Flying Solo North and Central New Zealand

Ok, so following Shannon's departure I had a few extra days to get back down to Dunedin from the Northern part of the South Island so I decided to do a bit of extra sightseeing on my own to some places that I've heard a lot of things about but haven't quite seen yet.

I started by driving 2 hours from Nelson down to Buller Gorge and visited New Zealand's longest swingbridge.

I walked around the park there for a bit on a beautiful afternoon. I stayed in a hostel that night known as the Lazy Cow! LOVED IT! :) I woke up the next morning for another adventure! Before I left the States I was given a National Geographic that had an excerpt on New Zealand. One of the things in the magazine that looked really interesting was this "cave rafting". I was intrigued. Well I noticed that the place that did this sort of thing was going to be on my drive down the West Coast so I hooked it up!! Basically, you arrive and are given a wetsuit, a helmet with a light, and an intertube. You start by taking this little train back into the Paparoa National park and walk across the river, up 120 steps and enter this enormous cave! It was absolutely amazing!! The limestone formations and things you can see in there were beautiful and b/c New Zealand is AWESOME, we don't have any bats here!

So you walk through this cave for about an hour until you reach some water where you sit back in your tube, make a train with the others in your group, turn off your lights and you are in complete darkness!! You literally cannot see your hand if you put it in front of your face and they say within 2 hours you can start hallucinating and going mad!! So you lean back in your tube, paddle your way back a bit and on the ceiling of the cave is what is known as "glowworms" and they look like a million tiny stars lining the ceiling.

Eventually you exit the cave and it spits you into the river where you ride down maybe a little under a mile in grade 1/2 rapids in an intertube! Hilarious and so fun!!

Following the cave rafting I drove down to Punakaiki which is a big attraction in New Zealand for it's Pancake Rocks. These are again limestone formations that line the beach and are quite spectacular.

I slept at a hostel right on the beach and had a beautiful sunset!

The next morning I woke up, drove to Arthur's Pass National Park which is in Central New Zealand and enjoyed a 4 hour hike that nearly killed my legs as you basically walk straight up for 2 hours! I enjoyed lunch at the top and had some amazing views!

Leaving Arthur's pass you come across something known as Castle Hill. Again, limestone formations but these sit smack in the middle of the country and farmland and you really can't appreciate how large they are until you are up close!

And finally, on the drive home that evening just an hour outside of Dunedin I stopped at the Moeraki Boulders. I'm amazed I hadn't been here yet to see them as they are so close but anyway, it made for some great pictures on a beautiful beach!

I'm back in Dunedin now and back to work! The plan is to get some work done for a bit and then maybe consider another hike in a few weeks and I'm also getting my scuba certification in May so lots to look forward to!

Hope everyone is well back home!

love,
lex

Last days of Shannon's trip Down Under

So days 7 & 8 marked the end of Shannon's trip in New Zealand and so we ended with a 2 day hike in the Abel Tasman National Park.

Can we say Golden Beaches and I mean GOLDEN!! BEAUTIFUL!!

We walked what is known as the Abel Tasman Coast Track and is considered one of New Zealand's "Great Walks". We ended up with a few tidal crossings which I will explain later! :)

We started off from Kaiteriteri where we boarded another jet boat out to Anchorage. We made a quick stop at Split Apple Rock which is a crazy limestone formation that over the years has simply cracked down the middle. From Anchorage, we walked to Torrent Bay and then stopped at Bark Bay for the evening. We had a short side trip to Cleopatra's pool where one of the rivers forms a pool of water and had lunch. Beautiful spot.

We stayed in one of the huts at Bark Bay where we had bunks and cooked up some pasta. We also collected some great shells and spotted a little starfish!

The next morning we woke up and hiked to Awaroa Beach which was just gorgeous once again!

So this here is Onetahuni beach where Shannon and I had to do a tidal crossing...well...apparently we were a bit early and so we had to cross it while the tide was still in a bit so that we could make our water taxi later. This is Shannon here AFTER the cross...we were in it up over our knees and WOW it was cold!! :)

Finally we boarded a water taxi back to Kaiteriteri, drove back to Nelson, had a dinner out and went to sleep.

We woke up the last day in Nelson on Good Friday where Shannon and I grabbed some breakfast and then headed to the beach for a few hours before taking Shannon to the airport for her trip home.

We had a wonderful trip and I was sad to see her go! Thanks for the memories, Shannon!!

Days 5 & 6 "Autumn Break" and Shannon's Trip Down Under

So now onto days 5 & 6. I guess I should start by saying that following our 4 hour canoe trip in the morning, Shannon and I had to drive the 4 or 5 hours down to Wellington to catch our Interisland ferry across to the South Island. Yay!! Road Trips!!

Anyway, we took the ferry across (a 3 hour trip) arrived at our hostel, got some sleep, and woke up the next morning to Picton and the Queen Charlotte Sounds and hike!

We first boarded our water taxi out to Ship Cove where Captain James Cook first took shelter in New Zealand. We started our hike through beech trees, shrubs, and other small trees and finally made our way up to a lookout where you could see the Sounds from above.

We ended up walking 26.5km TODAY!!! OUCH!! Our legs were hurting by the end of it and I thought for a minute Shannon was highly considering killing me after making her hike that far. I was sore and I know coming from flatland Illinois and hiking here in New Zealand is quite the change! :)

She ended up not killing me and we stayed overnight at a resort which also had hostel accomodation.

The sounds were absolutely beautiful and the views amazing!! We were supposed to hike another 21 or 24 km the next day but it was raining a bit and we were so tired that we didn't really feel up to hiking without the good views so we ended up chilling out at the resort for a few hours and taking the water taxi back into Picton. Actually a very good day for a rest!

Days 3 & 4 "Autumn" Break and Shannon's trip Down Under

Hello again!!

So days 3 & 4 consisted of some time in the Whanganui National Park on the North Island of New Zealand!

We began by driving down this CRAZY road where at one point we thought we were lost b/c there was no sign of human life ANYWHERE! We eventually made it to Pipiriki where we were told to go to coffee shop as a meeting place. Ok, literally....this was a trailer with a hand made sign saying coffee shop!

Anyway, we made our way there and boarded a jet boat which sped us up the Whanganui River. This river was pretty spectacular as it runs from Central North Island New Zealand clear out to the Tasman sea. We found out that it was once used as a highway by boats to get around!

The boat took us up to an attraction known as the Bridge to Nowhere...and literally...here is a concrete bridge suitable for cars to be driven on and it goes into NOTHINGNESS!! By the way, on our 40 minute walk out there we had to dodge a goat on our path!

Here is a quick history of the Bridge to Nowhere:

This bridge is the unofficial flagship of Whanganui National Park, an iconic symbol for New Zealand adventure tourism and a major visitor destination on the Whanganui Journey.
It is still used as a trampers’ bridge at the southern access point to the Mangapurua Valley.

It was constructed in the mid-1930s to provide road access to the lower and middle valley farms known as the Mangapurua Valley Soldiers Settlement.

By the time it was completed these areas of the Mangapurua Valley were deserted, the bridge rarely used and the construction of the road to the Whanganui River abandoned.

Following our tour, we made it back to the only Lodge within the National Park. This place was spectacular! Completely isolated, right on the river. This had to be the best ever spot to sleep. We used our afternoon to recover from our previous day's 19.4km hike and did some sunbathing, reading, relaxing, playing scrabble!! :) At night you could hear the Bucks in the forest calling out for their mates!

The following morning Shannon and I got up early and canoed down the Whanganui River for 4 hours back to our drop-off location!! Beautiful and VERY tiring!! My arms were screaming!!