Last few days on South Island

Arrived in Pohara, which is based near the top of Abel Tasmen National Park, luckily for us the weather improved and although slightly overcast, the sun was trying to come out. However, the drive was pretty scary as we had to cross some huge mountains which only had a narrow winding road down - we were going at snails pace but you should have seen some of the huge lorries coming from the other direction, speeding down without a second glance! As we didn't arrive until early evening we thought we'd get an early night for a full days activity the next day.

Set off early the next day to sort out a kayak trip but it didn't really work out (doesn't help when the person on the other end of the phone doesn't really speak english). Instead we asked the owner of the campsite who recommended we go to a local salmon farm, where you can fish for your lunch and get it cooked and smoked for you right there. All the equipment was free, we just had to pay for what we caught - Stace was the expert as she had been fishing before (well about 15 years ago but it was better than nothing), so we both cast off and within the hour we had both caught a decent sized fish. The owner had told us how to kill the fish by driving a knife into its head (awwwww) - that was the bit we didn't like (and Stace hadn't actually done before), and we quickly found out that these were super salmon, which couldn't be killed by a single blow to the head (or a slight tap in Staceys case). Nath came to the rescue with the touch of death - only the damn thing was still alive about 15 minutes later (don't report us to the RSPCA!). However, we had them smoked in cajan and tandori spices and Nath said it was the best salmon he'd ever tasted (Stace still being a non fish eater couldn't comment but she still ate it so it must have been good)!


Before the catch, the bloody mess and the end result

We then went next door into a small farm which had cows, llamas, sheep and emus which you were allowed to feed. The llamas took a special interest in Stace and had her surrounded at one point (which was strange because you'd think she would have attracted the goats instead)! We then went down to the rivers edge where eels have been coming for the last 100 years - we were given a small pot of meat and some sticks and we're told they'd actually come out of the water in order to get fed. They weren't wrong, at one point some of them started to go for Naths trainer! It was pretty cool though!


Feeding the eels



After that, we though we'd take a drive actually into the Park to a place called Tortaranui, for which we had to again go over a mountain on a gravel track (don't think Nath took a breath the whole way round). However, it was definately worth it when we got there - picture perfect golden beach plus the sun was out which was a bonus. We did an hour trek to Goat Bay (much to Naths amusement) which was great, then made our way back to camp.


Goat Bay in Abel Tasmen Park

The following day travelled back over the mountain to get to the lower part of the National Park (by this time Nath had mastered the mountain driving thank god) to a place called Kaiteriteri from where we got a water taxi round to one of the bays for a 3 hour trek back (Bark bay to Anchorage bay). Again, we had fantastic sunshine all day and the views were stunning (definately could match a beach in the carribean). The last bit of the walk had to be done at low tide, so we had to walk across the sea bed, which was pretty hilarious as noone had told us we'd probably need to take our shoes off, so there we were trying to jump over some of the bigger pools, and soaking ourselves in the process!

Anchorage Bay in Abel Tasmen (check out our tripod action..)

The swing bridge crossing (very Indiana Jones), and Stace getting a bootful

After drying off on one of the fantastic beaches, we got a water taxi back to our campervan as we had to then take a four hour drive back to the east coast to Picton, where we had planned to walk part of the world famous Queen Charlotte track the following day.

Caught a water taxi early this morning which took us out to Mistletoe Bay for our 4 hour trek, picking us back up from Tourea Bay, some 12km away. After Stace insisting at the start we had to take a right, we ended up doing a 30 minute loop track which basically took us right back to where we'd started, which was not a good start, so we had to trek back up the hill to start the walk properly (doh!). Luckily the water taxi company had advised us to do it this way, instead of in reverse as it wasn't so steep - not sure whether he'd actually done the bloody walk himself because it seemed pretty steep to us (especially after our 'warm up' loop) - basically kept winding up around the mountain until we got to the top, and then we saw the top of the next one towering above us - noooooooooooooo! However, the scenery was amazing, and did take our mind off our aching legs - looking out over the whole of the Marlborough Sound was fanstastic, and to be fair it seemed a lot further going down than going up, and we did make it down in one piece (and actually not as tired as we thought we would be). In fact, we did the walk with an hour to spare (experts that we are... yeah right)!

