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We arrived to a cold and blustery day in Christchurch airport and picked up our car for the one day free rental we had booked. We quickly got on the road west through the mountains and towards our first stop at Arthur’s Pass. It was a beautiful journey as we winded our way through the mountains, the visibility wasn’t great with the cloud hanging low round the mountains and the rain but this kind of added to the scenery making look mystical and still very impressive. Arthur’s Pass the highest settlement in NZ and was very pretty if not a bit small and by this time we were in a cloud and the views were non existent. The accommodation was great though, we had a lovely little cottage with three bedrooms and a big living area with a log fire. There was one other couple staying there but we barely saw them so pretty much had the place to ourselves.
The next day we woke up to similar weather and headed off down the other side of the mountains to Greymouth where we would drop off the car and get the bus up the coast to Punakaki. The drive down
was even more breathtaking than the previous day, definitely one of the best drives we have done. As we went further down towards sea level we came out of the cloud and the scenery was stunning. We arrived in Greymouth in plenty of time, so set off to explore the town. This took all of two minutes, Greymouth is a pretty ugly industrial town with not much to see or do so we were happy to be leaving.
The bus up to Punakaki was an amazing journey. The road winds its way along the rugged west coast, with steep cliffs on one side and crashing waves to the other. It’s certainly as good as the great ocean road near Melbourne. Unfortunately the weather turned again and it was raining as we got off the bus for the walk to our hostel (we were told it was a short 400m walk by our bus driver - it was nearer 1k). Our hostel was pretty basic but a great location right on the beach with the sound of waves crashing on the shore only meters from our room. Punakaki is famous for the blowholes so we went up to have a
look (there isn’t anything else in town), it was low tide so we didn’t see any blow hole action but it was still a beautiful places with great views down the wild coastline. The weather was ok and pretty warm so we enjoyed walking around and exploring the place, the only downside being the amount of sand flies everywhere, as usual I got bitten everywhere and Claire didn’t get a single bite.
The next day we woke to horrible weather. With a what looked like a break in the weather we headed up the steep walk up to the blowholes to see them at high tide. As we set off the weather changed, the wind and rain picked up, it felt like it was raining horizontally as we made our way up to the visitor centre. This didn’t stop all day amd we had to get back to the hostel to pick our bags up and make our way back to the visitor centre to catch the bus. It wasn’t a fun day.
The coach ride down to Franz Joseph was again impressive, the west coast is very wild and rugged and the low cloud and rain made
it look more so. We again arrived in rain so settled in to our hostel and booked a tour to the glacier the next day. We awoke hoping for better weather for our walk and were happy to see that it wasn’t raining. After getting all our gear we were quickly on our way to the glacier. It was a fairly long walk up the valley to the glacier face and after fixing crampons we were walking on the glacier. It was amazing to be walking through the glacier on the ice. The views down the valley were just as spectacular as the view up the glacier and the mountain peaks breaking through the low cloud. It only rained a little bit and we even got some sun briefly so we both really enjoyed it. Included in the ticket for the walk was a free ticket to the hot springs, this was lovely after the hard walk earlier in the day. As usual it was raining when we left the springs but there isn’t too much to do other than the glacier so we were both looking forward to heading to Wanaka early the next day.
It was a
long journey to Wanaka made much longer by stops at a Salmon Farm and several visitor centres on the way. This would be ok if we had planned this but when we pay by the hour for the coach journey and when its freezing cold and tipping it down outside it isn’t much fun. This and the exciting commentary, mostly about power lines and the amount of cows at each farm we passed, from the bus driver made it a frustrating journey. It was nice to finally get off the bus in Wanaka. The little town is beautiful. It sits on the south end of Wanaka lake and is surrounded by mountains, it’s very picturesque. It also gets very busy in ski season so there are plenty of shops and cafes. It is by far the biggest place we have stayed even though only four thousand people live here. After our stressful day we treated ourselves to a drink at happy hour, it’s very cheap compared to Australia, and randomly ended up watching Pretty Women in our hostel. We woke the next day to a rain free morning for maybe the first time. We tried to make the most of
it and rented bikes and set off round the lake, then followed a river down to a near-by town. The views of the lake and river were amazing , you could hear nothing apart from birds and the gentle flow of the river, this is what we thought New Zealand would be like and it was lovely. We got a little lost trying to get home, mainly due to the path being closed but made it back tired but feeling great for having been out exploring what New Zealand has to offer. Predictably it started to rain again so we stayed in and booked our Milford Sound trip and Queenstown.
As I write this we are waiting for our bus to Queenstown and will be doing Milford Sound tomorrow. Wanaka is a beautiful little town and if the weather was a bit better I could stay for much longer. The weather is getting annoying but we are still able to do the things we want to do, it’s just restricting us in doing more walks and bike rides. I’m sure better weather will be coming, we’ll certainly make the most out of it.
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auntie Jean
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NZ
speechless most beautiful place you've been so far xx