NZ: Twizel to Mount Cook

January 4 and 5, 2012

While we weren't in a hurry to be anywhere, we wanted to get out of the horrible campground as soon as possible, so we had a quick breakfast and left.  On the way out of town we drove by our last Lord of the Rings site: Pellinor/Rohan Fields.  It wasn't anything special, but Ryan explained that they needed to find a huge area to film the thousands of extras for a battle scene, so that made it much more impressive to imagine.

During our one hour drive to Mt. Cook Village the view got progressively nicer.  Mount Cook is New Zealand's tallest mountain, but it is far more accessible than Mount Logan (Canada's tallest mountain).  To see it you can simply drive to the village, and there it is - no need for helicopter rides or massive hikes. 

Our original plan was to spend the day relaxing in Mt. Cook Village (just a few hotels and a campsite) and maybe do some short walks, and then start our 2 day hike the next day.  When we went to get information from the visitor centre, though, that all changed.  They informed us that the hike to the Mueller Hut was actually an 8 hour round trip hike - not the 8 hour one way hike we were expecting.  They also warned us of bad weather coming in, and strongly suggested we leave that afternoon instead of the next day.  We quickly bought a wool hat and some rain pants, and rushed to the car to organize ourselves.  By 1pm we had made some lunch, packed our bags, and were ready to start our hike.

No, we did not plan to have matching shirts.

The hike was only a few kilometres in distance but one kilometre vertical, which is quite deceptive.  The hike didn't look so bad from the bottom, but there were a few false summits which were frustrating.

Because we were planning to stay overnight in the hut, we were carrying sleeping bags and food, but no tent or mats.  We also had a bazillion litres of water because Ryan is ultra paranoid of running out.  For me the hike up the mountain was very difficult, and I definitely held Ryan back (and kept making him drink some of my water to lighten the load).  Many people were doing it as a day hike and didn't have gear, so they of course passed us on the way up as well as on the way down.  I'll save you the groaning and just show you some pictures so you can understand just how fantastic this hike was.

That's Mount Cook on the left, with the clouds at the top.  It is rare to see the top, and we had almost a full day with a perfect view.

This was only just over half way, with a deceptively long way to go.

We eventually reached the last ridge and then had a spectacular view on the other side of glaciers and the hut.

Our first view of that hut - finally!

From the hut we could see a bunch of little avalanches on the neighbouring mountain, so I tried to catch a video of one with limited success.

One thing that was quite curious were the parrots living at the top of the mountain.  They're called kea birds and supposedly they're quite destructive, but it was super  weird to see parrots living in such a barren environment.

As spectacular as the views were, we were more than relieved to reach the hut around 5:30pm.  We had to be there by 7 for the call-in, and Ryan was getting anxious about the weather.  We had never done an overnight hike before, so we had no idea what to expect of the hut.  Turns out, it was awesome!  Sleeping mats were provided on the bunks, and the beds were next to a window with a beautiful view.  The hut got progressively fuller throughout the evening because heavy winds were driving the campers indoors to sleep, so we were lucky we got there early to claim a bed.  Upon arriving we had a quick dinner of instant soup and rice, and we were fast asleep by 8pm. 

I slept restlessly that night because I wanted to make sure to get up and see the sunrise.  At 6:15am I finally got up, but it was very overcast and there was no notable sunrise.  I promptly went back to sleep until 8:15, and by that time most people had already left the hut.  After a leisurely morning we made the 1.5 hour round trip to the actual summit of the mountain.  The climb was technically difficult, and really not worth the trip.

We started the descent at 10:20am, eager and  enjoying being cold again walking through snow (this was our Christmas holiday after all). 

Things took a turn for the worse once we got off of the flat area and we realized just how high up we were.  Ryan probably would have been fine if I hadn't been so slow, but we were both shocked at how hard the descent actually was.   My legs turned to jelly early on and I knew I was in for a painful walk down.  A storm quickly rolled over the neighbouring mountain ranges, so the views weren't as good as the day before.  The whole way down we were worried about the storm coming in, and what we would do if I actually couldn't make it down any further.  It got embarrassing when an old couple passed us on a day hike up, but it didn't make it any easier.  Anyways, for the last 45 minutes  Ryan carried my bag and we managed to reach the bottom by 2:30pm.

