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Published: November 8th 2011
The morning we left Queenstown we were partly relieved and partly gutted. Relieved to not spend as much money as it is expensive there, but gutted as it was like having a holiday within a holiday. The Stray bus picked us up at 9am and we met our 4th Stray driver of the tour - Seagull. They all have funny names, so we had originally Gollum, then Scratch, then sideshow Rob, and now Seagull. On the bus was our German friend Felix again, who had caught up with us on the trip so we chatted away all morning.
Once we left Queenstown we headed towards Mount Cook, doing our usual stop offs for toilet breaks and scenery pics. Once we arrived, we were informed that due to the freak winds we experienced in Queenstown, the roof of the hostel we were due to stay in had blown off and had to close down, but fortunately as Stray guarantee our 1st nights accommodation, we had to stay in a very classy hotel for the night called ’The Hermitage’. The place was amazing, comfy beds, our own kitchenette, en suite and discounted meal, free internet.. The works! We wanted to stay extra
nights but they usually charge $100 a night, so we decided to take advantage of the discounted Stray rate of $50 for both of us for just the one night. Once we checked in, we went on our glacier tour which was amazing. We actually sailed right up to the icebergs and got to taste and touch them, some of the ice was up to 600 years old. The views were amazing, the pics don’t do them justice. The guide told us that when the Christchurch earthquake took place in September 2010, 10 million tons of ice fell from the front of the glacier and formed the huge icebergs, and that only 10% of an iceberg is only on show, so you can imagine how big they must be! After returning from the glacier boat trip we went back to the hotel for our free 4d cinema show on astronomy which was an experience to say the least. At night we had a great steak meal for $12 due to the Stray discount, and chilled, reading stories about ‘Sir Edmund Hillary’ who climbed Everest, but practiced on Mount Cook. The crazy part was that Mount Cook is over 3000 metres
tall, but Everest is over 8000 meters!
Next day, we packed up and headed off to Rangitata for the white water rafting. I was shocked to find that out of the entire 25 people on the bus, only myself and a nice german girl called Ellie were the only people who wanted to do it. Every person we met told us that Rangitata was the best place to do rafting in New Zealand, so there was no way I was missing it. Jen wimped out on this one as she saw the brochure, but that made it 1-1 now from me on the canyon swing, so I let her off. Haha.
Jen walked around Geraldine town for the afternoon, then went to the hostel whilst I went to the rafting place. Once I got there I met a nice English guy called Simon who was on holiday and we all got our free lunch and then into our groups for the rafting. Half way through, the guide made us pull over and walk up the cliffs to view the Grade 5 rapids, as not everyone can handle them apparently, but we were all well up for it. I
can honestly say none of us fell out of our boat, but others did fall out of the theirs. Half way round the river, we pulled up for the cliff diving, which I was really nervous about, as I had always wanted to do it, but didn’t know if I had the bottle. We all did a 4 meter practice cliff jump, and then most people went back to the raft, but Simon convinced me to have a look from the top of the 15 meter one. Only a few of us went to the 15 meter one, and once there, a few people changed their mind and walked down and I actually did say to everyone no way, but then all of a sudden, I found myself in mid air with a huge rush of adrenalin especially when I realised I had survived it unscathed. If anyone is reading this and going to New Zealand, I can honestly say along with the Waitomo Caves, the white water rafting was the best activity of the entire trip, and worth every penny of the $160.
Once we finished the rafting after around 3-4 hrs, we went back to the hostel
for our free barbecue tea included in the price. Jen was back at the hostel so I introduced her to Simon and the nice Israeli couple I met and we all had a few drinks along with Felix before retiring to bed.
