New Zealand February 13 - February 24

After the criuse on the sound, we headed to Queenstown, the sporting and activity center of New Zealand. Every conceivable thrill activity you can think of is available for a price; hang gliding, bungy jumping, paragliding, canyon jet boating, river boogie boarding, sky diving. You name it, they got it and they do it from every conceivable place. When we got here, a cold front came in so we walked the town in the early part of the day and then went Canyon jet boating on the Shotover River. It was cool. You drive in these jet boats that come within an inch of the canyon walls, twisting, turning and doing 360 degree turns. It was a blast.




The next day we left for Wanaka but on the way stopped and watched the bungy jumping from theKawarau bridge. There are three of them in Queenstown but this is the original. It is unbeleivable that people do this. We got very close to doing a tandem jump but decided we would rather try hang gliding, maybe in Wanaka because the skies were not clear in Queenstown.
Wanaka is a smaller, quieter version of Queenstown on the Wanaka lake with the backdrop of Mt. Aspiring National Park, the third highest in New Zealand. Checked out the town (took about 5 minutes), relaxed and decided to do an overnight hike the next day and camp in the national park.

Picked out the hike and started to provision up, which took forever, you know, us shopping....... and headed off to the Glacier Burn trail. We figured out for just an overnight, we could suck it up and carry a bottle of wine with us! This was the strangest hike. We had to ford a river and two streams and even though it was in a National Park, you walked for about an hour across cow fields, with the cows right next to you. We kept thinking we must be in the wrong place. We pitched the tent next to the river Kitchener and made a very nice dinner. That's when the man with the rifle showed up. Very wierd standing in a national park talking to a man with a rifle with absolutely no one else in site. We were glad when he walked off. Also, New Zealand has this dark secret called sandflies, these little buggers bite the crap out of you. They make mosquitoes, with West Nile seem tame so we had to wear these cute little mosquito hats and eat dinner in the tent. That night the stars were unbelievable. We've never seen a sky like that ever before.



The next day, we hiked out and went and hung out on the beach in Wanaka and just relaxed to get ready for the next day. We had decided to go back to Queenstown to do a tandem hang glide because the views from the hilltop there looked more spectacluar than in Wanaka. So in the morning we called and made an appointment for that afternoon and drove back. We got there a little early so we grabbed lunch and went to the beach while we waited. A few hours later, off the mountain we jumped.










Pat went first. Was it because Tom wanted to take pictures or because he wanted make sure it was safe?????? The jump was unbelievable. You take three steps to get in sync and then you run as fast as you can for as long as you can until your feet leave the ground. Quite a rush, you truly feel like you are flying over the valley. Right before you land, the guy starts doing dives and 360's and it's like being on a roller coaster. When you land, you come in skimming about 6 inches off the ground and then he just sets down on your belly. It really was great.

We had dinner in Queenstown and then drove back to Wanaka for the night. In the morning we drove to Fox Glacier over the Haast Pass. It was a long drive but with some great scenery. We got to Fox in the late afternoon and decided to do the walk to the Glacier face. I know it's bad, but we just don't get the attraction. People do helicopter trips, all day hiking on the ice trips, etc.

We just left the next morning and drove to Lake Matheson where on a clear day you are supposed to be able to see and photograph the reflection of Mt. Cook in the water supposedly, the most photographed lake in New Zealand. We took our pictures, caught some of the reflection, did a walk around the lake and headed off for a long drive up the West Coast. What was amazing about that drive is the constant change of scenery. You go from glacial snow capped mountains to rain forrests to tropical beach all within a few hours. The parts where you are driving along the coastline are spectacular also. We realized about 4 hours out of Fox that in our rush to leave early in the morning, we left our Camelback water systems for hiking in the refrigerator back at the lodge. The challenge now is to try and figure out how to get them to us before our next hike, The Abel Tasman, in a few days. It's all good!

We arrived in Westport late and started looking for a room. This town has seen better days in the fifties. We couldn't even find a place that looked good for dinner but it was late and we didn't want to drive any further. So we went to the supermarket and bought some things and a bottle of wine and went down to a beach on the Tasman Sea and hung out for a sunset. It was a nice two hours of down time. The beach was a long stretch with dark sand with hardly anyone on it except some horseback riders. The sunset was OK but the moon rising in the east was spectacluar, a bright orange full moon! The unique thing is that the moon is rising right after the sun sets all at about 9:00 at night. Further south, the sun didn't set until about 9:30. So we definately made the best of a "Stephen King" town.