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Published: August 5th 2009
This Glacier just got cooler
No other words can do this justice.Back on the road and next stop Franz Josef, no not that 19th century ruler of Austria, but the glacier that was named in his honour. The town is a cozy little place complete with pub and a fish and chip shop. The only reason this place is even inhabited is because of the bloody big piece of ice sliding down the mountain at nearly 30cm a day. As geology goes this is super quick, faster even than Usain Bolt!
What could anyone see in a Glacier, let alone make money out of it? Well lets see, there's the outstanding natural beauty, the clear blue ice, the astonishing views, not to mention the personal and physical challenge involved. A days hike up will consume about 4000 calories (I really ate a lot up there), several hours and the skin from your heels. A sacrifice worth making. The guides are all professional and only go out drinking when they're not guiding. According to one of the guides, taking people up and down glaciers is how you start out in the business. Of course once you've done your glacier guiding "
It's all uphill from there mate." These guys really know what they're
Im Little Jonny Frostbite
Moving around, freezing you up, freezing you down. on about and since the first group up has to cut the path for the others to follow, the guy with the pickaxe needs to know where to carve, how to carve and how not to fall in ravines and crevices on the rock.
As Tomas, our guide puts it "[There are two ways off the glacier, the first is on your feet and the second is in a helicopter at your own expense. We do prefer you to take the first option whenever possible so dont be stupid up here."
It shouldn't be a surprise but the ice is cold, it is hard and it is slippery and it is dangerous, one misplaced step could be the end of you and those around you. Still not to worry, yours truly went up and down without too many scratches, bruises or life threatening injuries.
The hostel we stayed in had the most welcoming thing you could want after a day of defeating nature and walking all over it, it had a hot tub. Cue an hour of prunification. No time to relax though as the big green bus carried on its rampage across New Zealand the very
Hunger Strikes
Things got desperate, I was hungry, poor little Jimmy never stood a chance. next morning. Wanaka was the destination. A few scenic stops along the way, as if we hadn't had enough of stunning scenery already.
To be honest, I didn't see too much of Wanaka, though from what I can gather, its much like a poorer and uglier sister to Queenstown. It does boast the Treble Cone and Cardrona ski fields as attractions though. These are meant to be some of the best skiing on offer in the south island. That night was just a warm up in anticipation of the revelry planned for Queenstown the next night.
Heading out of Wanaka and away from possibly some of the worst live music ever, the Kiwi bus enters the Adrenaline Capitol of the World. As with every small Antipodean town Queenstown feels it needs a label to cement its position on the tourist map of New Zealand. Now, for most small towns these are rather lame titles or so completely false its a joke (Opportunity Capitol? Come off it).
Queenstown may be the exception to this rule. While every other hamlet and village clings to their spurious title like a kid to forbidden candy, Queenstown indulges itself on the candy
Lost Forever
Groups without guides are doomed to wander the glacier till it melts underfoot while jumping off a bridge straight into shark infested rapids while injecting itself with crack. And thats only the side streets. For the Kiwi Bus, this is
the stop on the tour. The one town where you can party most hearty and punish your liver and general health in ways unimaginable in Queenstown's more sedentary neighbors.
Home of the first commercial bungy, jet boat and teapot cocktail, Queenstown is a crazy mans paradise. What ever the activity you decide to indulge in you can be sure that it will harm or potentially harm your very existance, be it the big night out or jumping 134 meters into a canyon. With 2 ski fields just a half hour up the mountains, a lake on your doorstep and one of the most beautiful places on earth just down the road it is easy to spend a lot of time and money here.
For any backpacker in New Zealand, Queenstown is synonymous with the Fergburger. After extreme sports and extreme drinking, extreme eating is a must. These burgers will sate even the most mammoth of appetites. The Big Al alone could feed an entire 3rd world country for a week. While
Oh how Pretty
Somewhere in the South Island, near a lake I think. every drunk and their mothers are raving about the Ferg love and just how good the burgers are. I for one was not drawn in so much. Of course the burgers are very good, and for the price, extremely reasonable, but I cant help thinking that I've had better. For example, Auckland is home to the White Lady burger van, unlike the burger vans back home, this joint takes pride in the comestibles it serves to the general public. I would argue that the burgers from this North Island establishment are tastier, juicier and probably bigger as well, and yet for all that not many on the back packing circuit have even heard of the White Lady.
For the real coinisseurs of this mid sized town of madness the money shot is a must. Just take yourself along to Bar Up, a small, cosy and most importantly relaxed bar, neighbour to Bar Deux and just round the corner from Hell Pizza. Order yourself a Money shot and you wont be dissapointed. There is no tastier shot, a bar lady once told me that the only good shots were dirty shots, but after polishing off a money shot, invented in
Yup
There's the lake, pretty little place no? Bar up, I would have to disagree most heartily.
