Glacier Country!

We headed EVEN FURTHER south on the West Coast and entered Glacier Country - home to a number of New Zealand's glaciers - most famous of which are Franz Josef Glacier and Fox Glacier. Both myself and Su weren't in the mood for any hiking (thanks to numerous sand fly bites to the ankles - Feckers!) so most of our photos are from a distance. You'll get the idea anyway - massive ice flows coming down mountains:

The photo above is of Franz Josef glacier. The next one is also a photo of Franz Josef glacier but taken from a place called Peter's Pool:

Despite the name, I didn't have any urge to swim in (no doubt) freezing Peter's Pool.

Then we went to Fox Glacier! No sign of any polar bear sitting on this Fox Glacier (sorry):

You get a sense of size of the glaciers from this photo - the little dots on the bottom right hand corner are people. Normal sized people at that - not little people!

Su reckoned that this glacier could do with a cleaning as it wasn't as white as Franz Josef.

Then we drove further south again and just as we thought we were leaving Glacier Country we rounded a bend and saw this:

This is Mount Hooker (hey, I didn't make up the name) and it also has a glacier on top. Hooker Glacier to be exact!

So that's it for the day - we're all glaciered out now and ready for our next stop: Queenstown! Backpacker central! We're looking forward to chilling out and maybe hitting the town for a night or two. Look out!!

Punakaiki and the Mystery of the Unsolved Pancakes

The pizzeria outside Charleston turned out to be a little stranger than we had imagined. We went in to check it out and found it run by eccentric heavy metal loving Germans. After having a pizza each (which were very nice) and a glass of wine we found the bar attached (with a disco ball), full of local New Zealanders and the hosts (about 6 people in total). We got the impression that the night could be a late one so we had a drink or two each and chatted to the people at the bar (one guy had family from Inis Boffin!) and got out of there when the music turned from Motor Head to German techno. It was all a bit odd. We filled Hyacinth full of water and headed off to Punakaiki to solve the riddle of the Pancake Rocks.

Now for the science bit: Through a layering-weathering process called stylobedding, the Dolomite Point limestone of Punakaiki has formed into what looks like piles of thick pancakes.

No one knows why this happens here so that's the mystery. Satisfied that erosion was the answer we took more photos:

At certain times when the tide is right the sea surges into caverns and comes out of blowholes (didn't happen while we were there).

If the rocks aren't impressive enough for you, you can imagine them in shapes of animals and people! What fun!

The hours we spent there imagining different things! The craic we had! Finally exhausted we took off and have stopped off at Lake Mahinapua for the night. We are heading to the Glaciers soon so stay tuned!

Nelson Lakes to Golden Bay

Quick update with a few nice photographs - we're currently on the West coast of the South Island after leaving Nelson Lakes (after our long hikes... yeah right) and drove up to the north of the South Island to Golden Bay. We took a nice photo of meself and the missus on the jetty at Lake Rotoiti - the other of the Nelson Lakes:

I felt like a bit of a spa sitting on the jetty by myself while Su set the auto-timer on her camera so excuse the grumpy face. Still a nice photo though!

We got to our chosen resting place in Golden Bay late enough in the evening. We saw a nice beach with a jacks nearby and made ourselves at home.

The beach is called Tata Beach (so Su tells me) and it seems to be a hotspot for motor boats, jet skis, and water skiers. Su showed me one of her hidden talents and rocked the water skis:

The seasoned water skiers on the beach were gob-smacked and in total awe of her abilities. Shortly after this photo was taken she did a triple back somersault and glided perfectly onto the beach and stepped out of the water skis to a rapturous round of applause. I've never seen anything like it (never).

After all that exertion, it was time to stop sunning ourselves and watch the sun go down. We stayed two nights at Tata Beach - no sand flies and lovely weather - you couldn't ask for more:

 

I think this is one of the better photographs I've taken. Anyway, we're just outside Charleston on the West Coast now - at a pizzeria that has a camp site attached! It's great! We might even splash out and go for a pizza being the crazy things that we are. Hope all are well!

Kiakoura to Nelson Lakes

We left the sunny weather of Kaikoura to take a trip further north-west to Nelson Lakes. On the way out of Kaikoura we passed a Seal colony and Su took this wonderful photo (she's got a great eye! Two, in fact.)

Not sure if that's a Seal in the background. Pretend it is anyway.

Then, after a few hours driving, the weather took a turn for the worse but we arrived at the first of the Nelson Lakes: Lake Rotoroa. The light was fading but I managed to get this hastily-taken shot:

It was hastily-taken, not because of the fading light though, but because of the feckin' swarms of sand flies that feasted on me as soon as I left the van. The little feckers were everywhere and it was like something out of a horror movie with myself and Su huddled in the van for the night burning insect repellent incense. Our Lonely Planet book of New Zealand now has a nice join-the-dots puzzle on the cover where dozens of sand flies have met their demise. Did I mention that they are feckers?

We awoke the next morning to rain, rain and more rain. We went for a short walk and got rained on and that was about the highlight of the day. We had four games of "20 Questions" - the score is 2-all so it's close. I'll let you know if either of us edge ahead at any time. The weather is promised good for tomorrow so we're determined to go for a proper hike and take some decent photos of the place. I know, us hiking - WTF?? Stay tuned!!

