Christchurch and the end of our trip.

We departed Queenstown and headed northeast to our final city, Christchurch. Along the way we caught sight of Mt. Cook, New Zealand's tallest peak. We shot some pictures from a visitor's center on a large lake, which had a very unusual turquoise color to it.

Made it to Christchurch after an uneventful drive, and checked into our hotel, a very English looking affair. Went for a walk and found the place very quiet, but it was a Saturday afternoon.

Next day we visited the New Zealand Air Force Museum and took the "Restoration Tour". This is really an excellent air museum if you happen to be into that stuff. We got to go into the restoration workshops and look over their latest projects, which included a P-40, which is one of my favorites! They also had a Spitfire cockpit which I had to try out!

Went to the International Antarctic center, but tours were very expensive and we didn't see anything in the description that interested us too much, so we passed. Shelly did find a nice Kiwi charm in the gift shop, so it wasn't a complete waste of time! It's actually interesting to see what is here to support the Antarctic research, this is the jumping off point for most support flights to the pole.

We got back to the hotel, and then walked to the center of town. We saw gondolas on the river. Riding in these is called "punting", and you can take short cruises around the central city and park. We checked out a large open air market, then visited the Cantebury museum. This is a general purpose museum with a variety of themes. One was Antarctic exploration, and that was very interesting. They even had a sled from Admunsen's expedition.

Next day, we hit the vast Botanical Gardens and the town center. Shelly seems to have enjoyed these quite a lot, and she took lots of photos. I'll have to post them in a separate entry. We spent spent most of the morning there, then entered the central business district around midday.

Walking around, we came to the central pedestrian mall which had lots of open space and many food vendors. We grabbed a quick lunch of German style sausage and walked some more. There was a large scale chess board set up with people playing. you have to walk around the board and pick up your piece and walk it to the next space to make your move. Could be good exercise!

Click here for Christchurch

Tuesday morning, and it was time to leave New Zealand! We dropped off the car rental, then were shuttled to the airport and caught our connecting flight to Auckland. Flew out of Auckland for L.A.late Tuesday morning, and arrived in L.A. on Tuesday morning! (Thanks to the international dateline). Flew up to SFO, then took BART to Richmond and then caught the AMTRACK Capital Corridor train to Sacramento, then connected with the AMTRACK bus to Rocklin. Our son Ryan picked us up and we got home after about 32 hours of travel!

We slept pretty good that night!

What a trip, in 5 weeks we had flown, sailed on ferries and charter boats, rode trains, cabs, cable cars, drove rental cars, swam, and walked and walked and walked. I can't guess what our mileage totaled...By my count, we took 1578 photos! We'll be sorting through those for years!

The Milford Track

Now we came to the highlight of or tour, the 33.5 mile Milford Track.

We left Franz Josef pretty early in the morning to make the long drive to Queenstown. The weather was brilliant, so we took the scenic route through Cardona and over a high pass, coming down through many switchbacks into the valley that Queenstown sets. On the way we stopped by Arrowtown, an old gold mining town, then into Queenstown.



Queenstown is a resort city, with plenty of action. During winter it serves several ski areas in the region, while in the summer, it sits on Lake Wakatipu, and is the gateway to the Southern Alps.

We spent the night in Queenstown, in a room overlooking the lake. Nice room but a terrible bed!

Next day, we were bussed to Lake Te Ahau. We boarded a boat which took us to the very northern tip of the lake, which is the start of the track. From there we had a short walk to Glade House, our first overnight lodge.

The Milford Track is in a National Park, and access is limited. There are “huts” for the guided tours, like ours, which are really more like lodges with showers and dining facilities. There are also huts for independent hikers, with bunks and cooking and bathroom facilities.

It’s a very nice way to hike. You carry just clothes and toiletries with you on the guided walks, the guide service provided all the meals.

The second day’s hike took us through rain forest and across rivers and streams. The third day was the most impressive, we walked over MacKinnon Pass and down to our next lodge, a pretty tough 9 mile hike. At the lodge, there was an optional side trip to Sutherland Falls, we decided we had just enough energy to make that, so off we went.

MacKinnon Monument at the Pass

It was worth the effort, the falls are over 1900 feet high, and the water falling makes a strong wind at the bottom of the falls, so you get quite wet from just standing near them! It was the wettest part of the whole hike. We had unbelievable luck with the weather, with virtually no rain, and great conditions over the pass. Even the guides remarked about our luck with the weather.

Sutherland Falls

Day 4 was the last day of walking, but also the longest at 13 miles. It was relatively flat, but were feeling the affects of yesterday’s climb and descent. We came to the trail’s end in the afternoon and were picked up by a small boat which took us across the Sound to our last lodge, a very large place with all the comforts of home.

The next morning we boarded a ship and took a cruise on Milford Sound up to its mouth at the Tasman Sea. We saw seals and even some rare penguins. After the cruise, it was back on a bus for the ride back to Queenstown. Our room was at the same hotel as before, but this time we had a better view and a better mattress!

