The (almost) 6 months that I never got around to mentioning on this blog have been and gone, and I fear it is just too late to resurrect them now. So I'll give you a quick summary - Christmas and New Year in Melbourne, which was brilliant........ the return to NZ in January, a few days in Wellington, then across to Nelson......... January and most of February doing very little except settling in to life in Nelson and enjoying the summer sunshine, and thinking that I really ought to get around to finding a job at some point......... most of March [View Full Entry]

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I'm getting progressively more behind with this blog, it's over 5 months since I was at this stage of my NZ journey. I'm not sure where the time has gone. Anyway, this part of the story was really the last chapter in my circuit of South Island - it was almost time to fly to Melbourne for Christmas. We left Dunedin and drove along the coast, stopping for a while at Moeraki to see the boulders which are strewn along the beach - my lonely planet tells me they were formed millions of years ago around lime crystals within the surrounding [View Full Entry]

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Hi all. I'm sorry it's taken 4 months to get this onto my blog. (I've dated it December as that's when I was actually there!) More to catch up on after this too, so keep an eye out for further updates! I finally escaped from the mayhem (well, compared to the rest of south island) of Queenstown, and took the bus to Dunedin. Dunedin means 'Edinburgh of the South', but apart from various street names (Princes, George, Corstorphine amongst others) it doesn't bear too much resemblance. Except perhaps for the cold wind that was blowing, and the sound of bagpipes. A [View Full Entry]

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Not a theme park, but the Fiordland national park, part of the South West New Zealand World Heritage Area. (Called Te Wahipounamu in Maori, which means 'the place of greenstone'). I took a trip here out of Queenstown to visit Milford Sound. Most people do a crazy day trip which involves 4 hours on a coach there and back, so I decided to do it over a couple of days, and stayed overnight in Te Anau - not much going on there, it's a small place on the shores of Lake Te Anau, but I did walk around the lake and [View Full Entry]

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Still heading south, past Fox glacier and Lake Matheson, famous for it's mirror reflections of the mountains on a clear day - it was cloudy when we got there though, so no sign of Aoraki/Mount Cook (NZs highest peak). We drove down the coast for a while before turning inland and following the Haast River up to the Haast Pass and onto Wanaka. The scenery just takes your breath away, and the further I venture into South Island the more amazing it seems to get. I'm already planning the return trip, we passed by so many beautiful places without having time [View Full Entry]

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Leaving Nelson we had a long day on the bus, heading down to Greymouth. The road winds through the Buller Gorge before reaching the wild west coast. It's a fabulous journey through rainforest and past wave-swept beaches. We made a few scenic stops en route, at Tauranga bay to see a seal colony, then a walk along the Truman Track, down through the rainforest to the ocean, and later a stop at Punakaiki to see the famous pancake rocks. Photos of all attached....... I'd already decided by the time we arrived in Greymouth that I had to come back and see [View Full Entry]

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Uh-oh - I've got a lot of catching up to do. I'm in an internet cafe in Christchurch, the night before I fly to Melbourne for my Christmas holidays. You might think I don't need a holiday, but you'd be wrong :-) So, backtracking about 4 weeks now.....the bus took me from Kaikoura to Nelson via the Montana vineyards for wine tasting at 11 in the morning. This was good and bad, good for the obvious reasons, but bad because I hadn't had any breakfast (due to getting up too late, due to drinking a wee bit too much the night [View Full Entry]

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Flying from Auckland to Christchurch was very much like flying from London to Edinburgh - about 10 degrees colder, and there are shops selling Scottish stuff. I walked past one on the way to the hostel. Actually, Christchurch feels English more than anything, many of the road names are named after our towns and cities, and people punt their way down the River Avon - all very reminiscent of home. I also found a grocers shop which imports food from the UK, and became ridiculously excited at the sight of Green and Black's chocolate. Penguin biscuits and Heinz baked beans. Anyway, [View Full Entry]

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My last couple days on North Island (for now....) - I took the naked bus (NZ's cheap fares bus) to Raglan, via Hamilton. Nothing too interesting to tell as far as Hamilton is concerned, but Raglan is a great place, and NZ's top surfing spot. I stayed in possibly the best hostel yet, right by the waterfront, with spas, a sauna, electric blankets on the beds, and hammocks strung around the gardens. Mostly populated with American surfers, but that made a refreshing change from the hordes of German students who outnumber all other nationalities travelling around NZ by at least 3x. [View Full Entry]

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Back to Auckland in time for Halloween...... but Auckland is no place to hang around in when the rest of NZ is waiting. I got back on the Magic bus and went up to Paihia in the Bay of Islands, about 3 hours north of Auckland. It's yet another beautiful coastal area, and even more interesting as it is the place where the Treaty of Waitangi was signed in 1840, so it's a historically significant place to visit. (google if you're interested!!) I stayed 5 nights in the end, and took a day to travel up to the very northern tip [View Full Entry]

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