Category — New Zealand Adventures

Its been a while since I blogged. First of all, thanks for being patient. As some of you may know, I was away for 9 days for mid-semester break on a trip to the south island. I will try my best to recap the past week.

Day 1:
Skipped my afternoon classes to catch my flight out of Auckland to Christchurch. The flight was barely over an hour. We had a camper reserved for pick up, but the rental place closed at 4:30. We didn’t have time to find a cheaper alternative to getting transport into the city. We ended up having to get a cab and just making it in time. We rented from a company called Wicked Campers. They can be spotted all over NZ. The campers all have customized paint jobs and a silly quote spray painted on the back. Ours was called ‘Road Kill’ and came complete with a kitchen table, fold out chairs, a sink in the back, a gas camping stove, a cooler, the back seat turned into a full size bed, and sexy pink fuzzy handcuffs (check out the pictures once I get them up). It was starting to get dark once we went grocery shopping and filled up on gas so we decided to hunt down a place to crash for the night. We headed for Akaroa which is a peninsula not far from the city. It took about an hour and half to get there as I recall, but most of the time was spent trying to figure out how to escape Christchurch. We decided to camp at one of the many bays that surround the area. Naturally we got lost and ended up following a steep narrow dirt road into the mountains with cows and sheep littering the road. EEK. After about 20 minutes of that we decided it was time to turn around and try to find another bay. We found one 30 minutes down the road from where we got lost. Camped on the beach that night.

Day 2:
Slept in. Started up the car and headed back to Christchurch for the day to explore the city and the last real civilization we would see for a few days. We walked around the Cathedral Square (saw a crazy lady), ate at a vegetarian restaurant (naturally), went to an aquarium and a kiwi bird sanctuary, and walked around the city’s botanical gardens. Kiwi birds are the national bird and very rare since they are endangered. NZ is the only place in the world where they live. They are big, goofy, long beaked, flightless birds. They are very elusive and nocturnal, so we made it a point to try to see them since we had the opportunity. We headed for Kaikoura to spend the night. It was about a 3 ? 4 hour drive north that night. We drove around and finally found a place to camp at a random pull off on the side of the road.

Day 3:
Kaikoura is a famous surf town in the South Island. Katie really wanted me to teach her to surf, so the first order of business was to rent some wetsuits and surf boards. Once we found the local surf spot we realized that it wasn’t a beach, but rather rocks. Not the ideal place to learn to surf. We didn’t have water shoes and our feet got pretty cut up. Katie didn’t really have any luck and I can’t blame her. I had a hard time myself. After a little over a hour of getting beaten by rocks and eaten by sand flies we gave up. Kaikoura is also known for its seal colonies. After lunch we went out in search of some wild seals. We came across some really cool cliff faces along the coast and decided to scramble up them for the view. We then set out for our next destination, Arthur’s Pass. Arthur’s Pass is the scenic drive through the Southern Alps. We wanted to see it during the day, so we set up camp that night just before we got there.

Day 4:
We got up bright and early and hit the road. The drive was amazing. We found ourselves having to stop every 15 minutes to take pictures and to let it sink in. The mountains were enormous and humbling. The road would curve around them in the valleys bellow. Since there is a massive drought here in NZ, all of the river beds were strangely bare. At about noon we got to the base of Avalanche Peak with the intent to do a day hike. The mountain is 1833m (6110ft) and overlooks a huge portion of the Southern Alps. It took about two hours to reach the summit. The views were spectacular. Some of the neighbouring peaks had snow caps. It was the first time we had seen snow since we left Boston in that snow storm, about two months ago. We headed to our next destination exhausted from the hike and went to bed early at a pay camp site (which, we got away with not paying).

Day 5:
Since we didn’t plan to do the hike the day before, we were a little behind schedule of our loose itinerary for the trip. We arrived at Franz Josef Glacier and did a short 1 hour hike up to the base of the glacier. I don’t think that I have ever seen one up close. Unfortunately, since we were behind where we wanted to be, we didn’t hike the glacier. It’s probably for the best, since the only way to do it is with a tour company. About an hour down the road was Fox Glacier. We didn’t spend much time here either since we had a lot of ground to cover. Our next stop was at Lake Matheson. It was a 45 minute walk to the other side of the lake, were we could see a perfect reflection of Mt. Cook and Mt. Tasman in the water. How picturesque. Since we got away with not paying we set camp that night at another pay camp site.

