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Date: October, 2004
Location: New Zealand
After arriving in Christchurch and
spending a few days there, I decided it was time to move on. I hitched a
ride south to Queenstown (yes,
hitchhiking is no problem in New Zealand,
and it saves tons of money!), one of the most beautiful and definitely the
most adventuresome place I have ever been!
Queenie is located on an enormous lake in the middle of the New Zealand
Alps. Let's see, as the adventure capital of New Zealand, Queenstown has
lots to offer... I went on a tour of Lord of the Rings film sights,
night skiing, jetboating down a narrow canyon, bungy jumping (including
one falling off backwards with a chair attached to me), parabungy jumping
[off a parasail 190 meters (627 feet) over the water] and hang gliding!
The nightlife was also stellar, and I even had an opportunity to see a
popular New Zealand band (though I can't for the life of me remember its
name!).
From Queenstown I hopped on a backpacker bus full of interesting
people representing five continents (hey, all!). Our first stop was Dunedin, a coastal city boasting the
world's steepest street as well as a protected peninsula area full of
wildlife. We took a tour of the peninsula area in a tank-on-wheels, over
rugged and steep terrain in unbelievably windy conditions. In addition to
adult and baby seals we lucked out in spotting a few of the very rare yellow-eyed penguins!
The next day we were driven through the beautiful coastline area of
the Catlins where we did some
hiking and came just a few meters from a massive sea lion. They may
appear cute at a distance in a zoo, but let me tell you, they are mean, dangerous animals!
Arriving into Invercargill, a
Canadian, Frenchman and I decided to fly south to Stewart Island to do a
three-day trek. The plane that somehow
got us there and back was a six-seater tossed around by the winds of the
channel and landing what seemed like sideways! With only 350 people
there, Stewart Island was as isolated as advertised. Unfortunately, 90%
of the trek was in dense forest void of views, and the weather was cold,
rainy and windy - in a word, miserable! Luckily we were able to complete
the trek in two days, thus only having to spend one night in a cabin,
which actually turned out to be rather cozy after we got a fire started.
Immediately after the trek I flew back to Invercargill, and the following
day I jumped on the next backpacker bus to a lakeside town called
Te Anau. I spent half a day there
recklessly four-wheeling through shallow rivers, over enormous hills and
through expansive sheep pastures where I actually saw a sheep giving
birth!
The next day I jumped back on the backpacker bus to Queenstown via
Milford Sound. Milford Sound is
a 22-kilometer fiord surrounded by enormous snow capped peaks and
countless waterfalls (it rains over 5.5 meters/year!) and is honestly one
of the most beautiful areas of the world I have ever seen! I actually
wanted to trek into the area, but most of New Zealand's major tracks were
still closed due to avalanches. Luckily a two-hour cruise was included
with the backpacker bus so I got to see the entire coastline ... truly magnificent!
Back in Queenstown I met an Aussie with whom I caught a ride up to Cardrona where we skied for the day.
From there I hitched a ride north to Wanaka where I walked one the world's
longest mazes (1.5 kilometers!) and caught a movie in an old townhouse converted into a loungy cinema with two English girls I had gone out with in Queenstown the night before (hey Lou and Rach!). The next day all three of us drove their camper van north to Franz Joseph, a town near an ENORMOUS 12-kilometer (19-mile) glacier, and the day after that I went ice climbing for the first time. It took an hour to hike to the terminal face of the glacier and another hour or two to get to the deep crevaces higher up on the glacier. Though nerving at times ice climbing was REALLY fun. There's something about slamming hand axes and foot crampons into a wall of ice while making a 90-degree vertical ascent!
The next day I couldn't find or flag down a ride north so I splurged on a
bus ticket to Nelson where I stayed
three nights at a great hostel with a
$4 dinner and a hot tub! An Englishman, German and I spent one full day
sea kayaking along the spectacular coast of Abel Tasman National Park which is
full of isolated beaches, lagoons and playful seals!
The following day at mate and I took his rental car to Picton where we stayed a
night before embarking on a two-day mountain biking trek along the
Queen Charlotte Track, deep in the
heart of the magnificent Marlborough Sounds.
We were dropped off by boat at the far end of the track and were
immediately surprised at how rugged, muddy and steep the track was. We
probably had to walk our bikes uphill for a good 20% of the time, and I had a nasty downhill wipeout, falling off the edge of a cliff (but saved by a tree)! The views however were absolutely breath taking, making it all worth it.