We were proud that we made it and wouldn't take back the experience, but we definitely needed a comfortable bed and a hot shower at the end of it.  We discovered that the campsite we had planned on staying at the night before had not fared well during the heavy winds, and a picnic table had blown across the field.  Without even looking around we checked into a nice room at the Hermitage Hotel with a spectacular view.  We ate a well-deserved pizza downstairs, then showered, napped, watched a few movies, and played a few board games.  We were quite stiff and sore, but still managed to stay up until 10pm!

(wine: Earth's End, Central Otago, Riesling, 2008)

NZ: Queenstown to Twizel

January 3, 2012

We woke up that morning to roosters crowing and a beautifully calm lake - a nice contrast to the night before. 

With our stomachs rumbling, we drove straight to Queenstown for some breakfast at Fergburger.  Ryan had the breakfast burger (egg, bacon, beetroot, hashbrown, and everything else you can think of for breakfast) and I had the Cockadoodle-oink burger.  It was delicious, but possibly too much food for 10:30am.  We didn't stick around in Queenstown, but instead proceeded on to another Lord of the Rings site: Pillar of the Kings.  The best place to see it from was the top of a bridge being used for bungie jumping, so we had some bonus entertainment.

When we originally planned our entire trip we expected to go to the glaciers on the NW coast of the South Island, but once we got driving we realized that wouldn't work out very well.  We instead decided to cut that part out and slow down our last few days of travelling.  On this particular day we didn't have a far destination, so we made a few random stops along the way.  The first was at one of the many cherry stands on the side of the road.  The cherries were expensive, but they were sooooo good that we ate the first container while parked in front of the stand and went back for another box.  The lady was wondering why we hadn't left, and was of course happy to sell us more cherries.

The second spontaneous stop we made was to play mini-golf in Cromwell.  It seems that recently Ryan and I have developed a love for the game, and now we find interesting courses hard to resist.  The course was next to this massive fruit sign and a "skate" park filled with kids on scooters.

The scenery was beautiful, but the course was relatively uninteresting.  It was really hot in the sun, and that was only made worse by how bad we were playing.  I kicked butt as retaliation for losing so badly on our trip to Perth, but both of our scores were appalling.  One perk was that we used the garden hose outside to fill up about 30 litres of water bottles.  Ryan, the man who is always prepared, kept freaking out that we would run out of water.  We were planning a big hike in the next few days and he thought we should fill up just in case.  The attendant lady was very friendly about it, and told us all about her son in Vancouver while we filled all of our jugs.

On we went to another pit stop at a large Marino wool store, but only ended up buying ice cream.  The drive that day was beautiful, and very different from the scenery we had seen in previous areas.  One particularly nice feature was the millions of purple lupins growing in the ditches on the side of the road.

I'm not sure what kind of flower this is.

Eventually we arrived in Omarama, where we had intended to camp for the night.  And this is where my rant about camping in New Zealand starts.

Really, the first stop was our own fault.  For some reason I let Ryan lead us to the free campsite on the side of a river, and didn't think anything of the fact that the description said it was under a bridge.  Yeah...turns out it was camping under the highway...like trolls.  A little shanty town of tents was already there, they had a scary looking dog, and they had pretty much surrounded the outhouse.  We were in complete shock, since we hadn't seen anything like this anywhere else.  Of course we didn't stay.

Next we went a bit further into town to a holiday park, which didn't go much better.  And neither did the third place we tried.  It looked like this:

We really couldn't believe it.  We had just spent the past week camping in beautiful spots, and then we had multiple failures in a row.  We drove by two other places, then decided to just try the next town.  We figured it was impossible for every site to look like this.  Of course we were wrong, or this wouldn't be a good story!

We drove to Twizel hungry and tired, vowing to stay at whatever park they had.  The lady at the front desk, when asked if there were any less populated areas of the campground, said "well, we have over 40 acres, so if you can't find somewhere you like then there's something wrong with you!"  I think it's fair to say it was the most ridiculous campground I have ever been to.  It looked like people were living there permanently; people had massive barbeques, dart boards on trees, and even fences around their own little area. 

