NZ South island – Marlborough and North

Back to Christchurch. We did a full circle and returned for a game of rugby. And what a match it was. Local team the Crusaders (home of the most of All Blacks we have been told) played one of best South African teams - The Bulls. Kiwis re-confirmed their obsession for rugby with packed stadium and atmosphere to match. But guess what – we actually sat next to some Irish folk living in new Zealand (yes, they all do work in construction) and to our surprise (yeah, roysh) finished the night off in a pub. A bit of craic and a pint kept our homesickness at bay at least for the evening. Was back in the morning with the vengeance thou – it was St Paddy’s!

No point to dwell – we pressed on to Kaikoura and whale encounters. Well, the weather finally stopped us a bit. Due to high seas our trip was cancelled. We drowned our sorrows in the local Irish pub and celebrated the holiday in stile. With no trips in site even the next day we decided to give in and drove on Marlborough – our favourite white wine region.

Next few days we sampled and debated over the local wines, absolutely loving some and being smart about others. Bottom line – we just love NZ Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc in general. Plan to take it easy and have holiday from holiday here was not really working. Too much good wineries around. So, to save our heads and tummies in short run and our livers in long, we decided to go back south again and give Kaikoura another go. Wind was with us this time. We were exceptionally lucky and have seen not only Sperm whale but also Humpback whale (even to our guides astonishment!). Trip was great, although overpriced again (same story repeating in New Zealand). 

Only thing left on the South Island was the Marlborough sound. It was such a disappointment that it is not really worth writing about. However, little town of Picton was an absolute surprise. Although a big harbour, it is a lovely touristic gem – one out of only few in the South Island. We enjoyed our time here, but were also glad (Nives was bordering on ecstatic) to board the ferry and move on to more populated and richer in history North Island.

Some more pictures here.

NZ south island - Otago and Southland

And here we were, self-proclaimed adrenaline capital of the world - Queenstown. Bungee fanatics, paragliding gurus and jet boat aficionados have been expected (testosterone levels in the air were reaching self-igniting limits for sure), but what we didn’t expect was a cute little town. Yes, it is touristic and dolled up, but after definite lack of any nice human settlement in New Zealand this was a gift from heavens. For the record, we have stopped comparing down under towns to romantic old (that actually means more than couple a hundred years) places in Europe. Set in beautiful location surrounded by crystal clear lakes and rivers, deep gorges, mountains and vineyards. Even Nives had to agree that this is a nice place (some Pinot Noir arm twisting was involved). But the biggest surprise was once we actually checked into a motel and walked down to town centre. Bars, pubs, restaurants on every corner. In unison we agreed to push out a ferry date to north island for a couple of days and extend our stay here.

We also discovered that New Zealanders are world experts in selling (we are sure big US corporations are having team building and learning selling seminars here). Everything you see is best and greatest in the world. And when we say anything we mean it – these guys are on the next level. Every view is scenic, every place a national park and every activity severely overpriced for any rational being. Anything and everything is around 120-150NZD, which we felt was about 100% more than it should have been. But hordes of Asian tourists are coming and are willing to paying for it. So, in the end, fair play to the Kiwis. Milk it if you can. So, we didn’t do most of hundreds of things on offer (and it was beyond us what was on the offer and what people were paying for!) with the exception of jet boating. We skipped the best known company, which is offering a ride for about 80EUR for 15 minutes (and we thought Oz was bad!) and went for the other guys on the block. Same dosh, but lasts an hour. Good decision it was too – the boat ride was fantastic at 85km/h speeds at times over 10cm deep water.

Some of the NZ best red wines (please, bear in mind we are thinking locally now and are not comparing to our favourite French wines here!) are just a 30min drive away and yes, you have guessed correct, we made a day out of it. Just around the corner of Queenstown is central Otago, which is technically a desert. And it would still be, if not for the first class irrigation system. Even vineyards are watered – a big no-no in traditional European vineyards (can already hear some French farmer crying out in despair). We visited the southernmost vineyards in the world (Blackridge) and also the maker of the winner of “best wine of NZ” award (bannock brac).

