the Philippines and when I
am not a beach man why the hell would I head up there for the price it
is going to cost us. Talk about burning through money. Anyway I
digress.
Tom picked us up from the bus station in Nelson and took us for a drive and tour of Nelson. Looks like a pleasant city and apparently it has the sunniest weather in NZ, which given the fact that we are now in the middle of seemingly 2 weeks of non stop rain, it is very much appreciated in hindsight. We got lucky in the South Island for weather. We didn't get that extension on the North island. We went back to his place which is really impressive. His dad built it himself and its a really nice house. There we did some catching up, Tom cooked us a Chilean mixed grill style dish and we poured over maps of the Amazon as he was just about to head off on his latest Amazon trip. We kicked back with some beers and reminisced about the old times.
The next morning we set off for Nelson Lakes NP which was cool as I had wanted to go there. It was only an hours drive and then we set off to walk around the lake. We ended up taking the longer route that turned it into a good 30km round hike. Nice warm up for Abel Tasman. They have a lot of fresh water eels in the lake and it was cool to see them. The lake is a nice alpine lake and very pleasant. Not unmissable, but good for a nice day or two of hiking. We didn't meet many people on the loop and the end part down the valley was our first real off track hiking with just the orange markers to point us in the right direction. If you feel like getting out into some peaceful wilderness then I would recommend it. By the end Tom was a little knackered and Cannelle was feeling tired. The last 4km on the road we managed to grab a ride from an Israeli couple whose bed we climbed on to lie down while they drove us to a fish and chip shop. They had said they loved China (which made Cannelle feel good) and had said that Abel Tasman was nice, but after you've been to the Philippines then beaches elsewhere aren't very good. Its how I feel and a major reason why I can't be arsed to go to Queensland. How do you top the Philippines? You probably can't. We grabbed the car and drove back home and Tom was tired so he made me take the wheel while he drove. Weird as I haven't steered a car for ages. I still prefer a scooter. When we got back we watched Captain Phillips. It had no subtitles for the Somalis but neither did the version in the fish and chip shop in Kaikoura so maybe its not supposed to. It was good to catch up with Tom and a nice two days as he showed us the bike tracks he had built in his back garden and the cycling video he had been editing over the previous couple of months. His Spanish and Portuguese are really good now and I was a little jealous. I really need to improve mine and work on it.
In the morning he gave us one final spin around town and we got our shopping for the Abel Tasman hike. We took the bus to Motueka and walked ages to our hostel. Nice place. Not much to do here. We went out for some food and then chilled in the hostel. In the evening I went for a night time walk to find a pie and eating the pie while walking under the stars I realised that I was really, truly happy. Lucky life I have.
In the morning we grabbed our bus to the park entrance and took the aquataxi up to Totaranui. I had wanted to see split apple rock after the hike and head to separation point on the first day, but the aquataxi ride killed two birds with one stone. It stopped close to split apple rock to get some photos and then visited Tonga Island on the way north to see the seals. Oh well. Easier than I imagined. The aquataxi ride is cool, because you get to see the park from the water before hiking back. We thought this might ruin the experience but it really doesn't as its very different from the land. We were dropped in Totaranui around 1pm and the tidal crossing at Awaroa wasn't possible until at least 3pm so we were left to kick our heels as it was only 5.5km. We had decided against doing the rest of the northern part and an Austrian girl later told us that its the same but more rugged. The first day's walking was really boring apart from the rust coloured sand which was unique. We were apprehensive about the rest. When we got to Awaroa it was just after 3pm and we attempted the crossing. We got halfway before realising we were going to have to remove our boots and wade which came to around our knee. Apparently its impossible to get across without wading as it is still a river inside a tidal estuary. This was fun and we left our socks on so as not to get cut up on all the shells. Took us a good 20-30 minutes to get across. Once across we went on a hike to find the restaurant about 2km away but its very overpriced, was disappointing and let to an argument. The walk round there is quite nice though and leads past sand dunes, houses and crosses a couple of rivers. We got chatting with an American and an Austrian girl in the evening. There was a big group of Kiwis who monopolised the hut and were quite annoying. The ranger told us that this hut is completely cut off and landlocked during high tide. He told us that some people had even tried to cross it at 10pm at night having not read the notices. At high tide its 3m deep in the middle and they were freezing and wading in the middle of the tidal waters. Idiots. Some people never learn no matter what is written.
The next morning we set off early to make sure we would have no problems with the tide. We kept trying to anticipate where Daniel had taken the photo that is hanging on his lounge wall. Its very beautiful and we didn't want to miss it. Not long out of the camp we came cross the ranger and a friend of his behind a quad bike. Curious. They seemed a little embarrassed to see us. When I walked closer I could see a dead deer next to them. They had shot it because it was on national park land. They apologised to me, but I said not to worry as I would be a hypocrite given how much I like venison. They asked for some help lifting it, which was weird as I held the antlers and helped lift it onto the quad. Weird start. The first half of the day saw us walk to Bark Bay. Its a nice walk but we weren't blown away by much. Its around Bark Bay that it becomes very beautiful. We had also got lucky because the weather the day before had been cloudy and the day after was as well. This day was glorious however and it was the day where we would do the most beautiful part of the walk. The part from Bark Bay over to Anchorage is the prettiest part of the walk. We got the viewpoint we had been waiting for when we got close to Torrent Bay. We saw some little spiders and a lot of birds, including the wood pigeon. The tidal path was closed at Torrent Bay so we did the long 5km detour to get round to Anchorage. I took the side trip to Cleopatra's Pool (not worth it) and we eventually made it onto the beautiful beach of Anchorage. 27km of walking and it was a really nice part of the park. Cannelle loved it. I thought it was really nice. I would say that if you are pushed for time then you should just do the Awaroa to Anchorage part as the rest of the walk is pretty boring or average. That way you would see the best of the park. In the evening there was a very fat guy in our room and he snored so loudly that everyone else left the ranger hut to sleep outside. It wasn't that bad. In fact the German guy who left due to the snoring was snoring so much worse the night before. When we woke up it was just Cannelle and I, as the other two had left early. My sleeping bag was killing me. Being thermal it was far too hot for where we were.
In the morning we were up early and did the last 12km out of the park to Marahau. The fact that this took us just over 2 hours will show you how boring the last part of the walk was. Might as well take a water taxi out if you have the money. We were out early and got some hot food at last in the extortionate cafe next to the entrance. Then we got a ride back to Motueka and did nothing as we just finished off the hiking. One more great walk to go. Everyone had told us that Abel Tasman was the best. I disagree. Its a nice walk. Its on a par with the Kepler. The Routeburn is miles ahead of the other two from the two we have done.
In the morning we had to grab an early bus to Nelson (waiting for an hour) and another bus to Blenheim (2 hour wait). Blenheim looks like an ultra boring place. How on earth the Israelis can work there I don't know. I am still really happy that we took our working holiday visa in Australia and not New Zealand. Eventually we got to Kaikoura and the weather was a bit shitty with tons of mist. We decided to go and get some fish and chips from the apparently second best in NZ (more on that later) and then just chilled out in the hot tub of our hostel. We had decided after a lot of back and forth not to do a whale watching tour and just go to see the seals.
The next day we went to town for lunch and nothing was open so we went to the fish and chip shop next door to the other one. His was better and he told us that the other fish and chip shop had come second ina survey done by the kiwi explorer bus. Far be it for me to disparage reviews conducted by 18 year old morons from my country, but the fact that this survey only includes one fish and chip shop per town (hardly fair) and only the ones the bus visits, I think its hard to take it seriously. If you are in Kaikoura skip the surly bullshit from this self proclaimed great fish and chip shop and go next door for a nice chat with the owner of the other shop. We chatted with him for a couple of hours about the ridiculous monopolies on crayfish and whale watching in the town. He said how he wanted to open a burger bar and we ended up talking about making a crayfish sandwich for $15. I think its a winner and if you go to Kaikoura and see a shop selling $15 crayfish sandwiches then let me know, say hey to the owner and know we helped inspire it. He even told us about an Italian fishing ship that had strapped a jet engine onto itself to escape pirates. Interesting guy. After that we walked to the seal colony, but you can't really see any seals as they are too far out. Shame really. We saw a few basking close by and got surprised when one almost came out of a bush right next to us. Shit. Made me jump. It was still grey and misty. I am no sure it is worth visiting if you don't plan on seeing the whales but we had a nice couple of days there. Onwards to the north island.