Milford Sound

click here for Milford Track pix

I haven’t put too much detail into this account to keep it brief, so it may understate the awesome beauty of this place. Look at a few of the pictures I’m posting, that might help. But the point is, this was a fantastic experience. You enjoy some of the world’s best hiking, and also enjoy the company of fellow hikers from all over the world. I really recommend this hike.

Franz Josef Glacier

Franz Josef Glacier

Franz Josef Glacier was discovered by an Austrian and named after the Austrian Emperor of that time. It's one of the largest Glaciers in New Zealand, a land of many glaciers. It has a small resort community which exists because of it.

It's an impressive glacier, even from the distance we observed it from. After viewing Franz Josef from many different angles, we drove around the mountain range and visited Fox Glacier. It's a little smaller than Franz Josef, but still an interesting site.

Pix of FranzJosefGlacier to Queenstown

We left Franz Josef pretty early in the morning to make the long drive to Queenstown. Driving is a bit slower down here, roads are curvy, and there are a lot of single lane bridges, so you can't go too fast.

NELSON TO FRANZ JOE

The drive from Nelson was an interesting one, along the way, we took a side road to view some lakes and found the best road sign of the trip!

We eventually came to the coast of the Tasman Sea, and enjoyed some very beautiful scenery, not unlike to coast of California. Saw some wildlife, especially the Weka, and moderate sized bird. Also stopped and checkout a blowhole and the “Pancake Rocks.

Pix from NelsonToFranz Josef

SOUTH ISLAND PICTIN TO NELSON

Passing a smaller ferry at Pictin!

After getting off the ferry, we picked up our car in Pictin, a small harbor town that hosts the main ferry line from the north. From there, we dropped south to the Marlborough region near Blenheim, a wine producing area. We stopped at a couple of wineries along our route and sampled some very nice wines, and had a nice lunch.

On to Nelson, a moderately sized city where we came to the finest hotel of our trip. Built to resemble a French chateau, the hotel looked out over an estuary flowing into the sea.

The restaurant next to it was also very nice, but a bit to pricey for dinner, so we blundered our way into Nelson and found a decent café. We did have a fine breakfast at the place the next morning, then departed for Franz Josef Glacier

Pix from Pictin to Nelson.

WELLINGTON

We departed Rotorua, heading south to the capital, Wellington. Along the way we picked up some groceries for lunch. We came to a huge lake (Taupo). It’s enormous, the biggest lake in NZ. We stopped to take a break, and I found a MacDonalds with an airplane attached to it!

We drove though a national park which included these two massive, snow clad volcanoes. One reminded me of Mt. Shasta, which was actually Mt. Doom in the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. After passing these we came into a high desert region. We stopped by a wool producer’s outlet and found some excellent things there. We also took a lunch break.

We made to Wellington at just about rush hour. It wasn’t too bad driving, but at the hotel, there was a sea of people walking by. We managed to park the car and check in. About an hour later, we went out for dinner and found the streets deserted and few things open!

Next morning we dropped off the car and boarded the ferry for a 3 hour cruise to Pictin, on the South Island. The ferry was really big, with cafes and dining facilities.

Rotorua to Wellington pix.

ROTORUA

Along the way to Rotorua from Auckland, we stopped at a couple of smaller towns. At Hamilton, we found a really extraordinary garden. It contained several examples of different garden styles, like Japanese and Italian Renaissance.

Click to view pix from Hamilton Gardens 

Finally made it to Rotorua without incident, although I had a couple of bad moments in traffic circles. The hotel was nice enough. We had arrived just in time for happy hour so we had a beer then walked around a bit. We ended up having dinner at a pub that was in the old police station. I took the opportunity to have another lamb meal.

Next morning we walked to the city park and observed lots of geothermal pools and mud holes. There a lot in this area, and the whole town can sometimes take on a sulfur smell. That afternoon we drove up to the Agrodome, north of town to see the Zorbing! A Zorb is a large plastic ball you climb into and ride down the hill in! Well, I had to try that so in I went. You are strapped in and just roll down! It was like doing lots of really smooth somersaults, hard to describe, but worth doing once!

Back to town for some more walking and shopping. We found the large bath houses and bowling lawns. There was some bowling actually taking place so we watched to get some pointers. The grass is like a really dense carpet. Hitting the shops, Shelly found some nice jade at the Jade Factory, an interesting place that has this humongous jade boulder at its entrance.

click for photos of Rotorua

Next morning we departed, heading south to Wellington, the capital.

STARTING NEW ZEALAND; AUCKLAND.

We arrived in Auckland in the late afternoon and were greeted b y a man from the travel agency who gave us our vouchers for NZ. He also sat us down and gave us a brief overview of our itinerary, with lots of good advice thrown in. We then took a shuttle to our hotel, which was located in the heart of downtown Auckland, on Queens Street.