Not to spoil the sunny weather (reported as one of the biggest droughts in history of NZ) we headed out to one of the tourist heavyweights of NZ (and the world, surely partly due to unbelievable and efficient NZ tourist marketing tactics) – Milford sound. It is actually a fiord not a sound, on the west coast and accessible by one way road the is a highlight in itself. Do we need to say it is sold as the best experience in life, most beautiful fiord in the world with the most breath-taking road to it? Well, it was really beautiful for sure, but we would possibly restrain from any ‘best in the world’ remarks. Road to it was highly enjoyable and absolutely worth the trouble. In our opinion, definitely one of the most spectacular in New Zealand. Sound itself is home to some of the highest sea cliffs in the world (Mitre peak at 1692m is one of them – left peak on the above picture) and some spectacular scenery. It is surrounded by high cliffs from both sides with narrow entrance – which made Capitan Cook miss it completely on his survey of NZ. Can’t miss it these days with hordes of tourists neatly packed on number of pleasure boats that go out in a row and all stop at the same stops and enjoy the same views. That are breath-taking for sure. Couple of hours on the boat passed way too fast and it was time to drive the scenic route back inland again. Now last but DEFINITELY not least – whole experience was severely diminished by your best buddies in Milford – sand flies. This is definitely a world capital (haven’t seen that advertised thou) of those little annoying blood-suckers. We were ecstatic we decided not to spend a night here!

We ploughed on further down south towards the most southern point of our journey – Bluff. It is a town on south of NZ, which is the furthermost point away from home (its 18000km to London from here). Bluff is definitely not a place to write home about – one of the ugliest harbours we ever saw. It’s all north from here thou, back into the warmer climate and boy are we looking forward to it. Its bloody freezing down here! Probably not in terms of winter in Europe this year, but for the record we are a wee bit spoiled at the moment. On the way here we discovered that Bluff is also a home to world famous (can it be any other way in New Zealand?) Bluff oysters. We have not heard of them before, but were definitely willing to try. And so we did. They were excellent – delicious with the taste of the sea. We were definitely ready for our seconds and thirds, until we were told they are wild oysters. This definitely spoiled the experience, but the final blow was a discovery of how they are harvested – by dragging the nets on the bottom of the sea. Absolutely horrified that something like this can be happening in civilized world (hey, we are avoiding Chinese restaurants for shark fin soup!) we cancelled our order and left Bluff with bad taste in our mouths.

Driving thru the Catlins costal road and past Dunedin and Omaru on south east coast, we came across a lot of scenery we are used from Ireland, but definitely not as nearly as beautiful or spectacular. Plenty of wild life thou with seals and penguins galore.  If anything, wild life is something to be enjoyed here. With no pretty towns around (Dunedin was a huge disappointment, especially for Nives) we headed back towards west coast and the glaciers.

By this stage, we were ready for remoteness and wilderness. Or so we thought. This place was something else. Kilometre after kilometre of nothing really. And that includes mobile signal! Just for the record, we are not talking 3G here, but your regular 2G one. Absolutely bewildered that this actually can be happening in first world country we arrived to Fox Glacier township. This is also concept that was probably invented here. Means few houses, hotel and general store most of the time, and tourist traps galore. Mobile signal included. But hey, we are at one of the lowest glaciers in the world here! So, we did a fill tourist shebang – walked to both Fox and Franz Joseph and topped it all with a helicopter ride. And that was amazing! Views of glacier blue ice, crevasses and ravines was just amazing. Theory of relativity was definitely proven during the 20min flight – felt like 60 seconds! We opted to miss out on ‘exhilarating experience’ (as sold by tourist operators) of helicopter landing on a mountain (not a glacier!) and standing in a real snow for extra 100 NZD (you would be amazed how many people are actually going for this!). Considering we come from ski resort that hosts World Ski Cup race and host of the Winter Olympic Games and have moved to Ireland to avoid snow in the winter was probably a reasonable choice. All in all, glaciers were spectacular – silent (when they are not breaking off J) reminder of ancient times. Definitely something that should not be missed here.