Tom picked us up from the bus station in Nelson and took us for a drive and tour of Nelson. Looks like a pleasant city and apparently it has the sunniest weather in NZ, which given the fact that we are now in the middle of seemingly 2 weeks of non stop rain, it is very much appreciated in hindsight. We got lucky in the South Island for weather. We didn't get that extension on the North island. We went back to his place which is really impressive. His dad built it himself and its a really nice house. There we did some catching up, Tom cooked us a Chilean mixed grill style dish and we poured over maps of the Amazon as he was just about to head off on his latest Amazon trip. We kicked back with some beers and reminisced about the old times.
The next morning we set off for Nelson Lakes NP which was cool as I had wanted to go there. It was only an hours drive and then we set off to walk around the lake. We ended up taking the longer route that turned it into a good 30km round hike. Nice warm up for Abel Tasman. They have a lot of fresh water eels in the lake and it was cool to see them. The lake is a nice alpine lake and very pleasant. Not unmissable, but good for a nice day or two of hiking. We didn't meet many people on the loop and the end part down the valley was our first real off track hiking with just the orange markers to point us in the right direction. If you feel like getting out into some peaceful wilderness then I would recommend it. By the end Tom was a little knackered and Cannelle was feeling tired. The last 4km on the road we managed to grab a ride from an Israeli couple whose bed we climbed on to lie down while they drove us to a fish and chip shop. They had said they loved China (which made Cannelle feel good) and had said that Abel Tasman was nice, but after you've been to the Philippines then beaches elsewhere aren't very good. Its how I feel and a major reason why I can't be arsed to go to Queensland. How do you top the Philippines? You probably can't. We grabbed the car and drove back home and Tom was tired so he made me take the wheel while he drove. Weird as I haven't steered a car for ages. I still prefer a scooter. When we got back we watched Captain Phillips. It had no subtitles for the Somalis but neither did the version in the fish and chip shop in Kaikoura so maybe its not supposed to. It was good to catch up with Tom and a nice two days as he showed us the bike tracks he had built in his back garden and the cycling video he had been editing over the previous couple of months. His Spanish and Portuguese are really good now and I was a little jealous. I really need to improve mine and work on it.
In the morning he gave us one final spin around town and we got our shopping for the Abel Tasman hike. We took the bus to Motueka and walked ages to our hostel. Nice place. Not much to do here. We went out for some food and then chilled in the hostel. In the evening I went for a night time walk to find a pie and eating the pie while walking under the stars I realised that I was really, truly happy. Lucky life I have.
In the morning we grabbed our bus to the park entrance and took the aquataxi up to Totaranui. I had wanted to see split apple rock after the hike and head to separation point on the first day, but the aquataxi ride killed two birds with one stone. It stopped close to split apple rock to get some photos and then visited Tonga Island on the way north to see the seals. Oh well. Easier than I imagined. The aquataxi ride is cool, because you get to see the park from the water before hiking back. We thought this might ruin the experience but it really doesn't as its very different from the land. We were dropped in Totaranui around 1pm and the tidal crossing at Awaroa wasn't possible until at least 3pm so we were left to kick our heels as it was only 5.5km. We had decided against doing the rest of the northern part and an Austrian girl later told us that its the same but more rugged. The first day's walking was really boring apart from the rust coloured sand which was unique. We were apprehensive about the rest. When we got to Awaroa it was just after 3pm and we attempted the crossing. We got halfway before realising we were going to have to remove our boots and wade which came to around our knee. Apparently its impossible to get across without wading as it is still a river inside a tidal estuary. This was fun and we left our socks on so as not to get cut up on all the shells. Took us a good 20-30 minutes to get across. Once across we went on a hike to find the restaurant about 2km away but its very overpriced, was disappointing and let to an argument. The walk round there is quite nice though and leads past sand dunes, houses and crosses a couple of rivers. We got chatting with an American and an Austrian girl in the evening. There was a big group of Kiwis who monopolised the hut and were quite annoying. The ranger told us that this hut is completely cut off and landlocked during high tide. He told us that some people had even tried to cross it at 10pm at night having not read the notices. At high tide its 3m deep in the middle and they were freezing and wading in the middle of the tidal waters. Idiots. Some people never learn no matter what is written.
The next morning we set off early to make sure we would have no problems with the tide. We kept trying to anticipate where Daniel had taken the photo that is hanging on his lounge wall. Its very beautiful and we didn't want to miss it. Not long out of the camp we came cross the ranger and a friend of his behind a quad bike. Curious. They seemed a little embarrassed to see us. When I walked closer I could see a dead deer next to them. They had shot it because it was on national park land. They apologised to me, but I said not to worry as I would be a hypocrite given how much I like venison. They asked for some help lifting it, which was weird as I held the antlers and helped lift it onto the quad. Weird start. The first half of the day saw us walk to Bark Bay. Its a nice walk but we weren't blown away by much. Its around Bark Bay that it becomes very beautiful. We had also got lucky because the weather the day before had been cloudy and the day after was as well. This day was glorious however and it was the day where we would do the most beautiful part of the walk. The part from Bark Bay over to Anchorage is the prettiest part of the walk. We got the viewpoint we had been waiting for when we got close to Torrent Bay. We saw some little spiders and a lot of birds, including the wood pigeon. The tidal path was closed at Torrent Bay so we did the long 5km detour to get round to Anchorage. I took the side trip to Cleopatra's Pool (not worth it) and we eventually made it onto the beautiful beach of Anchorage. 27km of walking and it was a really nice part of the park. Cannelle loved it. I thought it was really nice. I would say that if you are pushed for time then you should just do the Awaroa to Anchorage part as the rest of the walk is pretty boring or average. That way you would see the best of the park. In the evening there was a very fat guy in our room and he snored so loudly that everyone else left the ranger hut to sleep outside. It wasn't that bad. In fact the German guy who left due to the snoring was snoring so much worse the night before. When we woke up it was just Cannelle and I, as the other two had left early. My sleeping bag was killing me. Being thermal it was far too hot for where we were.
In the morning we were up early and did the last 12km out of the park to Marahau. The fact that this took us just over 2 hours will show you how boring the last part of the walk was. Might as well take a water taxi out if you have the money. We were out early and got some hot food at last in the extortionate cafe next to the entrance. Then we got a ride back to Motueka and did nothing as we just finished off the hiking. One more great walk to go. Everyone had told us that Abel Tasman was the best. I disagree. Its a nice walk. Its on a par with the Kepler. The Routeburn is miles ahead of the other two from the two we have done.
In the morning we had to grab an early bus to Nelson (waiting for an hour) and another bus to Blenheim (2 hour wait). Blenheim looks like an ultra boring place. How on earth the Israelis can work there I don't know. I am still really happy that we took our working holiday visa in Australia and not New Zealand. Eventually we got to Kaikoura and the weather was a bit shitty with tons of mist. We decided to go and get some fish and chips from the apparently second best in NZ (more on that later) and then just chilled out in the hot tub of our hostel. We had decided after a lot of back and forth not to do a whale watching tour and just go to see the seals.
