The Good, the Bad and the Unexpected

Final Thoughts on New Zealand

Well, this is it. We have been back home in Blighty for a few days, the jet lag has (largely) gone and it will very soon be time to return to work.

For our final post we have decided to sum up our experiences in New Zealand. It would have been nice to have used the proper Clint Eastwood film title but, to be honest, we couldn't really think of anything Ugly.

The Good

Monteith's Golden Lager. You have to be careful where you buy it though; the very best stuff is only sold to weary walkers at the end of a long, hot day.

Coffee. The flat white is the best coffee I have ever had. If you are lucky, you get a nice fern motif in the foam; if you are going to be really lucky you get a heart, apparently.

Friendly people – and not too many of them.

No litter. That really is no litter.

No louts or ladettes – and virtually no swearing.

The roads – interesting and empty. This is slightly nuanced by the fact that the (rather low) speed limits are enforced.

Beautifully-tended vineyards. These definitely added to the enjoyment of drinking the fine wine.

Wellington. As the nation's capital this seems to be disproportionately endowed for its modest population.

Queenstown. With its lake and surrounding mountains this lovely (if touristy) town has a setting that is as good as you can get.

Tramping around Mt Cook, with its associations with 'Sir Ed', in glorious weather.

Jet boats. The jet boat rides are fun but the jet-boat concept (an NZ invention) is brilliant. Practically every boat in NZ is a jet boat whether it declares itself to be or not.

The Bad

Hut toilets – there has to be a better way. The cloud of flies that sometimes emerged when you lifted the cover makes you realise that you can't apply the inset repellant to every bit of exposed skin.

Sandflies. Enough said.

Scoria on the volcanoes. Depending whether you are going up or down , this is possibly the most heartbreaking or treacherous surface that you can imagine.

One horse towns. Like the American mid-west. Our friends in Auckland joked that some of the towns were so small that they had 'Welcome' and 'Come Back Soon' painted on the same sign. We laughed a lot and it took us a week to realise that this would always the case, irrespective of the size of the town.

The lack of birds and animals - away from the coast at least. This is a bit of a puzzle. We know that the Maori ate everything that was slow enough to be caught, and that pests introduced from Europe saw off a lot of the rest, but it is surprising that some things didn't flourish. It is my uninformed view that the sandflies would provide an excellent start to any food chain.

The Unexpected

Half-hearted recycling. For a country that prides itself on its green credentials, the recycling seemed to be very patchy. Perhaps it was just organised differently to the UK and that an army of workers separated the potato peelings from the plastic bottles. It didn't look like it though.

Sheep jams. This is not entirely tongue in cheek. Most of the fields and pastures in NZ seem to be empty but when you do see sheep or cattle there are vast numbers corralled into a small area. This particular crowd were clearly being taken somewhere but this wasn't always the case.

Finding two 1950s Maserati Grand Prix cars in Wellington. Shame they were in a museum rather than a hayseed farmer's barn.

House moving. Always a stressful experience but not usually for motorists. This desirable residence was heading South from Queenstown. A small convoy of outriders made sure that all oncoming cars were securely parked up in roadside ditches before the house came past.

So that's the end. We've had a great time and lots of experiences. Hope you've enjoyed reading the blog – and well done if you've followed it this far.

Milford Sound & Doubtful Sound

As we now know, Milford and Doubtful Sounds are not true 'sounds' but 'fiords' because they were formed by glaciers. These are some of the 'must do' sights of New Zealand and we were keen to see one or the other. Advice from others suggested that Doubtful Sound is more remote, and therefore less touristy, but also 10 times the size of Milford Sound, so we decided that was the one to do. However, the Routeburn track finished only 30km from Milford Sound, so it seemed crazy not to see it. We managed to book into the only lodge in Milford Sound and got a morning cruise before the tour buses arrived.

It had been raining all night, but as we ate breakfast, there were tiny breaks in the cloud and we were hopeful.

Mitre Peak with the top still in cloud

In fact they proved ideal conditions as the rain and cloud cleared but the waterfalls were still full, so spectacular, and the sun gradually appeared.

Waterfall in spate following rain

Milford Sound has really steep sides and is awesome! Unfortunately the photos don't do it justice, and I don't have the vocabulary to describe it – all I can say is that I'm really glad we didn't miss it out.

Mitre Peak in sunshine

We drove down to Te Anau to camp for the next (and final) 2 nights, but the clouds reappeared. However, after a freezing night (yes, really), a perfect day dawned for our trip to Doubtful Sound. To get there involves a boat trip across Lake Manipouri, followed by a bus trip over the Wilmot Pass. Doubtful Sound is huge and all the hills rising out of the water are covered in bush. There are many hanging valleys and the place feels very remote.

View from the stern

We had a perfect day for it with clear blue skies – an unusual sight apparently as it rains for three days out of five.

The mountains round here are beautiful – it's a real shame that none of the Great Walks goes over them! Never mind, we are on wind-down now. We only really have the jet-boating to go.

