South Island Extravaganza

My hands are knackered to the point where it almost hurts me to write these words, yet all I can think is that it was absolutely worth it. The damage is clear, small cuts and knuckle bruises, insect bites and some odd stains that I can only blame on a fateful chilli meal that wont wash off. All result from the great fun that the past couple of weeks have been on our tour of the south island driving our (slightly battered) camper van.


Only this morning I bid John and Mike farewell back at Christchurch. But I’m back in Auckland now, which is slowly starting to feel oddly like home and after a massive washing session and general toiletry I can finally catch up on both my blog and memories.

Part 1- Due south

We decided to go on holiday on the coldest, rainiest and generally nastiest day I’ve seen in NZ so far. And it’s been pretty bad before.
Being our usual hardcore, John, Mike and I were pretty tempted to stay in bed, yet somehow we got our assets in gear and headed down south. Originally we planned on sending a couple of days in the north, but since the weather was crappy we decided to pelt it down to Wellington.

We did manage to stop off at Rotorua, a well-known Geothermal centre and national park, where we had a nice bath in a naturally warmed river… sweet! It was great, the water is warmed by the thermal activity and results in a sort of natural Jacuzzi. You gotta care not to dunk your head or risk meningitis (those pesky bacteria love the warmth as much as we do!) .


Also worthy of mention was the “thermal wonderland”, which I am embarrased enough to admit to going, but I must say that it was worth it. Crazy coulours due to mineral deposits in the landscape and the lakes!


We eventually made it to Wellington and Jumped on the Interisland Ferry that takes us to Picton! This was an amzingly scenic ride, tho the sea was uber choppy and the winds were absolutely insane! The combination was awesome

Part 2- North of the South

Picton is a picturesque coastal town that serves as the ferry gateway to the south island. Our initial destination was to head over to Motueka, the nearest town to the Abel Tasman national park, host to some of the best known walks and one of new zealands to tramps (hehehe- I still find that funny).


We checked out the park and it was pretty awesome how incredibly variable it is. Some of the hillsides reminded me a lot of La Perdiza near Madrid, being quite rocky shrublands. These were intermingled with temperate rainforests, white sand beaches and awesome mountain ranges. All within minutes of driving! I understand why they claim that new zealand is so diverse… it damn well is! We scrambled down some rocky beaches and collected our dinner’s share of Pipis, some real tasty clams, which we promptly cooked up. Very tasty in a rissotto with a hint of wine.



We did a bit of kayaking on the east coast of the park. We hired out kayaks for the day. We were given clear instructions on where we were advised to go and were helpfully indicated not to go past a certain bend in the coastline. So obviously, we went past the point of no return, then around the corner, stayed for lunch, then took our long way back. Sweet.




In fact the weirdest thing was how on the way back, we approached this island looking suspiciously like King Kong’s home. I was in the midst of pointing this out to my buddies, when we hear this weird- as distant roar! Needless to say, we paddled on quite happily!

Part 3- Westport, Punakaiki and The Forging of the Fellowship

We headed down the west coast towards Westport, where we successfully managed to get dangerously stuck in mud and out again! We spent the night there near the beach and caught some pretty nice views



We had planned to go surfing, but the town was hiving none of that, so instead we headed further south to Punakaiki to check out the pancake rocks, a sea whethered limestone deposit which over time has become a stand-in for an american home on Sunday morning. The sea was absolutely nuts, and some pretty awesome blowholes did pretty good geiser impressions too.


We met up with Morgane and Fran at Greymouth. They are a couple of friends of mine from Auckland that were brave enough to join us in the van! We headed over to Hokitika, further down the coastline. This place is located near the Hokitika river (what were the chances!) which washes down the west coast mountains and Jade deposits. This means that one can find lumps of jade just walking around the beach, and Hokitika has become a busy Jade carving town.

After some jewlery shopping we headed over to the Hokitika Gorge, a brilliand blue lake for lunch. The water is bright blue in evidence of its glacial formation. As the glacier scraped the bottom of the limestone base it pulverised the bottom of what is now the lake. The particles suspended in the water now diffract light in such a way that the blue light is reflected. Or something like that anyhow, I’m no geologist!