The South Island and Whites Bay

After two days of idling around Wellington (we did some shopping - Su bought prezzies and I bought a book - I've read Harry Potter in two days) we got the ferry over to Picton on the South Island of New Zealand. We hung around Picton for a while to stock up on the essentials (Shhhhpuds, Shhhhalad, and Shhhausages) and made out way down the south-east coast to the Whites Bay DOC Recreation Reserve where we were promised (according to the DOC Conservation Campsites booklet), hot showers, picnic areas, and bins for our increasing rubbish. The showers were cold unfortunately and were housed in "Blair Witch" style concrete loos which Su had a problem going in to after dark (not that I blame her) and there were no bins but don't get us wrong, we weren't complaining. The setting was, again, lovely:

Su rustled up yet another fantastic meal (10 points to those who can guess what it was? Spuds, Salad, and..... SAUSAGES!) I tell you - that woman can make the best meals out of the most basic of ingredients - she should make her mother proud) and then we settled down to a few episodes of Grey's Anatomy on the laptop (can you believe that McDreamy was already married!! We were shocked!! I think I need some male company soon...). Between episodes we had a peek out the curtain to see the moon rising. Very rose-mantic!

Getting the new battery for Hyacinth in Rotorua has been a Godsend - it has been 9 days now without plugging in and today has been the first time the 'electric' has run out. After spending another day in Whites Bay getting burned to a crisp (well - I did, Su had the good sense to put on sun screen early enough. I'm ok though - don't worry about me...), we headed further south along the east coast to Kaikoura to plug in to a campsite, recharge Hyacinth, and hit the town. Once we got to Kaikoura we stopped off at a seafood barbecue and had a lunch of Crayfish fritters, garlic Scallops, and garlic Mussels - TAS-TEE! We also met an Irish couple (Ken and Lorraine) who have been to a lot of the places we are planning to go to and updated us on the hip-hop-happening places to go in South-East Asia. So here we are now in the campsite - the fridge is up to full strength again, the beers are nice and cold, Su has had the hot shower she has been looking forward to since Wellington, I've got the blog up-to-date, we're both healthy and happy and life is good. We're treating ourselves to a meal tonight so fish and chips it is. Hope everyone is getting on well at home and you're enjoying the updates! Be sure to leave comments - it's always nice to hear from everyone!

Kaitoke Regional Park and Rivendell

The plan was to go to a place called Paraparaumu today, which is the principal town of the Kapiti Coast, and spend some time on the beach but the weather was so miserable by the time we got there and after driving around for two hours trying to find a campsite we decided to cut our loses and have a look on the map for another campsite. We found one in a place called Kaitoke Regional Park which seemed about 40 kilometres away and after consulting our guidebook we discovered that it was where the Rivendell scenes from Lord of the Rings were shot (this won't mean a thing to a lot of you). Anyway, we headed off and perhaps three hours later, after driving through some of the most mountainous and winding roads I've ever been on, we got there. And just to reward us for our strenuous efforts, the weather cleared up just as we got there! The campsite was pretty reasonable aswell and had a power socket (so I could charge up the laptop) and an outdoor kitchen with barbecues. We had a quick drive around to find the part of the park where the Rivendell scenes were shot...

If's it's not recognisable it's because they built a big scaffold towards the right of the river where the set was - you might be able to see it on the photo of the notice board below...

... and then we found our campsite for the night and cooked dinner on the barbie provided. This evenings meal consisted of a starter of around 4 beers, followed by steak seasoned with salt and pepper, sliced barbecued potato slices, carrot sticks cooked in oil and balsamic, and barbecued corn on the cob cooked in butter. Dessert was the starriest sky we've ever seen and a glass of wine or two while watching the Lord of the Rings (part 1) on the laptop. Scene of the crime so to speak.

The next day was a scorcher aswell so I decided to have a dip in the morning.

The water was unbelievably cold but there were people watching so I forced a smile for the camera.

Off to Wellington now for a few days before heading to the South Island on the ferry. More to follow from the South Island and please keep leaving the comments - it's great to hear from all of you!

Ohakune, Waitonga Falls, and Gravity Canyon

Su recently got a new camera so we were a bit snap-happy lately. As New Zealand is such a beautiful country and the area we are in is particularly beautiful, it is proving very difficult to sort through which photos to post up on the blog. I think this photo does the place justice though:

The reason Su is standing beside a massive carrot (by the side of the road incidentally) is because we have travelled through Ohakune which is the North Islands top ski location and also New Zealand's carrot capital. Don't be fooled though - the carrot in the photo isn't real - I have broken teeth to prove it.

We were feeling particularly energetic (must be the mountain air) so we decided we would trek to Waitonga Falls. The photos in the information centre we went to were spectacular so we decided it was worth the expended energy. After a stunning walk of a whole 40 minutes (well... it was uphill) we finally got to the Falls:

 

You might notice a distinct lack of water here - so did we. I might photo-shop this photo later to add in torrents of water. It was a nice walk nonetheless and besides, this is the view we had from our camper van the next day:

I also promised in the last blog that I would show a better photo of Mount Ngauruhoe (Mount Doom to those film fans) and here it is - again partly obscured by cloud but that's as good as it got:

We passed by a bungy place on our travels called Gravity Canyon. As we were walking up to have a look before deciding whether to actually partake, we saw an old man and his son (in his 30's I'd say) come towards us deep in conversation. The son was saying "So the cable is faulty! Wow!" before looking up at us and saying "Oh hello there!" with a big smile on his face. Joking or not, that was enough to put us off and doubly so when we saw this:

The old guy seemed genuinely disappointed when we said we weren't doing it.

We stayed in a place called Hunterville that night - which had a free campsite. I think it also had a pub.

We are off further south tomorrow for some beach-side fun!