The next day we went to town for lunch and nothing was open so we went to the fish and chip shop next door to the other one. His was better and he told us that the other fish and chip shop had come second ina survey done by the kiwi explorer bus. Far be it for me to disparage reviews conducted by 18 year old morons from my country, but the fact that this survey only includes one fish and chip shop per town (hardly fair) and only the ones the bus visits, I think its hard to take it seriously. If you are in Kaikoura skip the surly bullshit from this self proclaimed great fish and chip shop and go next door for a nice chat with the owner of the other shop. We chatted with him for a couple of hours about the ridiculous monopolies on crayfish and whale watching in the town. He said how he wanted to open a burger bar and we ended up talking about making a crayfish sandwich for $15. I think its a winner and if you go to Kaikoura and see a shop selling $15 crayfish sandwiches then let me know, say hey to the owner and know we helped inspire it. He even told us about an Italian fishing ship that had strapped a jet engine onto itself to escape pirates. Interesting guy. After that we walked to the seal colony, but you can't really see any seals as they are too far out. Shame really. We saw a few basking close by and got surprised when one almost came out of a bush right next to us. Shit. Made me jump. It was still grey and misty. I am no sure it is worth visiting if you don't plan on seeing the whales but we had a nice couple of days there. Onwards to the north island.
New Zealand Part 4 (Routeburn Track, Milford Sound, Wanaka, Fox Glacier, Franz Josef Glacier, Hokitika and Punakaiki)
This part involved a lot of walking. We got picked up in the morning
and driven out via the Rees-Dart Valley and past Paradise to the start
of the Routeburn. The valley round here is very pretty. If I come back
and have time I would like to hike over the cascade saddle walk as it
looks spectacular. The weather was looking decidedly dicey and this was
to be the first and only bad day of weather on a day we needed good
weather while we were in New Zealand. The walk started with more keas
in the car park. They love car parks. We walked onto the walk and
crisscrossed over bridges over a very beautiful river. See through
turquoise like in Slovenia. This continues until you break into a
yellow field that is the Routeburn valley. This leads to the first hut
and from here you ascend to the waterfalls that give the second hut
their name. A beautiful walk. From there you enter another valley
similar to Ha Giang in Vietnam. From there you climb up to a lovely
alpine lake at the saddle. From here we had shitty mist and couldn't
see into the Hollyford valley. After a while the mist cleared and we
were treated to the stunning view of Lake McKenzie from above. Even on a
day when we had crap weather and rain we could still get lucky that it
cleared for that view. You then descend down to the hut through some of
the most beautiful moss filled forest I have seen. Wow what a first
day. This walk is truly world class. Its one of the best walks I have
ever done and ranks right up there. I would be surprised if its not the
best of the great walks. Truly spectacular. Even the rock colours
blurred between orange and a sort of jade like green. Its hard to
describe. Just walk it. We pitched our tent just before the rain
thundered down and didn't leave the tent except to poke out a hand to
give the ranger our tickets.
In the morning we were up and off again. The second day was less spectacular than the first but was still a pretty walk. The waterfall is really nice as is Lake Howden and the sidetrack up to Key Summit is very beautiful. You can see down multiple valleys and the range of colours is immense. Some clouds blocked the money shot at the top, but this is a walk to savour, even if we were devoured by sandflies at the divide while we waited for the bus. The bus driver of tracknet told us how he was impressed that we travel so light like Kiwis when a lot of foreigners take too much stuff onto the trails. Our original driver had even said that some people had come for the alpine walk in sandals or pulling guchi cases. Weird. We got chatting with an American and his Aussie girlfriend who had got pissy when we passed them on the track. We rarely carry more than 4-6kg on the hike including sleeping bag as we eat cold food, but this time I had had to carry the tent as well. We got our first ride down the Milford Sound road that we would come back along the following day. Looked very nice. Back in Te Anau we confirmed our pick up for the following day and chilled out.
The next morning we were picked up by the bus for Milford Sound. I hate tours but this one was half price as it would enable us to get back to Queenstown afterwards and pick up our luggage. The bus driver was annoyingly rude in not letting us board and we had to wait for ages to get on. I was fuming at first but after it was fine as his commentary was really informative as we travelled down the road. We had a few stops for photos, including most memorably at the mirror lakes (that really do reflect the mountains) and the chasm (which is a nice short walk to a mini gorge). We eventually passed through the tunnel and descended down to Milford Sound where we would board our boat. Its a pretty place but I was not blown away by it. We took our two hour cruise and in my opinion its a little repetitive scenery wise and lacks the variety of colour that I like in landscapes. Maybe in the winter with some snow caps it would be more impressive. Cannelle thought it was really beautiful but not a highlight. I think it was a nice boat trip but nothing special. Most people seem to say this is their highlight of New Zealand. If that is the case then I don't think they could have seen much of New Zealand. A lot of people had told us that without a car you can't see all the beautiful places in New Zealand. That's not true. With the exception of Mt Cook we have been able to get everywhere we wanted to with no problems. I would counter that if you don't get out there and do some serious hiking then you can't see the real New Zealand as all of our major highlights in this country have come from hikes. Maybe it was because we had done the Routeburn just the day before, but in my opinion it is far more impressive than Milford Sound. I would say its worth doing for sure, but you need to get out and hike to appreciate this country. We got back to Queenstown that evening and met an American guy named Joe who would join us in Wanaka for the Rob Roy Glacier. We just chilled in the evening.
The next morning we went to get our bus to Wanaka and were waiting with 5 other people. And waiting. And waiting. We contacted naked bus to see where the damn bus was, only to be informed that we had gone to the wrong bus stop and had missed the bus. Fuck. We had been booking everything in advance in New Zealand and this was going to cause us some problems. I argued with them that their website had the wrong location, while they argued that we hadn't read our confirmation e-mail. Shit. Who reads them anyway. Bugger. Oh well. Hitchhiking is apparently easy in this country. We were about to put it to the test. Actually two women just got stabbed and ended up with broken bones hitchhiking here so maybe its not so safe. We took a bus out to Frankton and tried our luck. Both of us were very uncomfortable with trying it, because although we'd got offered rides all over the world we had never actively looked for a ride. We sheepishly tried for about half an hour before we got a lift from a builder. He took us on the scenic route to Wanaka through the mountains and told us a lot about the area and how 14 year old Kiwis are taken into the wilderness at 14 and have to survive for 3 weeks. Cool. No wonder they are a tough bunch who know how to take care of themselves. It was a really nice ride and we chatted the whole way. He recommended a cafe to us in Wanaka and so we got an English breakfast there and just chilled out at the lake. The woman in the DOC office was super cool and even recommended hitching to Rob Roy Glacier the following day. So much better than the I-Site people.
In the morning we decided to try our hand at hitching but we figured we had set off too late and gave up after about 10 minutes or so. There was another couple trying and we saw them at the glacier so I guess we could have made it. We went to Joe's hostel and decided to take a taxi there together. It was $70 each for the return journey. That's our daily budget and I wasn't sure it was going to be worth it. We went back and forth for ages before we finally decided just to do it anyway. It was really cool. The drive there is impressive and the 5km hike up to the glacier is considered to be the best short walk in New Zealand. The glacier itself was picture perfect. A truly great place. We were now concerned that the other glaciers wouldn't stack up to it. We were right to be concerned. I would thoroughly recommend this day trip out of Wanaka, especially if you have a car.
The next day we took the bus to Fox Glacier. They stopped just after the Haast Pass for an unimpressive waterfall and a downright ugly black sand beach. The west coast is nice but underwhelming. At fox glacier we decided against doing an ice hike as I would like to do it when I go back to Perito Moreno Glacier (I regret not doing it there and it pisses all over other glaciers I have seen so far). We walked the 6km to the glacier. Some people had been killed there and you aren't supposed to cross the barriers. Cannelle wondered who would be stupid enough to disobey the rules, when right in front of us 4 people chose to cross the barriers. Oh well I guess if they get crushed by some falling ice its their bad decision making. The glacier itself is so so. Its nice to be able to get above it for a view down, but the skree alongside it is a little ugly. The parts further up look more beautiful, but you can't see them from the viewpoint. It was a little underwhelming, particularly I imagine if you have glaciers in your own country. On the plus side we did get a lift back from the bus driver of the ice hiking company and the little lake to the left of the glacier on the way is stunning with its illuminous green algae.
