It was blowing an absolute hooley as we left the North Island and crossed the Cook Strait to the South Island on the Interislander ferry. Steve spent the journey on deck, getting soaked watching the view and Megan disappeared into the cinema to watch some action-packed block buster. As you approach the South Island, you sail along the Marlborough Sound, which is a bit like cruising through Scottish lochs. Despite the persistent rain, the views were impressive as were the captain's navigation skills. The film wasn't bad either!
So, after gale force winds and torrential rain during the crossing, we found ourselves stuck behind a flotilla of campervans disgorged from the ferry and all headed South. Purely to get out of this rather sedate procession of Winnebago Warriors, we pulled off at Blenheim, which just happens to be smack in the middle of NZ's main wine producing region, Marlborough. It's where the famous and very over subscribed Cloudy Bay comes from. Again, purely to avoid the traffic jam [honest], Steve indulged in a little wine tasting! [The Sauv Blanc is excellent, the Reisling rank.] The sun was out in Blenheim and as we progressed further South (with Megan driving now), the weather turned progressively more glorious. By the time we were 100km from the ferry terminal in a town called Kaikoura, the weather woman was telling us we were in the hottest spot in all NZ. Just shows how changeable conditions can be here! It generally seems that, on the South Island, the West coast is wet and windy and the East is warm and dry; or at least less wet and windy. Accordingly, we decided to put off going to the Southern Alps for as long as possible - at least whilst the weather held on the East coast. We were meeting people who'd come from the West and they had a rather bedraggled look to them.
In Kaikoura we did some walking, including the 1602m (5255 ft) Mt Fyffe (from sea level), which put us just above the snowline and gave awesome views of the Seaward Kaikoura Mountains and out over the Kaikoura peninsula. Beautiful, but very cold! However, the highlight of Kaikoura was taking a boat to go whale watching. We went out with Whale Watch Kaikoura, who managed to find loads of sperm whales for us to watch and photograph. We had "fridge door" seas and clear, blue skies, which made the whole thing even more enjoyable. Seeing a 20m long whale turn and dive for the depths was quite amazing. True enough, they look like large floating logs, but to see the classic pose of the flukes in the air as they dive was appreciated by all on board. To think these dudes dive to 800m and spend 45 min holding their breath. Magical!
After Kaikoura, we headed on down to Christchurch where you can punt on the River Avon and where every street pays homage to some part of Britain. Gloucester St runs parallel to Hereford St. Durham St leads into Cambridge St and Salisbury St intersects Madras St! Christchurch is known as the most European city in NZ. It's unclear whether the locals are proud or ashamed of this fact. We managed to find a very nice hostel, but unfortunately it immediately filled up with South African firemen! Strange, but Megan didn't seem to mind too much! 15 had come over for some kind of fire-fighters' games. A bit like the Olympics only rather more tug-of-war and lager. The SA entrant for the superhuman fire-fighter of the World contest spent most of his time out on the balcony smoking.
In addition to being intensely European and still running trams around town, Christchurch is also the Eastern Terminus of the so called TranzAlpine rail line, billed as one of the most scenic rail journeys in the World. So, we donned anoraks and climbed aboard.
The TranzAlpine train runs West across the South Island through the country's backbone - the Alps, to the rather enticingly named town of Greymouth. On the day excursion from Christchurch, you get about 1 hour in Greymouth. That's about 30 mins too long! The journey takes you up into the Southern Alps (and up into the clouds) to Arthur's Pass, which is quite famous even though there's nothing there. Just as well, as we wouldn't have been able to see it anyway due to the cloud cover. As a bonus, you get a running commentary from the lady who sells the tea and buns.
We left Christchurch as the fire-fighters prepared for their games. They'd been limbering up for the 3 days we stayed with them. Beer for breakfast was a popular training method. Mind you, we did notice that all the fire doors in the hostel were religously closed, whereas they'd been propped open when we arrived, so maybe it was worth the inconvenience.
Next, an overnight stop at Oamaru between Christchurch and Dunedin to satisfy Megan's new found urge to see Little Blue (or Fairy) penguins (she'd always wanted to do this apparently). No wonder they're blue, it's freezing down here! Memories of Thailand are very distant! We managed to see a whole bunch of the little blue critters being battered against the rocks in the swell as they tried to get back on to land. Most entertaining! They spend all day 20km out to sea fishing and then, when they finally get back at sunset, exhausted and full of food for their chicks, they have to get on to dry land, waddle up a steep banking and then scuttle across a gravel yard just so that the Oamaruans can extract $10 from us to watch.
Still with anoraks tightly zipped after the train journey, we paid a geezer in a cammo jacket and hat to take us off into the bushes and show us nesting Yellow Eyed penguins which are very rare [apparently].
Still not satisfied, we drove to Dunedin, and went out onto the Otago Peninsula to see the Royal Albatross (no, not Prince Philip, the bird). As it was nesting time we couldn't use the special hide that had been built to stop humans disturbing them because... we'd disturb them (??), so we had to be content with leaning over a cliff in a force 10 watching them swoop back and forth.
That's enough birds!