Thought we were done, but we still had to climb over the top!

This is our last day in the South Island (boooooo), tomorrow we've booked the ferry which will take us across to Wellington in the North Island. We've been told that the North Island is completely different to the South, and we've already planned our route - lots of caving, skydiving and mud pool lounging to be done....

BTW Brett - wish you were here....?!

Whales and wine

Unfortunately the weather deteriorated so the afternoon whale watch was also called off, so we decided to cheer ourselves up by going out for a slap up meal. Ended up at this really nice bar/restaurant where Nath ordered the biggest crayfish meal in the world, which he says was fantastic! There was also a really cool singer with a guitar so we hung out there for the rest of the night (nothing to do with the fact that the dessert menu was amazing, honest...)!


Kaikoura scenery

The next day we got up early as we had managed to get 2 spaces on the dolphin swim trip, which was great news seeing as we'd tried booking it the day before and were told there might not be enough space. Got to the place where we had to change (or shoehorn in Naths case) into full wetsuits and were given a briefing before jumping on a boat to try and track down the dolphins. We'd swam with a trained dolphin before so had it in our heads what to expect but couldn't have prepared for the experience - it was amazing. The captain had a tip off so we finally came to a stop - we were expecting to see a couple of dolphins, but we were in the middle of a pod of about 400!!!!!! We had to slide off the back of the boat as quietly as possible, which was difficult seeing as the water was absolutely freezing, but once we were in we quickly forgot the cold. I cannot believe the amount of dolphins that were swimming past us and with us - you'd put your face in the water (we were given a mask and snorkel) and see a whole group of them come towards you. As they are all completely wild we were told a couple of tips to make them more interested in you - circling with them and making completely stupid noises. However silly we felt it worked and it was probably one of the best experiences we've had here so far - amazing! Especially as it was calving season so all of these dolphins had tiny little babies with them too.


Dusky dolphins of Kaikoura (looking like a school of sharks in the last picture)

After that we had rebooked to do the whale watch - finally they confirmed we were all set to go. The sea was pretty choppy and because we'd been out in the morning aswell we both were feeling pretty rough by the time we got out there. Stace was expecting for the boat to drive straight to a whale but obviously its not that easy - we were boating all over the place trying to find them, and the captain had this big microphone he'd put in the water to determine where they were. We were starting to think we weren't going to see anything when all of a sudden there it was - again, I think we were expecting to see the whole thing, but obviously you only see the top (in fact, we could be mistaken for thinking it was a big floating treetrunk), only thing giving it away was the spray every couple of minutes. When it got bored and decided to dive, well that was pretty spectacular - you get to see its massive tail as it comes out of the water - wow!! We only managed to see 3 whales inbetween hearing most of the cabin puking (nice) - luckily we managed to keep our dinner down.


The spraying log and its final dive

After the knackering previous day we took a slow drive around the coastline up to the Marlborough wine district. Most of the guide books advise you to stay in a place called Blenhiem but we'd had a recommendation to stay in a little backpackers place in a town called Renwick, just outside (thanks Neil). However, we stopped in Blenheim for lunch on the way through, we parked up the van and luckily ate in a restaurant opposite when Nath noticed someone eying up the van. He decided to go over and ended up having an argument with a traffic warden who had ticketed us for parking the van facing the wrong way up the street - another stupid New Zealand law! Anyway, nothing we could do about it, so drove to the council building where we had to pay the $40 fine and Stace jumped out to pay it. Luckily, her wily feminine charms got the better of the guy behind the desk and he cancelled the ticket for us (apparently it happens a lot to British tourists) - result!!!!