It turned out that Queens was a really lively part of town! The first night we watched a demonstration for an increased minimum wage pass down the street. The sidewalks were quite busy after that. We grabbed some kebabs at a funky little place and headed back to our room

The next morning we were picked up by the car rental shuttle and taken to their office to pick up our car. It was a Silver Corolla! Actually a 2004, so nearly identical to our own. Now I got to learn how to drive on the left side of the road. It’s a little weird at first. Highway driving is fine, but urban travel is a little stressful. Especially the round-abouts! Holy cow, they have multiple lane round-abouts that can drive you nuts.

We made our way back towards our hotel but stopped at One-Tree-Hill for the spectacular vies of the city and harbor. Then, into the Auckland Museum. It’s a huge place that contains lots of Maori and White history. There is a gigantic Maori war-canoe, it holds 100 people and was about 250 feet long. Also a Mitsubishi Zero and Spitfire from the WWII exhibit. There was a large natural history collection which contains probably the only Kiwi we’ll see. The Polynesian exhibit was very impressive. We could have spent a lot more time there but our parking was limited so off we went. Dinner was at a small Mexican Restaurant which had pretty good food.

Next day was a cruise across the harbor to Devonport. We had a ferry pass so after we toured that village we road the ferry across the harbor again, just because we could!

Auckland photos.

Next morning we were off on the road to Rotorua.

DARWIN, CAIRNS, DUNK ISLAND.

We arrived at Darwin after sunset. After checking into out hotel (Travel Lodge, nice place), We ate at the pool bar. Not really great food, their idea of a Porterhouse is really different from mine. Shelly’s Chicken Parmigiana wasn’t to hot…we had certain misgivings about this place!

But the next morning we went for a stroll, looking for a breakfast spot. Lonely Planet recommended a few spots nearby but we had a hard time getting our bearings. People don’t post street numbers often around here. Finally we stumbled into the place! (The Roma cafe) An excellent place for breakfast. I could tell because there were about a dozen bicyclists sitting around eating. You know they go where food is good and relatively cheap! I had the banana pancakes which were excellent.

We had lattes there too. A word is in order about Australian coffee. Latte’s and cappuccinos are very common, and about the same cost as regular coffee as far as I can tell. A “Long Black” is similar to an “Americano” at Starbucks. Also, regular coffee is often not great, kind of like Denny’s or Carrow’s.

We spent much of the day walking along the Esplanade which runs along the Harbor. Darwin has a huge harbor. Unlike Sydney’s, Darwin’s harbor was virtually empty.

There’s quite a lot of WWII history around here. We visited the area where Catalina Flying boats were moored. Also, there are numerous placards describing the Japanese attacks here. (Darwin was bombed 64 times!) The USS Peary lies at the bottom of the Harbor.

We left the Esplanade and found a large water park which included a wave maker! Apparently, there are enough hazardous creatures out in the Timoor Sea that people prefer to swim in a more protected area.

We then got directions to the Botanical Gardens, which were an easy walk from our hotel. It was getting late so the only things open were the trails themselves.

Dinner was at Tim’s Surf and Turf. A funky little place which served crocodile. Of course, we had to try some. We had the croc appetizer, breaded and fried with a sauce on the side. It tasted, I swear, just like chicken. I went to the bar to pick up a couple of beers, there on the bar was a baby croc in an aquarium, It made me feel a little funny.

Both Shelly and I enjoyed Darwin, it was a comfortable size and seemed to offer a lot. We would have liked to spend more time there, maybe next time!

Had to leave the hotel at 5:40 the next morning for our flight to Cairns. Getting up that early would have been a problem had we not been all jet lagged anyway. A few hour’s of flying and we were in Cairns, we then transferred to Hinterland Air for the flight to Dunk Island. We boarded a smallish Cessna Caravan for a 30 minute flight.

Dunk Island is 4.5 kilometers off the coast, you can easily see the coast from there. It consists of a large resort and a National Park. The resort is pretty luxurious, with 2 pools, 2 large restaurants, a jetty with watercraft, sports courts, and lots more. We found racquetball courts there!

Many of the activities were quite expensive, so we were able to eliminate a lot of them! But we played racquetball, bocce ball, and hiked around the island. We did a little snorkeling, but that wasn’t as nice as in Hawaii. It took us a little while to get used to Resort life, but we got the hang of it, and wished we had a few more days when we had to leave.

Back to the mainland, we spent a day in Cairns. This is another nice town, lots of tourists and beach bums around, kind of like Southern California. Walking around, we came to some large trees, with lots of screeching coming from them. What we thought were birds turned out to be bats, hundreds of them!! They looked just like the ones we saw in Sydney. A sign posted under the tree said that this was their mating season, hence the noise. We snapped a couple of shots and got out of there!

Walking along the beach, we discovered one odd life form, there are weird fish(?) which crawl along the mud on their front fins! They looked like giant tadpoles, I can’t really say if they were fish of amphibians, they looked like one of those animals illustrating evolution from the ocean! We tried to get a photo, but I don’t think they came out very well.

Click for pix for Darwin, etc.

Next day, it was to the airport, and on to New Zealand!