Whilst in Dunedin, we simply had to go and see what the locals claim is the steepest street in the World and which Lonely Planet, with customary accuracy, documents as being 1 in 1.26. This we had to see! Baldwin St is quite steep, but anyone who stops to think would realise it couldn't be 1 in 1.26! Donning the anorak again, Steve investigated and found the true gradient to be 1 in 2.6. A bit disappointing but still a steep walk! Apparently it's in the Guinness Book of Records.
We'd avoided the West coast as long as we could hoping Spring would suddenly mutate into a glorious dry Summer, but even El Nino couldn't beat the Fjordland statistics. So, having seen penguins, drunk wine and photographed whales, there was nothing for it but to head over to the West coast and take whatever the roaring forties had to offer.
The South Western corner of the South Island is known as Fiordland and, with the full expectation of getting very wet, we headed over there to check out the areas Captain Cook had feared to explore. Fiordland receives 7600mm of rain per year (that's not a typo and it's also known as 25 feet or getting on for 1 inch a day, every day). In anyone's book that's a fair amount of rain - even more than Lerwick!
It was bright and sunny when we arrived!
This is glacial country so there's lots of hanging and U-shaped valleys and the fjords are deep and cold. About 450m deep and 10 deg C cold. You can dive here so... we didn't! We stayed in the YHA in Te Anau and it's an excellent place which restored our faith in these hostels; so many had been very poor.
Due to the sunny weather, we booked on a tour to Doubtful Sound for the next day. It's "Doubtful", as Captain Cook thought it doubtful he'd be able to get his ship out again if he sailed in; so he didn't. And it's not actually a Sound, as it was formed by glaciers, then flooded by the sea, which makes it a fjord. A Sound is formed by a river which is then flooded by sea.
Anyway, the trip to Doubtful is about 8 hours and involves a 45min boat ride over Lake Manapouri followed by a coach 20km along a road that is not connected to any other roads, followed by a 3 hour boat trip along the Sound out to the Tasman Sea. You also get to visit the hydroelectric power station (the reason the road was built) on the return trip. The mountains here rise up to about 1500m, which is not massive, but they are dramatically steep and they do plunge straight down into the water. Because of the amount of rain, there is lush rainforest clinging to every slope although the tops are clear of vegetation and were covered in snow when we visited. Spectacular! Ahem, except for the fog! Sunny? Who said it would be sunny? On the way out, all we saw was vertical rock faces soaring up into the clouds. On the way back, the clouds had lifted somewhat and we got a sense of how dramatic this scenery really is. But we did get our allotted inch of rain. And, just for an engineering treat, the coach took us down a 1 in 10, 2km tunnel, directly into the side of a mountain. There, 180m below the lake, is the hydroelectric station. An immense chamber has been hewn (not just cut, mind you; hewn) out of the solid granite and filled with turbines generating 730MW. And, unlike the Yangze Dam project in China, they didn't raise the water level an inch.
The Doubtful Sound trip is an excellent day out run by Real Journeys. It's also much less popular than the famous Milford Sound cruise [see below], which is run by the same company but is much shorter (only 2 hours). You do need to be prepared for the weather though; both mentally and sartorially.
Also, whilst staying at Te Anau, we took a boat across the lake of the same name to the Glowworm Caves. No surprises here, except for how amazing these creatures really are. You trek up inside a very young cave system (i.e. wet) and take two punt journeys. In the end, you're sitting in a punt in the pitch dark drifting along. Above are thousands of cool, blue pinpoints of light which are the glowworms hanging from the ceiling. It's just like looking up at the night sky. Drips of water fall on you, completing the effect! These guys glow to attract insects and the brighter they glow, the more hungry they are. Makes you really wonder how that Darwinism stuff really works.
Of course, we did make the trip out to Milford Sound. It's a 120km drive from Te Anau up a cul-de-sac, but what a drive! It takes you through some serious Alpine mountains - the avalanche warnings are still in place and you're not allowed to stop. The road winds up into the head of a classic U-shaped glacial valley before plunging into the Homer Tunnel through the mountain and emerging into the head of another valley that leads down to Milford Sound. Milford was named after Milford Haven in Wales (the home town of its discoverer) although there's little similarity. Again, this is a fjord and not a sound. If anything, Milford is even more impressive than Doubtful, despite the fact it's much smaller. The towering, 2000m granite mountains plunge directly into the water and waterfalls run off everywhere. The Sound is narrower than Doubtful and that makes the cliffs loom menacingly overhead. But it is littered with tour boats and helicopters. If you want splendid isolation, Doubtful's the one. If you just want a quick fix of impressive fjords, and a case of neck ache, then Milford has it.
Self styled adventure capital of the World, Queenstown has all the bungy jumping options you could want. You can jet boat down the Shotover River or parascend over Lake Wakatipu. Where else but Queenstown could you train for a diploma in "Commercial Sky-Diving"? There's a hundred and one activities for the adrenalin starved thrill junkie, but more about Megan later!
Queenstown itself smacks a bit of an out of season ski resort although it manages to maintain itself in Summer by charging people vast amounts to jump off bridges with bits of elastic tied to their ankles. The scenery all around town is absolutely stunning. Mountains on all sides and snow capped to boot. We agreed that it was a good town to be in. Add Queenstown to your list if you're coming to NZ.
