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Published: July 12th 2006
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Okarito
A near escape! Well i've finally made it to the 'bottom of the world'!!! I've been travelling south for about a week and a half now from Puni and as predicted it has gotten colder all the way but there's been plenty to entertain me on the way down.
I got a very handy life from the Te Nikau (the hostel) with an American girl (Courtney) who was heading to Okarito, a tiny little place on the end of 'Westland' thats got beautiful beaches and amazing sunsets. Its famous as the home of the author of a NZ book 'The Bone People', this women's house has a sing saying, 'All unknow cats and dogs will be shot on site!'. All i can say is, 'how west coast'! Courtney had wwoofed for a couple there so we got to hang out with them and have a free nights accommodation. Sweet, as the nz saying goes.
Franz Josef and Foz Glacier were great, the thing I came to nz for most was the glacier walk that certainly didn't dissappoint. It was a full day hike complete with comedy axes to make us feel important! There were just three guys and the guide in our
Extreme danger
Extreme danger in Franz Josef group so we had a great day, 'seeing how high it was possible to go', and falling into icey water only a few times. Half way up we meet a parrot, yes an alpine parrot that lives on glacier and poses for tourist pictures, steals trampers food, and even ties shoe laces together!!! Birds in NZ where the only predators for millions of years so they do tend to be pretty smart. At Te Nikau, one Weka (like a cross between a kiwi and a duck - also called Maori bush hen) came back for the same bag of rich about three times. Anyway glaciers aside I got lots more tramping in, one walk in particular was 8 hours return to the top of the neighbouring mountain and invovled a lot of snow! It was worth it for the amazing view. I also meet a german guy on the way up, that i then meet twice more on my travels.
On advise from one of my friends I took the bus to Wanaka - a little ski town next to the lake. This is the first major town out of westland. The trip was great, not least because it
On the Ice
On the ice, silly glasses mandated by the drunken loss of my real pair was nice to see some landscape that wasn't thick rainforest. It weird how stuff like that becomes important. Wanaka itself was amazing, I was inspired to take some (in my opinion) actually quite impressive sunset snaps, and climb a few more hills! Alas due to school holidays, skiers, thousands of French people (seemingly they only travel in this region?), a second night was not meant to be, which left me in Queenstown. This place is like the backpacker drunken and adventure heaven. I've meet pleny of people that hate it just for this, but i thought what the hell, meet up with the german guy, drank half a bottle of vodka with some crazy kiwi kids and headed into town! I was in the town for about three days and had a great time, though i did very little of note. It just a very pleasant place, with lots of people - very strange for the South Island.
Te Anau was the next stopoff, in Fijordland (the far, far south west), I decided on being a tourist here and headed out on the boat trip to 'Doubtful Sound', it was misty but the atmosphere was great, one of the
On the Ice with axe
With axe making me feel important most remote places i've ever been. We got almost out to the Tasman Sea but then learnt why when captain cook first saw nz, he named this port 'doubtful' and moved on! Even go to visit an underwater power station and meet a Wellington women involved in a campaign in the 60's to stop a village flooding to do with said power station! All very interesting if you are me! I will not bore you with energy politics, but its interesting now much renewables nz used, compared to the uk policy and the 'cracks' in Hartlepool station! Back to Te Anau, before getting sick of the rain I saw some nice glow worms - don't really get the big deal, but the caves and underwater river was cool.
Sick of the rain this morning I escaped to the last town in the map, Invercargill, which is let me tell you the place most like Hartlepool in the whole of New Zealand, there must be something about being bypassed by motorways!!! I did however get to see the Southern Ocean and a great view of Stewart Island.
From now on my travel plans are changing dramatically! From tommorrow, the
Lake Matheson
At the Fox Glacier with Mountains in reflection key rule is - head north, i mean i don't really want to fall of the earth..........
Stay tuned for the next blog from Upside down uncle Peter, for those not aware my sister is due to give birth to her first child today! But he's late, just like his mother at 8.30am on a school morning!
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Margaret D
non-member comment
Mr Handsome
Hi Peter Been keeping up to date with your blogs. We all think you look very handsome in the sunglasses pic! Can't believe you missed our free city sightseeing tour. How could you!! Take care in all that ice and stuff. We all send our love Margaret D and TIC staff