We’re back!  Just spent the last 10 days tramping around southern New Zealand (Dec. 27 – Jan. 5). The trip with was Flying Kiwi; leaving from Christchurch and each day we traveled to a new city and new  campsite.  Every night we camped, most of the time in amazing places with beautiful views.  Most days, we would travel for about 3 hours on the bus, stopping every hour or so to see another beautiful site.  We biked (Kit logged 60 miles, Heather logged 25 miles), hiked and did excursions.   It was by far our most active vacation EVER! 

We traveled with 25 other people, two families and the rest single travelers.  People ranged in age from 16 to 56, and came from all around the world (China, Germany, Italy, Canada, England, Malaysia, and Dallas!).  It was really fun getting to know everyone and since we were on the trip for 10 days, we even got to became friends with few.

Day One

The first day the bus picked us up in Christchurch and we drove across the Canterbury plains to Rangitata Gorge where we camped at the foot of the Southern Alps in Peel Forest.  When we got to camp, we set up our tents and started cooking dinner.  It was a nice night to just relax and start meeting our traveling companions.

Day Two

While a lot of the travelers went white water rafting (we didn’t to save money), we decided to cycle to the first stop in Geraldine (20 miles away). The first 10 miles of the bike ride went great, but then we started getting tried which made the last 10 miles suck. 

From Geraldine we traveled to Lake Tekapo which was gorgeous. 

That night we camped at Lake Pukaki and both went for a swim in the glacier lake.  From the lake you can see Mount Cook which is the highest mountain in New Zealand. 

The sunset over the lake and turned the sky red and orange.  The sunsets in New Zealand are amazing!

Day Three

In the morning we did a cycle ride towards Mt. Cook where we then did a three hour hike to the glacier near the base. 

That evening we went to see the penguins that live in Oamaru.  We saw yellow eyed penguins playing in the ocean and about 200 blue penguins exit the ocean and run for their homes.

Day Four

In the morning we visited the bizarre Moeraki Boulders which are a bunch of round boulders on the beach.  We found out later that they actually fell off the cliff that overlooks the beach, and that in 25 years they will be erroded away… so if you want to check them out for yourselves, you should go  quickly!

Then we traveled to Dunedine and saw the world’s steepest street.  It turns out it is really steep.  The crazy part is people actually live off the street.

In Dunedine, Heather toured the Cadbury Chocolate factory and Kit toured the Speights Brewery.  Speights is the most popular beer in New Zealand and the tour was really fun (30 minutes of free all-you-can-drink Speights beer).  The Cadbury Chocolate Tour was really fun too, also with lots of free chocolate… turns out that Kit can drink more beer than I can eat free chocolate, as I was ready to puke by the time I got back to the bus, while Kit was all smiles.  That night, our whole travel group set up our tents and went down to a local pub to eat dinner and hang out.

Day Five (New Years Eve)

We journeyed through the scenic southern pastures, stopping for lunch on the shores of Lake Manapouri.

As part of the Flying Kiwi traditions, we bought second hand costumes in Dunedine the day before to wear during New Years Eve day.  Heather’s costume was great but Kit’s didn’t fit all that well. 

That night we camped in Fiordland National Park.  It was great except for the swarms of sand flies.  We put on bug spray but everywhere we didn’t get the spray, we were both bitten-up.  The bites didn’t do anything for the first few days but then they swelled up and started itching like crazy. We are both still itching our bites, even as we write this post!

That night, New Year’s Eve, we had a big fire where we roasted marshmallows and watched fireworks to ring in the New Year.

Day Six

We started the day by drinking out of a fresh mountain stream.

We spent New Year’s Day taking a boat cruise through Milford Sound which is one of the wonders of the world.  Milford Sound is a river that travels between steep mountains out to the ocean.  It receives the second most rain per year (20-ft) in the world.  Howeve,r the day we went was beautiful and sunny.  Words and pictures cannot describe the beauty of Milford Sound-but it is hands down the most awe-inspiring thing we have ever seen!

These fur seals live on a rock on one of the coasts in Milford Sound…I think if I had to come back as an amimal, this would be the one that I would like to be reincarnated as- WHAT A LIFE!

Day Seven

Day seven was a free day in the city of Te Anau.   Instead of camping, we paid for an upgrade and got a room the size of a walk-in closet with a full size bed and a desk.  We  spent the whole day sleeping in and taking naps.  It was a much needed day of relaxing and totally worth the $32 dollars!!!!

Day Eight

We traveled to Queenstown which is surrounded by mountains and nicknamed the adventure capital of the world.  In Queenstown you can skydive, budge jump, hand glide or any other adventure thing you can think of.  While we wanted to do something adventurous, we didn’t want to spend $250 pp for 15 minutes of fun.  We are still being careful with our money so we can travel to lot of other places.  So instead we walked around the town and ate Mexican food (or at least thier version of it..).  The town reminded us of a small town in Colorado, and is definetly someplace that we want to visit again.  This was our last night with the group so everyone went out for a night out on the town.  We had a lot of fun with our new friends, we ate an awesome pizza place (Winnie’s) that kinda reminded us of Homeslice, and then went bar hopping… super fun, but it would have been better if beers weren’t $7 each.

Day Nine

The Flying Kiwi group set off for the rest of their tour around New Zealand (some people for another 18 days) so we were on our own.  We put our stuff down in our hotel and went horseback riding through the mountains.  The mountains we rode though were where part of the Lord of the Rings was filmed so that was pretty exciting to both of us…sadly/happily we saw no orks….

Day Ten

We caught a bus from Queenstown back to Christchurch (8 hrs) and arrived around 11pm. 

The Wonder of Flowers

Next to the sunsets, the flowers in New Zealand are amazing.  They are everywhere!  It makes for a beautiful drive no matter where you are going.  Not sure what these flowers are called, but they are everywhere, and they reminded us of bluebonnets on steroids….

So now that our wonderful vacation has come to the end, it’s time to start thinking where we want to go next, maybe Australia…