New Zealand, Part 2: The South Island

Travel blogging is all about writing stories from a trip that took place over two years ago, right?

Am I doing this correctly?

No, but I’m doing it my way. Which is not exactly the way I traveled around the south island of New Zealand, but I enjoyed it all the same: Wine tasting overlooking a majestic lake, surrounded by layers of lush mountains; A private beach house with thousands of stars, secret glow worms in a murder cave, and a vivid orange sunset; a soaking-wet, muddy hike to the bright blue pools of a mineral-dyed river; a rare lone sunrise hike to a popular glacier; Waka ama canoeing to a lighthouse in a calm bay; and, honestly, the wildest ferry ride I’ve ever been on (though that I could have done without. I have also been on very few ferry rides, so take that as you will).

The most scenic winery I have ever been to

I have to back up for a minute. In my previous New Zealand post, I discussed the spectacular Milford Track, but before we tramped, we spent a couple of days in Te Anau. This involved getting to Te Anau from Colorado, which was quite an adventure in and of itself, comprising of the following steps:

Lyft ride to Park and Ride in Colorado.
Bus to Airport.
Fly to LA.
Spend 8 hour layover walking several laps around LAX, preparing for 14-hour plane ride.
Fly to Auckland for 14 hours.
Fly to Queenstown
Bus to hostel in Te Anau, several hours south of Queenstown

… all this was slated to take about 36 hours in total.

And apparently my Good Travel Karma was a bit spent prior to departure, so we ended up with some flight delays (I know you’re preparing for your 14-hour plane ride, but let’s sit on the tarmac for 2 hours first). Plus, American Airlines randomly changed our seats such that we were not sitting together on aforementioned 14-hour flight. AND I even temporarily lost a bag with all my camping gear. Somehow, it all worked out; we changed our seats, made all of our connections, and reunited with every piece of our luggage, albeit with more last minute scrambling than I would have preferred. What I found wonderful was the attentiveness of the folks at the Queenstown Airport. It could have been a place fed up with tourists, but instead it felt like a small town airport interested in helping its patrons. I also thoroughly enjoyed the black tea with milk that was served on New Zealand Air - a favorite of mine that is not really popular in the States. Furthermore, sitting down in the one restaurant at the Queenstown airport gave me an extra boost of confidence: they had gluten free bread and were happy to substitute it on my sandwich. So, it was with a full belly that we breathed a sigh of relief, all bags in hand, as the bus wound around Lake Wakatipu and trundled down to, really, truly, the other side of the effing world.

South Island, as seen from the airplane.

Te Anau

Te Anau was relaxing. At the hostel, we showered in our luxurious en suite bathroom, then watched Rick and Morty until it was an acceptable hour to go to bed. We were exhausted, what else were we supposed to do? Plus, for some reason, I really enjoy doing incredibly mundane activities like watching a popular television show while halfway across the world. A sense of stability, I suppose. I was having a hard time grasping how many miles we had traveled. Made even more difficult to believe because one of the hostel employees used to live in Colorado. Same city, in fact.

The next morning, we rented bikes and rode alongside the lake for awhile, enjoying the leisure path. We talked to the Department of Conservation office, received all the information we needed for our hike, and enjoyed a pleasant day, albeit with moody weather. The town is relatively quiet and while it was obvious we were in another country, it didn’t feel that different. This did not stop us for being entirely stumped walking into a cafe for breakfast and reading the list of available espresso drinks: Short Black? Long Black? Flat White?? We both ordered our first of many Long Blacks - it’s somewhere between an espresso and an americano, but somehow way better.

Christina and Andrew arrived around noon with the rental car, so we met up with them and prepared for the camping trip by stocking up on groceries and backpacking food, and picking up the information we needed for “Easy Hike”.

Andrew and Kit on a random zip line in the middle of Te Anau (photo by Christina)

Check out here for the next 4 days.

Stepping off the water taxi at Milford Sound was a bit surreal. We’d spent the last four days walking through lush forest and weaving through fiords, which was fantastic, but we were tired and in desperate need of showers (or at least I was, at any rate). However, we had booked a late afternoon “cruise” around the Sound, because it seemed silly not to. This was quite possibly the most touristy place in New Zealand, but for good reason. It was incredibly beautiful. But the rows and rows of tour companies lined up at the docks really hammered home just how many people came through here. Which is odd, because it’s not exactly easy to get to.

