Tarangi NZ (north island)

Unfortunately no crossing for us, the weather is so bad we cant do it! We have slightly changed our route so that we could possibly come back in a week or two and try again! (fingers crossed)!
So yeh, bummed around pretty much..not much going on here at Turangi..we did actually do the river walk, but it was only 1hr long and we went up to a lookout point, that was nice got a good view of Lake Taupo! We sampeld the coffee had a little shop around and thats all folks!

New Plymouth NZ (north island) / Egmont National Park

5hrs in car, was so glad when we finally arrived!! We are staying in this really nice hostel, they are a great little dog called Vincent but also 2 cats!!!! Paul has been suffering a little but seems to be ok, well no hives yet but have got the paper bag on standby!
Weather isn't that great, we came here so that we could go hiking at Egmont National Park (Taranaki)..we did set off but when we arrived it was hailing and visibility was terrible, so instead we came back sorted out our laundry, saw the sights of New Plymouth and bought a couple of souvenirs, well our first actually! We have done the coastal walk here, which was delightful apart from the wind, we saw the famous wind wand in action, didn't rate it that much..bit of an eye sore!!
The lady at the hostel is into making things out of flax, its what the Maori people used, she was showing us how last night and Paul managed to make a fish..argh..Its very sweet..tonight he is making me a head band!!! Just the 2nights here at New Plymouth, off to Turangi tomorrow so that we can do the Tongariro Crossing, a well known day walk..apparently the most popular one in NZ!!

Wellington NZ (north island)

The ferry wasn't too bad, bit boring but we did have the opportunity to see Narnia again..think not!! Just drank coffee, ate muffins and read paper!!
Wellington is a very nice place and thankfully we had some good weather, we stayed with some friends of my cousins..Brenda, Craig, Lorraine, Josh and Fin..it was fantastic being able to stay with them and we will be eternally grateful!!!! Thank You!!!
We visited quite a few of the sights Wellington has to offer, including Te Papa museum, we walked to Mt Victoria lookout and got great views of Wellington. We also ventured out to Belmont Regional Park and did a hike there, we walked upto Belmont Trigg and got great views of Wellington and the surrounding areas we could even see the south island! We went to the Botanical gardens, which was very nice indeed..probs the best one we have been to yet, and lets face it we have visited many!
We cant believe how quick time is going by now, only got 4wks to do the North Island and before we know it we will be back in Oz then literally home...Scary!!!!

Picton NZ (south island)

Picton is gorgeous, a really nice place..fair enough the drive here wasnt to impressive..as always i felt really car sick up and down, round and round!!! We booked into a well what i thought was a great hostel, we had a good room, it had a homely feel to it and well we just spent the entire afternoon sunbathing in garden, you cant get much better than that can you??? Paul didn't like it much, he didn't feel the homely vibe to it like me!!!
Today we have spent the day our time, well firstly this morning on the phone ha ha..as always i have my weekly calls then we decided to do a walk, we first did the Tirohanga Track, was a good walk gave us great views!! We then carried on and did the Snout track was very good, up and down round and round a good work out am shattered,had to stop off at the bar for a drink on the way back (dehydrating work) even had to drink the rest of the beers we had in the car!!! Still not worked last attempt eating a homemade chocolate brownie to get our energy levels back up!!! Last night was great, the manager of the hostel we are in dabbles a bit in juggling and fire throwing, she gave us a bit of a show, was very good!!! Roll on tonight!!!
Early start tomorrow, 7am ferry to Wellington north island here we come, oh god that means its only 9wks till we come home!!!!!!!!!!

Abel Tasmin National Park NZ (south island)

It was a great day the sun was beaming down, it was so hot Paul even broke the shorts out!
We arrived early morning, decided to make the most of the great day and got straight on to the coastal walk, we walked as far as the first hut, Anchorgae bay stopping off along the way at some of the great beaches, think we walked about 10miles but didnt notice it as much with the weather and the stop off's! Well earned beer when we got back not to mention the cookies and the chocolate bars!
Today the weather has changed slightly, dry but windy and a little cloudy! We have just into the nearest town Motueka which is about 10km from the national park, sorting a few things out like email, laundry, post..its a hard life!!! back to Hostel for some lunch and then off to Kaiteriteri for a little walk around the bay which, was very lovely!!!
Off to Picton tomorrow, hopefully will get a chance to go to Marlborough sounds before we leave for North island on 23rd!