Part 4- Walking on thick ice

The next morning we woke up uber early to catch the sunrise at Lake Matheson, further south, near the mountains. Totally worth it, the lake was so relfective and the was the light shone on the lake was a proper kodak moment.



We then ventured onto Fox glacier. Maori legends speak of the Avalanche girl, who was a fervient rock climber. Then this guy (insert hardcore maori name here) fell in love with her, and to prove himself worthy, the fool decided to climb the Fox Mountain to prove himslef worth. Needless to say, he slipped and fell onto the abyss. Dumbass.
Anyhow, the Avalanche girl, cried a lot, and her tears became the west coast glaciers. The tears from her left eye became the Franz Joseph glacer and those of her left became the Fox, which we quite happlily explored.
Armed with a set of Clampons (sic) we hiked around pretty high. It was pretty awesome, and sruprisingly warm! The ice was brilliant blue or grey depending on whether the glacier was ploughing through the land or not. And the views were so sweet.

Part 5- Wanaka

Queenstown is effectively the place to go in the south island. A busy ski resort and a popular tourinst town, it hosts pretty much all sorts of extreme activities, including white water rafting, bungee jumping or camping out in parking lots! (Guess which one you wont find in tourist guides).

But before we headed on there we stopped off at Wanaka, a lakeside town very highly regarded by Kiwis in general, as the less touristy alternative to queenstown. We hiked up Mt Iron and enjoyed some awesome views.



Funnily enough, atop the mountain we observed this circus- like place, so we thought we’d investigate further. The Puzzling world was a pretty cool park of mazes puzzles and general optical and mind tricks. Pretty cool, but eventually we gave in to temptation and headed off to Queenstown!

Part 6- Queenstown

We partied in queestown quite happily! It turns out it’s peak season over there so the place was swarming whith “brached” skiers and tourist. The bars were free to go in and open till ridiculous o’clock, with happy hour till 2:30. A recipe for good times indeed.



The next morning we headed over to the summit of a nearby mountain and then quite happily jumped off! I have to say, bungee jumping is … like jumping headfirst into an empty pool, realising it’s a lot deeper than you thought, and not really caring! It only occurred to me later that not only I put my life on the hands of a total stranger, but I actually paid for it as well! And still I would gladly do it again, I’d be mad not to!

Part 7- The farewell and the Mt Cook experience

At this point we split up from the girls again. They were lucky enough to have plenty of time to head further south to the fiordland, whilst we had to start making our way back to Christchurch. It was indeed a sad moment, nothing brightens up a van like their happy chatter. They smell better too.

Nevertheless, our trip took us eastwards to Mount Cook, the highest peak in New Zealand and the whole of the south pacific. We hiked in the ice, wished we still had our crampons and had plentyful snowball fights.



The day after, and for my last day of holidays we headed over to lake Tekapo further east. We had planned on Water Skiing, but were told that we’d be retarded to that in this cold (well, I think they were a bit more polite than that, but you get my meaning). We were advised to take up fishing instead. But they had the last laugh on us again, since they had no equipment to rent to us.
So we did the only thing that three mature young guys can do on their last day together in new Zealand: We played Lord of the Rings! We went proper trigger happy and made a whole storyline (jeeeezz) which I’ll spare you. Viewing available on request tho…

Epilogue

And with that our travels were pretty much over. We drove over to christchurch, the largest city in the South Island, where my filght back to auckland was due to depart in the morning. We had a couple of beers and reminisced over our trip whilst watching the All Blacks take the Tri Nations cup with their victory over the Aussies.
Christchurch actually looks like a place worth a visit, more european in style than Auckland, with some nice monuments and some actual evidence of city planning (not a fair comparison I suppose).


But grumblings about Auckland and poor public transport are a different story.

For now, all is left is the memory of an awesome trip. I just wish I had had more time. And some hand cream, perhaps.

