Well it's good news, the technical department in Canada have managed to find a way to get the photos back in the text, so please enjoy the blog back in its original format.
Well we leave a windy Wellington on a sunny Wednesday morning ready for our smooth crossing to the South Island, Jan was pleased! The last hour of the three hour crossing is spent sailing down the Queen Charlotte Sound to Picton, very scenic and after leaving the windy Cook Strait, very warm.
Although we are now on the south island we are in actual fact no further south than what we were in Wellington, the top of the south island sits west of the north and it is much warmer much to our surprise, and hopefully long may it continue! We head off to Elaine Bay on the north coast where after an initial fine evening the winds return with vengeance, we were going to fish off the jetty the next day, but with the wind being so strong it was difficult to stand on it let alone fish off it.
By the evening the wind subsides and I try my luck, catching a couple of little yellow eyed mullet, which was more than the two other guys on the jetty were catching, oh & Jan hooked the bottom! From here we are off to the top of the south Island a place called Farewell Spit.
This spit is the longest sand spit in NZ some 35km’s long across the top of Golden Bay and yes when we arrive it’s blowing a hooley yet again. As there are no roads going around the northwest corner, we cut back inland and downwards towards the west coast, camping overnight at Lake Rotoroa. Here is our first introduction to sand flies, the booklet telling you about the campsites tells you to “take repellent for ferocious sand flies” and as soon as we stop the van they descend on to its outer sides like bees round a honey pot. Whilst walking around the Lake their not to bad but as soon as you stop, well it’s open season and any exposed skin is a target, needless to say after our walk we don’t venture out of the van, but spend our time watching others draw up opening their doors and getting eaten alive! One young couple even running around in circles while cooking trying to evade the little ----------!!!! We hopefully leave the sand flies behind and travel down the Buller Gorge, walking across the longest swing bridge in NZ during the process. For our return journey we take the tandem flying fox, which due to Jan’s extra weight (I’m wafer thin don’t forget) helps us go even faster.
We spend the night at Jack’s Gasthof, a bar and pizzeria that also does overnight camp sites for the princely sum of $10 about £4.40. The local brew was excellent the first decent dark ale I’ve tasted since leaving England, and although the pizzas were his specialty I’ve been at least two weeks without a steak, so there was no contest. The next day we are off to do the west coast road, which according to the Lonely Planet and I quote “SH6 along the surf pounded coastline proffers fine Tasman Sea views; so fine that Lonely Planet’s Blue List dubbed the west coast highway one of the planets 10 best road trips.” So yes we were looking forward to this drive, the only problem being that the weather has again closed in, in actual fact not only was it raining (pouring) but the cloud cover had dropped down to road level, making the fine Tasman Sea views just a little difficult to appreciate!!!
Anyway you win some you lose some we can’t expect two years of travel not to have it’s hiccups, even if they all seem to be happening in New Zealand, at least Greymouth certainly lived up to it’s name as we passed through it on our way down the coast.
This coast road ends at Tai Poutini National Park, famous for its two biggest highlights the Franz Josef & Fox Glaciers. We walked on Bhaltar glacier when we were in Pakistan but only at the terminal end of it, this time I was hoping to take a helicopter ride to get further up a glacier so that we could get to see the blue ice near the top. I say I because Jan as you well know is not the best flier, and so although she wanted to see the glacier was far more hesitant! Both glaciers move at approximately 10 times the speed of any other valley glaciers around the world about one metre a day. The reason for this is due to the funnel like shape of the glacial valley and the huge neve, the snow accumulation area, at the top of the glacier, which due to the endless rain that falls on the west coast (don’t we just know it!) makes for perfect conditions, so much so, that both glaciers have been advancing for the past 25 years. We arrive in the rain at Franz Josef and walk to the terminal end, this is supposed to be the more superior ice experience, but with the bad weather and higher than average camp fees, we drive on to the Fox Glacier and spend the next 30 hours waiting for the weather to improve so that we can fly up onto the glacier. We past some of the time by walking to the terminal end of the Fox glacier in the rain, Ralph this isn’t one of your wheelbarrows is it!
The afternoon is spent walking around Lake Matheson, the most photographed lake in NZ trying to capture Mount Cooks reflection in the lake along with the cloud!!!
So here we are, finally a morning where you wake up and can see the sun and clear blue sky it looks like the wait was well worth it! Until one of the helicopters develops a fault after power up and has to be shut down and checked out, this all in front of a very nervous Jan.
So it’s at about this stage that my wife is leaving and walking back to the town to wait for me there, but after some more reassuring that the pilot has no intention of getting himself killed along with the rest of us, she allows herself to be shoe horned onto our awaiting death trap (according to Jan). It turns out that it was only a defective radio (so they say) and we are on our way in no time at all. It’s the first time I have flown in a helicopter this small, and what a pleasant surprise, it is a bit like sitting in an armchair and being smoothly whizzed around the skies, even Jan opened her eyes on the return journey and actually smiled (never been known to happen in flight before!).
We land about halfway up the glacier and spend two and a half hours walkabout on the glacier seeing some wonderful caves, waterfalls and blue ice, another experience that will stay with us forever.
After such a good morning we head south through some stunning scenery (fellow overlanders will know what I mean!)
finding a camp spot at the viewing point overlooking Queenstown and the lake. Our first free camp since arriving in NZ, which is quite disappointing really, as we were led to believe that freedom camping is a big thing in NZ, but after seeing all the “NO CAMPING” signs we have realised that the Kiwi’s are even worse than Western Australians for their use of these signs. But never mind, this view point didn’t have any “NO CAMPING” signs and so we stop the night at Crown Range Pass, 1076 metres high, right next to the highest bit of sealed tarmac in NZ, this pass was first used by sheep herders in the late 1800’s, then by gold seekers, now by the Jell’s finding their first free camp in NZ.