Collingwood NZ (south island)

The weather hadnt improved much, still raining and very windy! The hostel was fairly nice, small place with a nice feel!
We sort of just hung around all afternoon, had some lunch..read our books, nipped into the little town, looked around the one shop it had and thats about it, just sat watching the rain the rest of the time out of the hostel window!
Next day, even though was wet it was better then the day before so we decided to have a drive down to Fairwell Spit, which is the most northern point of the south island! We walked out as far as we could, it wasnt amazing or anything..quite a depressing feel to it..sort of made us think of the end of the world!! We also walked over to the other side Whataraki beach, it was a lot better at this side, there was sand dunes all over and seals, lots of seals!
Later that evening we took the dog, from the hostel out for a walk...big mistake it nearly dislocated my shoulder, it wouldnt walk with us it kept pulling to go its own way and when we wouldnt go it just sat on the floor, Paul was literally dragging it along to make it come, so yeh didnt offer to do that again!!

Nelson NZ (south island)

After a drive and half we ended up in rainy Nelson! We stayed in probably the worst place yet, it was our own fault as we hadnt booked anywhere and when we stopped off in Blenheim for coffee we decided to ring a few places, unfortunately they was booked up so had to settle for this one! We was starving but couldnt be bothered cooking, so ate all the selection of cheese's we bought the day before along with a giant french stick!!
After a crap nights sleep, the bed just squeaked all through the night when ever one of us moved (which was quite a lot) then that was it the other was awake!
We stayed there one night thinking that we set off early next morning and make our way to Collingwood, our thought was well if there seems to be a lot going on in Nelson then we can stop off on way back through! (we wont be going back, nothing there that floated our boats..also havnt got time)..sorry Nelson!!

Christchurch...NOT AGAIN!!!!

Yep thats right back again, bloody tooth!! All sorted now though....had a locum dentist do it, oh god he didnt have a clue, thank god for the nurse she was well clued up and eventually he was using the right instruments!!! The good thing about Christchurch is we can catch up with email, upload pics and fill our bott with food and drink..yip yip!!

Akaroa NZ (south island)

Its a little French town, really sweet, gorgeous views! Arrived feeling really car sick...so many hills up and down, like being on a rollercoaster!!! We stayed in this little backpackers was ok, very small and very clicky. Most of the people who was staying there worked in the area and had been there for some time and was like this is home and we just felt a bit out of place!
Was well miffed aswell, because of the storm at Arthurs Pass we was in a rush to get out, we only left our food bag didn't we..not happy bacon, sausages, pasta, sauce..loads of bits!!! caffeine was needed so we walked to a little coffee shop, was well nice latte for Paul and Cappacino for me with an extra shot!!
We spent the rest of the time just chilling out reading our books! In the evening we went to the local had a couple of beers!
Next day we walked to Onuku it was a pretty little town, actually its a Maori village, it had a cute church! We also went to the cheese factory, yum yum got a nice selection of cheese's! Not much else happened really, pub,book and then bed!!!

Arthurs Pass NZ (south island)

Weather had improved a lot when we left Greymouth, but unfortunately when we arrived at Arthurs pass it was raining. Accomodation was good as it was a small cottage, with a great wood fire! We went out for a short walk as it was raining, and halfway round Jack slipped and fell a few feet onto her side, bit of a nasty fall, but just come off with some bad bruising. We called it a day and Jack hobbled back. On our return to the cottage we met two kiwi's, who were staying the night as they had been locked out of there accomodation down the road. We started off with a few bottle's of wine, but some German lads turned up and one of the Kiwi's brought a litre bottle of gin out (big mistake) and we finished it between us, and Jacks pain subsided! Next morining we got up and did a nice open view walk over Beasley Spur, with some superb views, on our return we met an American couple, but had an early night this time round.
We were woken up at about 5am as a storm came in with hugh lightening and thunder that rocked the windows, by the time we got up the roads had turned into rivers, and it was raining 2 inches every hour. We decided to go for the east coast and the roads were horrendous, slips had come from the sides and the road was deep in water in parts, a tree occupied half the road at one point, after about half an hour we got throught the worst and later on arrived in Akaroa, where we realised that we had left our food bag in the fridge! The next days paper told us that the river rose the highest in 150 years and burst it's banks and the road we travelled on was closed after we had gone throught it!