I will admit I had a lot to drink that night (wine: Stella, Sauvignon Blanc, Central Otago, 2009 - not great), but I swear I'm not making this up - an ice cream truck drove by our tent!

The next morning we were leafing through a brochure that the mini-putt lady had given us and I checked out the section on camping - to see if we were just missing something.  Nope!  Turns out this was exactly the kind of camping we should have expected!  It's hard to see, but turns out the family in the bottom picture has the exact same striped campervan awning as our campsite neighbours.  Boy, do I have a renewed love for camping in Canada.

NZ: Mossburn to Queenstown

January 2, 2012

After a nice shower and a hot breakfast (including some mystery milk from the farm lady  - we're not sure what animal it was from) we partook on an absolutely beautiful drive to Queenstown.

Queenstown has a similar feel to it as Banff, in that it is a resort town for skiing in the winter and other extreme sports in the summer.  We made a quick stop at an internet café, then went straight to Fergburger for lunch.  Now, Fergburger is a burger joint, but not just any old burger joint.  You can tell you've found it by the giant line outside the store, and you know it's good because we waited 25 minutes for two take-away burgers.  I'm not sure why we didn't take any pictures of the food, but the prices were good and the burgers had awesome names like "Cockadoodle Oink" (chicken burger with bacon) and "Sweet Bambi" (venison).  The burgers surpassed all of our expectations.

We had hoped to go paragliding in Queenstown, but didn't end up doing that because we decided we would instead spend the money on Marino Wool clothing - a New Zealand specialty.  Ryan found some shirts, but I didn't have much luck.  It bugged me that none of it was made in New Zealand, and that most of the stores were chains I could find in Australia.  Also, the independent stores made really ugly women's clothing.  After 4 hours I settled on a ball of wool to make my own scarf, and in the end I was very happy with that decision.

As you know we're not really city people, so we promptly left Queenstown and drove north in "pursuit of the rings."  I actually haven't seen all of the Lord of the Rings movies, but I do know that the scenery was spectacular so Ryan lead us on an adventure to a few of the movie sites near Queenstown.  This picture was taken just north of Queenstown before we hit any of the sites, but that 40km stretch of road was breathtaking.

The real fun began once we got on a dirt road that lead to the town called "Paradise."  The pictures obviously don't capture it, but I think it was the prettiest place I've ever been. 

LOTR Site: Lothlorien

LOTR Site: Isengard

We eventually hit some water on the road and had to turn around, but we had seen everything we wanted to see and really enjoyed the peaceful drive.

We decided to camp next to Lake Wanaka (50km NW of Queenstown), which was beautiful but very windy.  The campsite itself was sketchy (with a random mattress lying on the ground nearby), but the views were excellent.

We had planned on using the picnic table to cook dinner, but it was windy and cold.  Lucky for us, Kinloch Lodge was right next to the campsite so it was impossible to resist going in there for dinner.  They had a wood burning fireplace (which we admit was a bit excessive) and we ate absolutely delicious venison pie and eggs benedict for dinner.  Now that we're experts at sleeping through a wind storm (the secret is setting your tent up right and using earplugs), we had an excellent sleep.

NZ: Te Anau to Milford Sound to Mossburn

January 1, 2012

We fell asleep quite early on New Year's Eve, but around 9pm we were woken up by the park ranger.  Ryan had insisted that we could pay in the morning because no one would be checking, so he was the one who had to get up and pay the ranger.  After that we had a great night sleep and didn't get up until almost 9am.

We started our drive to Milford Sound, but quickly realized that in our food crisis the night before we had forgotten to get gas.  We only had 1/3 of a tank left.  The road to Milford Sound is one way in and out, and doesn't have any towns or connecting roads, so we made the reckless decision to continue on and hope that Milford Sound had a gas station.  We knew if we turned around we wouldn't backtrack again, so we would miss out on Milford Sound completely. 