Day 6:
We were awoken by an obese man knocking on our trailer demanding payment for the night’s stay. Guess that didn’t go as planned. We drove around to see some of the sites where Lord of the Rings was filmed. I’m not sure if I was able to pick out specific scenes. Oh well. We got to Queeenstown in the early afternoon. Here we met up with some friends from Uni and used the shower in their hostel. First and only formal shower of the trip. Felt good. We then walked around the town and explored. Queenstown is know as the adrenalin capital of the world. If you have ever thought of doing something crazy, this was the place to do it. We had some time to kill before our bungy jump. We then hopped back in the car and drove out to the Kawarau Bridge just outside of town for our jump (sorry I didn’t tell you mom, it was probably for the best). This was the worlds first commercial bungy, with a 43m fall over a river. We had the option to do a water touch, where you hit the water on your jump. We both took advantage of this option, but unfortunately neither of us were heavy enough for it to work. I was surprisingly calm for the whole thing. The jump was sort of short and anti climactic. Before I realized what was going on, it was over. Apparently I was told that since I jumped out really hard I had a cool jump. I bounced all over the place. Once I got off, I found that several buses of Korean tourists had parked just in time for my jump. They were all clapping for me as I walked by and saying stuff to me I couldn’t understand. It was all a bit humbling and uncomfortable. Oh well. We headed back to Queenstown for dinner and to say bye to our friends. Our next destination was a long drive, so we hit the road earlier than usual. We almost ran out of gas just before our destination for the night. That was a little nerve wrecking, since most gas stations in the boonies close early. We set up camp along the shore in a small town called Te Anau with fumes left for gas. Some sort of possum/evil monkey was climbing the trees near our camper all night making weird noises.

Day 7:
We drove towards Milford Sound through mountain roads again. Very scenic and we once again found ourselves stopping quite often to take pictures. The road went through a mountain. Really cool. It was about 3 km in a tunnel and we came out on the other side of enormous cliff face. Milford Sound was beautiful but we were disappointed with how touristy it was. We wanted to rent kayaks and explore on our own, but found that this wasn’t possible without a pricey tour. We ended up just taking a boat tour of the sound and visiting the underwater observatory. We then had a 5+ hour drive to Dunedin, so we headed out while there was still sunlight. That night we camped at the end of a peninsula outside of Dunedin.

Day 8:
We woke up and hiked down the jetty that we had camped near. We walked down in search of penguins. Unfortunately we didn’t find any, but rather a small group of seals. We got pretty close until they got irate. That was our cue to leave them alone. We walked around on the beach for a bit before heading into Dunedin. We found an amazing cafe/rock club that severed vegetarian breakfasts and had free internet. I wish we had something like that in Auckland. We then had a tour of the Cadbury chocolate factory. Lots of free chocolate and I have to say that I was much more impressed than I was with Hershey’s in PA. We sat in the lawn in front of the famous railway house for a bit and did some people/tourist watching (always fun). We hopped in the van and went to another peninsula in search of penguins, once again, no success. Back to Christchurch it was, since we had a sky dive scheduled for the morning. We camped at a boat launch outside of a little suburb called Lyttelton.

Day 9:
We woke in the morning to high winds and some rain. The jump was pushed back to later afternoon in hopes of better weather. We now had some time to kill, so we headed into Lyttelton for a vegetarian breakfast. I really liked this small town. It was very friendly and had a sort of New England feel to it. I got a haircut at the local barber shop. We headed back into Christchurch so that Katie could get one too. Just as she finished we called up the sky dive place and were told the weather was not going to cooperate. So no skydiving for us. Bummer. We had some lunch along the water and walked around Christchurch for the rest of the day and then headed back to Lyttelton again to crash for the last night.

Day 10:
Flew back to Auckland in the morning. Nothing too exciting. There are A LOT of pictures to sort through. I’ll try my best to get them up soon. I may just do a little bit at a time so bare with me.

Nothing really exciting to report of the last week. I basically hung around Auckland all week and wrote papers for each of my classes. All of which are due at the same time this week before we go on mid-semester break. Yesterday (Sunday) I was signed up to have an all day kite surfing class. We headed out to a beach on the east coast in the morning. It was a really nice and sunny day. After a few hours of learning how to fly the kites and learning kite surfing theory, we were ready to head into the water to learn how to use the kites for power strokes to get out of the water. Unfortunately the all of the wind died. So… we just went home. I have to reschedule and hope there’s wind. Bummer.

Thursday after class, we’re hopping on a plane and headed for Christchurch in the South Island. We rented a camper van in hopes to save money on hostels. I think were just going to wing it again and see all that we can during our week off of classes. If I can get on a computer I’ll try to post an update during the week.

