Tongariro

On Saturday I made my way up to Tongariro. This is where a lot of filming of Lord Of The Rings was done. Unfortunately, a few days ago there was a flash-flood and it took the lives of a Teacher (a young Lady) and 6 high school children (16 and 17 yo I believe). What a terrible thing to happen.

I made my way up to the base and was told about the weather conditions so I decided that after what had just happened I'm not going to take my chances with nature. It was raining and starting to get windy (which is when Flash-floods and avalanches happen).

Wellington

I spent a couple of days in Wellington. Wellington has to be my favourite city in NZ. It's cosmopolitan and has a character which is unique. It's a small town city! It has a very welcoming feel but also has a city feel. If I were to live somewhere here in NZ this would be my first choice. However the city seems to mainly host goverment jobs and thats not surprising since that's where the Houses of Paliament are.

Wellington from the harbour


The Houses Of Parliament

Boat to Wellington

I caught the ferry back to the North Island and met up with an Australian couple who I met earlier in my journey on the South Island. Rob and his Wife (sorry I can't recall your name) were really good companions and I would love to visit them in Perth, Australia as they have extended me an invitation. As it happens we met in Picton just before the ferry journey and ended up having a coffee together whilst waiting.

Leaving Picton into the Cook Straight


The Boat I traveled on

Picton

On the following morning, I went to Picton. This was my exit from the South island. I decided to make my way to the North Island as I'm pretty much done with seeing the sights.

I hooked up with another English guy (Justin) and we went out for dinner and a couple of beers.

Kaikoura

Kaikoura was a bit of a waste of time for me. I stayed u[p in the mountains on the entry to Kaikoura and it was just amazing. Unfiortunately the winds picked up so I made a decision to not be blown off the cliff face and make my way down to the coast!

When I got down to the coast, I found that the weather was better. Only that it got worse about a couple of hours later. There was a line-squall coming in from the ocean and it got amazingly windy and rainy. I put in my earplugs and hunkered down for the night. At least I'd be blown in-land and not off a cliff!

So now dolphins, penguin or whale watching for me. Shame really as everyone has commented on how amazing Kaikoura is. You can't always get what you want ...

Lake Bruener & Lewis Pass

For the last couple of nights I've been traveling to the east coast again. Arthur's pass took me onto the west coast and then I came back over Lewis pass after staying by lake Bruener. Lewis pass brings me further north onto the east coast.

On my way I stopped a night at Hanmer Springs which is a small town based on the natural hot springs. They are set up as a few (8?) Pools so that you can bathe in different temperatures. I must admit the hot pools were very welcome as my muscles were still very sore after the Mueller Hut trail!

After Hanmer I made my way to Kaikoura. I decided to stop in the mountains for the night but at around 11:00pm the winds really picked up and since I was looking over a ravine I didn't feel too comfortable staying there. The van was rocking from the strong winds coming up from the valley. Anyway I decided to make my way towards the coast and ended up staying on Kaikoura's south beach. There were a load of other camper vans there so I felt that the spot was good. Little beknownst to me that there was a line squall brewing out at sea and it was heading landwards! The storm came in about 1:00am and made a heck of a racket. I decided to put in the earplugs and ignore it (since I wouldn't be blown off a cliff, being near the coast line).
Yesterday I left Kaikoura as the weather was so bad that I was unable to do any whale watching. A real shame as Kaikoura is famous for these thing. Anyway I'm pretty much done with touring the south island as the weather is getting progressively worse as winter rolls on.

Today I'm in Picton and have a ferry booked for Wellington at mid-day. So later today I'll be on the North Island and hopefully the weather will be a bit warmer as I travel north!

Arthur's Pass

I took a detour today as I was going to head in to Christchurch. As it happened it had been snowing last night and I decided to head into the mountains. I was blessed with some amazing views whilst starting out on the East side.

The Snow capped mountains of the east side






Lake at top of Arthur's Pass


As I worked my way over there were some pretty hard roads to climb. There is one part of the pass where they have put a rock-slide bridge in place so that an avalanches don't hit the road and just fall down into the valley below