One stop along the way was Mirror Lakes.

While we were there (probably 80km from Milford Sound) we saw a sign saying that there was no gas station in Milford Sound, so yet again we had to make a decision.  The car gage estimated that we could make it, but just to be sure we emptied the fuel from our stove and our jerry can into the tank (much to the amusement of onlookers).

For the rest of the trip there we cringed every time there was an uphill stretch or a slow car in front of us.

Despite our lack of confidence, we decided to stop at The Chasm.  It would appear I didn't actually take any pictures of it though.  I guess I was preoccupied with this:

I swear, he asks me to take these pictures.

Anyways, it wasn't that exciting except that I backed into a little girl by accident with my butt and got the WORST glare I've ever been given.  Also, Ryan took this opportunity to inform me that because he is a well-paid, working professional, he raises my social status.  Supposedly this is confirmed by the fact that if it were up to me we would be living in a van and travelling around Australia (Ryan: "You're welcome").  Hah!  Who's the one who tells him if his shirt is inside out?  Enough said.

Other than the stunning scenery, the last attraction on our way to Milford Sound was the tunnel through a mountain.  We should have recorded how long it was, but my guess is over two kilometres, and it's one way only.  There is a 15 minute wait while the other cars go through, and during that time we watched people get out of their cars to play in the snow on the side of the road.

Eventually we reached Milford Sound.  The only thing I can compare it to was our experience in Skagway, Alaska; the scenery was beautiful but there were only cruise ships, a tourist building, and hundreds of annoying tourists.  Needless to say we basically just used the bathrooms and left.  I'm sure the cruises were nice, but we had already been on an intimate kayak trip through the fiords and had no desire to ruin that memory.

We still hadn't had lunch, so we decided to stop next to a nice waterfall and have a picnic.

We both really wanted to get closer to the waterfall, so we walked a little ways up the side of a mountain to get to it.

My underwater camera paid for itself that day.  We took a few quick snap photo sequences (think action heroes in Germany), ending up with this little gem.  I think you can fill in the before and after, knowing us.

We both agreed that our waterfall picnic was for sure the highlight of the day, but also in the running for the highlight of the trip.  The water was freezing cold, but it was an amazing place.  I'm not sure how many park rules we were violating, but we prefer not to dwell on that.

The rest of the drive back to Te Anau was tense, since we still weren't sure if we had enough gas to make it.  Long story short, we did make it but based on our calculations at the gas station we only had 4 litres of gas left in the tank!  Phew!  Crisis averted!

We continued half an hour further to the Mossburn Country Park, which was our campsite for the night.  It also had a kitchen and showers, but more interestingly it also had lots of random animals wandering around (think peacocks, chickens, alpacas, etc.).  It still had some rustic charm, and best of all there were no flies!  We toasted to an excellent day and a happy New Year (wine: Sauvignon Blanc, Stonleigh, Marlborough, 2011 - yum!)

NZ: Manipouri to Te Anau

December 31, 2011

Our 5am wakeup call was actually a blessing in disguise because we go to see the beautiful morning mist over the lake and the mountains.

On our sleepy drive back to Manipouri we saw tons of eagles and rabbits (many were roadkill), and the sunrise.

Our kayak trip started at 7:20am, so we promptly met our guide Harlan (who was awesome) and boarded our first motor boat of the day.  We were offered tea and coffee as we sped across Lake Manipouri and took in the stunning views.

Once we reached the end of the lake and disembarked, we were instructed to put on our swimsuits, then a special sweater, then a wetsuit, and finally a horrible plastic shirt overtop of everything.  We were dressed for success!

Next, the group boarded a bus for a 40 minute mountain drive to get to Milford Sound (which is actually a fiord, not a sound).  The road was private and not accessible to the public, so the people who use it have permits and pay for all maintenance, making the trip very remote.

After all of that, we were finally able to get into some kayaks.  Coordinating 7 kayaks was quite chaotic, but we figured it out eventually and began our voyage.

Typically the area would be very wet and full of waterfalls and clouds since it's a rainforest, but we were actually there during a warm, dry spell, so it was incredibly sunny and hot without a cloud in the sky.  Since nothing particularly exciting happened I will mostly narrate the rest with picture - which unfortunately didn't turn out great.