From here we went to Franz Josef Glacier and were staying in the Love Shack, which is nowhere near as cool as it sounds. The hostel did offer free soup, though it seemed to be more hot water than anything else. Still it was free. We walked the 4km to the glacier and the weather was crappy. After the long walk we could barely see the top of the glacier. Eventually it cleared enough to see the top of the glacier and its very beautiful. Its almost as beautiful as Rob Roy but the surrounding area is not as nice. We were glaciered out by this point as we had been to three in three days. I would say Rob Roy is the best of all of them and the East side of Mt Cook is better than the West. In fact I would recommend skipping the west coast of new zealand if you have to choose from Wanaka. Lake Tekapo and Mt Cook are far better than the west coast glaciers.
The next day we chose to bum around and do nothing. I got some of the writing for this blog done and we went to the hot pools in Franz Josef. We got there early and had the place to ourselves at the beginning. Nice place to spend a few hours and kick back.
The next day we had a long bus ride up to Nelson to see my friend Tom. I include it in this list to complete a couple of things regarding the west coast. Everyone says its amazing and we opted not to stay anywhere between Franz Josef and Nelson as we were running out of time before he left. I am now very happy that we didn't stop anywhere as what we got with the bus was sufficient. We stopped in the cute town of Hokitika for lunch and got some fish and chips. It was enough to look around. Greymouth and Westport look crappy so happy we didn't stop. The Punakaiki rocks are very famous and well worth a visit. We had 20 minutes there. You probably need an hour but stopping there the night would have been unnecessary, though its still probably the best place to break heading north. The stretch of coast between Greymouth and Westport is also quite scenic but similar to the East Coast of Australia without the beaches. The Punakaiki rocks are cool and seeing the waves carve shapes into these layered rocks is nice. Next came the Buller Gorge which I would argue is more of a valley than a gorge. Its picturesque but nothing earth shattering. All in all its a nice ride but a ride is all it is. No need to stop at all. If you are taking Naked bus then I would say the ticket from Franz Josef to Nelson is enough as you will see everything you will want to see with the stops where you would want them. So we were off to Nelson and to catch up with Tom, who I hadn't seen since we were breaking into castles in Cartagena.
In the morning we were up and off again. The second day was less spectacular than the first but was still a pretty walk. The waterfall is really nice as is Lake Howden and the sidetrack up to Key Summit is very beautiful. You can see down multiple valleys and the range of colours is immense. Some clouds blocked the money shot at the top, but this is a walk to savour, even if we were devoured by sandflies at the divide while we waited for the bus. The bus driver of tracknet told us how he was impressed that we travel so light like Kiwis when a lot of foreigners take too much stuff onto the trails. Our original driver had even said that some people had come for the alpine walk in sandals or pulling guchi cases. Weird. We got chatting with an American and his Aussie girlfriend who had got pissy when we passed them on the track. We rarely carry more than 4-6kg on the hike including sleeping bag as we eat cold food, but this time I had had to carry the tent as well. We got our first ride down the Milford Sound road that we would come back along the following day. Looked very nice. Back in Te Anau we confirmed our pick up for the following day and chilled out.
The next morning we were picked up by the bus for Milford Sound. I hate tours but this one was half price as it would enable us to get back to Queenstown afterwards and pick up our luggage. The bus driver was annoyingly rude in not letting us board and we had to wait for ages to get on. I was fuming at first but after it was fine as his commentary was really informative as we travelled down the road. We had a few stops for photos, including most memorably at the mirror lakes (that really do reflect the mountains) and the chasm (which is a nice short walk to a mini gorge). We eventually passed through the tunnel and descended down to Milford Sound where we would board our boat. Its a pretty place but I was not blown away by it. We took our two hour cruise and in my opinion its a little repetitive scenery wise and lacks the variety of colour that I like in landscapes. Maybe in the winter with some snow caps it would be more impressive. Cannelle thought it was really beautiful but not a highlight. I think it was a nice boat trip but nothing special. Most people seem to say this is their highlight of New Zealand. If that is the case then I don't think they could have seen much of New Zealand. A lot of people had told us that without a car you can't see all the beautiful places in New Zealand. That's not true. With the exception of Mt Cook we have been able to get everywhere we wanted to with no problems. I would counter that if you don't get out there and do some serious hiking then you can't see the real New Zealand as all of our major highlights in this country have come from hikes. Maybe it was because we had done the Routeburn just the day before, but in my opinion it is far more impressive than Milford Sound. I would say its worth doing for sure, but you need to get out and hike to appreciate this country. We got back to Queenstown that evening and met an American guy named Joe who would join us in Wanaka for the Rob Roy Glacier. We just chilled in the evening.
The next morning we went to get our bus to Wanaka and were waiting with 5 other people. And waiting. And waiting. We contacted naked bus to see where the damn bus was, only to be informed that we had gone to the wrong bus stop and had missed the bus. Fuck. We had been booking everything in advance in New Zealand and this was going to cause us some problems. I argued with them that their website had the wrong location, while they argued that we hadn't read our confirmation e-mail. Shit. Who reads them anyway. Bugger. Oh well. Hitchhiking is apparently easy in this country. We were about to put it to the test. Actually two women just got stabbed and ended up with broken bones hitchhiking here so maybe its not so safe. We took a bus out to Frankton and tried our luck. Both of us were very uncomfortable with trying it, because although we'd got offered rides all over the world we had never actively looked for a ride. We sheepishly tried for about half an hour before we got a lift from a builder. He took us on the scenic route to Wanaka through the mountains and told us a lot about the area and how 14 year old Kiwis are taken into the wilderness at 14 and have to survive for 3 weeks. Cool. No wonder they are a tough bunch who know how to take care of themselves. It was a really nice ride and we chatted the whole way. He recommended a cafe to us in Wanaka and so we got an English breakfast there and just chilled out at the lake. The woman in the DOC office was super cool and even recommended hitching to Rob Roy Glacier the following day. So much better than the I-Site people.
In the morning we decided to try our hand at hitching but we figured we had set off too late and gave up after about 10 minutes or so. There was another couple trying and we saw them at the glacier so I guess we could have made it. We went to Joe's hostel and decided to take a taxi there together. It was $70 each for the return journey. That's our daily budget and I wasn't sure it was going to be worth it. We went back and forth for ages before we finally decided just to do it anyway. It was really cool. The drive there is impressive and the 5km hike up to the glacier is considered to be the best short walk in New Zealand. The glacier itself was picture perfect. A truly great place. We were now concerned that the other glaciers wouldn't stack up to it. We were right to be concerned. I would thoroughly recommend this day trip out of Wanaka, especially if you have a car.
The next day we took the bus to Fox Glacier. They stopped just after the Haast Pass for an unimpressive waterfall and a downright ugly black sand beach. The west coast is nice but underwhelming. At fox glacier we decided against doing an ice hike as I would like to do it when I go back to Perito Moreno Glacier (I regret not doing it there and it pisses all over other glaciers I have seen so far). We walked the 6km to the glacier. Some people had been killed there and you aren't supposed to cross the barriers. Cannelle wondered who would be stupid enough to disobey the rules, when right in front of us 4 people chose to cross the barriers. Oh well I guess if they get crushed by some falling ice its their bad decision making. The glacier itself is so so. Its nice to be able to get above it for a view down, but the skree alongside it is a little ugly. The parts further up look more beautiful, but you can't see them from the viewpoint. It was a little underwhelming, particularly I imagine if you have glaciers in your own country. On the plus side we did get a lift back from the bus driver of the ice hiking company and the little lake to the left of the glacier on the way is stunning with its illuminous green algae.
From here we went to Franz Josef Glacier and were staying in the Love Shack, which is nowhere near as cool as it sounds. The hostel did offer free soup, though it seemed to be more hot water than anything else. Still it was free. We walked the 4km to the glacier and the weather was crappy. After the long walk we could barely see the top of the glacier. Eventually it cleared enough to see the top of the glacier and its very beautiful. Its almost as beautiful as Rob Roy but the surrounding area is not as nice. We were glaciered out by this point as we had been to three in three days. I would say Rob Roy is the best of all of them and the East side of Mt Cook is better than the West. In fact I would recommend skipping the west coast of new zealand if you have to choose from Wanaka. Lake Tekapo and Mt Cook are far better than the west coast glaciers.