We had a nice boat ride, albeit a little sleepy. It was pleasant to sit on the edge of the boat, leaning up on the railing, watching the Sound go by. We cruised all the way out to the ocean, passing waterfalls, steep fiord walls, misty mountaintops, and snoozing sea lions. Upon returning to the docks, I searched for the perfect spot to take the popular Milford Sound photo, but the lighting wasn’t helping. I honestly think I was a little photo-ed out after 4 days on the Milford Track!

(taken by Christina) - Kit and I looking…tired

Reunited with our car, Christina drove us back to Te Anau. Like pretty much all of New Zealand, this was spectacularly scenic as well. My “favorite” part (sense the sarcasm here) was the bizarre, seemingly unfinished, long, one-way road tunnel right through a mountain. (it’s actually quite famous: it’s called Homer Tunnel. I didn’t take a picture but check out the Google Streetview below. In searching for this shot, I also found a Kea playground??)

My hair has never felt as good as it did after my shower that evening.

Christina and Andrew went out to eat at an Italian place, but Kit and I stayed in, too exhausted for a real dinner. I was eager to get back to internet service as well, to check in on a family matter at home. Unfortunately, this did not result in good news, and I decided I just needed to sleep. I can’t pretend that it did not impact my experience, knowing that I really needed to be home with my family. Instead, I was about 8000 miles away. I’m not touching on this again, but know that it was there. And know that it is possible to feel worry and excitement at the same time.

So it was with a weight on my chest that I woke up in Te Anau the next day, and together we drove away from the surprisingly sleeping lakeside town.

Wanaka

(No, not Wakanda. Sadly.)

The next piece of the trip is where we drove a lot. I will complain about this experience to some degree, but one should not take it too seriously. I just don’t enjoy being in cars. I found it difficult for us to actually do the things. But it was still fun. I have extremely fond memories of the experience, and I’m glad that I did it. I would do things differently if I went back, but I am not saying that I regret doing the thing in the first place. I’m really critical of, well, my life - I realize this comes off as more negative than it is intended. I just overthink everything.

Basic White Girl Travel Style (photo by Christina)

The first stop was back to Queenstown, this time by car instead of bus, where we ate ice cream and gawked at the incredibly crowded streets and weirdly touristy vibe. It was BUSTLING. And signs were posted everywhere, trying to entice visitors to Skydive HERE or Kitesurf THERE. As I did not want to Skydive HERE (or anywhere), we kept the visit short. We did not enjoy finding a parking spot but we did enjoy walking around and people watching. The lake and mountain ranges were magnificent as well. We stayed long enough to take a few pictures before heading along a windy road through hilly farmland.

The next stop, and our home for the evening, was Wanaka. I had heard from a friend, and verified on the internet, that this would be a “chiller” stopping point than Queenstown, and that was accurate. On the way there, we stopped to take pictures of the colorful lupin flowers and bask in the glory of the New Zealand hillside.

Once in town, we checked into our 2-bedroom luxury hotel suite (this one was actually pretty nice - one of the fancier places we stayed), then headed directly to a winery, on Christina’s request. It did not disappoint. We sampled wine, talked with the knowledgeable staff and visitors from around the globe, and accidentally wandered too deep into the grape vines and were reprimanded by a winemaker for our inability to read a sign (whoops). The breeze, the perfect scenery, the big blue beautiful lake, laughing with friends, sprinting down the hillside - picturesque beyond words. Travel can be messy and terrible, but sometimes it is pure bliss.

Somehow the best photo we took together?

We ventured down to downtown Wanaka to photograph That Wanaka Tree (#worthit, I guess?), and to get another round of drinks at a pub (definitely #worthit). We also found one of the best restaurants we ate at during the entire trip, in my opinion - fast casual that actually served lots of vegetables and vegetarian dishes! Greens! In New Zealand! Then, that evening brought hot tubing and laundry. Kit and Andrew were both really interested in mountain biking in the area, and Christina and I were eyeing some hikes, but we realized it wasn’t going to be possible. Tomorrow was Christmas. Rentals would be closed, and we had a long drive to the next stop. So, we made a plan to get out early and stop for some hikes on the way to Franz Josef Glacier.