Lunch was on the boat.  We packed our own food, but they also provided some hot chicken soup.  Since it was so warm, everyone stripped down to their bathing suits, but we had to leave on the plastic shirt.

By the end of the day we had kayaked 14km.  It didn't feel that far since the pace was nice and slow, but that's what the GPS said.  We only kayaked one way, then the motor boat came and picked us and the kayaks up.  With all of the kayaks safely aboard, we all cooled off with an amazing swim.  For me this was the highlight; I had been dying to get in the water all day!

After a sleepy boat/bus/boat ride back to Manipouri, we drove to Te Anau and had a panic about food.  We weren't sure if anything would be open on New Years Day so we stocked up on groceries.  We weren't happy with the campsite we had picked, so we drove back to our other option: Henry River at Lake Te Anau.  This site was next to the lake and even had a picnic table, so we feasted on pasta and wine.  Happy New Year!

NZ: Invercargill to Manipouri

December 30, 2011

Throughout the very early morning, both Ryan and I were awoken periodically by the sound of sheep and a very strange sounding bird.  We're not sure what it was, but we both had weird dreams about it.  Taking advantage of our gourmet kitchen (and the $38/night charge) we made grilled cheese and tea for breakfast, then used the internet.  This was where we first discovered that our money card actually couldn't be reloaded.

On our way to Manipouri in Fiordland we passed many New Zealand landmarks.  First was Riverton - a very pretty town, and also the oldest on the South Island.  If timing had worked out it would have been great to spend a morning there.  A bit later we saw a fat pig running around on the road.  This was weird in general, but even weirder because it was the only pig we saw all trip.  Next we made a brief stop at Orepuki beach. 

It is also known as gemstone beach, but we forgot to look for gems because Ryan was too busy telling me how a "giant tsunami" came thousands of years ago to bring this rotting wood ashore. 

I'm obviously oversimplifying his explanation, but I'm pretty sure it's a load of crap anyways.  Either way, first he got mad at me for not believing him, but then it became the running joke that everything we saw thereafter was formed by a giant tsunami (seriously, I'm laughing even as I'm writing this).  The other cool part about the beach was the little (dead) blue jellyfish that had washed ashore.  They made a funny popping noise when we stepped on them, tee hee!

Finally, we passed through Tutapere (the sausage capital of New Zealand) before arriving at our campsite on Lake Monowai (50 minutes outside of Manipouri).  The drive was down an 8km dirt road surrounded by streams, mountains, and sheep.  The site, although majorly bug infested, had our first picnic table.  After this a picnic table became a site requirement, since we were sick of eating on the ground. 

We were uncertain if we were supposed to drive to the site since there was a giant boulder in the way, but a bunch of camper vans had somehow managed so we gave it a go.  It's hard to see, but the side with the plants had an intimidating slope for our tiny car.

We quickly pitched our tent to claim our spot (there were only 5 total) and interestingly we saw a campervan from the previous night doing the same thing.  The next morning was our big kayak trip departing from Manipouri, so we wanted to do the drive and find the location ahead of time so nothing would go wrong.  Turns out we needed to factor "sheep crossing" into our travel time.

In Manipouri we got "lost" in the one road town while we were looking for the info centre, but it made us find a short trail we thought would lead to a lookout since it was on Lookout Road.  It didn't.  The trip was still worthwhile because we had an excellent lunch of fresh, local, pan fried blue cod and pizza with beautiful views of Lake Manipouri.  After a short walk on the stony beach we drove back to our campsite to prepare couscous, corn, and beef for dinner. (wine: Stoneleigh Reisling, Marlborough, 2008 - awesome!) 

After dinner we took a short walk down the trail by our campsite which was beautifully green and lush. 

We also saw this mossy thing that looked like a snail.

That night we slept terribly; I dreamt of giant snails and Ryan dreamt of vampires.  It didn't help that it was really cold and there was a gunshot at 3am.  None of this is good with a looming 5am wakeup call!