The next day we chose to bum around and do nothing. I got some of the writing for this blog done and we went to the hot pools in Franz Josef. We got there early and had the place to ourselves at the beginning. Nice place to spend a few hours and kick back.
The next day we had a long bus ride up to Nelson to see my friend Tom. I include it in this list to complete a couple of things regarding the west coast. Everyone says its amazing and we opted not to stay anywhere between Franz Josef and Nelson as we were running out of time before he left. I am now very happy that we didn't stop anywhere as what we got with the bus was sufficient. We stopped in the cute town of Hokitika for lunch and got some fish and chips. It was enough to look around. Greymouth and Westport look crappy so happy we didn't stop. The Punakaiki rocks are very famous and well worth a visit. We had 20 minutes there. You probably need an hour but stopping there the night would have been unnecessary, though its still probably the best place to break heading north. The stretch of coast between Greymouth and Westport is also quite scenic but similar to the East Coast of Australia without the beaches. The Punakaiki rocks are cool and seeing the waves carve shapes into these layered rocks is nice. Next came the Buller Gorge which I would argue is more of a valley than a gorge. Its picturesque but nothing earth shattering. All in all its a nice ride but a ride is all it is. No need to stop at all. If you are taking Naked bus then I would say the ticket from Franz Josef to Nelson is enough as you will see everything you will want to see with the stops where you would want them. So we were off to Nelson and to catch up with Tom, who I hadn't seen since we were breaking into castles in Cartagena.
New Zealand Part 3 (Te Anau, Kepler Track and Queenstown)
We changed buses on the way to Te Anau and arrived in the cute little
lakeside town. There is not a lot going on there, but its a picturesque
little town. The YHA is very clinical and clean, but a little
soulless. We didn't do much and just went down to the DOC birdlife
park. Its a nice little place and we got to see our first Takahe and
Kaka, but most of the birds are in little cages. The lake itself is
very pretty when it is not completely covered in clouds (which it often
is). They have a mean little pie shop in the town and we were able to
get some venison pies. Its cheap down there as they farm venison. Then
we just bought all our food for the first of the great walks. A lot of
people had said that it was quite boring to hike the back 30km through
beech forest, so we decided to just hike up to the top of Mt Luxmore if
the weather was good and stay a night in Luxmore hut. They do a boat
across the lake, but its apparently $25 or $30 one way, so we elected to
leave at dawn and hike around the lake (around 10km) before the ascent.
In the morning we set off just as the light was breaking and as the sun rose, we realised it was going to be a cloudless day. Perfect for the walk and it looked like we would be able to hit Mt Luxmore in one go. The walk around the lake is boring (and this was our first forest so imagine how boring it is if you've already done some). Following the 10km of almost nothing, we hiked up the mountain. DOC says 4 hours to the hut, but we took just over 2 hours even with Cannelle injured. We realised that we did 2/3 of the DOC times on the flat and 1/2 of them on the slopes, so I would say they are very conservative with their estimates. It was only when we finally broke the treeline that we realised why this walk was famous. The views from the top on a clear day are absolutely breathtaking. Your visibility is about 90km or so and you can see across most of the lake and over reams of mountain ridges. Really special. We stopped to eat and soak it all in before climbing up to the hut. We dropped the packs and set off for Mt Luxmore which did take us more than an hour. We crossed the ridge in only 20km/h winds. Nothing really. Would not want to be up there when they have 100km/h winds and lateral rain. Our luck with the weather had continued. We got to the top and just sat and admired the views. Really nice. On the way down I asked some Germans how the view was along the rest of the ridge and they told me it was the same as what I had seen so far, so I don't think we missed much. If you took the boat you could do Mt Luxmore peak in a day if you were fit and would probably have seen the highlights of the Kepler. No need for the rest. Back in Luxmore hut we saw that the ranger was doing a nature walk at 5pm. I wasn't sure but Cannelle said we should go. Everyone seemed to join in and about 40 of us went on a rather long and boring walk around the hut. Unless you love flowers then this is not really for you. Every now and again he would give you some interesting information, but you had to wade through the inordinate amount of plant data to get to it.
"This is a daisy.........bla bla bla"
"This is another daisy.......bla bla bla"
"and this over here may not look like it but its another type of daisy"
I did not know there were so many daisies. Probably fascinating stuff for botanists but judging by the continual drop out rate of our group from 40 down to 10 I guess most of us weren't. When some would leave he would say
"well over here we have some more plants if any of you are interested"
We thought we'd stick it until the end but there did not seem to be an end. After a while I kind of felt that it was a test of endurance and a game for him to see how much boring shit he could shovel onto us to see who would be the last person standing. It was a one hour tour, but when we left to leave the group at 10 it had been going on for nearly two hours. They eventually returned in the dark and I guess he had found his winner. He also asked everyone questions such as well "as you all know what colour are these in Europe?" Fuck. I had no idea. Surely someone must know. Everyone was looking around awkwardly. Someone save us. Its embarrassing. Finally there was a German guy who knew the answers. Thank fuck for him. After this tour we went to bed, but were summoned down for a safety talk by the same ranger. God no. This consisted of telling us to open windows in case someone ate beans, a long spiel about the introduction of mammals and how it killed birds (by now I can recite it by heart. Hopefully they will lay off on the north island as it gets repetitive). He asked some people why they were leaving (because a beautiful sunset was happening behind him), asked some Germans to share their story if it was so important (like being at school) and finally finished off by telling us about a maori instrument and then proceeding to play it while dancing around like a demented pied piper. It was hard not to laugh. Very surreal. You can't tell me spending all your time out in these huts doesn't turn you nuts. Weird. We got chatting with a guy from the Basque in Spanish for the rest of the evening. Good practice. The huts are impressive here by the way. Way better than I have seen in other countries.
The next day we headed down the mountain to retrace all the boring steps we had taken on our way up. The valley was filled with clouds now, which was impressive and we were lucky to get both views. When we got down we were a bit tired (out of shape after Sydney) and just did our laundry before heading to Queenstown. As it was Cannelle's actual birthday as well we went out for a meal in an Italian restaurant in town, but it felt a bit bad as we had celebrated it in Dunedin.
We got an early bus to Queenstown. Its mostly a boring ride. At one point there is a sign that says 'End of the Southern scenic route'. I am not really sure where it began. When you get to the lake with the remarkables on the right it suddenly becomes a very beautiful place. Queenstown really does have a magical location, surrounded by the mountains and nestled on the lake. It seems all the Kiwis live in Frankton though (which I think is the real original Queenstown) and the centre of the town has been left for the foreigners much like the Dutch have done with Amsterdam. We checked into our hostel, which is an amazing place and is always booked out weeks in advance. You have to book in advance in New Zealand. Not what I am used to when I travel, but I guess you have to make sacrifices so you don't have to sleep on the streets. We went to see the I-Site and asked about the Shotover canyon. They said you can take the jet boat and you can't see anything if you go up there. We pointed out that cars go over the bridge and they said that maybe you might be able to walk over it. Liars. That was the second time we were lied to by an I-Site. We stopped going to them after that and decided not to trust them at all. We walked the 5km to the shotover bridge and not only can you see the river (which is beautiful) but you can actually see the famous canyon on all of their brochures. Amazing. Liars. To think you pay the same for this jetboat as you do for the Otago Peninsula tour. The value is incomparable. I can't believe people pay that much. I have not met anyone who has done it who hasn't enjoyed it, but neither have I met anyone who thought it was value for money. That was a walk that was well worth it. We weren't going to be doing the usual tours in Queenstown and we actually spent very little money there. Our hostel did a meal in the evening and that Sunday it was a sunday roast complete with yorkshire puddings.
The next day we took the bus over to Arrowtown to visit for a day trip. Its an easy ride over and you could probably cycle it (We should have done as our hostel had free bikes). The old buildings are nice and they reminded me of historic Colorado mining towns. The Chinese settlement is especially interesting and has a number of historical plaques you can read. Its a good trip. That night we met Charlotte and some people from her hostel as it was St Patricks Day and we decided to test the legendary Queenstown nightlife. I think it is only legendary because the rest of the South Island sucks so much. It was like clubbing in my hometown and although we had fun it was a little bit of a letdown. Oh well. The drinks before in the hostel had been fun again.