Queenstown is where our daughter Charlotte spent several months living and working a couple of years ago, and we were interested to see some of the places that she has spoken about. There were no signs up saying “JELL’S NOT WELCOME” so they seem to have recovered from her visit!! This is our second day of good weather on the trot, my we are lucky, the difference a bit of blue sky makes, just like being back in England. After spending the day exploring and shopping (Xmas cards it has to be done wherever you are in the world), we head off to Milford sound where we have a late deal overnight cruise booked for the next night, there is only the one road to Milford Sound which we plan to drive nice and slowly because they say it has the sort of scenery that makes drivers swerve wildly off the road for, as they reach for their cameras! We are not disappointed with repeated stops for photo shots of waterfalls and snow capped mountains that in places reach right down to the roadside.
As we found out that night on the cruise this road is the most dangerous road for avalanches in the world and it is regularly closed during the winter & spring months, especially up by the Homer tunnel where you wait 15 minutes for the traffic lights to change, last year they had to set an avalanche off because of the build up of snow above the tunnel, it took two days for the diggers to clear the tunnel entrance not much chance of seeing the green light if you get caught in that then!
Milford Sound itself is out of this world, towering cloud covered sides covered in waterfalls, which considering they get in excess of six metres of rain a year here, is hardly surprising.
Our boat the Milford Mariner is very luxurious, probably the best cruise we’ve done so far, with it only being two thirds full we enjoy the extra space and the all you can it dinner buffet and breakfast, the only consistent thing with all our cruises is the bar bill at the end! The evenings in NZ are much like in the UK and it stays light until about ten o’clock at night in the summer, so we take advantage of being zipped around the sound in a fast launch to spot dolphins, seals and penguins, and it didn’t even rain once on us, our luck is hopefully changing.
Fully recharged and relaxed after our overnight cruise it’s back to the camper and the long road to Invercargill famous for Burt Munro and his motorbike the fastest Indian, made into a film in 2005. Too far for us to rush it in a day, so we stop at a Department of Conservation campsite next to Lake Monowai, late that afternoon. Settling down for the night a rustling sound can be heard from the front of the vehicle, our rubbish bag seems to be alive, yes I think we have a visitor (or at least Jan did I was soundly asleep). Well picture the scene, it’s one o’clock in the morning, it’s now raining hard and my wife is not happy, which in turn ensures that I am both awake and not happy either! We opt for the easy option throwing out the bag of rubbish, which we will sort out in the morning once all the other animals have dragged it around the campsite! So this should be it then, peace and quiet, not quite, it appears the mouse did not leave with the rubbish but is now on a tour of our vehicle running over my arm as I lay in bed in the process. The next hour is spent trying to track our little friend down which in a long wheelbase transit camper is not an easy thing to do to many holes to hide in. We eventually restrict his movements to the rear of the vehicle and then put our dastardly plan of a bit of cheese in a cardboard box to trap him into operation. Sure enough after about ten minutes he goes for the bait and we have him, Jan threw the box out so hard I thought it was going to into orbit, make sure he doesn’t come back I heard her muttering. So it’s now two o’clock in the morning & we both finally settle down to sleep, well almost. I glance down and there he is popping his little head up inside the back doors, not only does this transit let dust passed the seals, it also lets mice pass as well!! So after managing to quickly open the rear doors forcing him out, we opt to drive further down to the boat launching ramp, and park in the middle of a large puddle (the rain is good for something) hoping that this little mouse hasn’t got a boat in which he can sail across to us in!!! Our last week is spent cruising around the coastal roads taking in the sights of the Catlins. The beaches and rocky outcrops on this part of the coast have numerous colonies of Fur Seals and Sea Lions, which we enjoy being able to watch and get up close to,
in their own environment, as well as visiting the most southerly point of the South Island.
Dunedin with it’s steepest street in the world with a gradient of 1: 2.86, which just to check our
hearts are still functioning correctly we manage to walk to the top of without the aid of a oxygen mask!!
From Dunedin we drive to Christchurch our final stop before flying out of NZ, we again experience all the elements in one day from a perfect sunny morning with lovely views across Lake Tekapo towards Mount Cook to an hour later driving through a hail storm with all the fields covered in hailstones, and all this on my birthday perhaps next year the weather will be better, back in England!!!
Christchurch and the comfort of a hotel room for our last two nights in NZ, here we spend a day on the Tranzalpine railway, crossing from coast to coast through the Southern Alps to Greymouth, at least the weather was much nicer than the last time we passed through. Unfortunately a lot of the snow had melted up at Arthur’s Pass and so we didn’t get to see it in all it’s glory but I’m sure the Canadian Rockies will more than make up for this later on. New Zealand has been our most disappointing country so far, it’s not the country itself but a combination of factors that together have made our experience less enjoyable than anticipated, firstly my parents were meant to be joining us for the tour but due to my father’s motorcycle accident were unable to make it, but good news he is now making a very good recovery and will probably be back on his other bike before we return next year. What with the defective camper that we first had and the fight to get some joy out of the company, coupled with the relentless bad weather and the not very friendly local councils with their “no camping signs”,
has made what could have been very enjoyable, into very difficult at times. So we leave the southern hemisphere supposedly in its summer, but after the size of the hail stones yesterday and the very chilly overnight temperatures we have to wonder! Heading off to Vancouver for a taste of real winter chilly temperatures, let’s hope our winter clothes have arrived ahead of us, because my shorts have certainly struggled in New Zealand. We wish all our readers a very merry Xmas and a happy new year wherever you may be on this planet, and to both new friends and old we look forward to meeting up again at some point in the future.
