New Zealand

Around mid-January I finished up the first part of my Australian trip... In the last couple of days I hung out with my friend Brian we went to Bondi Beach for the afternoon walked the beach path and drank smoothies. I also had a few great days of surfing, one night right after a storm I had a wicked night surfing, I think I caught my best wave of the trip, or at least it felt that way... however, little did I know that if you surf after a storm you can get sick from everything that washes into the ocean from the streets... so a couple days later in the middle of the summer I got a sinus infection that consumed me... and well it lasted well over a week which carried over into my New Zealand trip... I have never had troubles flying before but this time I thought my head was going to pop off when we were landing...

The flight over from Sydney, Australia to Christchurch, New Zealand was about 3 hours.... Christchurch is the main city on the South Island of New Zealand... I stayed at a very nice Hostel called Dorset Lodge, for about six days. Christchurch is a beautiful city, reminds me a lot of Victoria, B.C. with the older buildings and lush greenery... but again its a city so I wasn't too happy hanging around... I stayed for six days because I wanted to buy a van... Apparently that's what backpackers do here, they buy a van, travel in it for 2-3 months and then sell it... so I thought that is what I'll do... as most of us know cars are not my expertise but I wanted to show my Independence and buy a van... so with only 1 hour long consultation with my father and multiple short consultations with my boyfriend, a mechanical check and alot of bargaining I bought a 1992 light blue Nissan Serena decked out with all the camping gear and a bed in the boot!

Started my trip by driving from Christchurch to Lake Tekapo, only 3.5 hours.... Lake Tekapo is a beautiful glacial lake and within an hours hike there is an observatory with incredibly huge telescopes... I got to see Venus and the moon through the telescope, very cool... I met a 70 year old man on the hike down from the observatory and he recommended I check out Mtn. Cook National Park and hike the Muller hut hike so the next day that's what I did... I climbed up the 4.5 hour climb, 1000meter staircase to get to the Muller Hut overlooking Mtn. Cook.... Mtn. Cook is New Zealand's tallest mountain and stunningly beautiful!! Stayed at the hut and met some great people...

One of the guys staying at the Muller hut was an Aussie dude named Dan, he is living in a near by town and told me he had a couple of aussie friends visiting for a couple of weeks and he organized this 4 day hike the next day, with jet boat rides at the begining and end of the hike. I thought cool I could be up for that so I kind of invited myself along and oddly enough he didn't seem to mind. So the next day they came to pick me up and the four of us started this four day hike through the Young Valley out of Makoroa river... The first jet boat ride was short, but it got us across the river, then we started our 20km hike to the Young Hut... alot longer than we all thought but made it there after 7 hours of hiking.... the next day was the pass day, up over Gillespie Pass, extremely steep 2 hour straight up climb, and very long descent to the next hut, Siberia Hut into the Wilkin Valley... It was a ten hour day but with many stops to chat, take pictures and whatever other reason we found to stop... the next day was supposed to be a rest day, but I don't remember resting much.. we did a little day trip up to Lake Crucible which is a glacial lake, about 7 hour return trip to Siberia Hut.... and finally out last day, was a quick 2.5 hour hike out of the Wilkin valley a super cool Jet boat ride back to Makarora... The jet boat even pulled 360's in the river... it was unbelievable trip, in total I think we trekked 45kms over 4 days, we all got along great and had a few good laughs... we ended our trip with an "awvo" (aussie word for afternoon) session at the bar... a couple of drinks and some "dirty" or greasy food... All in all (Jess, you know how we grade our tour guides) Dan gets an A plus in tour guiding, he organized a great trip for his friends, the jet boat rides (with the 360's) topped it off....

Well I am in Wanaka now... going to hang out for a few days and recover... Wanaka is a small town haven't seen too much yet but it kind of reminds me of Squamish... So we'll see what it has to offer... I am able to download pics from my trip so far but I think my camera just broke or something so I am not too sure if I'll have pics for the next blog but I'll do my best... Hope you are all well... Big Hug Jamie