Our final day in Queenstown saw us hike up the hill with the gondola on it. They have mountain bike tracks running all the way down the hill. I wish we had gone biking as it looked really cool. We will have to try in Wellington, though apparently the tracks are not as cool as here. When you get to the top they have a luge track that looks cool and all sorts of extreme sports from paragliding to bungy jumping. They also have a jelly bean shop that you have to take the spin the wheel challenge and can end up with anything from a nice flavour to dog food, vomit or rotten egg. Its good fun and we bought some jelly beans afterwards. We thought about doing some other things but just ended up walking back down the hill. The view from the top is really nice. This is a town where you can do a lot for free or you can spend loads of money. The choice is up to you really. When we got back to the hostel I played the pub quiz at the hostel. We won a crate of beer, which was cool. We were miles behind after the first couple of rounds, but there was a cryptic one on English sweets. Given we had the most native speakers and four english people we smashed it and that won it for us along with the music. The next day we had booked transport to the Routeburn and we were off to our second great walk. Queenstown is easily the coolest place on the South Island and you could spend ages there if you chose to. Cool place.
In the morning we set off just as the light was breaking and as the sun rose, we realised it was going to be a cloudless day. Perfect for the walk and it looked like we would be able to hit Mt Luxmore in one go. The walk around the lake is boring (and this was our first forest so imagine how boring it is if you've already done some). Following the 10km of almost nothing, we hiked up the mountain. DOC says 4 hours to the hut, but we took just over 2 hours even with Cannelle injured. We realised that we did 2/3 of the DOC times on the flat and 1/2 of them on the slopes, so I would say they are very conservative with their estimates. It was only when we finally broke the treeline that we realised why this walk was famous. The views from the top on a clear day are absolutely breathtaking. Your visibility is about 90km or so and you can see across most of the lake and over reams of mountain ridges. Really special. We stopped to eat and soak it all in before climbing up to the hut. We dropped the packs and set off for Mt Luxmore which did take us more than an hour. We crossed the ridge in only 20km/h winds. Nothing really. Would not want to be up there when they have 100km/h winds and lateral rain. Our luck with the weather had continued. We got to the top and just sat and admired the views. Really nice. On the way down I asked some Germans how the view was along the rest of the ridge and they told me it was the same as what I had seen so far, so I don't think we missed much. If you took the boat you could do Mt Luxmore peak in a day if you were fit and would probably have seen the highlights of the Kepler. No need for the rest. Back in Luxmore hut we saw that the ranger was doing a nature walk at 5pm. I wasn't sure but Cannelle said we should go. Everyone seemed to join in and about 40 of us went on a rather long and boring walk around the hut. Unless you love flowers then this is not really for you. Every now and again he would give you some interesting information, but you had to wade through the inordinate amount of plant data to get to it.
"This is a daisy.........bla bla bla"
"This is another daisy.......bla bla bla"
"and this over here may not look like it but its another type of daisy"
I did not know there were so many daisies. Probably fascinating stuff for botanists but judging by the continual drop out rate of our group from 40 down to 10 I guess most of us weren't. When some would leave he would say
"well over here we have some more plants if any of you are interested"
We thought we'd stick it until the end but there did not seem to be an end. After a while I kind of felt that it was a test of endurance and a game for him to see how much boring shit he could shovel onto us to see who would be the last person standing. It was a one hour tour, but when we left to leave the group at 10 it had been going on for nearly two hours. They eventually returned in the dark and I guess he had found his winner. He also asked everyone questions such as well "as you all know what colour are these in Europe?" Fuck. I had no idea. Surely someone must know. Everyone was looking around awkwardly. Someone save us. Its embarrassing. Finally there was a German guy who knew the answers. Thank fuck for him. After this tour we went to bed, but were summoned down for a safety talk by the same ranger. God no. This consisted of telling us to open windows in case someone ate beans, a long spiel about the introduction of mammals and how it killed birds (by now I can recite it by heart. Hopefully they will lay off on the north island as it gets repetitive). He asked some people why they were leaving (because a beautiful sunset was happening behind him), asked some Germans to share their story if it was so important (like being at school) and finally finished off by telling us about a maori instrument and then proceeding to play it while dancing around like a demented pied piper. It was hard not to laugh. Very surreal. You can't tell me spending all your time out in these huts doesn't turn you nuts. Weird. We got chatting with a guy from the Basque in Spanish for the rest of the evening. Good practice. The huts are impressive here by the way. Way better than I have seen in other countries.
The next day we headed down the mountain to retrace all the boring steps we had taken on our way up. The valley was filled with clouds now, which was impressive and we were lucky to get both views. When we got down we were a bit tired (out of shape after Sydney) and just did our laundry before heading to Queenstown. As it was Cannelle's actual birthday as well we went out for a meal in an Italian restaurant in town, but it felt a bit bad as we had celebrated it in Dunedin.
We got an early bus to Queenstown. Its mostly a boring ride. At one point there is a sign that says 'End of the Southern scenic route'. I am not really sure where it began. When you get to the lake with the remarkables on the right it suddenly becomes a very beautiful place. Queenstown really does have a magical location, surrounded by the mountains and nestled on the lake. It seems all the Kiwis live in Frankton though (which I think is the real original Queenstown) and the centre of the town has been left for the foreigners much like the Dutch have done with Amsterdam. We checked into our hostel, which is an amazing place and is always booked out weeks in advance. You have to book in advance in New Zealand. Not what I am used to when I travel, but I guess you have to make sacrifices so you don't have to sleep on the streets. We went to see the I-Site and asked about the Shotover canyon. They said you can take the jet boat and you can't see anything if you go up there. We pointed out that cars go over the bridge and they said that maybe you might be able to walk over it. Liars. That was the second time we were lied to by an I-Site. We stopped going to them after that and decided not to trust them at all. We walked the 5km to the shotover bridge and not only can you see the river (which is beautiful) but you can actually see the famous canyon on all of their brochures. Amazing. Liars. To think you pay the same for this jetboat as you do for the Otago Peninsula tour. The value is incomparable. I can't believe people pay that much. I have not met anyone who has done it who hasn't enjoyed it, but neither have I met anyone who thought it was value for money. That was a walk that was well worth it. We weren't going to be doing the usual tours in Queenstown and we actually spent very little money there. Our hostel did a meal in the evening and that Sunday it was a sunday roast complete with yorkshire puddings.
The next day we took the bus over to Arrowtown to visit for a day trip. Its an easy ride over and you could probably cycle it (We should have done as our hostel had free bikes). The old buildings are nice and they reminded me of historic Colorado mining towns. The Chinese settlement is especially interesting and has a number of historical plaques you can read. Its a good trip. That night we met Charlotte and some people from her hostel as it was St Patricks Day and we decided to test the legendary Queenstown nightlife. I think it is only legendary because the rest of the South Island sucks so much. It was like clubbing in my hometown and although we had fun it was a little bit of a letdown. Oh well. The drinks before in the hostel had been fun again.
Our final day in Queenstown saw us hike up the hill with the gondola on it. They have mountain bike tracks running all the way down the hill. I wish we had gone biking as it looked really cool. We will have to try in Wellington, though apparently the tracks are not as cool as here. When you get to the top they have a luge track that looks cool and all sorts of extreme sports from paragliding to bungy jumping. They also have a jelly bean shop that you have to take the spin the wheel challenge and can end up with anything from a nice flavour to dog food, vomit or rotten egg. Its good fun and we bought some jelly beans afterwards. We thought about doing some other things but just ended up walking back down the hill. The view from the top is really nice. This is a town where you can do a lot for free or you can spend loads of money. The choice is up to you really. When we got back to the hostel I played the pub quiz at the hostel. We won a crate of beer, which was cool. We were miles behind after the first couple of rounds, but there was a cryptic one on English sweets. Given we had the most native speakers and four english people we smashed it and that won it for us along with the music. The next day we had booked transport to the Routeburn and we were off to our second great walk. Queenstown is easily the coolest place on the South Island and you could spend ages there if you chose to. Cool place.