Another view of Lake Wanaka as we drove away in the morning

The West Coast

In the morning, the rain came.

Andrew heroically drove us through most of it. We had a four hour drive on winding mountain roads (notice a theme here), including some outstandingly tall bridges. Several were of the one-lane variety. New Zealand continued to amaze us with beauty, but I was a bit grumpy at how wet it was. We decided we weren’t going to let the rain stop us from at least one of our planned pit stops, the Blue Pools. It was only about 2 km to the pools, and even if swimming in the pools was off the table for the day, we figured we could make it to the suspension bridge. We did, but we got wetter than we wanted in the process.

It was with pouty faces that we arrived at Franz Josef Glacier: no penguin-spotting in Haast, no dip in the blue pools, no afternoon glacier hike… We had lunch at the only open cafe, then we didn’t really know what else to do with the buckets of water coming from the sky. So we lounged around the hostel, and it was kind of nice to relax.

For dinner, we pulled out the groceries we had picked up in Wanaka and prepared a homemade “Christmas” dinner in the hostel kitchen. The hostel was busy that night, full of travelers choosing a night in from the rain. Christina made friends with a Frenchman who was sharing some counter space with us. I wish I had her ability to strike up conversation with strangers - I truly do love hearing from other folks around the world; I’m just so bad at starting the exchange. It was over chopping carrots and peppers that we learned of his travels, and met a few more folks from Germany in the process. Meanwhile, Kit and Andrew were engrossed in a self-pity-fueled Civilization V game on their laptops. We ate our thrown-together Christmas Dinner in the bustling dining room, surrounded by people from all around the globe who had come to take in the beauty of this spectacular corner of the world. Then, we spotted a man wearing a very familiar tee shirt - Mountain Sun, a popular brewery in Colorado. Not such a wide world after all, yet again! He and his spouse were some of the only Americans we met while in New Zealand.

We woke up very early, before most other people, to hike to the glacier. We were determined to get more activity out of this trip, after the soggy day before. It did not disappoint - we hiked under the rising sun through the valley, getting as close to the glacier as one could get without shelling out $500/person for a helicopter ride. The glacier-carved valley was spectacular. It was also disheartening to see how much the glacier has retreated in recent years.

We breakfasted at the same Only Open Cafe before hitting the road north, along the coast. The clouds had officially departed, and it was in the sun that we drove along more winding roads to touristy beach towns - interesting, though, that these towns were touristy to Kiwis, and less-so to foreigners. Most places were small, with very little going on. We pulled over in Hokitika, allegedly a great stopping spot, but in actuality just extremely breezy that day and we nearly blew away on the beach. We visited some of the shops but they didn’t really do anything for me. It was over an hour out of the way for us to visit the Hokitika Gorge, which would have been breathtaking no doubt, but we decided to skip it and continue north.

We had a late lunch in Greymouth...which was honestly about as exciting of a town as it sounds. We continued up the coast for another hour or so before stopping at Paparoa National Park. A short hike from the road there is a cluster of interestingly formed rocks and extremely annoying birds, so of course we had to go check it out. Then, we found our private little beach “bach” (Airbnb Rental) about 20 minutes from there. We had only one night here as well, though there wasn’t a lot to do because it was kind of in the middle of nowhere. That suited us just fine though, because it was RIGHT on the beach. We cooked another meal, then headed out for a sunset beach walk and hopefully some penguin-spotting (no dice). It was still a brilliantly charming evening, with the bright orange sun simmering down over the crashing waves. The West Coast reminded me a lot of the Oregon Coast, a personal favorite of mine.

We had a second adventure planned for that night: our Airbnb host left us directions to find a secret glowworm cave nearby. Glowworms are fairly unique to New Zealand, making it a big tourist draw. On the north island, there are some very famous and very popular caves, with tons of boat tour options. We wanted to see if we could find something a little more private here, and we were rewarded (though, I thought “cave” was a bit of a misnomer: I preferred “dilapidated, abandoned mine shaft” or “ax murderer hidey-hole”. More descriptive.) We had to do some poking around a grown-over trail on the hillside behind the beach before discovering the murder-chamber. Once inside, however, if you let your eyes adjust to the blackness, you begin to see bright blue dots almost twinkling on the ceiling. It was quite dazzling, or it would have been, had I not been so convinced that we were about to be chopped to pieces by a crazy person wielding an ax. Everyone else had a great time though.

