New Zealand

So for mid-semester break I went with two friends for a 9 day trek through New Zealand. It was spectacular. We left on Saturday mid day from Brisbane and flew to Christchurch on the south island. The city itself is known for guess what? A church. So after checking into our hotel (yes, hotel not hostel because we found an amazing deal) we took a stroll through the city. Its just beginning to be spring so all of the flowers are in bloom and the trees are blossoming. Christchurch has the feeling of an old European city and lots of little cafes and museums scattered all around. The church was incredible, especially when you think about where and when it was built. New Zealand stayed fairly remote and rustic much longer than you would think! Unfortunately Jess and I had colds so we called it an early night and headed back to the hotel. The next morning we tooled through a few street markets and visited the botanical gardens. Its sort of amazing how easily we amuse ourselves. We spent nearly an hour playing and taking pictures in this spectacular old hollowed out pine tree. The next morning we flew from Christchurch down farther south (and farther into the cold!) to Queenstown.

While in Christchurch we decided that hiking one of New Zealand's glaciers was a must do activity. We also realized that with our travel plans as they were we weren't going to be able to fit that in. So we changed our flights around with a little chatting on the phone with JetStar. That meant 3 extra days before leaving Queenstown and no more Auckland... but it had to be done.

Queenstown must rank in my top 5 places. We landed and stepped off the plane on to a tarmac to walk into the airport and were greeted by spectacular mountains rising straight out of the valley floor. No foot hills, no gradual grade, just mountains. Appropriately enough the range is called "The Remarkables". It is the only other mountain range in the world that runs North-South besides the Rockies. From the airport we took a cab to the resort (another great deal) we were staying at and got a bit of a tour of the city. The only way I can describe Queenstown is to say it is a cross between a Colorado mountain town and Annapolis, MD. Obviously I adored it. The town itself is set on a huge glacial lake that is crystal clear and almost always perfectly placid which reflects the mountains quite nicely. So once we checked in we headed back down into town and got lunch at a great cafe called Vudu on one of the side streets. Then we booked our activities. Jess set up a skydiving session for Tuesday and all of us booked white water rafting for Wednesday. I had planned on skiing at Coronet Peak on Tuesday but my cold had gotten worse so I had to scratch that. Very sad story. We also booked our glacial hike and transportation up the west coast to make it to Fox Glacier.

That evening in Queenstown we had dinner at a great pizza joint called Winnie's and then went to a bar called Minus 5. PS. Minus 5 is ACTUALLY Minus 5 degrees Celsius. The bar itself is made of ice, the chairs are ice, the walls are ice, the CUPS are ice... its all ice. Very cool figuratively and literally! On Tuesday Marisa and I hung around town while Jess hurled herself out an airplane at 15,000 feet. As a treat for her when she came back we had booked an hour in the hot pools up in the mountains. So once we met her after her infamous flight we headed up to Onsen Hot Pools right outside of town. This place was pretty spectacular. We had our own little room with a built in pool filled with heated run off from the snow melt that over looked the Shotover River Valley. Then, with the press of a button we could retract the wall and half of the ceiling to be right outside on the edge of the cliff. It was a nice relaxing way to spend the afternoon.

Wednesday morning we woke up early AGAIN to go white water rafting. It is still cold... remember that. So we put on wetsuits and jumped in some vans which took us to our put in site. The road we travelled on is one of two roads too dangerous in New Zealand to be covered by insurance companies. We did it with an 18 passenger van. Spectacular. Finally at the bottom I was feeling a little nauseous but got in the boat anyhow and learned how to paddle. I think I have a new past-time to take up because I absolutely loved white water rafting. We did class 4 and 5 rapids towards the end and no one from our boat even got tossed. Although, at the end as we went over a waterfall Jess did somehow manage to smack her face off her paddle leaving her cranky and with a bruised nose the rest of the trip.

Thursday we got up early again and checked out of our hotel before trekking down to the city to catch a bus. We got on a coach to take us up to Fox Glacier and made a few stops along the way. The first stop was at a really beautiful orchard in Otago which is the central wine region of the South Island. From there we continued on to Wanaka which is a cute little ski town about two hours away from Queenstown. The mountains on the way there were really spectacular and we crossed over a mountain pass into the subtropical rainforest part of the island. Next we stopped at a beautiful waterfall called Thunder Creek Falls before we continued up the coast to the small town of Fox Glacier. The town has a permanent population of 250 people. We stayed at the Fox Glacier Inn and hung out in the little town for the rest of the afternoon.

Friday we woke up to TORRENTIAL downpours but were told we would hike the glacier rain or shine so we got dressed and headed down for brunch befor

e we checked in. So after hanging out in the lodge for a few hours we went to the desk to check in and were told that our hike was cancelled due to dangerous rock slides. Yes, after changing our flights and booking two days of bus rides to and from this little town, the weather stopped us from actually walking on the glacier. It was a pretty tragic moment. Our only

option was to take a hike to the terminus (the face) of the glacier, so we took it. Im very glad we did because it was

pretty spectacular just to be able to see the glacier. We got to hold a bit of the ice and even sample a little bit.

Saturday we had to catch our bus back out of Fox Glacier early in the morning and slept most of the way back to Queenstown. On the way back through we stopped in Wanaka again and then continued on to Queenstown. When we arrived back in Queenstown we were surprised to find that it had snowed while we were away. We found ourselves a place to stay for the night and then went off to complete our souvenir hunting. The rest of the evening we sort of chilled out and went to a local tavern for dinner (where we got carded for the first time all trip?) She even asked for my passport?! I guess we were looking a little ragged at this point.

Our flight out was fairly early Sunday morning and from Queenstown we flew up to Auckland. Then in Auckland we had some layover time before we flew out to the Gold Coast. It was significantly cheaper to fly to Gold Coast and then take the train up than to fly directly into Brisbane. In Auckland though Jess got pulled out by a check in agent for having too much baggage and they charged her $160 to check an extra bag! Needless to say she was very very unhappy. After our flight got delayed sitting on the tarmac we ended up getting into the Gold Coast an hour late and missed our bus to the train station. Clearly this was a good day of travel for us. Once we finally made it to the train station we still had a two hour train ride and two more busses to make it back to campus.

Even with the last day of travel, New Zealand was incredible. It is a very beautiful country, that is a totally different world than Australia. Id love to be able to make it back because there is so much that I feel like I missed. Im fairly certain I could spend a whole year just on the South Island and never see the same place twice. Its like a huge playground for big kids!