We simply had to try out the Street Luge; well you would woudn't you? We took the Skyline cable car up to the top of a local mountain for great views out over the lake. Then you hand over the reddies and climb onto a small plastic dinner tray with wheels. A concrete roadway winds down the mountain. Banked curves, tunnels, bridges, jumps. You have to navigate them all as you hurtle down the mountainside on your glorified dinner tray. Great fun! We were laughing the whole time and spent twice what we expected on extra turns.
There's a major Scottish influence around here and Steve was keen to stomp up Ben Lomond, which lurks behind Queenstown and rises to 1746m (5728 ft). It's a fabulous trudge, with fantastic views the whole way up culminating in a 360 deg panorama of snow capped Southern Alps. He even met a genuine Scottish person on the mountain. Megan? She just had to slot in that adrenalin fix so she went flying! Why not e-mail her and ask about it.
The road from Queenstown to Mt Cook is spectacular (and largely closed). Rock falls and incompetently managed civil engineering projects turn what was a long drive to begin with into an epic journey. Consider a major road that is closed for 40 min every hour! Imagine a stop/go contraflow system where you only get a turn every 20 min! To alleviate the boredom, we stopped at the Kawarau Gorge Mining Centre and tried our hands at fossicking for gold. We fossicked like crazy for a couple of hours but with no real success. The dudes who own this place clearly think it's more efficient to make the tourists pay to pan for gold. Fossicked out, we continued...
Late afternoon. The air was shockingly clear, the sky a deep postcard blue, the sun was shining - glorious. Prescience took hold, we dashed off a few photos of Mt Cook; all snow and rock silhouetted against the deep blue sky. At 3755m (12319 ft), it's the highest peak in Australasia. It used to be higher, but the top fell off a while back.
We had two days planned for walking in the Mt Cook region (Aoraki to the Maori), where that famous Kiwi Sir Edmund Hillary learned his trade. In the end, and kind of as expected, the cloud rolled in and, although we walked the Hooker Valley and the Tasman Valley, we were not to see Mt Cook again - the photos will have to do. We were surrounded by swirling mists and the odd glimpse of snow capped peaks. Good walking 'though, even if Megan thought the masses of lateral morrain and even more masses of drizzle made the whole area reminiscent of Ffestiniog. The assistant manger of the Hermitage Hotel agreed - and he used to live near Bangor.
By now, we'd finally wised up to the fact that you have to work around the weather. So, we spotted the one good day in the following week and booked to go out walking on the Franz Josef Glacier. As we'd omitted to bring out ice axes and crampons, we went on a guided tour with Franz Josef Glacier Guides who give you the necessary hardware. We'd read the weather well. We spent a whole day out on the glacier including some rather damp crevass squeezes and plenty of hacking with axes. This glacier is exceptionally steep which means there's tonnes of seracs (ice pinnacles) and very jumbled (i.e. interesting) ice fields to navigate. we've now got little certificates to go with the elephant riding ones from Thailand.
With only a few days to go before our ferry back to the North Island and by now thoroughly saturated by torrential West coast rain, we head for the town reputed to be the sunniest in NZ. Nelson is indeed mighty sunny when we arrive and manages to remain so for the duration. It's worth knowing that you can hole up here within striking distance of the ferry terminal and yet in a very relaxed town. We treated ourselves to a meal out (the home cooking features more repeats than the BBC). We also stomped along 22km of the Abel Tasman track. It's one of NZ's "Great Walks" and consequently is a bit of a motorway. It snakes along the North Coast past some very picturesque coves - all golden sand and clear blue/green water. Unfortunately most of the track runs through trees so the most common sight is of tramping tourists crouching and teetering with zoom lenses extended trying to get a clear shot through the foliage.
Fjordland may be hugely spectacular but that's not much good if it's covered in thick cloud 24x7. All the tour brochures depict glorious sunny days cruising the fjords and tanned, be-teeshirted things lounging on boat decks. As soon as you board a boat however, the tour guides love to impress you with statistics about how much rain they get. The brochures are tantamount to misrepresentation and if you go expecting it to be like that you'll probably be disappointed. As long as you know this, it's a great area to visit and spectacular in its own very wet way.
Here's a little poem the locals seem quite attached to:
Rain
It rained and rained and rained
The average fall was well maintained
And when the tracks were simple bogs
It started raining cats and dogs
After a drought of half an hour
We had a most refreshing shower
And then most curious thing of all
A gentle rain began to fall
Next day but one was fairly dry
Save for one deluge from the sky
Which wetted the party to the skin
And then at last the rain set in
Sums up our experiences quite nicely!
Rain is one thing, the black flies are something else. The locals call them sand flies but they're black and too big for what we know as such. They infest the West coast so even if you did get a sunny day, you'd be chomped to death by millions of swarming flies. Their bite is much worse than a mosquito. DEET seems to keep them off but then all your skin falls off instead. The rain seems to damp them down a lot so, in retrospect, we were lucky!