Greymouth NZ (south island)

We only stayed here for the one night and when we arrived it was pouring down and freezing, first stop was coffee shop for latte and lunch!! We spent our time in Greymouth just sorting a few things out, caught up on internet with emails and blog etc, then sorted our flights out for US and ferry to take us to north island (23rd Nov)!!
The Hostel we stayed at was great, we was in the den in the afternoon watching dvd's and basically chilling out and trying to keep warm! In the evening we ate free muffins and got speaking to this really nice couple from back home and what's more there was no alcohol involved...erm actually that's a lie i just remembered that me and Paul had already drank a bottle of wine with our dinner!!!!

Fox Glacier NZ (south island)

The glacier was the main reason for this stop, not much in the town itself...very small with a handful of shops and accomodation!
We did manage to do a little walk on our arrival, Gillespies beach walk it took us down to another seal colonie...the walk wasn't great, probably the worst we have done yet. We walked on the pebble beach for about 45mins it was really windy and the sand was whipping round us..then we walked in the bush for a bit but there was just nothing to see, and finally reached the colonie but no seals, disappointed!!!
We booked the full day tour on the Glacier, it was good we both enjoyed it but there was a lot of hanging around and it wasn't as challenging as we thought it was gonna be? The Tour guide Dennis was good, he told us loads about the glacier, was really informative! We spent about 3hrs on the glacier, Dennis was cutting away steps all the while for us with his pick so it was fairly easy to walk on, we did manage to get quite high up in the glacier and some parts were a little tricky and some small crevice's we had to get through!
We stayed in this little cottage, the first night it was full, well when i say full there was only 6 of us there 3 couples. We got chatting to this couple from Great Yarmouth, we ended up having a right laugh with them but they left the next day! The other couple left to so we had the place to ourselves, it was good we got back after our glacier trip and just chilled it was really nice, felt normal!!

Wanaka via Arrowtown NZ (south island)

We will start with Arrowtown first, it was the cutest little town we have ever seen, really was adorable, so pretty!! We stopped here for lunch and had a browse round the shops! Best pies around me thinks! Steak and cheese and mint and lamb..yum yum they was so meaty!!
Wanaka is the nicest lake we have ever seen it was truly lovely! The weather was great aswell, it was so hot. We spent the day chilling really, we walked round the lake to the other end and sat on some stones just watching some people mucking around with water ski's!
In the evening we got a bottle of wine and as it was such a great night just sat on the balcony at the hostel looking over at the lake eating our dinner! Postcard views!!
Next day we was planning on doing a walk, unfortunately the weather changed and it was pouring down and freezing cold so we just decided to do well, not much really!!! Got some papers and mags from shop and went to coffee shop for a couple of hours, still no change in weather so went to puzzle world, was good fun spent an hour or so in the illusion rooms, back to hostel after that cup of hot chocolate and narnia!!

Queenstown (South Island)

Arrived safe and sound, Queenstown is a lovely little town, we had a walk round on the first day and that was about it, bumped into a lad called Mike who we met in Mt Cook in our hostel and chatted most of the evening with him, before chucking a video on. The day after when for a walk around the lake and took in the views as the scenery is spectacular. We've looked into doing a skydive but know that it is cheaper in the north island so going to wait till we get there, just relaxed in the evening as we planned a long walk, the next day.
We planned on doing a 6-8hr lake walk which was about two hours from Queenstown, we set off and were nearly there, but the road crossed three small rivers, the first one wasn't that deep, but got to the second and it was moving fast and deep, so sacked it and drove to the Routeburn track, and did the second hut which took us about 41/2 hours there and back. Weather even turned out nice, which was a nice change. Some beautiful views with loads of little field mice running around! Off to a place called Wanaka next.

Milford Sound (South Island)