With food and drink now sorted in this lunatics playpen, its time to hit the slopes. Armed only with skis poles, several layers of clothing and a flask of scotch we made all haste up to Coronet Peak for a days fun on the piste. One has to bear in mind that these aren't the ski areas of Europe, the runs are shorter and the blacks are easier but you get less posers and douches on these slopes. Even the lift attendants are friendly (to a point). Now I consider myself a rather good skier, in the sense that I don't need to crash to stop, and I found myself thinking that a day up Coronet was probably enough, anymore and you could find yourself in danger of becoming bored with the same 3 or 4 runs. What with avalanche risks it really isn't advisable to go too far off piste either.
Now skiing, snowboarding, bungy jumping, canyon swinging, sky diving and jet boating are all rather expensive. You would need either a rich and generous benefactor or a really high paid job to sample every adrenaline rush on
Love the Ferg!
A typical Queenstown scene, revelers lining their stomachs with burger, onion rings and chips oh and more burger. offer here. In addition to this, most of the activities on offer here can be done, sometimes better and in most cases cheaper, somewhere else in New Zealand. The skydive is cheapest in Taupo, the best White water is between Taupo and Wellington, the best mountain biking is on offer in Rotorua, the highest bungy is in Hong Kong. What these places don't have is the aura that surrounds Queenie, the "
Yeah I will have those other 3 pints before lunch" mentality and what they all lack is Frisbee golf.
Yes, frisbee golf. Because even in the center of nuttiness there is (relative) calm. As the name would suggest, the sport is golf but played with a frisbee. Gone are the expensive clubs, the ridiculous outfits, the outdated and pedantic rules and the more expensive training. All one needs for this specially Kiwi sport is a frisbee and a course.
Frisbees are readily available and the course is conveniently set out in Queenstown park (plus one to your score for any bystanders hit). This 18 "hole" course takes the beginner about 2 hours to complete, pit yourself against friend and the elements alike. Battle the winds and conquer
the course.
As an optional extra the Kiwi Ex traveler has the chance to explore the very bottom of New Zealand. Taking in Dunedin and the steepest street in the world. Invercargil and Burt Munroe. Riverton and its Paua shell shop and Te Anue and Milford Sou- oh wait I forgot. Everything here is weather dependant. If the meteorological gods do not look down favourably then much of what is offered is off. Sure you can still get a view of Dunedin or Invercargill, but in murky weather who really wants to anyway. The weather had sent a whole load of snow falling on the slopes around Queenie, while that was good for those on piste, it was bad for anyone wanting to get out to Milford Sound. The alpine pass from Te Anue to Milford was closed due to avalanches.
To be fair, we did have some good weather as we cruised along the southern coast. Seeing many a beach and waterfall. At one point most of NZ was rainforest and this only stopped once it met the sea. Now there are only a few places left where this happens, and, if I'm honest it is truly
Oh what a MisSpeight
Oh what fools at the Speights Brewery tour, don't they know the taps have a restraining order on me? underwhelming. Still a view is a view and not to be sniffed at lightly (especially true back up in Rotorua). We saw sealions, lighthouses, chocolate factories, pubs, bars and penguins.
There is the must stop and have a look at brewery in Dunedin. Dunedin, home to about 100,000 people and the Speights Brewery, for some reason the Islanders are proud of this beer. From a completely unbiased standpoint, it is no more than average. OK so it won a gold medal in Sydney, beating beer from 80 other countries, but that was back when Victoria kept our throne warm. I don't think they've won much since. Still the tour was a good laugh, a nice old chappie who looked as if he came with the original foundations gave us the irreverent whirlwind treatment down through the building. Apparently it is one of the last remaining breweries to use gravity.
Its no use trying to stay in Invercargil, there's nothing there except the ghost of Burt Munroe and the fastest Indian. In the 60's, Burt, an old man from this town of 50,000 bought and rebuilt a 1929 Indian Scout and turned it into a lean, mean, record breaking
The South Coast
Hey look Sealion. Lion? Where? See, lion? Where? What? machine. Truly one of the great men of NZ.
But with the tour brutally cut short by the Avalanches wrecking everyone's fun we headed back to Queenstown a day early.
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John
non-member comment
got suck in
I was searching for info about Dunedin and the magical algorithms of Google came up with your page. And, of course, one thing led to another and here I am reading through your entire bloody blog! I'm American but live in Southern Costa Rica. Keep up the blog, it's entertaining. Sincerely, John-Charles, Playa Zancudo, Costa Rica