goodbye Grover and goodbye NZ!

today is a bit of a SAD day.
we parted ways with Grover The Great, as i am now naming our ex-car. he was a good car, a loyal car, and he took us all the way from Auckland to Christchurch with only the odd squeak of complaint from his overly inflated back tyres. he taught me how to drive again, and he took us to many amazing places- he will be missed. thankfully we are getting a new car tomorrow in Brisbane… we have tentatively named this car Grover II.

so, as should be evident by my comments, our time in New Zealand is pretty much at an end. i have a major re-packing of the backpack to attempt and this may take some time, especially after i went shopping today and made a few new purchases (oops! it’s been a MONTH! and everything i bought was in the sale!). we are also going to go out for one last NZ dinner tonight rather than eating in (the motley collection of food that we have left would make a rather mis-matched and un-appetising meal. potatoes, spaghetti, a tin of sweetcorn, half an onion and some salad cream does not a delicious dinner make!!), so i will attempt to whip through a recap of our last few days speedily and succinctly….. yeah, cos i’m so good at that!!

i believe that when i last blogged we were about to hop in the car and head the few hours down the road to Milford, to set sail for an overnight cruise in the Milford Sound. we had a great drive through the Fiordlands to get to Milford- it really is such a spectacular place. every corner you turn around you are faced by yet another massive mountain, usually spouting an equally massive waterfall of snow melt. it was a gorgeous day, so the skies were bright blue, framing every view perfectly. we boarded our cruise ship, and were soon chuntling down the sound. if you are unclear as to what a ‘sound’ is in kiwi speak, it is effectively a fjord, a massive valley formed by glaciers running into the sea, which have gouged out the rock in their path and then melted. Milford Sound runs into the Tasman sea, and its sides are impossibly high. at one point we were told that we were sailing past valley walls that were a mile high from the sea level, and that isn’t even taking into account how far below sea level the valley also runs. for the majority of the cruise they were so high that the tips were shrouded in cloud, and you actually hurt your neck craning to follow up the sides to try and see their peaks.

we sailed past leaping dolphins (yes, they were actually swimming along the side of the boat, and jumping out of the water in a totally charming and clichéd way!), more waterfalls, the odd seal, and out to the Tasman. once at the mouth of the sound the boat dropped anchor, and we were allowed to go for a little explore, either on the boat’s tender or by taking kayaks and doing it independently. ever the independent travelers, we took the kayaks and had a fun hour paddling around, navigating the gentle waves, trying not to get splashed by the freezing water or bitten by the persistent sandflies. we succeeded in the first, but failed spectacularly in the latter! after a warming shower, and application of much tiger balm to the bites, we had dinner in the mess. we were put at a table with a couple from Abingdon in Oxfordshire, about our parent’s age, and were soon thrilled to discover that they were also Africa-philes. we spent the evening talking about various safari experiences, and stayed on at the bar until the young bar man could stand it no longer and closed up around us. after a brief stroll on the deck, admiring the stars and looking for seals, we took to bed, ready for an early start. the return cruise in the morning took us slowly back through the sound, via some rather close encounters with the waterfalls, and stopping briefly for Fiordland Crested Penguins on the rocks, but mainly just enjoying the intense peace and tranquility of this very special place.

we drove back to Te Anau, and had an afternoon trip to visit some glowworm caves- very interesting, and quite magical- and then had a delicious blow out dinner at another place recommended by my parents from their previous jaunt around New Zealand. i had a good seafood chowder, a really innovative duck main course, with a savoury bread and butter pudding and date and walnut jam (so scrummy!) and a deconstructed banoffee pie for desert. the most ‘foodie’ meal we’ve had since we got here, and it felt like a real treat. we staggered back to our hostel feeling sleepy and replete!


the following day we headed to an area called the Catlins in the very south. it was quite interesting- it’s a very undeveloped area (they only started tarmacking the roads there about 5 years ago), and seemed pretty poor and run down, but the wilderness and wildlife is why we had built it into our schedule. the afternoon we arrived it was very rainy and pretty cold, and the wind was ferocious the whole time we were there, but the sun came out on our second day so we at least had blue skies to visit the sights and natural wonders (albeit having to resist being blown off cliff tops at the same time!). we spent a portion of our first evening visiting a hide, and managed to spot a couple of very rare yellow eyed penguins leaving the sea and heading up the hills, but were eventually beaten by the biting cold and wind and headed back to the comfort of a log fire and spaghetti bolognese pretty sharpish! the next day we had fun exploring, walking down to the most southern point of the south island, trekking to a spot on the beach called the Cathedral Caves and uncovering beautiful waterfalls. the whole visit to the Catlins was made memorable by some awesome sealion sightings the morning we were leaving. we strolled straight from our hostel onto the beach, the wind had dropped and the sun was shining, and we walked for about an hour down to the end of the bay, stumbling over sleeping sealions all the way. at the cove at the end of the beach there was a group with one full grown adult bull and about 8 juveniles, playfighting and running around on the beach and in the waves. we sat watching them from the dunes for ages- it was super cool to watch them and work out their individual personalities, and as aspiring wildlife photographers it was a great experience. to see the proof of our very close and thrilling encounter with these massive beasts check the Flickr account- http://www.flickr.com/photos/ivegotitonfilm/!