This is meant to be the second wettest place in the world, and from what we have seen, it most definately is, it never stopped raining! We visited the sound, and walked the 20 minute boardwalk, to get the view of the sound, and took some touristy pics as you do. We went and found our accomodation, which was the only lodge in the place and landed in our room, we messed around a bit to find a phone to contact the last hostel, to put aside our adaptor and charger we left. We took a short drive up to a waterfall called the chasm, where the water has made some beautiful shapes out of the soft and hard rock. Didn't do much else apart from meet a nice couple from Australia, so chatted with them for a while and at dark ventured out to a small glowworm cave at the hostel, then went to bed.
We got up the next morning and went for a short drive to a 3 hrs walk called Key Summit, no suprise it was raining, so set off with new waterproofs and as we reached the top, the cloud was that low you could only see about 10 ft in front... The worst bit was that we found out our waterproofs weren't that waterproof and we had wet legs! We got back to the car and had lunch before driving down the road to Lake Marian, which i thought would be a flat 3hr walk to a lake, hmmm wasn't i wrong, it was like an obstackle course through the jungle on a cliff face! We were knackered by the time we got to the top and were let down again by the cloud and could not see anything, thus no pictures of the lake! Got back made tea and then played a game of Monopoly, i managed to by all the expensive properties and put houses on, so when jack owed me $1100 rent she had to sell up and became bankrupt! It was fun for a change.We are off to Queenstown tomorrow and Jacks driving, so if you don't hear from us in a couple of days, you know why.

Te Anau ( NZ south island)

The weather had improved thank god, it was actually quite a sunny day...whats more we stopped off on the way for a little shopping and found crumble, we have wanted crumble and custard for ages now and just couldnt find any, but we have a its huge so will have to have half each!! We booked to stay at a backpackers just out of Te Anau. It was ok, little log cabin but a bit aged, main thing we can cook our crumble!!
Te Anau itself was really nice the lake was lovely! We did a spot of survival shopping in the way of walking boots and waterproofs, its getting to the point where we really need them so enough is enough and we hit the shops!!
We spent a couple of nights here at Te Anau, the first full day we went tramping, and i dont mean going round rounding all the homeless up either, the locals call wlaking tramping out here!! But yeh there is a 3day walk (the NZ walk) and its called the Kepler Track, well we just did day one of this up Mnt Luxamore, it was a good day so that was a good start, but the walk was hard going, it was mainly a climb and god could i feel it, we made it to the top and got to the Luxamore hut, didnt make it to the summit as we was both knackered and had to come back down again, it felt like a life time getting back to the car..i was that tired i was tripping over and everything my legs just didnt want to carry on, We worked it out later and we had walked 28km...about 17.5miles...oh god!!!! Definately worked off that wild berry crumble and custard we ate last night!!
Next morning the plan was to check out and make our way to Milford Sound stopping off on the way to do a little 3hr walk around lake Marian half way there realised we had left phone charger and adaptor in room back at Te Anau...so carried straight on to Milford and made a few phonecalls!!

Catlins (south island)

The weather was still very wet and no sign of it improving, we arrived at the catlins and found this gorgeous farm hostel to stay at. It was so lovely and cosy, they had baby orphan lambs that we helped to bottle feed, we also went out with Ray the farmer around the farm on his truck with the working dog and helped round up the sheep, we was also gonna help out tailing the lambs but unfortunately the weather didnt improve while we was there so had to move on!! It was really interesting though and cant wait to find somewhere else like it!
Whilst at the Catlins we did manage to see some sights surprisingly!! We went for a walk down to Surat bay, we walked across the beach over to the headland and came across some more Sealions, it was really funny we was walking over to this massive one with a little one next to it and the little one got up and started chasing us, we ran off a little then stopped and then the sealion started chasing us again, it was really funny and they are actually quite fast! We also visited Nugget Point, there was a lovely lighthouse here and below us on the rocks where more sealions, its good to see them though dont think we'd ever get bored watching them, think its called Nugget point as it looks like there are a few nuggets sticking up out of the water?? We did want to do a 5hr walk along the Catlins river but again the weather let us down so we ended up at cannibal bay, apparently at some point some human remains where found here, we didnt see any thank god the seal was bad enough back at Surat!
In the evening after a bottle of wine, few games of yahtzee and just the one game of dominoes, we went down to see the glow worms, they was along this path and all over on the rock faces, they was just like little lights..really nice and pretty!

Dunedin (south island)

Well to be honest cant really tell you much about Dunedin as we spent the majority of the time in the pub, we did set off with good intentions but it was so cold and wet by 1600 we was in Speights brewery sampling all the beer...think Paul managed them all but one, even had apricot beer and i just stook to the one i liked...we decided to make an evening of it and ended up staying there for dinner, and that was basically Dunedin!!!

On the way to Dunedin we did stop off at Moeracki Boulders, most people actually parked at the boulders and just walked down to the beach where they were, not us, oh no we parked at the oppostite end and then had a 45min walk to the boulders....the beach was very cold and wet..! There was an upside though we did come across a seal, unfortunately when we got close to it we realised its face was missing!!!!:(