Irrational anxiety strikes again.

Christina and I toast with my new favorite Sauvignon blanc

Christina and I found each other both awake at 3 am, armed with cameras outside the beach bach. It was a clear night, and we were far away from any major city. The stars were good. My attempt at astrophotography was not.

Nelson

We only had about 24 hours left on the south island. We were all feeling a little antsy, with another 4 hour drive ahead of us and the knowledge that we may never get the opportunity to return. We somberly drove north and east, to the top of the south island, passing the time with podcasts. It takes a long time to drive anywhere in these parts, we learned. While the speed limits aren’t low, there isn’t really a way to go fast on the hilly, mountain terrain. And it was all hilly, mountain terrain, even along the coast.

I would have been too shy, but because we were travelling with Christina, she booked a shared-space Airbnb in Nelson. This was a worthwhile stay. The hosts were an older couple who love to meet new people and they had lots of great advice for things to do in the area. We sat down and made a real plan - our ferry to the north island was scheduled for 11 am tomorrow, but that was going to, yet again, interfere with any activity we wanted to do. This is where we had the brilliant idea to delay our ferry - we could easily transfer tickets to the 4 pm departure! Spontaneously changing plans, and receiving guidance from our hosts, gave us new optimism for the next 24 hours.

First, we spent the afternoon and evening at the famous Abel Tasman National Park. This required more driving (ugh) but also allowed for a few miles of hiking. This was another beach, but it felt very different from the west coast. Here, it was crowded. Families were splashing in the shallow waters next to the bright yellow sand. Real fruit ice cream stands provided Christina with her favorite nourishment. We hiked a small portion of the Abel Tasman Track, another one of the Nine Great Walks. Then, we ate fish and chips on our way back to the Airbnb for the night.

Christina, capturing birds at Abel Tasman

Next, I was up all night throwing up for reasons I don’t really understand. I don’t think it was the fish. I just have some weird health issues.

NEXT, Christina and I (very tired, but feeling totally fine otherwise) joined our Airbnb hosts for their morning “Waka ama” boating excursion. This was a brand-new experience for us, but it was very fun! It is a very narrow outrigger canoe which requires a specific, coordinated paddling technique. We met some more locals and took our canoe to a lighthouse off the coast. Meanwhile, Andrew and Kit finally got to mountain bike. We reunited in downtown Nelson and ate lunch at a restaurant that served decadent-looking milkshakes that the guys thoroughly enjoyed. I decided to risk more wine, with no regrets. We were all satisfied, I think, in more ways than one.

Me in front of the Waka-ama (Photo from Christina)

Alas, there was still more driving.

The ferry departed from Picton, which is not the most scenic town in and of itself, but its docks host several cruise ships and is surrounded by wineries. We didn’t have time to visit the wineries, but we enjoyed driving by the grapevines. The ferry itself travels through Queen Charlotte Sound, which is said to be quite spectacular. Now, having hiked into Milford Sound, I reviewed it a solid “meh”. But it was quite nice. I’d never driven onto a ferry before (not that I was driving…), so that was yet another new experience for me. The ferry was huge, by far the biggest watercraft I’d ever been on, and I was hoping that would help with seasickness. I didn’t need any more stomach troubles. And I didn’t get sick, much to the chagrin of the the goddamn waves, which were pretty vicious. It was apparently a particularly rough crossing (..yay). I’m still not entirely sure how everything stayed in place with the rocking.

Queen Charlotte Sound, and calm waters before the crazy.

So on that note, we waved goodbye to the south island. Our group would be splitting up the following morning, but we were ready for a change in scenery, change in itinerary, and even more of New Zealand to experience.

love,

april

Song of the Day: Fever To The Form by Nick Mulvey

long post, adventuresACJune 15, 2020travel, new zealand, wanaka, Paparoa National Park, Nelson1 Comment