From Picton we took a comfortable car ferry (even watched a movie in its
onboard theater!) across to Wellington.
Wellington is very quaint city, but other than the fact that it's the
capital of New Zealand, it's not terribly interesting so we moved on after one day of sightseeing.
We drove up the rugged Kapiti Coast, took a detour down the scenic
Whanganui River Road and continued north along the Great Desert Road to
Taupo. Taupo is located on the
northeastern corner of New Zealand's largest lake and has brilliant views
of Tongariro National Park's volcanic peaks where the Morder scenes of
Lord of the Rings were filmed. The two main things we were hoping to do in
Taupo, the Tongariro Crossing (hiking across those volcanic peaks) and
skydiving, are weather-dependant, and since rain was forecasted for the
following couple of days, we woke up early the next morning and drove west
to the Waitomo Caves. There we
repelled/abseiled down 100 meters (330 feet) into the Lost World Cave
(fitting name), trekked up an underground river and climbed
up a 30-meter (99-foot) ladder back to the surface ... VERY intense!
We then drove back east to the thermal area of Rotorua,
which I will forever remember smelling like sulphur. The one day I went
into a hot spring there I washed all my clothes with the towel I used to
dry myself off, and wouldn't you know it, ALL my clothes came out smelling
like sulphur! Two adventure
activities we did in Rotorua were
street lugeing down a mountain and rafting down rapids that included a
ridiculous, 7-meter (23-foot) waterfall! Rotorua is also known as a
cultural center for the Maori, the indigenous people of New Zealand. We
attended a Maori show and dinner, and though it was touristy it was also
very educational. From my understanding the Maori were a highly warlike
people when the Europeans arrived, but unlike many other countries settled
by Europeans New Zealand has done a fairly good job of integration.
On the way back south to Taupo we spent a few hours at the very impressive
Wai-o-Tapu Thermal Area
and prayed for a good day to do the Tongariro Crossing. As luck would
have it we called a company early the following morning, and they were
going! We had initially thought we could do it alone, but we soon learned
that the upper portion of the crossing is covered in deep snow and foot
crampons as well as an ice axe are needed to get across. The first part
of the crossing was fairly lax, and the volcanic scenery really was like
something out of Morder in Lord of the Rings. Soon enough though we hit
the snow line, strapped our crampons on and began climbing. I have to
tell you, the whole experience was really, really surreal. The
surrounding scenery is indescribable, and the summit is snowless due to
heat generated within the volcano. Moving down from the summit we crossed
over a never-ending crater filled with snow and ran down a steep slope
(you can move really fast with the crampons!). By the time we reached the
end of the snow line my feet literally felt like blocks of ice, followed
by a feeling of walking on a bed of nails as my feet slowly "defrosted."
Overall the Tongariro
Crossing might have been the highlight of my entire New Zealand trip
so if you're planning on going it's not to be missed!
We wanted to go skydiving the following day, but the weather was terrible
and wasn't supposed to get any better so we did a body-in-water bungy jump
(it's as exhilarating as it sounds!) and drove north to Auckland. I
considered skipping the Far North and
instead flying to Fiji, but after finding
out Fiji is not a destination included on my round-the-world ticket we
headed up the west coast through Waipoua Kauri Forest, which boasts
one of the world's tallest and oldest trees,
and across to Paihia, the main town
on the Bay of Islands.
Since I had been going FULL speed since arriving in New Zealand I decided
to stay there for a good five nights. After checking into a hostel,
I ran into a girl I went to high school with! Turns out she had been
working in Perth and was visiting Bay of
Islands when she broke her foot there, got
job at the hostel, met her current boyfriend and decided to stay.
I spent the first day dolphin
swimming. Actually we couldn't go swimming with them because there
were babies in the group, but we did see them really close up ...
remarkable animals! We also spent one day checking out the
Cape Reinga
Lighthouse at the northernmost point of the country, followed by sliding full speed on boards down ENORMOUS sand dunes and driving briefly on Ninety Mile Beach. We considered driving the whole thing, but we heard a horror story from an Austrian who got his car stuck there only to see it later engulfed during high tide!
Two days before I was to leave the country we headed back to Auckland.
Other than the Skytower, one of the tallest towers in the world, I didn't
find Auckland particularly special, but the nightlife was great!
And with that, I was done with my trip in New Zealand and thus around
the world. I flew back to the States and
spent a few days in San Francisco
before heading back to Dallas, and back
to the real world!
- Greg
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