Blogs from Bluff, South Island, New Zealand, Oceania

. After reading this story, in the unlikely event that you still want to do the Tour Aotearoa, the Donkey has some random tips for you. - A mountain bike travels slower than a road bike, much slower. - Every day takes longer than you think, even if Tailwind is with you. - Be prepared for Headwind, Rain and Cold. They can arrive at any time on any day, just individually or as a team. - Consider every nice weather day a bonus - Plan your trip carefully; seek advice from the website (http://www.touraotearoa.nz/p/home.html) and tour guide books. Also seek advice from experienced bike packers and mountain bikers but don't believe everything they tell you as they function on a different planet. - If you are a novice mountain biker and bike packer avoid the grade ... read more

Purakaunui Bay dawned and I woke to the sound of waves crashing on the shore. A quick check out the window told me the surf was up and some brave souls were out in full wetsuits.... and I mean full.... booties, hood and all. As the 3 of us settled in to breakfast, we had one of those moments.... you know the ones.... when something happens that just takes your breath away. While munching and talking about our route for the day, Mo suddenly exclaimed that there was something on the beach, and as the waves pounded and the surfers bobbed in the water, a sea lion pulled itself up above the water line to laze in the sun on the sand. Nature has a funny way of making you remember that you are just a ... read more

You could say that the weather has been horrendous down south pretty much all the time. We were quite disappointed but still loved it in a rain, cold, wind and the fog :) You would think its going to be a winter soon! Invercargill, Bluff - rather disappointing. No mountains, not much to see here. We saw couple of dolphins though. We were considering turning back north, straight to Mt Cook to try to get better weather but went to Dunedin instead. Curio and Porpoise Bay were really cool, full of surfers and dolphins. The area is also known for fur seals, NZ seelions and yellow-eyed penguins http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow-eyed_Penguin and guess what! We saw one, it was so so cute! You cannot get close to them though as they are protected. We prayed for better weather...but nothing ... read more

Bluff is the bottom of the South Island, right? Well, actually no. Ask the locals and most of them will tell you that the true southernmost tip of the South Island is Slope Point, 70 kilometres east of Invercargill. How the signpost at Bluff came to be established as the southernmost point isn’t clear to me. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that at Bluff there is a port and a township, both readily accessible by car. At Slope Point there is nothing other than some sheep grazing in the paddocks and a 20 minute walk through farmland to a sign pointing to the South Pole and the Equator. It Adds Up It didn’t take much arithmetic to work out that Slope Point is in fact, the most southerly point. Its latitude ... read more

Greetings everyone!! This will be a short blog, but we visited a very cool point this weekend that I think you all will get a kick out of. We traveled for two days this weekend all the way to the bottom of the south island, to Invercargill, for a two-day assembly. Yesterday afternoon when the session had ended, we drove another half hour south to the southernmost point in the country, a tiny town called Bluff. Here we gathered (with Hungry) for the obligatory photos beneath the Land's End sign. For those of us who don't think in kilometers (ourselves included, though we're slowly starting to after four months!), here are some conversions: From New York City: 9,004 miles From London, England: 11,374 miles From the South Pole: 2,886 miles Of course Florida wasn't on the ... read more