New Zealand Part 2 (Christchurch, Oamaru, Dunedin and Invercargill)
We arrived back in Christchurch and this time we had to walk 4km or so
out to the Eastern suburbs. This was just a pit stop so we didn't plan
on doing much. We met Steve at the hostel and he said he had been
waiting for a few hours for the owner to come to the hostel to sign him
in. That's a little weird. There was a group of people living and
working in Christchurch who were just sitting out back like zombies for
the entire time. Weird, but we later learnt from Charlotte that they
were all on meth. No wonder. Weird place. The owner eventually showed
up an hour or so late and kept asking us how we had booked. I kept
telling him and he kept asking us again. I think his memory is a little
shot. He introduced us to our room and asked us what time we were
leaving the next day. The place has a free lift but as it was early
saturday morning he just let us know that we were better off taking a
taxi. We had planned to walk anyway. So we met Charlotte in the room
and chatted for a bit. She had said the place was always full of
weirdos. We went and got some cider and sat around drinking in the
room. Then the owner came back with some Germans he had picked up at
the bus station. He was walking to the room, when he turned around and
had this conversation with one of the German guys.
"Do you have a booking?"
(hesitant) "Yeah"
"I don't think so. What are you doing here?"
(hesitant again) "I was just in the car with you"
Maybe the owner is on meth himself. Not quite breaking bad level of intelligence, but he couldn't even remember someone who was in the car with him 5 seconds earlier. Weird. He then told them that 2 of them would be sleeping on couches because he had overbooked the room. Great for them. They said they were happy just to have a room over their heads, but I figured it was a bit shitty as they had paid the same as us. A few of them went out clubbing later but apparently it was shit.
The next day we walked in to town and grabbed the bus to Oamaru. We checked into the artsy hostel which is quite nice. To see the blue penguins cost a lot of money so we decided to wander down to the old town, which is really cute and although its small, its really nice and kind of reminded me of coastal Devon town. Very nice to walk around. From there we set off to walk over the headland to see the yellow eyed penguins. This is a longer walk than it looks, but we got there just in time to see one yellow eyed penguin exit the sea and a few seals on the beach. Not very impressive and barely worth the walk out there. You would need a telescope to see them in any detail and our camera was utterly defeated. Luckily on the way back we got picked up by an old Kiwi couple and they drove us down to see the blue eyed penguins. We waited in the dark and saw nothing. I think we should have paid to go and see them here. Maybe we might get lucky and see them somewhere else. Underwhelming and I think that one day is enough here probably. We caught some live music in a pizza restaurant on the way back and put our $2 in the train outside the steampunk museum. Worth doing after dark.
The second day we went back to the old town for the sunday market. Its shitty, but we got to try cheese rolls, which are just bread wrapped around cheese. Like a calzone cheese on toast. Oh well. So we headed to the steampunk museum. Its much smaller than we expected, but its quite cool and weirdly atmospheric to have a wander around. It might be overpriced at $10 though. The kaleidoscope machine was totally crap compared with the steam train. Next we went off to the Whitestone cheese factory and got one of their platters of cheese. This was really nice and well worth the visit. We didn't see the point in going back over to see the penguins, so we ended up playing quad lingual scrabble with a Dutch guy we met in the hostel. Was a fun way to kill the evening. I really liked Oamaru. Its a cute little town with a lot of cool little things to do, but none of them take much time and one day here is sufficient.
The next day we were off to Dunedin. Cannelle described it as a shithole when we arrived, but then after walking around, decided that it was a cute city. The hostels here and in Invercargill both had shitty reputations, but both of them were nice. I think some of the people here (especially the Germans) have way too high expectations from a hostel. We went to the Pioneer's Museum which is an interesting place to spend a couple of hours. Then we went to the I-Site and asked about Sandfly Beach and whether any animals came there anymore. They told us that there weren't any seals etc there anymore, because too many tourists had scared them off. We were late told on our tour that they were still there so the I-Site lied to us. Fuckers. We have had that from them twice now and it clearly appears that the I-Site is more interested in pushing tours onto tourists than on giving you info. Another factor in the stealth money grabbing that the Kiwi tourist board is out to gain from tourists. Its not good when they are lying to you for money. We went and got the obligatory photo of the Dunedin train station. Apparently its the second most photographed building in the Southern Hemisphere. It is a really beautiful building. Cannelle still had ankle problems from her new boots that had been killing her and the pharmacy told her to try strapping them up. I offered to pay for the Elm Tour to the Otago Peninsula for her birthday as I knew that she really wanted to see the wildlife and the walking necessary would have been too much for her feet. She said ok. We had also booked into Plato for the evening for Cannelle's birthday meal from my dad. Really nice restaurant. We had 6 excellent dishes that we decided to split between us. Very, very good restaurant. If you have some spare money and feel like a really good meal then I would highly recommend it.
The next day we went to the Sports Museum in the morning, which is an interesting place for an hour or so. They have a few nice museums here. At 3pm we were picked up for the tour and informed that we would be getting a free look at Larnach castle on the way, because we had to pick up two Americans there. An excellent bonus as I knew the Dutch guy had had to pay $75 to go there. There were a lot of things that were either similar to England (or in this case inferior) that weren't worth the money for me, but may be for people who don't come from countries with that history. Suffice to say it was pretty but not worth the money. The tour headed through the wetlands first, where we got excellent commentary on all of the native birdlife and free binoculars to view them from. The tour was $105 for 6 hours. We went to the Royal Albatross Centre and saw the huge birds come in over our heads. We got some great up close views of these majestic birds gliding by and some more great commentary. The peninsula itself is very picturesque and like some of England's best scenery. We were here mostly for the wildlife. The next part was a double header on their own private land. We saw a feeding frenzy out at sea as the fish bait balls had been disturbed up to the surface. Sadly no orcas came to the buffet. Down one side we went and saw the fur seals. There were loads of them and all the babies seemed to be playing in a baby pool. We spent about half an hour watching them before we climbed up the hill and descended the other side. Here walking just ahead of the guide, we rounded a corner and came across a yellow eyed penguin standing just 10m away on the other side of the fence. He walked away slowly and waited. We went through and approached cautiously before he ducked down a tunnel. Five seconds later he reemerged being chased by another penguin who was biting him. We witnessed this little fight close up. Cool. We then went down to the beach and saw 5 sea lions there. One had even been mistakenly tagged as a male, when we found out later it was definitely a female. We went round them to see the yellow eyed penguins at the end of the beach. We could see quite a few from the beach and saw one come back slowly from the sea, while others were moulting. We even got to see a mating dance performed by two of the penguins, before getting to witness the female sea lion attack the guide after he confirmed she was indeed a female. Perhaps she is touchy about her sexuality. The guide himself said it was one of his favourite tours. He also recommended visiting the Rob Roy Glacier when we were in Wanaka. It has won a lot of awards for tours in New Zealand and they do a lot of their own conservation work on the lands they took us to. Normally I hate tours, but I have to say that this was $105 very well spent. I would highly recommend it. You won't regret it. It was also this tour where we first heard the story of how possums and stoats etc were introduced and they have decimated the local birdlife. Interesting the first time, but we have now heard this story from every fucking bus driver and now its just funny. I guess they want to make sure they hammer the point home.
We were really enjoying Dunedin and our last day was just a half day. We probably could have done with one more day to really enjoy it. The final day we went for a tour round Cadburys World. I had done this before in the UK, but Cannelle wanted to do it. Overall it was nothing amazing and probably not worth the money, unless you love marshmallow chocolates. The chocolate waterfall was cool though and the kids loved it (It was more targeted at them to be fair). Lastly we went to the Otago Museum, which is really cool and the best of the museums. Shame we only had one hour to go around it as we could have easily spent more time there. We got a Nandos in the town and took the bus to Invercargill. We met Joe there, who had taken buses with us before, but we hadn't spoken to him before. We agreed to meet him outside the Invercargill museum to see the Tuatara. The hostel was a funky place dedicated to the film 'World's Fastest Indian' and went out with a Dutch girl and another German guy to see the tuatara and then to eat in the World's southern most Burger King (I just typed McDonalds there by accident. Do you think their marketing is effective lol). Had to do something cool there. The tuatara was cool to see though as it was alive at the time of the dinosaurs. Still looks like a lizard though. Not much to do in this town but its ok.