A Note on Maori Carving

The Maori go in for elaborate carving on the door posts of their Mare (meeting houses) and similar carvings are to be found on things rather like totem-poles at many of the visitor centres. The first one of these we saw was in Titirangi in Auckland. Amongst other things the carvings depict naked warriors and are big, shall we say, on manhood, none more so than in Titirangi. Elsewhere they have been very much emasculated, probably because most of the visitors are in school parties.

In fact I have seen more stuck-up pricks in Auckland than anywhere else in New Zealand. I have shared this observation with a number of people we have met on our travels; without fail they have slapped me on the back and offered to buy me a drink.

Queenstown and Beyond

We'd been warned about Queenstown by various people – it's brash, loud, busy and a real party town – not the sort of place we'd like! We tried to avoid it but in the end just had to go there to sort out a few activities, including the white-water rafting that we didn't want to miss. What no-one told us, is that its setting is one of the most beautiful in the world.

It's on a lakeside, but the lake twists and turns and there are magnificent mountains in every direction. There's even a range called the Remarkables, and they really are. They had the benefit of a light dusting of snow when we arrived. We had two hours to spare before we needed to be in the centre of town for our rafting trip, so we parked the car (easily and cheaply) strolled into town, eyed up the gear shops, stopped for a coffee and fell in love with the place before turning up for our rafting trip.

The rafting was brilliant -lots of fun and fairly adrenaline inducing, although in retrospect we wondered how much of the 'safety' instruction was just hype. We're convinced that by far the most dangerous aspect of the trip was the bus ride to the start along Skipper's Canyon, a gravel road cut into the cliff face and just wide enough for our bus and raft trailer. We had a S African bus boy who was a real wit. Here's an example :

Bus boy: “Where you from?”

Us: “England”

Bus boy: “I'm sorry?”

Us: “England”

Bus boy: “Yeah, I heard you, I just said I was sorry!”

Here's another:

Bus boy: “Driving the bus today will be Shirley, one of our most experienced drivers. Shirley is actually going to be leaving us tomorrow and we are all going to miss her a lot”

Sucker on bus: “How long has she been with you?

Bus boy: “ Three days”

Anyway, we enjoyed the whole experience and managed not to fall in, and we're really looking forward to returning to Queenstown!

The next day we set of to start a 3-day tramp on the famous Routeburn track. It was only a 3-4 hour walk to the first hut, so there was no hurry to start. We set off at lunchtime in glorious sunshine and arrived 3 hours later at the hut in sunshine. Ian went to investigate a fantastic viewpoint with a view down the valley that he had been told about. Apparently this was another 250m above the hut and could be found by following a goat track; Maggie enjoyed an hour in the sun!

Looking back down the Routeburn Valley

The second day dawned with an ominous red sunrise.

Red sky in the morning........

Our route involved a climb to the Harris Saddle and a further climb without rucksacks to 'Conical Peak' – with views not to be missed!

The summit of Conical Hill - our high point

Four hours later we arrived shattered at Mackenzie Hut. This one had a wood-burning stove, so Ian was in his element lighting it and keeping it going. The huts are fairly rudimentary, offering shelter, a mattress and gas for cooking -you still need to bring your sleeping bag, food, cooking pans etc.

A dorm inside the Mackenzie Hut

The final day dawned with rain and wind (we knew that the forecast was diabolical but the hut booking system on the Great Walks does not allow for second thoughts) , and after breakfast we set off fully clad in wet weather gear. It was only a 4-hour walk to where we hoped our car would be waiting! The walk was wet and our gear showed its inadequacies, but it was quite exciting crossing some of the un-bridged streams. We passed several cascades running down the mountainside, and one very spectacular waterfall. Unfortunately, having already wrecked one camera in the rain, we were reluctant to risk another one!

At length we arrived at the Howden Hut, just an hour from our final destination, but for some that we'd been walking with, this was their stop for that night. It was already full of very wet people travelling in both directions along the route. These DOC huts don't have any facilities for drying wet gear – they're barely more than a shelter really, and we were glad we weren't sleeping there.

We finally arrived at the car park and were delighted to see our car. We then drove the final 33km to Milford Sound where we were able to spend the night in extreme comfort ( indoors, showers and bed!) and celebrated by drinking our expensive 'Maggie's Block' Pinot Gris bought in Nelson.

We now have a couple of easy days in store, cruising around Milford Sound and Doubtful Sound before getting back to Queenstown for our final tourist thrill - a jet boat excursion on the Dart River.

My Story so Far

My Story so Far

By A Stick

I don't know how long I had been lying on the grey tarmac of the factory car park. I had fallen quite heavily but I didn't think that anything was broken; I just couldn't move. The shadows were already lengthening when she came out to her car and noticed me. She quickly looked around to to see if anyone was watching and then unceremoniously scooped me up with her shopping and bundled me into the car boot. 'Out of the cupboard and into the loft', as we sticks say. Yes, that's right, I'm a stick, a walking stick. “That's ridiculous” I hear you say, “sticks can't walk”. Well, how about a man eating chicken? You can see one of those every day at KFC. The kids fall for that one every time. After that they never have the nerve to question whether a stick can be self-aware.