Some more pictures here.

NZ South island – Canterbury

Two days of proper R&R in Hanmer Springs were just what the doctor ordered. A lot of sleeping, few nice dinners (very nice indeed!), some gentle walks and a really good quad bike excursion later we were reborn and ready to attack New Zealand in full swing! Started off with few wine tastings in Waipara wine region (what else?). To our surprise we discovered New Zealand red vine – Pinot Noir. We are no PN drinkers usually, but this one got us by surprise – we liked it. We also once again confirmed we love NZ Sauvignon Blanc (no real surprises there…).

Next stop – Akaroa, supposedly lovely little French influenced town on the Banks peninsula. Add Hector’s dolphins to the equation and we have a winner. Well, that was before we started looking for accommodation – not available again! What is it with NZ and rooms? So, we applied well tested solution from Australia – sleeping in a car. After a freeing night it looks like this will not be a solution. Akaroa is probably one of warmest places on Southern Island, but felt cold to us. Yep, we will need to get on top of this hotel/motel business. B&Bs we counted on are actually luxury accommodation that cost arm and leg – not really in our budget range this time.

Only French thing in town were street names and odd looking croissant in the local bakery. All the images of Provence and Loire valley we had in our heads were gone with the wind from the Pacific ocean. And this one was majestic. Open water till Antarctica and South America… Big, big blue. Full of life! On our bay cruise we saw Hector’s dolphins riding our wave; New Zealand fur seals welcomed us with big black eyes and lot of cuddly young pups; even caught the odd penguin by surprise. Pure enjoyment! We finished off the day with fresh fish bbq on the pier – what else can you want?

Then back to mountains and lake Tekapo. A vivid blue glacial lake close to Mt Cook (Highest mountain in NZ). Colours were amazing, landscape a total surprise. We expected lush green and a lot of rain and were welcomed with rugged, barren vistas. Best views were promised from the local hill – Mt John. Little did we expect the vistas we were going to get. Not just the lakes and mountains, but also the Southern skies. Yep, you guessed it – this is the most southern observatory in the world. We could not miss the tour, could we? Southern cross, Orion belt, Magellan clouds, beauty of the night sky was there. Topped off with some wonderful sights of rings of Saturn (our out of focus photo really does not do it justice!) and Moon. And then of the Sun the next day (part of the tour). This probably is one of the best things on this trip!

Mt Cook was also nice, but guess after the extra-terrestrial experience it would be almost impossible to be wowed so easily. We took the walk everyone recommends (2,5 hours of strait walking after about 5 years of doing no hill-walking at all!) Our feet (just getting accustomed to shoes again) did not look that good in the end. Verdict – walk was not really worth the trouble. And we still prefer the European Alps. We decided to cool off in the only hotel in the region and this was a treat. Cold beer on a terrace with best views of Mt Cook you could wish for (yep, very proud we schlepped around for 3 hours). But best thing was to come in the afternoon – drive on the glacial lake with view of the largest glacier in New Zealand – Tasman. We figured easy afternoon after all that walking was due. Wrong again! There is another hike to the lake and back to bus. Miraculously this time all went well, seems our bodies remembered the routine (beer possibly helped a bit?). Timing was perfect – few days earlier a large iceberg broke off the and it was still floating about (partly in chunks thou). And we ARE talking LARGE here – about 50m above the surface and estimated 200m below. For the first few minutes we thought that was the glacier and not the ice-berg floating in the lake (guess beer helped here as well…). Aqua blue ice on another glacial lake – a proper spectacle to see.

It was time to say good-bye to Canterbury for now (we’ll be back for Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers) and head off to Queenstown – world capital of adrenalin junkies (Dejan grinning, Nives moaning…).

Some pictures here.

