"If you ever find yourself lost in the woods, build a house. 'Well, I was lost, but now I live here -- I have severely improved my predicament.'"
-Mitch HedbergBack from
spring autumn break! Oh, it was pretty crazy. Lots of traveling, lots of money spent, and lots of fun had. It was me traveling with Ashley and three of her friends from Uni for the first week, then me traveling alone for the second week. It was really good to drive all around the south island. Besides Abel Tasman, I have now been to visited every part of the south island that I wanted to.
In order to best tell the tale of my entire journey, I'll recap day by day, with a picture for every day. A couple are borrowed.
Saturday, March 22nd: I saved most of my packing until the morning of my flight, which was a pretty bad idea. I ended up leaving out a few important things including the
Lonely Planet, anything to write in, a book besides
The Life of Pi, water bottle, and heaps of other small things that would have been helpful. Caught my flight around noon, then got into Christchurch and met up with Ashley and Jess at Cathedral Square. We walked around town and got some food that evening, then stayed in Cokers backpackers.
Sunday: I picked up the car early morning. Half expecting a crappy car, I was surprised with a Holden Commodore. We headed out from Christchurch, drove through Arthur's Pass, and ended up in Franz Josef that night, after driving down a nice section of coast.
Monday: We took a guided tour of the Franz Josef glacier. While it wasn't very
entertaining per-say, it was interesting. Hiking on a giant glacier is quite the experience. We stayed at the same backpackers in Franz Josef that night, and I slept in the lounge because one of our roommates wouldn't stop snoring. I only remember two nights my entire trip that there wasn't someone who snored loudly in my room.
Tuesday: We got an early start, and headed to Queenstown. Not a very exciting day, minus the misjudging of the petrol gauge, and almost running out of fuel. We got into Queenstown in the afternoon, checked into the Hippo Lodge, and checked out the town.
Wednesday: We were up at 3:30AM! We booked the 9AM boat tour at Milford Sound, which is conveniently a 4 hour drive away from Queenstown. So when 4AM rolled around, we were already in the car on the way. We saw plenty of wildlife, including rabbits, possum, hedgehogs, keas, and maybe a kiwi. We saw far more animals than cars, encountering less than 20 autos on the road during the four hour ride. The Milford Cruise was very scenic. We saw seal pups and got sprayed with giant waterfalls. The Milford Sound is also located in a giant canyon, which was very cool. Drove back afterwards and stopped in Ta Anau for lunch. After we got back, it was a pretty lazy day.
Thursday: This was my lazy day. I didn't really do anything besides poorly planning the rest of my trip, going to the underwater observatory to see diving ducks and giant fish, and finishing
The Life of Pi. What a miraculous book. I suggest you read it.
Friday: I returned the rental car in the morning, then hung out until it was time to Bungy Jump at the Nevis. The Nevis is a 134 meter jump, which is currently the third highest in the world. It was an incredible rush. The feeling as you are free falling towards the bottom of a canyon is pretty unrivaled. Click the picture for a bigger version. That evening the girls and I went into town for gourmet pizza and dessert since it was their last night it Queenstown.
Saturday: The girls left and I was left wondering what to do. I decided to hike the hill that the Gondolas run up. It was a good hike, but I could barely bend my knee when I finally reached the top. I took the gondola down for free, then spent the rest of the day heating and icing my knee. How enthralling, I know.
Sunday: I picked up my next rental car from Jucy and realized I forgot one of my shirts at the Hippo Lodge. I went back to find one of the housekeepers trying to pocket it as their own, but I grabbed it away from them and left. I then drove from Queenstown to Dunedin, picking up a hitch-hiker on the way for company. He was from Chile, and a nice guy who had been working in Queenstown and was starting to travel. When we reached Dunedin after a long drive, I checked into On Top Backpackers and hung out for the rest of the night. I started a new book,
Overload, that I picked up in Queenstown for $2. Sorry, no photo here. I'll put two up for tomorrow.
Monday: I spent the day in Dunedin, doing two different types of tours. The first tour of the day was the Speights Brewery tour, which was very interesting and a great deal, as we were given about 20 minutes in the bar at the end, able to have any Speight's beer we wanted. I felt it necessary to try all the different kinds, and 6 glasses later I had done so. The apricot beer was really quite interesting, and didn't even really taste like beer, more like a soft drink. The second tour was the Elm Wildlife tour, which was very interesting. We left around 3, and first visited the Albatross watching area. After seeing a few Albatross and being amazed by their enormous wingspan, we traveled to a wildlife conservation area, where we viewed wild fur seals. There was a colony of a few hundred, who were doing everything from lying around lazily to playing in small pools. After the seal viewing, we walked over to the beach, where on the way down we saw a yellow eyed penguin standing in one spot, guarding his path. On the beach I got within a few meters of adult male sea lions, and watched them flop around lazily. We then walked over to a hide where we observed a group of yellow eyed penguins on the hillside, then watched as
a penguin came in from his day at sea. All very funny, and entertaining. The coolest thing is that they were all completely wild animals, not like those you'd see in a zoo. We got back to the backpackers around 9PM, leaving the trip duration at 6 hours. Not bad at all. The picture doesn't look too interesting at small size, so click on it and look a little closer, you may notice something.
Tuesday: I left Dunedin, but not before walking up the steepest street in the world, Baldwin Street (I’m not exaggerating, it’s in the Guinness Book of World Records). Yep, it’s a steep street. Not a whole lot else to say. After that I headed towards Christchurch, stopping in Oamaru to see the blue penguin colony but about 8 hours too early. The colony comes back in the evening, at dusk. After spending many hours on the road and listening to stations labeled as classic that were straight up pop music, I arrived in Christchurch again. I stayed in Cokers again that night, had sushi for dinner, and watched a bunch of movies with some Canadians.
Wednesday: I left Christchurch for Kaikoura after having a nice conversation with a couple from England about traveling NZ. Stopping only once at St. Anne’s Lagoon for lunch, I got to Kaikoura in a few hours. I booked myself in for two nights at the Dusky Lodge, and chilled out for the night after visiting the seal colony and getting growled at by them. The next two days were the big days.
Thursday: Thursday began the experience that is just too absolutely incredible to be explained in little detail. So I am warranting an entire post to it. Look to the next post for details.
Friday: Same deal for the beginning of the day, then I drove back to Christchurch, where I returned the car. I stayed with a friend at the University of Canterbury for the night instead of sleeping in the airport, and had a good time.
Saturday, April 5th: I made my way back to the airport, worrying whether I was going to make my flight or not. I did, and the flight back was no fun. But I arrived in Wellington around 12:30, and my journey was over. Kind of a bland end, but I’m alright with it.
So after going out to dinner with my sister, editing photos for hours upon hours, and sort of unpacking, I am now writing this. Reflecting on my break, I think that even though I now have about 10 cents in my bank account, the vacation was well worth it.