When we reached our destination I was hung up behind the front door, and my heart sank. My finder turned out to have more walking sticks than you could, well, shake a stick at. What was even worse was that they were upmarket Lekis. I have to admit, that I don't come from a good family and if I told you my name, it would mean nothing to you.

Her husband on the other hand was definitely one stick short of a load. He even told Her that he “wasn't really a stick person”. Good God, doesn't he have a mirror? I don't know how I kept a straight face.

Things did not start out too well. She nagged Him to take me out for a walk. Initially he also took one of her snooty sticks but the three of us never really got on. Then he took me out on my own for a bit; he would play with me for a while but I could tell that his heart was never really in it. I would usually come home, clinging on for dear life to the back of his rucksack. She continued to take the Lekis for walks but increasingly I found myself left hanging around behind the front door.

Then one day He appeared carrying a much bigger rucksack than usual and looked at me with renewed interest. And my life changed. Since then I have come to know the Malvern Hills very well, not to mention Snowdonia and the Lake District. Once he even said that I was what his right arm was for – nowadays. He gave me a sly look as though there was a joke hidden in there somewhere, but if there was, I didn't get it.

He has even started taking me on long haul trips. At first the very thought of this made me go weak at my telescopic joint and I desperately wished that I could screw myself together. In the event, I found the velvety blackness of the hold and the distant mutter of the engines, strangely comforting. I think that perhaps it reminded me of my shipping container. This is such a sticky concept that it would be hopeless to try explaining it to Him. I mean, where would I start?

Our first long trip together was to Nepal, where we reached Annapurna base camp. I was up for a summit bid but He is getting on a bit now. Since then we have tramped over a large part of New Zealand. We have both had enough of walking up volcanoes though; that rough pumice wore out his boots and completely took the edges off my ferrule. It is no longer the fashion for sticks to wear badges but I know where every dent and scratch on my paint has came from.

I wouldn't say that he is a considerate keeper. He uses me to point at things, which is rude, and sometimes pokes me into things that he would prefer not to touch. I know that I am wanted though, if not actually loved.

And that's my story so far.

SP by author. Ballpoint on [unidentified]

 

Back on Bikes - at last

“Get a bicycle. You will not regret it, if you live” was was the advice given by the immortal Mark Twain (d.1910). We took his advice and hired a couple of mountain bikes today to explore the tracks around Wanaka.

Yesterday had been largely taken up with trying to organise our final couple of weeks in NZ. Surprisingly few of the Great Walks end up where they start and it's quite difficult to co-ordinate transport and accommodation.

Anyway, back to today, We had chosen a route that started off skirting Lake Wanaka, before heading eastwards along the bank of one of the rivers flowing out of it. 

Lake Wanaka

The trail, I am sure, was described in the DOC guide as 'family friendly'. I can only assume that the average family in New Zealand is a lot tougher (and braver) than its UK counterpart.

Last night a storm sprang up from nowhere and threatened to blow our tent away. The weather had been so calm since we arrived that we hadn't bothered to peg out the guylines. It was no joke having to do so in the pitch dark and in the teeth of a howling gale and driving rain. During the night the wind died away but, periodically, we would hear a squall approaching, seemingly from miles away, When it reached us, there was about 30 seconds of uproar and thrashing tent fabric, followed by another eerie calm. After a rather disturbed night, we awoke this morning to bright sunshine and a tent that was still standing. It might all have been a dream except for the twigs and small branches scattered around the campsite, and the fresh snow on the surrounding hills. We had been told that it is the Southerlies down here that bring the storms and cold weather. I guess that this must have been one of them.

It was good to be back on bikes today though we both felt a bit rusty. The track we were on can best be described as a Camel Trail with attitude. There were wonderful views of the implausibly blue-but-crystal-clear waters of the River Clutha but these were sometimes 100 feet below us, over the edge of a precipitous and unfenced drop. 

Overlooking the River Clutha

Likewise, the gentle backdrop of North Cornwall had been replaced by jagged snow-capped peaks. It really was quite stunning, though requiring a certain amount of concentration. The track itself was also very varied, at times being very narrow and weaving between trees, elsewhere crossing quite bleak grasslands. Once we had left the immediate environs of Wanaka, we hardly saw another soul, something that we are starting to get used to over here.

Maggie trying not to notice the big drop on her left

We had to return the bikes to the hire shop by 6 pm so, having reached our planned finishing point, we decided to take the main road back to Wanaka to save some time. The cold wind had freshened in anticipation of our return and meant that we needed to pedal hard even when going downhill. To celebrate getting the bikes back on time we treated ourselves to a couple of Danish's and ate them back at the tent, accompanied by steaming mugs of tea. The sun was shining and we were able to sit outside, but not for long as the wind was cold.