Published: February 16th 2006Oceania » New Zealand » South IslandFebruary 6th 2006


Queen Charlotte
Amazing views, everywhere
Hey everyone,
So Again a long time passed since my last mail, And this time I will try and keep this update much shorter.
On my last update I was in wellington the capital of NZ and the city where you take the ferry(boat) to the south Island from.
I took the ferry on the 20 of january and arrived to picton, still with ron the guy I am lifting with.
On the ferry we met 2 other israelis, amir and ofri, very nice guys and they joined us on the HIT place we were sleeping at in picton.
We decided to do the queen charlotte track together, it's a 4 days track all around sea and bays, and there are water taxis that take your big bags from place to place, so we thought it would be easy!. We also had a surprise, a guy called tom which I met on the flight and another time on the north island also came to sleep at this hit, so he joined us on the track also, we went a big group to it and it was really fun.
So the track was supposed to be easy, but it wasn't that easy,


Some more
And more from the queen charlotte
everyday is 20+ km walking, and the third day is 27km, walking 3 days at this pace is exhausting.
on the third day of walking, in the middle of the track 14 km away from the end, ofri's knee started to hurt, and he could hardly walk anymore. We decided him and amir will go for the nearest bay where they can order a water taxi back to picton, and the rest of us will run to the end of the day and call to see if they are alright and if untill 22:00 they still don't arrive we call the search and rescue. We splitted at 16, we ran the 14km and 3 hours and a half, that was really hard, then we called them and they still didn't arrive, they were supposed to have only 1.5 hours walk and we were very stressed, we were already about to phone the search and rescue but at 9:30 they called and said everything is okay. This was a huge relief, then the last day was really fun, but we were completely tired.
After that track I went down straight to christchurch, because ron's girlfriend arrived and we had to go


Queen Charlotte 3rd day
Yes, it's me and it's a pretty damn nice sea
pick her up. At christchurch I met daniel, a friend from the army and we talked and decided maybe to travel together later. I went up then with ron to kaikoura, which is a town surrounded but all of the water life like dolphins and whales. I did a swim with the dolphins, it was amazing! you swim with hundreds of them, they jump over you and beneth you, it's great, I also got a bit sea sick from the boat and from swiming around the dolphins, but even that was an experience.
From kaikoura I went back to christchurch, I tried to hitchhike there but with no success so I took the bus.
There I met daniel and we decided to buy a car together. We bought a mazda station wagon 1994, which looks fine, let's hope there will be no problems:).
Right after we bought the car we went to hamner springs, a place with hot springs in the middle of very nice scenery, we spent only one night there and cut to they city Nelson, which is in the north of the south island.I met amir and ofri again which was nice.
There in nelson me and


Queen Charlotte More from 3rd day
I can't stand this, too beautifull
daniel did the abel tasman, it's a coast track of 3 days,
we did 1 day kayaking, which was a lot of fun, and amazing views, but there was a lot of wind, it was really hard doing the kayaking. The guide was proud of our group that we did it.
Afterwards we walked the rest of the 2 days, abel tasman is a pretty calm track so it was fun.
We were camping with a tent, and the 2nd night it rained, i must say it was an experience since our tent was not really rain proof, but we somehow managed to sleep.
Now after the track I am here writing to you. from here we are gonna go north to the goldenbay which is supposed to be a very relaxed area, and then go to do the nelson lakes track which is supposed to be amazing.
Anyways, I am waiting to hear everything that is going on with all of you, it is great hearing your replys and it makes me really homesick.
But, I am still enjoying myself too much.
There are more photos below
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Sabin
non-member comment
W00T
Cool beard Omer, keep on having fun for the rest of us back at home. Also, update as much as you can, I'm having fun reading your updates, looks like you're having the time of your life. Anyway, watch out for yourself, and keep on having fun.
From Blog: Start of the south Island.