Randemonium

The pictures of no place in particular but worth sharing!

Muriwai Beach- Fo Sho!!!

Muriwai beach is a very short drive from Woodhill forest, so we headed over there after a gruelling biking session. Like most of the west coast beaches the sand was completely black, a result of NZ’s volcanic heritage.



Twas a beautiful day (a single cloud in the sky, no doubt a reject from cloud society with no friends) and great for chilling out by the sea. This time the water was definitely too cold for a swim (alotough some random kiwis disagreed and totally plunged in) so we settled on creating a sand castle, or should I say, a fortress of Evil! The black sand was great!!

Woodhill Forest

This Sunday, for lack of other things to do, I went Mountain Biking with some mates to Woodhill forest! This is only a short drive south west of Auckland and there’re several tracks that are kept real well for mountain bikes and is a very popular spot, judging by the huge number of cars at the parking lot!

So we rented some bikes (we needed that front wheel shock absorption) and off we went down dirt tracks and bike parks and had a great time getting pretty dirty!



>Mama!!!!

Time plies

Indeed, as time flies by, I notice my workload is growing steadily at the same pace that my time allowance diminishes. So I've found meself purty busy over the past few days!

Of course this is all for a good cause.

No, not getting a good grade on my thesis! You see, in a little over a week a couple of mates will be comig over and so we'll be off to visit the south island! Now i know that this is pretty stupid, considering how close the deadline is looming, but heeey, I didn't come all this way just to do work, right? (hopefully my markers will agree!)

So I've been looking at camper vans and the sort, and it looks like we're in for a good one, albeit really cold, espectially by July standards! We'll be freezing our little asses off, as Madrid hits the 40 degree mark! But hey, we're rugged right?

Road Trippin'

Some cool photos taken whilst on the move







>"moozaaa, saca la ropa pa seca nnnnda!"

Coromandel Peninsula

This weekend we went to check out the Coromandel peninsula, to the south east of Auckland. A couple of hours away from downtown Auckland, Coromandel is a popular getaway for the city folk who fancy a break. Whilst I may not particularly belong to the Auckland jet set, I was happy to join in the fun and check the place out!

We set off late on the Friday night, and stayed at this pretty cool pub/hostel, where we had a but of a lock in with some locals and travellers and stayed up to watch the Germany/ Argentina game (starting at 3am, so yeah, a bit of a lock in!)

This meant that we had a bit of a lie in on Saturday, but still managed to get around.

The highway that runs through the west coast of Coromandel is literally on the seafront, and the peninsula itself has some pretty wild landscape where the sea meets the mountains.


We checked out some of the beaches (awesome) then headed out to the famous Hot Water Beach, which I have now put as one of my all time favourite places. It's basically a beach, where because of some crazy geothermal activity, you can make your own spa!!
There are basically hot springs next to the sea front, so that at low tide you can actually dig a hole in the sand and take a steamy bath!!


You gotta bear in mind that we went there at night fall (low tide was at 530ish, which is about sunset here nowadays) so that it was pretty cold out, but we totally went for it, jumped in some of the pools and i have to admit that the water was very warm! you could definitely boil an egg in the sand! Awesome experience to run into the sea long enough to get refreshed then run back to the hot water pool!

That was actually a wicked night, we then headed over to a nearby backpackers and then proceeded to explore some nearby beached at night, so we had a campfire and roasted some marshmallows... mmmm....

Anyhow, i digress... the next day we went to check out cathedral cove, a beautiful beach on the east coast, and the weather was so warm, that even tho its actually winter over here, we went swimming to some rocks, where you could do some funky dives!


Our Coromandel expedition was then concluded with a visit to a nearby Kauri Forest. The Kauri trees are New Zealand's native trees, some of which are absolutely gynormous! We went tramping around a forest and came across an awesome waterfall (the water was freezing, but otherwise it would have been cool to do some jumps in La Pedriza style!)


And that's that, an awesome weekend for fun, but I guess football suffered with most of my favourite teams for the world cup being knocked off (too bad, England!)