On or way back to Picton we stayed a night in Kaikoura. This is the whale-watching capital of New Zealand. Altough the sparkeling sea mocked us for some time with fluke-like images far of in the distance, we didn't see a whale. So made some other stupid tourist stare out to the water by telling them where we had just seen the whale and left for the penguin- and seal-colony. Those animals are more reliable and usually can be expected to be there. Some tourists around the seals acted pretty annoying. They tried to pull at a sleeping seal's tail until [View Full Entry]

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Christchurch is one of the oldest cities in New Zealand. Old means from the mid 19th century. Some buildings, the cathedral and the university mainly, have been build in an old-englisch style. But if you imagine Christchurch like one of those beautiful small towns in England, like Oxford, Stratford, Exeter, Cambridge, Canterbury, etc. then you are wrong. The university buildings are quite nice but otherwise it's a pretty modern city with little old charm. An interesting fact for physicists is that Ernest Rutherford studied here for some time. Since he had a couple of disagreements with the loc [View Full Entry]

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It was my special wish to go and see Mouraki Boulders. It was about the only place in New Zealand I knew about before I came here. I had seen a picture in a calendar showing "Dream Horizons". And I wanted to take pictures myself. Unfortunately the Weather was not to good, but we still enjoyed this accumulation of huge stone marbles. [View Full Entry]

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We did not have time to go down the South Island west coast to see the famous glaciers and Fjordland or even Queentown were also too far away. Instead we spent more time on the east side of the Southern Alps, around Lake Tekapo, Lake Pukaki, and Mt. Cook. The weather was as good as it can be. We had great views across the turquise green water of Lake Pukaki, a beautiful sunset, and a clear and sunny visit to New Zealands highest mountains, Mt. Cook and Mt. Tasman. We had a really good times those days. Always in the nature [View Full Entry]

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Waking up in the nice hostel in Greymouth we had a good breakfast and started making a plan for the day. Not a usual day, it was Ira's birthday. In the morning we biked to the harbour mole to watch the dolphins in the surf. Later we left Greymouth for the scenic drive across Arthurs Pass. Here we got our first impression of the Souther Alps and did a quite special cave trip. A few kilometers after Arthurs Pass a car park and a sign-board were the only hint that some activity could be done here. The road had been winding [View Full Entry]

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With all the wild camping and hiking once in a while we were looking for indoor accomodation with showers. In Greymouth we got a lot more than this! Run as a Backpackers by a local couple Global Village is a place of great atmosphere. When we arrived and steped into the lobby we felt like being in someones living room. A nice fire was crackling in the fireplace, gentle music was playing in the background, and people sat on comfortable sofas reading or chating. We we got to see our room we could hardly belive it. It was completely in african [View Full Entry]

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Abel Tasman National Park is a stretch of beautiful coastline near the north-west end of South Island. To really appreciate it you can do a four or five day hiking tour along all its bays. But with time limited we stayed a night near Totaranui Bay, did a days hike toward a view point, and stayed another night. During the hike we saw several wonderful coves, many animals, including strange birds (I felt a bit like in the world of "Riven: Sequel to Myst", for those who enjoyed this computer game) and seals. We also found out how the locals enjoy [View Full Entry]

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On the way to Abel Tasman National Park we came across some nice places in Nelson Bay. One night we camped next to a beach. In the morning we discovered all kinds of wounderful subjects in the sunrise. [View Full Entry]

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Three weeks on New Zealand is not much. So we gave back or little car in Wellington, got the ferry to the South Island, to Picton and picked up a new car over there. This deal with the rental company allowed us to save the fee for the car on the ferry. The crossing was good, a long trip through the sounds at the north coast of South Island. Picton is a pretty small fishing harbour, which just gets tourists because of the ferry connection. [View Full Entry]

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The two hobbits had a rather fruitless attempt on reaching Mount Doom this time. Sauron sent all the bad weather he could provoke, the clouds, the rain, and the wind had us turn back at the famous Tongariro Crossing. We felt a little bit 'doomed' and we were happy to get back to dry area afterwards... [View Full Entry]

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