The final road trip was to Christchurch but due to the earthquakes we had to be dropped off at the airport (there is pretty much no ’city centre’ anymore hence the airport drop off) We said bye to our Stray mates and then checked into the Jailhouse Hostel. The Jail was amazing (see pics) we couldn’t believe over 80% of the building was in its original state from 1874, the steel doors, the brickwork and the rusty gates. We decided to go for a walk into the city of Christchurch as we had been told they had opened ’container city’ - a range of temporary shops and coffee houses. Since February the whole CBD has been closed and this is the first sign of any progress with redevelopment, so it was a big deal for the locals and was really busy. Once we got there, there was such an eerie feeling everywhere. There were curtains still blowing
from smashed building windows, and on one window high up in a building, you could see someone had wrote help with paint on the window. The whole area was still closed and fenced off, and the shops still hadn’t been touched. After seeing the Manchester riots at home recently, I would of expected the looters to have all the stock, but rightly so, there is a huge sign of respect here, and nothing had been touched from the damaged shops. As there was nothing really open in Christchurch we decided to hang out at the hostel and contact a few friends n family.
In the morning, Mark (one of Jens family friends who lives here) came to meet us and we all went out for breakfast. Mark then kindly lent us his car as we were going to Akaroa for a couple of days, so we set off on our 1.5 hr car journey through these very scenic hills, then stopped at the hilltop for a drink and a photo opportunity (see pics). The place was amazing and had a huge French presence. We checked into our hostel for the night ‘Chez la Mer’ which was very nice, and
had a wander around the town and lazed in the sun, really nice chilled place.
Jen wanted to do another walk today, so we set off for a 3 hr round trip to the Heritage Park up the hills in Akaroa. Once we arrived there, the views were amazing, so we had a picnic at the top before setting off back down, to meet Katherine our friend from San Francisco who was in the area. We had a chat with Katherine, then sat on the edge of the pier for a while just taking in all the beautiful scenery, when all of a sudden a Hector Dolphin, popped up right in the harbour. I knew it was a Hector dolphin from researching, but was so surprised to see it in the harbour, especially on its own. Jen managed to get a good pic, it was amazing just watching it. The rest of the trip in Akaroa was just chilling around the hostel.
Mark and Tracey kindly put us up for the rest of the week and we had a good couple of days just taking it easy and taking their gorgeous dog Quinn out and about. We went
out with some of their friends to a great Turkish restaurant on the Thursday. It was so interesting to hear all about the earthquakes and how its affected everyone, really quite sad too.
On Friday afternoon we set off to Moeraki (the famous boulders) on the east coast of NZ. We stopped off for the 2009 best fish n chips in NZ in Hampden (which were amazing) then headed for the beach retreat that Mark n Traceys neighbours own - absolute heaven! In the morning we went to Fleurs for breakfast which is one of the only restaurants the famous chef Rick Stein recommends to eat at, then set off for Dunedin. We were gutted when we arrived to find out the Speights brewery tour was full so we drove around the peninsula to see the seals and Albatross, and visited Larnarch Castle - NZ’s only castle apparently! On the way back we stopped off at a few pubs in Dunedin, then went for a curry before returning back to the cottage.
Another road trip the following day took us first to the coast to see more seals and penguins - but we cant possibly disclose the name
of the place as it’s a hidden gem! Not many people know about the area and it meant that you could pretty much sit next to the seals - there were loads of them! It was great to watch them all playing in the sea, such an amazing spot with nobody there! We then went inland and up to St Bathans and did a walk around the Blue Lake which was rich in gold mining in the late 1800’s - the village itself consisted of a pub, that was it! But it was surrounded by ‘proper’ NZ scenery - rolling hills and millions of sheep.. Exactly what we were expecting from this country!
On our trip back to Chch we were treated to an amazing lunch by Mark and Tracey at a great place called ‘Riverstone’ which recently won best restaurant in New Zealand - rightly so, it was out of this world!
We are looking forward to our last week here in New Zealand. We’ve got quite a bit planned before we head to Bangkok (fingers crossed!!!) in exactly a weeks time - where does the time go?!
TTFN peeps xxx
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Pauline Bass (Mum)
non-member comment
Wow!!!
New Zealand looks amazing, the piccis are fantastic, hope your making the most of everything,wish we were there! Love ya trillions.xxxx