The way that Easter and ANZAC Day fell this year meant a ten
day vacation with only having to use three days of annual leave. What a perfect and ideal situation to take
advantage of the beauty of New Zealand!
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| Cave Stream Scenic Reserve - en route to the glaciers from Christchurch |
So on Holy Thursday night Dave, Liz and I flew down to
Christchurch on the South Island.
We
arrived very late so it was off to sleep for a few hours before beginning our
road trip in the morning.
On Friday
morning we picked up our campervan, Gordo.
And we started on our journey...our
end destination on Friday was Franz Josef Glacier all the way on the west coast
(Christchurch is on the east coast). We made a couple scenic photo op
stops along the way and 7 hours later we made it to the Glacier Village.
About two hours from the glacier village Liz pointed out a downed power line …and
we just kept traveling along. Then a little further down the road we saw
some houses that had candles in the windows and no other lights....now we are
starting to put two and two together…there must be a power outage. Upon arrival to the village it is pitch black
and we have a hard time finding our holiday park. We eventually find it and there is no power
so they suggest we stay elsewhere. There
was one hotel with a generator so we checked in. Now our lunch today was peanut butter
crackers, chips, and ice cream (We got ice cream in Hokitika during one of our
scenic photo op stops) so we really needed some dinner. There was one restaurant in the village which
has a generator for the kitchen where every tourist is trying to get in for
dinner. Luckily we got seated and had a romantic dinner for three by one
tea light candle! It was fun! The power outage was caused by the
remnants of a hurricane that happened a couple days earlier but there was still
some wind and lots and lots of rain.
Saturday morning we were supposed to do a heli-hike on the
glacier. However due to the power outage, wind, and rain, the tour was
cancelled. A bit disappointing but I guess safety first. So we
decided after breakfast that we would just continue on our way down to our next
stop -Queenstown. But before leaving the glacier village we attempted to
drive to the base of Franz Josef Glacier but all we saw was lots of grey mist
and got soaking wet. We also walked
around the base of Fox Glacier and continued to get soaked. After a quick change to drier clothes
we left for the hopefully drier south. En route to Queenstown we stopped for some more
beautiful scenic photo ops and some lunch in Haast. We made it to
Queenstown for dinner time (another long day of driving - thank goodness for
Dave who drove every step of the way!). We ate at the famous Ferg Berger!
On Easter Sunday we took a beautiful walk through historic
Arrowtown and did the Tobin Track hike with beautiful views over Queenstown and
Arrowtown. The fall foliage was in full effect - just beautiful. Before
heading into Queenstown we had some Easter Sunday ice cream at the famous
chocolate place Patagonia. On Sunday
afternoon we did a walk around Queenstown then a gondola ride up to the top of
the mountain overlooking Queenstown. Up
there we did three luge runs on the mountain- lots of fun! We had a very
nice traditional Easter dinner - a lovely roast dinner at an Irish pub! We then made our way to our hotel – St.
Moritz. The hotel only had valet parking
so this is where the camper van that smells slightly of mold from all of our
wet clothes along the way plus who knows what from previous campers was valet
parked by staff of a five star hotel! (Note four days in and no one has slept in the camper yet!) Our hotel had a hot tub garden so after dinner
we hung out in the hot tub and I looked up and saw a shooting star so that was
really neat! The sky was so clear that it was full of many stars to gaze at.
On Monday
we went white water rafting in Queenstown before driving 5 hours to Milford
Sound. Queenstown is known for adventure sports – skydiving, white water
rafting, abseiling, etc. When we went to
collect Gordo from the valet after our rafting trip he said – and you guys have the camper – yes, yes
we do! We had some delicious Mexican
take out in Gordo while we drove to Milford.
During our drive we of course stopped for photo ops along the way. We arrived at the Milford Sound Lodge for an
evening of dinner and Skip-bo!
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| Drive from Milford Sound to Queenstown |
On Tuesday
we took a nature cruise in Milford Sound and saw dolphins, birds, and
seals! The landscape was just beautiful - hard to capture in a photo -
actually NZ was hard to capture in a photo as a whole - such a beautiful
country. Then we drove 5 hours back to Queenstown. Wow...we sure
did drive a lot. On the way back to Queenstown we stopped for lunch in Te
Anu. Once back in Queenstown, it was at
this point that I separated from Liz and Dave as I had an early morning flight
up to the North Island on Wednesday morning. It was actually good that I
was alone this night as I turned my phone on again and called in to do a
reading for the funeral mass of my Gammy who I found out passed away on Holy
Saturday. So even though I was thousands of miles away I still got to be
a part of the mass. Probably vary unique for the church to hear the
reading from a hotel room in Queenstown but it was important for me to be
involved some way.
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| Mirror Lakes en route to Milford Sound |
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| Queenstown |
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| First glimpse of blue sky driving from Glaciers to Queenstown |
The south
island did not disappoint. It was such a
beautiful place and I can’t wait to go back someday and explore more. And exploring this amazing place with some of
the sweetest expats sure was a treat. Stay tuned for adventures of the North Island.....
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