Sunday, July 13, 2008

Greetings from Brighton beach (NZ)


We had only planned to stay for one night in Queenstown, but overnight a blizzard covered the ground with a thick blanket of snow which even forced the ski slopes to close for the day. The snow also blocked all of the roads out of town so we were stuck with nothing to do except to sit in pubs drinking bad Guinness (and it wasn't just us; according to a newspaper article, 62% of people asked were 'very disappointed' by NZ Guinness).



When the roads were finally cleared we headed across the country to the east coast, which has some of NZ's rarest wildlife. Our first stop was the Otago Peninsula, home to one of the few albatross colonies outside of Antartica. Here we saw great fat (8kg!) albatross chicks, who grow to twice the size of their parents before they learn to fly. They sat stupidly on their nests, exposed to the freezing cold wind and looking just like oversized fluffy slippers. Afterwards we walked down to a small beach where we watched the resident Blue Penguins (the smallest penguins in the world) come out of the sea and onto land for the night.



The following day we stopped at a place called Moeraki (just down the road from Shag Point!) which has some perfectly spherical boulders scattered along the beach. They were just big rocks really, but made for some nice photos.


Further north we saw some Yellow-eyed Penguins which live in a colony near the town of Oamaru. They emerge from the sea in the late afternoon, but it takes them several tries before they make it ashore as every time they nearly get there they are swept back to sea by a big wave. Once they get onto the beach they then have to climb up a steep cliff-face to their nests, no easy task on tiny penguin legs. The first penguin to make it up there was a bit of a bully who then blocked the others' paths and attacked them when they tried to pass, tilting his head back and emitting a piercing scream from deep in his throat.



We took a slight detour en route to Christchurch to visit Brighton. Just like the British one it is a cute little seaside town, although the New Zealand version has a population of about 100 and their beach is sandy, and apparently their Pride parade isn't much to write home about.
After a day's shopping in Christchurch we headed north to a town called Kaikoura where we went out on a boat trip and saw four sperm whales. They were massive creatures, at least the size of our boat, and each one hung around for a few minutes blowing water out of its blowhole, before flicking its tail into the air and diving back to the bottom of the sea. We also saw some fur seals who swam past on their sides waving at us with their flippers, and a couple of adult albatrosses, no doubt out looking for more fish to feed to their fat chicks.


Our last stop in New Zealand was a spa town called Hanmer Springs where we spent two days soaking the cold out of our bones in preparation for the tropical heat of Darwin, in northern Australia, where we fly tomorrow.

Thursday, July 3, 2008

It's grim down south


Lots of people had told us that the South Island was their favourite part of New Zealand and we have to agree. Howevever as we have headed further south the weather has become progressively worse, with lots of really heavy rain and freezing cold nights. Therefore we have given up parking up overnight in laybys, and started staying at powered campervan sites with our little fan heater on full blast all night.


Our first stop was the Abel Tasman national park, where we spent a day walking along the coast through lots of tiny bays with golden sandy beaches, covered in little starfish, which backed onto coastal rainforest. It was beautiful, but the sight of so many deserted beaches made us wish that it was warm enough to have a swim; instead a torrential downpour came out of nowhere and soaked us to the skin.



Our first attempt to get to the northern tip of the south island was thwarted as the road through the mountains was blocked by a heavy snowfall. However we made it through on the second try and spent a day in the Golden Bay area, which is famous for the clearest freshwater springs in the world. At lunchtime we went to a salmon fishery on the Anatoki river where visitors are given a rod and bait, and invited to catch their own lunch. The staff then fillet and smoke your salmon for you while you wait. The river was teeming with fish, and the most difficult part was holding them still while we bopped them over the head hard enough to finish them off. Debbie's salmon refused to die, and kept coming back to life every time like Freddy Krueger at the end of Nightmare on Elm Street.



Next we headed down to the west coast and the bad weather seemed to follow us. We drove through high winds and driving rain to a place on the coast called Punakaiki where at high tide the waves are forced up into the air through 'blowholes' in the rock. We were told that that this spectacle is most impressive in foul weather, so for once the bad weather worked in our favour.




Then we contiued south until we reached the glaciers at Franz Josef and Fox. The weather suddenly improved, giving us a couple of perfectly clear days to see the glaciers in the sunshine. However for Graeme the view from the ground was not enough. The glacier looked even better while skydiving 12,000 feet above it.


That evening, after a few celebratory beers, we went on a slightly tipsy walk through the forest to a glow worm dell. Halfway around we realised we were being followed, and our suspicions were confirmed when we shone the torch directly into the eyes of a big fat possum. Possums are public enemy number one here and a few days ago we even found a cafe which sold possum pies, though the vast majority that we have seen have just been roadkill.


Yesterday we drove down the long and winding road to Milford Sound. Despite some snowfall the road was clear and we made it through, despite being ambushed by the Kea – cheeky New Zealand parrots who beg for food from every passing tourist. Milford Sound is a fjord on the South West coast of New Zealand and we took a boat trip along the whole length of it, past the mouth and out to sea. It was another miserable day but the torrential rain just added to the atmosphere, as the mountains seemed to rise dramatically out of the mist. We stayed overnight in a caravan park and in the middle of the night there was a storm and our van was shaking so much that we thought it was going to topple over in the night, or that we would wake up in Oz. Instead we woke up still at Milford Sound, albeit with a a few extra waterfalls that hadn't been there the night before.