New Zealand - here we come

In our good tradition, we did not plan a lot in advance. So much so, that when we wanted to check in at the airport in Brisbane and were asked for outgoing ticket from New Zealand we had none.  Actually, at that point we were not sure where we wanted to go (this was supposed to be decided in New Zealand). We are sure only very professional training kept the astonishment from the face of the Virgin employee. So, we had 45 minutes to decide where and when we want to go after New Zealand. And the luck winner is New Caledonia in April 13^th (just don’t ask why…). Another minor detail – we arrived without any accommodation booked (that must sound familiar by now…). To be honest, landing in Christchurch on the south island was also a mere draw of the cheapest ticket (hey, they did have a special offer!) than careful planning. No surprise than that we (again) found ourselves  stranded on the airport on the first night (we really should start to plan these things in advance).

We knew New Zealand will be colder, but did not really register on the rational level. But, this time luck was on our side in every way possible (hope that wasn’t it for this leg of the journey)! First, flight from Australia was delayed for 4 hours and Christchurch airport didn’t close for the night – especially as we had NO warm weather clothing of any kind, having spent last 8 months in heat wave after heat wave locations. It felt like the coldest night we ever had (sure it was quite balm in the airport by any normal standard). Luckily, we did have a rent-a-car (another courtesy of 4 hour delay in Brisbane – we are getting there!). So, accommodation in Christchurch. Acclimatizing in nice, warm room for a few days sounded like music to our completely frozen ears. We even managed to move our toes! Until (sure you guessed what is coming next) we found out that 2 years after the devastating earthquake, which levelled city centre, there is little accommodation available. NONE vacant for the next week or so. And again we found refuge in the form of a rent a car and drove away to the closest accommodation available some 150km away. And this would be in the mountains (still can remember why we decided to go an even cooler place first).

Not all was bad luck on day One. As we were making our retreat out of the city we passed Kathmandu outdoors clothing outlet store with end of the season 70% discount sign. Yes, baby! We will be warm after all!. With smiles, we put on shoes (some tears there as well – our feet got used to flip-flops) and warm jackets for the first time since leaving Ireland.

Even after being in the country for a few hours we noticed good few things that we loved about it. People are sitting in cafes and restaurants and not running around or working out. Maybe because food and wine are significantly cheaper than in Australia, or its just because they enjoy life? We even managed to go to the toilet without seeing sign for help-line for depression (normal occurrence in Australia). Bush flies (none to be seen here!) almost made us use the phone number to think of it… People we met had smiles on their faces and were happy to chat. 

Yeah, think we are going to like it here! 

Australia Recap

So, our final feelings on Australia.

We LOVED the way they sort out the visa problem. It takes you 10 minutes to submit an application on-line and few minutes later you get the mail. This is by far the best process we have seen so far anywhere in the world. No checking for outgoing tickets or invitation letters or anything. Just pretty amazing.

We really did not like the rules & regulations abundance. Everything is regulated down under and even more disturbing everyone was following the rules. Pretty unusual and not what we are used to.

Indigenous people situation. We don’t have feeling this problem is really sorted. We did not get the feeling the rest of Australia is really eager to do a lot about it either. It is almost as there are two separate ways of existence:  traditional and modern one. On one hand indigenous people seem to prefer to live the same way their ancestors lived for 30 000 years before white people showed up and changed the scene: hunters and gatherers living off land and in harmony with it. The ‘new-comers’ want to live the way we do – modern existence. Ruining pretty much everything and anything but going ahead with technological progress. And they really don’t mix well. Living according to ancient philosophies and customs just does not fit into the 9 to 5 routine of the modern world. Who has it figured right? It’s everybody’s choice really.  

Food wise, Oz was great. We LOVED kangaroo meet (we know, we are horrible people!!!). BBQ was a very common and often occurrence… Along the way and many days in wine regions we learned a lot about Oz wine as well. Much more to it then we usually see in Europe.

Whole atmosphere. Well that was a bit 1984, as we already said. It is almost as if Australians are trying to create a new society where everything is regulated. A bit too much for us. We appreciated the cleanliness, but that did not the whole ‘perfect people’ thing. Not to mention the whole stay fit movement in Sidney that seems to be spreading to Melbourne.

So, are we happy we went? Absolutely! Are we thinking of going back? No, not really. 