I haven’t been able to make any updates recently since I have been busy with Easter break shenanigans. Good Friday was a day to run around and catch up with some errands that needed to get done. It seemed that Lena and I were the only people around that weekend. We didn’t want to spend too much money, so we did two budget day trips for the weekend.

Saturday we woke up bright and early to catch the first Ferry to Waiheke Island. After about only a 45 minute ride, we arrived in chaos, as all the busses were leaving the harbour at the same time. They only ran hourly so we had to figure out what we were going to do fast. We hopped on a crowded bus that was headed for the main town and the closest beach on the island. We still had no idea where to get off, so we just hopped off at the first sign of civilization. The beach was right around the corner, but it was a little too early in the day and we still had a lot to see before we did some lounging in the sun. Once we got off, all of the buses flew by. We were stuck for the next hour, so we decided to go by foot. We hiked the along the main road for a little over an hour. It was sunny and hot, but scenic. I bought some honey from some guy that looked like a pirate who was selling jams and such on the side of the road. It came from Coromandel (his brother’s honey). It looked legit and home-made. (Several days later I heard in the news of an outbreak of toxic honey in Coromandel so I had to chuck it. Shame.) The journey continued to the next beach. We layed around and played Frisbee for about two hours. We then caught a bus headed further east twords the famous vineyards on Waiheke. We were ready to go wine tasting for the rest of the evening. The first wineries was great. We sampled four wines and Lena bought some amazing home-made pesto. The rest of the wine tasting turned out to be a disappointment. All of the other wineries wanted us to pay to sample the wines. Pshh! So much for a budget day. So we hopped a bus and ferry and headed back to Auckland to make dinner with the new pesto. Pictures are posted from this day.

Sunday we started the morning the same way. We got up nice and early to catch a ferry. Today we were headed to Rangitoto Island for some hiking. Rangitoto was formed by volcanic eruptions. The hike was up a mountain towards a crater. We hiked through a mild forest which would often open into feilds of volcanic rock. We made a detour 3/4 of the way up to see a lava cave that was created by… you guessed it, lava. The summit had a trail that circled the crater with views of surrounding islands and Auckland. Had our lunch at the peak and decided that we were sick of tourist hikers crowding the trail. We made the decision to take a different trail back to the pier that way we could avoid backtracking and seeing other people panting and wheezing with fanny packs. The hike back took about an hour and a half and was exactly what we expected. It was great. We got back to the pier to catch a ferry back to Auckland and once again make dinner. We were Exhausted. Pictures are also posted from this trip.

Monday – Friday was my big surf trip that I had planned long before leaving for NZ. The trip was overbooked. I was asked to drive a few people under the condition that the company rented and paid for a car for me. In return I would get a $100 discount on the trip. I agreed. Woke up nice and early Monday to pick up the car and meet the group. The guide’s name was Rangi (named after the island I had hiked on the day before… cool!) I drove 5 hours North following the van to the Northland peninsula. We made several stops along the way to pick up some people who weren’t in Auckland. We arrived at an amazing bungalow right on the beach in Shipwreck Bay. There was 11 of us including myself. I was the only American which was pretty cool. 4 Kiwis (Rangi, his wife, and two other Aucklanders), 1 Swiss, 1 Canadian, 1 Guy from Spain, 1 Taiwanese girl, and 2 Swedes. We made for a fun and interesting bunch. We got right to surfing that evening for what few hours were left in the day. I was able to get up on my board relatively easily. Man, surfing is tiring. After a few hours we were all beat. It rained the whole next day. But no mater, we surfed all day anyway. No sunburns and fresh water coming down was refreshing while spending all day in the ocean. By the end of day two everyone was able to get up constantly in white water (the wave as it foams after it breaks.)

Day 3: more of the same, I started learning to hit some bigger waves and control the surfboard well. After a 3 hour surf session, we did some skirfing. There was a small stream about 100 yards up the beach in the sand. Rang puled the truck onto the sand and tied a rope to the back. We basically did what resembles wake boarding in this stream but behind a truck rather than a boat and on a short surfboard with no bindings. I was first up and got it down pretty quickly. I got to drive the truck for everyone else. Makes me miss my rover back home. Thursday I started to get ambitious and pushed myself to catch the bigger waves before they break. It was a painful and frustrating day. I was not able to stay up. I did learn to surf backwards and do a headstand on the surfboard! That night we had a dance party in the bungalow. Fun times. Friday morning we went out for one last surf session before heading back to Auckland. I was determined to catch the waves I had been trying so hard to get. I was able to catch two of them and ride them to shore. Good way to end the week. Pictures will be up shortly. Check back for them.