On the way to Renwick

Anyway, got to Watson Way backpackers - what a great little place, the owners were lovely (Nath decided the guy looked like Rolf Harris), and the facilities were really good and clean. We had a quick scout around the place (didn't take long as there was hardly anything there) and decided we'd do the winery tour the following day. Luckily the weather was glorious (apart from a pretty strong wind) so we hired some bikes and started off around 11am. Got back to the site around 4ish, after having wine tasting stops in all of the winerys around our cycle loop (about 8 of them), slightly worse for wear - what a great day. Obviously it would have been rude not to buy a bottle in each of them (well, from the amount of tastings we did we must have nailed a bottle in each anyway), and we've also ordered a crate of really good Sauvingnon Blanc to be sent back to the UK too. When we got back that night Nath decided to cook tea so went back to the van to get the food and ended up locking the keys in the van - doh! The rental place he phoned was no help at all, so Rolf offered to help break into the van with him however, luckily after trying to wedge a bar into the door Nath tried one of the windows and found that Stace hadn't closed one properly - phew! After that ordeal we had a very surreal night - in this little place in the middle of nowhere Nath bumped into Helen from Bristol, someone he knew from years ago - how mad is that, half way across the world in a remote backpacker place!!!!


The cycle tour of the winery's (followed by the end result...)!

We're now in Nelson, on our way up to Abel Tasmen National Park where the beaches and walking are supposed to be great. However, we've ran out of luck on the weather front and its bucketing down with rain yet again! Fingers crossed it clears for tomorrow as we've still got alot of suntanning to do (or so Nath tells me anyway)...

Here comes the sun...

Bottom of Fox glacier

After Wanaka we headed up to Fox Glacier on the west coast of New Zealand - we're sure the views of the Sea would have been great but typically it was raining hard was grey and cloudy so we didn't stop to take any photos!! We booked up to fly up to the top of the glacier and do a couple of hours hike, but unfortunately the cloud never cleared so the Helicopter was not able to fly! We booked in for a half day hike instead and spent a tiring 2 hour hike up to the glacier and then hiked around on it for an hour. It was really cool and the views again were great! Luckily it stayed dry and wasn't too cold.


Walking the glacier


How appropriate (Stace was starving)...

After the hike on the glacier we headed straight up to Franz Josef which was only a couple of hours up the road. We booked into a really nice campsite called the Rainforest which had it's own bar and restaurant, so decided to eat there. Got to the bar and Nath fancied a Jagermeister so we both necked one - uugghhh! Then a Contiki tour turned up (18-35's) and filled the bar up - Nath teamed up with a local guy (Mark) to start taking on some other guys at pool - fortunately Mark was really good and made up for Nath being shite! (he potted the black by accident in the first game). Mark started getting the Vodka redbulls in and we ended up getting wasted and going on to the Blue Ice nightclub (which Nath didn't even remember!!).

Woke up the next morning with our first hangover of the holiday and then took a long 5 hour drive to a place called Hanmer springs - a really nice village that has some thermal Spa's. Finally, the sun came out and the weather was glorious, so we went Mountain biking in the morning, which was great (think we'll get Stace some stabilisers next time though!) and then spent the afternoon in the sun at the Spa.


A well deserved rest from biking


Is that the sulphur pools we can smell, or Nath....?

We have just arrived in Kaikoura where we are going to go Whale watching - unfortunately the weather at sea is a bit rough so our trip has just been cancelled (typically!) - we have booked back in for the trip later on today so fingers crossed the weather will clear in time. It's actually nice and sunny on the land, but the sea does look choppy (maybe time to get some sea sickness tablets)! We're maybe thinking of doing a dolphin swim aswell, but we have to leave tomorrow to drive up to Blenheim to spend a couple of days getting leathered by cycling round wineries (well, it'd be rude not too wouldn't it....)

Rain rain go away...

Milford Sound


Up close and personal to a waterfall in Milford

On Monday we took a coach and cruise trip to Milford Sound - its a valley which has been flooded by water from the Tasman sea and is several hundred metres deep. We thought the scenery from the coach trip was spectacular but once we were on the boat it just got better and better - sheer rock faces and huge waterfalls everywhere, plus we even got to see some fur seals and penguins close up! The only wildlife which weren't welcome were the sandflies which were everywhere - Nath has already been feasted on a couple of times!!! This is probably the driest day that we've had (although the sun still didn't shine) but typically as we'd booked another trip the following day on Doubtful Sound the weather worsened and we had to hang around another day before we could make that trip!