we moved up coast from Caitlins to the Otago Peninsula in the early afternoon. We were booked in to a lovely backpackers, that was more like a farmstay, appropriately called McFarmers. the first thing we did once we had settled was to head down the road to an Albatross sanctuary, but we decided to do the cheapy thing and we watched them from the cliff by the car park rather than going inside and paying the $40 cover charge. these birds are so massive- it is only when you see them soaring majestically alongside the seagulls who, despite being pretty large themselves look like sparrows in comparison and are struggling to stay in control. there were countless albatross effortlessly flying over the cliff tops, all teasing us with photo-opportunites- the wind was really strong so holding the massive lenses steady in the powerful gusts to take photos was a bit of a challenge!! it was a really great afternoon- we hadn’t been that fussed about seeing them, because we had great sightings from the whale watch boat in Kaikoura, but it was a lovely unexpected bonus to be able to get so close without going in to the actual sanctuary and see so many of them looping round our head and mastering the winds!

we then went to a notorious penguin spot called Sandfly beach as the sun dropped in the sky. we walked down from the carpark at the top of the hill, and realized instantly that we would have a bit of a challenge- the soft sand had been formed into massive peaks and hills in the winds, and we could barely stand up going down hill. at one point I just put my feet sideways and snow ploughed through the sand- it was that steep! the wind was the worst we’d experienced- i ended up with my scarf covering my whole face and tucked into my hat in an attempt to keep the grains from going in my mouth and eyes. nonetheless we persevered through the sandstorm for 40 minutes to get to the hide, we waited an hour and saw one little yellow eyed penguin coming out the sea. they are some of the world’s rarest penguins, so we were pleased with that sighting, especially having seen 2 the previous night, and it was nearly sunset, so we had to head back to the car- we didn’t fancy navigating back up the mountain of sand in the dark! so we walked back along the beach, heads down to avoid the whipping sand and clueless about what may be going on around us. but we were walking with some researchers who were more observant than we, and halfway along the beach they spotted another little chap coming out the waves. we sat down together and watched him toddle up the beach as the sun set behind him, from only 10-20 metres.

the next day we chilled out and explored the peninsula in the sunshine, and then spent a very nice afternoon drinking our bottle of desert wine from Hawkes Bay, and eating our foie gras on the boundaries of our farmstay’s land- we were at the top of a field, at the top of a hill, but looking out into the bay at the amazing view we felt like we were on top of the world. we spent that evening spotting more penguins- this time a breed called ‘little blue’. these guys only come out once the sun goes down, so patience, a keen eye, and an ability to withstand the cold of a blustery New Zealand evening are all key skills. i froze my little butt off, but after a couple of hours we had seen maybe 45 little penguins (they are very little, and also blue!) surf in to the beach together, clamber up the hill and around our feet to their burrows, and we retreated back to the farm and another log fire!

we left the Otago somewhat reluctantly- it was one of my favourite places we had stayed and 2 days really wasn’t enough- but we had to keep on moving, and after a brief trip to the world’s steepest street in Dunedin, we were on our way to the next stop Lake Tekapo. we didn’t have big plans for this spot- it was just a stop off to break the journey to Christchurch- but once there we made the most of the afternoon, and fitted in some sunbathing, a visit to some hot springs and spa pools, our first official portion of New Zealand ‘fush and chups’ (they were not great to be honest- I think the chips were McCains!), and some stunning starspotting. again, check Flickr for the evidence of the best place to stargaze in New Zealand.

the countdown for our last few days in New Zealand was really on now, so the next morning we got on the road to Christchuch as fast as we could. we had a brief detour up to the Mount John observatory to check the view, and stopped at a ridiculously blue lake along the way to take some photos of Mount Cook, but other than that we were highly focused and got to our final destination (the appropriately named Dorset House backpackers) by lunchtime. so we had an afternoon of laundry, Grover washing, getting our bearings in the town and general catch up and then gorged ourselves in the evening on a 6 course Japanese-Korean restaurant that was recommended by Lonely Planet. today, our final day in New Zealand has been typically chilled- we’ve shopped and wandered the town and the botanic gardens, we’ve dropped in to a fabulous photographic exhibition (Cooke and Shackletons exporation photos) that we stumbled across and enjoyed beer in the sunshine.

Christchurch is repeatedly described as the most ‘English’ of New Zealand’s cities. i have seen pubescent public schoolboys wandering the streets in stripey blazers, shorts and knee high socks, a lady in a boater with a tray selling fudge, people punting down the River Avon, and a mass of tents being set up in the green and perfectly cultivated public gardens where small children feed friendly ducklings in the lakes. by my reckoning that isn’t England as I know it- the only person i’ve seen in a hoody is the husband- and in the country that inspired ‘Middle Earth’ a more perfect than possible ‘Middle England’ has been created. but nonetheless it is lovely, and a very pleasant way to end our time here. it doesn’t remind me of home, other than that all of the streets are named after English towns, but then i’m not looking to be reminded of home when we still have so long to travel. and Aussie here we come!