Sailing the Whitsundays

And now it was time for Dejan to enjoy Nives’ gift for his 40^th birthday – sailing trip in Australia. We opted to charter a sailing boat in Whitsunday islands. One of the guide books even said that if you don’t like it there you don’t have a pulse.

Well, we can confirm we have one. It really is beautiful. Green tropical islands with powder white beaches in the blue seas. Pretty much heaven on earth. Except for the water. This is the time of jelly fish in Australia and you cannot go in the water without the stinger suits. And those would be whole-body lycra suits. With hoodies. And gloves. Dresses all in black we decided to answer only to Ninja 1 and Ninja 2. No more Dejan and Nives… Is it annoying? Extremely!

But we did not let this minor detail ruin our holiday! 2 weeks of pure sailing were amazing. Our dame Zigzag got us safely around in no winds and tropical storms (we had up to 34 knots of wind!). We sailed narrow passages and turquoise waters of long sand beaches. Enjoyed the sun and stars. Peace and quiet and company of other sailing boats. Just beautiful…

And two weeks passed quickly and our time in Australia was up. Next step – New Zealand.

Some more pictures here.

Diving the barrier reef

Finally! Time for some serious fun. Or so we thought…

Although we did not win the lottery (although it is soooo expensive you feel you should have), we booked the premium Australia diving holiday: 4 day dive trip to the outer Coral sea. It is actually so far that you fly back to Cairns as they do not have time to drive you back (yes, baby!). Also, no diving on the inner Barrier reef (heaven for discover scuba and open water diver courses, for non-divers this means ruined coral and less fish), only outer (the real stuff).

Needless to say, we were pretty hyped up. By the time trip started we were so eager to go under we were practically seeing sharks walking the Cairns streets. But afraid Barrier reef did not live up to our expectations. Yeah, we know – two moaners again… Here it is why. Visibility was not what we were hoping for and fish life was far from what we believed it would be. By no means it is bad diving by any standard, but it is also not top world class (or even best in the world) as it is usually presented to be. And when you think of the price, it probably has really bad value in ‘what you get for the price’ box. And at one point it looked the whole thing will be a complete flop.

During out trip wind was blowing from the side it never blows from (our weather luck is really starting to annoy us!!!), so we could not do the usual shark feed (we could not approach the site due to high seas). This is the place they do it with all the security precautions in place. Everybody was really down. So, dive guides decided to drop the tuna head in the water within the lagoon eager to “tick the box” and stop the mutiny, but really not expecting anything. Safety speech was about 30 seconds long, guides didn’t even bother to go into the water – this did not sound like safety obsessed Australia. Nor did it look like shark feed safety bonanza we saw on previous tour video. To our amazement sharks did come and we could be really close to them during the feeding frenzy (very smart, right?). Fist row seats in the one of the best nature cinemas. One of the guys on the trip was a return guest and said this experience was far superior to the ‘regular’ one. Is our luck finally changing?

Diving time passed quickly (as it usually does) and we were already on a small plane back to Cairns. This was amazing! Flying so low and close to the reef you could see schools of dolphins and manta rays. Just beautiful! Definitely should do this again when we win the lottery for real.

We did not have a lot of time in Cairns – just to grab a rent a car and go quickly to the south. Yongala, here we come. For non-diving community this is one of the most famous wreck dives in the world, arguably the best one. Wreck is on the sandy bottom with nothing for miles around. Which will bring down the visibility just to a few meters close to bottom. As expected it has abundant fish and coral. Dare I even say it has one of the biggest fish density we ever saw. When we were about to jump in dive guides started rushing us as there was a sea-snake on the surface (To Nives’ horror). We were in quite a few minutes later when snake disappeared. This being Australia, all penetration is forbidden (5000AUD fine) – here we go with that safety again. Is it our favourite wreck dive? Definitely not. But still worth doing, we feel. Especially the fish side of it.

And that was that for diving in Australia. As planned, we did not do a lot (way too expensive). It is safe to say we expected more, but in the end still pleased we did the lot.

Some more pictures here.