Stace was very amused at this sign...

So, on the Tuesday we made up for the weather by stuffing ourselves stupid on cakes (mmmm afghan biscuits) and chilling out, which was a good thing because by this time Stace must have bumped her head at least 15 times (mostly getting out of the campervan) so she needed some time to recover.


Can't believe they named a bar after me...

Wednesday looked a lot more promising (still no sign of sunshine but at least it wasn't raining), so we headed on down to Lake Manapouri to get the ferry over to the Sound. For those geeks out there, the difference between the two sounds is that this particular one was actually formed by a glacier which melted thousands of years ago - oooooh!! Again, the scenery was amazing and instead of huge great rock faces, there was a lot more space and tranquility (god, we are starting to sound like new age hippies aren't we????). Again, saw some seals (which was probably the only time Stace ventured up on deck - well, although there was no rain it was absolutely freezing), and a yellow browed penguin. It was a great day (also due to the fact that Stace managed to get her sandfly killing tally to about 20 just on the coach - god we hate those things!)! As soon as we arrived back to land we took a 2 hour drive back to Queenstown for a night on the tiles. However, as we were both knackered (and rubbish) we just managed to stuff ourselves stupid on a three course meal (my god the green lipped mussles are HUGE over here) and did a quick stop off in one of the bars (Neil - we went to Winnies, but they couldn't open the roof because of the rain, surprise surprise)!


Doubtful Sound

The following day we drove to Wanaka, which took us up over a steep mountain range - not the best thing to try with a campervan! Anyway, finally got to Wanaka which was a very picturesque town surrounded by a lake (by the way, when we say lakes were not talking about the pond like lakes we have back in the UK, on these lakes they are massive and its difficult to see the other side, if at all!) . Anyway, we thought we'd spend the afternoon mooching round the town before setting off on a recommended walk the following day (you know whats coming next, yes we ended up spending more money on clothes and bloody snowboarding stuff for Nath "but its so cheap here"!!!). However, you guessed it, it started raining and didn't stop for 3 days (in fact its still raining now and we're in a completely different place now!). We couldn't really spend anymore time in Wanaka, even though we really wanted to do the walk as we were running out of time, so we headed north towards the Glaciers on the west coast - Fox and Franz Josef.

We are currently the village of Fox Glacier, waiting to be told that the helihike trip we've booked has been called off (you can't even see the Glacier due to the low cloud so theres no way the helicopter will be going up), however we have also booked in a 4 hour Glacier hike as a back up which will be cool! We'll update you on how we get on soon (anyway, I'm sure Stace will find it amusing as Nath clings to the side for dear life)....

Queenstown...

Where to start - we have done so much since our last entry!

Got up bright and early on Friday and decided to take a hike along the moonlight trail to the Ben Lomand Saddle, which promised fantastic views over Queenstown. Apparently the trail should only take 4 hours but they hadn't told us that it was all uphill (well, it was from the end of the trail that we started!). The sun was shining and (once we'd found the start) it was a fantastic morning's walking - all around the mountain where we overlooked the bungy swing (unfortunately we didn't see anyone on it) and we had the trail all to ourselves. Anyway, about 3 hours in it started to get a bit tougher...then a bit tougher and on and on! 6 hours later we arrived at the top and although absolutely knackered, the views over Queenstown were fantastic!


View over Queenstown

We needed an early night to recover from that, and the next day we had booked in for Jetboating and White water rafting on the Shotover river! Wow, the jetboating was unbelievable - so fast and almost hitting rock faces! Also, the 360 degree turns were coo, though we did get quite wet! After that we thought rafting would be a bit more relaxing - yeah right!!!!!
After getting kitted up in wetsuits (very flattering) we were taken to the top of the river by helicopter which was amazing! There were 6 people in our boat plus the guide and the trip started out quite calmly, with us practicing the strokes. We thought it was going to be a breeze, but then the rain started and we finally got to the rapids - grade 4 out of 6 for our first time, hmmmmm! Needless to say we both went for a swim in the freezing river (Nath out of choice, Stace basically just flew out of the raft)! Definately something we'll be doing again, but perhaps when its a little warmer (we've still not had much luck with the weather)!