The next day we went back to the Southlands Museum, which is a nice place and a good place to kill some hours in Invercargill before we picked up our bus and we were off to Te Anau and the Kepler.
"Do you have a booking?"
(hesitant) "Yeah"
"I don't think so. What are you doing here?"
(hesitant again) "I was just in the car with you"
Maybe the owner is on meth himself. Not quite breaking bad level of intelligence, but he couldn't even remember someone who was in the car with him 5 seconds earlier. Weird. He then told them that 2 of them would be sleeping on couches because he had overbooked the room. Great for them. They said they were happy just to have a room over their heads, but I figured it was a bit shitty as they had paid the same as us. A few of them went out clubbing later but apparently it was shit.
The next day we walked in to town and grabbed the bus to Oamaru. We checked into the artsy hostel which is quite nice. To see the blue penguins cost a lot of money so we decided to wander down to the old town, which is really cute and although its small, its really nice and kind of reminded me of coastal Devon town. Very nice to walk around. From there we set off to walk over the headland to see the yellow eyed penguins. This is a longer walk than it looks, but we got there just in time to see one yellow eyed penguin exit the sea and a few seals on the beach. Not very impressive and barely worth the walk out there. You would need a telescope to see them in any detail and our camera was utterly defeated. Luckily on the way back we got picked up by an old Kiwi couple and they drove us down to see the blue eyed penguins. We waited in the dark and saw nothing. I think we should have paid to go and see them here. Maybe we might get lucky and see them somewhere else. Underwhelming and I think that one day is enough here probably. We caught some live music in a pizza restaurant on the way back and put our $2 in the train outside the steampunk museum. Worth doing after dark.
The second day we went back to the old town for the sunday market. Its shitty, but we got to try cheese rolls, which are just bread wrapped around cheese. Like a calzone cheese on toast. Oh well. So we headed to the steampunk museum. Its much smaller than we expected, but its quite cool and weirdly atmospheric to have a wander around. It might be overpriced at $10 though. The kaleidoscope machine was totally crap compared with the steam train. Next we went off to the Whitestone cheese factory and got one of their platters of cheese. This was really nice and well worth the visit. We didn't see the point in going back over to see the penguins, so we ended up playing quad lingual scrabble with a Dutch guy we met in the hostel. Was a fun way to kill the evening. I really liked Oamaru. Its a cute little town with a lot of cool little things to do, but none of them take much time and one day here is sufficient.
The next day we were off to Dunedin. Cannelle described it as a shithole when we arrived, but then after walking around, decided that it was a cute city. The hostels here and in Invercargill both had shitty reputations, but both of them were nice. I think some of the people here (especially the Germans) have way too high expectations from a hostel. We went to the Pioneer's Museum which is an interesting place to spend a couple of hours. Then we went to the I-Site and asked about Sandfly Beach and whether any animals came there anymore. They told us that there weren't any seals etc there anymore, because too many tourists had scared them off. We were late told on our tour that they were still there so the I-Site lied to us. Fuckers. We have had that from them twice now and it clearly appears that the I-Site is more interested in pushing tours onto tourists than on giving you info. Another factor in the stealth money grabbing that the Kiwi tourist board is out to gain from tourists. Its not good when they are lying to you for money. We went and got the obligatory photo of the Dunedin train station. Apparently its the second most photographed building in the Southern Hemisphere. It is a really beautiful building. Cannelle still had ankle problems from her new boots that had been killing her and the pharmacy told her to try strapping them up. I offered to pay for the Elm Tour to the Otago Peninsula for her birthday as I knew that she really wanted to see the wildlife and the walking necessary would have been too much for her feet. She said ok. We had also booked into Plato for the evening for Cannelle's birthday meal from my dad. Really nice restaurant. We had 6 excellent dishes that we decided to split between us. Very, very good restaurant. If you have some spare money and feel like a really good meal then I would highly recommend it.
The next day we went to the Sports Museum in the morning, which is an interesting place for an hour or so. They have a few nice museums here. At 3pm we were picked up for the tour and informed that we would be getting a free look at Larnach castle on the way, because we had to pick up two Americans there. An excellent bonus as I knew the Dutch guy had had to pay $75 to go there. There were a lot of things that were either similar to England (or in this case inferior) that weren't worth the money for me, but may be for people who don't come from countries with that history. Suffice to say it was pretty but not worth the money. The tour headed through the wetlands first, where we got excellent commentary on all of the native birdlife and free binoculars to view them from. The tour was $105 for 6 hours. We went to the Royal Albatross Centre and saw the huge birds come in over our heads. We got some great up close views of these majestic birds gliding by and some more great commentary. The peninsula itself is very picturesque and like some of England's best scenery. We were here mostly for the wildlife. The next part was a double header on their own private land. We saw a feeding frenzy out at sea as the fish bait balls had been disturbed up to the surface. Sadly no orcas came to the buffet. Down one side we went and saw the fur seals. There were loads of them and all the babies seemed to be playing in a baby pool. We spent about half an hour watching them before we climbed up the hill and descended the other side. Here walking just ahead of the guide, we rounded a corner and came across a yellow eyed penguin standing just 10m away on the other side of the fence. He walked away slowly and waited. We went through and approached cautiously before he ducked down a tunnel. Five seconds later he reemerged being chased by another penguin who was biting him. We witnessed this little fight close up. Cool. We then went down to the beach and saw 5 sea lions there. One had even been mistakenly tagged as a male, when we found out later it was definitely a female. We went round them to see the yellow eyed penguins at the end of the beach. We could see quite a few from the beach and saw one come back slowly from the sea, while others were moulting. We even got to see a mating dance performed by two of the penguins, before getting to witness the female sea lion attack the guide after he confirmed she was indeed a female. Perhaps she is touchy about her sexuality. The guide himself said it was one of his favourite tours. He also recommended visiting the Rob Roy Glacier when we were in Wanaka. It has won a lot of awards for tours in New Zealand and they do a lot of their own conservation work on the lands they took us to. Normally I hate tours, but I have to say that this was $105 very well spent. I would highly recommend it. You won't regret it. It was also this tour where we first heard the story of how possums and stoats etc were introduced and they have decimated the local birdlife. Interesting the first time, but we have now heard this story from every fucking bus driver and now its just funny. I guess they want to make sure they hammer the point home.
We were really enjoying Dunedin and our last day was just a half day. We probably could have done with one more day to really enjoy it. The final day we went for a tour round Cadburys World. I had done this before in the UK, but Cannelle wanted to do it. Overall it was nothing amazing and probably not worth the money, unless you love marshmallow chocolates. The chocolate waterfall was cool though and the kids loved it (It was more targeted at them to be fair). Lastly we went to the Otago Museum, which is really cool and the best of the museums. Shame we only had one hour to go around it as we could have easily spent more time there. We got a Nandos in the town and took the bus to Invercargill. We met Joe there, who had taken buses with us before, but we hadn't spoken to him before. We agreed to meet him outside the Invercargill museum to see the Tuatara. The hostel was a funky place dedicated to the film 'World's Fastest Indian' and went out with a Dutch girl and another German guy to see the tuatara and then to eat in the World's southern most Burger King (I just typed McDonalds there by accident. Do you think their marketing is effective lol). Had to do something cool there. The tuatara was cool to see though as it was alive at the time of the dinosaurs. Still looks like a lizard though. Not much to do in this town but its ok.
The next day we went back to the Southlands Museum, which is a nice place and a good place to kill some hours in Invercargill before we picked up our bus and we were off to Te Anau and the Kepler.
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