Shotover Jet Boat

The next day Stace had booked in to do a bungy jump - basically thought the best thing to do was to pick the highest one so we went on the trip to the Nevis cable car jump! Its basically a static cable car suspended 134metres above a valley - scary!!!! Due to Naths fear of heights, he decided to show support and to just come along and watch - big mistake! Once you're there its very hard not to get swept along with it and so both ended up doing it - Nath actually being the second person out of our group to do it! OH MY GOD, it was unbelievable!!!! We got some video footage but didnt' manage to get any photos - luckily (or stupidly) we were able to buy them there - check us out on website http://www.ajhackett.com/. Click on daily photos and enter the codes: AJHN611123640356 for Stace's and AJHN611123540326 for Naths!



Looking down from Bungy Cable Car, and the jumps

Right, after a thrillseeking few days we decided it might be better to slow down so we headed further south to Te Anau to check out the beautiful scenery at Milford and Doubtful Sound. We've just arrived here now so are going to go for dinner and a few drinks before heading out on a boat trip tomorrow. We'll update you all very soon. Also, just to let you know that the comments button does work so look forward to hearing from you!

Our very own 'home from home'

Well, what can we say? We are now the proud owners of a VW campervan with a fridge and a flushing toilet!!!! We arrived in Christchurch on Tuesday afternoon, a little worse for wear from the long flights - when we arrived at our hotel we planned to have a quick 'power nap' before heading out to explore....unfortunately we slept on through for a whole 18 hours (for those of you who know Stace well that was the norm for her)!!!! Anyway, we awoke feeling much better and excited to be picking up our new home and to start our trip properly!

Finally hit the road on Wednesday lunchtime (after a quick provisions stop) and headed down towards Lake Takepo in the glorious sunshine. However, just over an hour down the road we got pummelled by tennis ball size hailstones so had to wait for that to clear (nothing to do with Nath nearly skidding off the road..)! Arrived at the Lake early evening - the views were fantastic! However, within half an hour the clouds started drawing in and then it started to snow - heavily (you can see a trend starting here..)! Pitched down for a cold night, (which wasn't actually too bad), and set sail again this morning, heading for Queenstown! The drive was stunning, lots of snow capped mountains and crystal clear lakes, however we did get held up for an hour along part of the road as they were blasting some of the rocks (luckily we'd made a quick cider stop earlier so actually missed being crushed - phew)!

Here now in Queenstown, which is so nice. Currently still deciding which death defying activities to partake in (still trying to convince Nath to do a bungy)! Will give you a full update in a few days. Also are going trekking tomorrow for the first time - we're preparing for lots of arguments along the way (Stace is not the best for navigating...)!

Oh, almost forgot, fitted another shopping trip in today, we're starting to think we have a serious problem!!!

Speak to you all very soon!!

N&S
xxx

We've arrived....

Kia ora,

We have finally arrived in Auckland, feeling very tired after two long flights - luckily we stopped over in Los Angeles for a night to break it up a little. Spent the day in Santa Monica and went for a stroll along Muscle Beach before hitting the shops! Unfortunately we have pretty much spent our entire budget on clothes which we now have to lug around with us the next 6 weeks - oh dear! Had a very funny experience in the hotel - our bill came through for breakfast and they had only charged us for an adult and a child (Stace's youthful looks!)

Just waiting at Auckland airport for our transfer to Christchurch which should take about an hour thankfully! We have a night planned in a hotel before picking up our camper van tomorrow, which will be our home for the next five weeks.

Not much to say yet as we have spent most of our time on planes! But will be sure to update you once we have started our road trip.... (as I am driving I have let Stace be on toilet duty!)