Thank you John and Patricia Sampson

Blog Post 14 - the last one.

Woke up bright and early at 3:30am NZ time to catch our flight.  I had another hour to sleep, but as anyone who ever has an early flight knows, once you are up, you are up - don't want to miss that flight!  We got to the CHCH airport - thank goodness we were early since there is a 23 kilo weight limit on bags and we had one at 28k.  Ugh.  We shoved a bunch of stuff into plastic bags and off we went.  Sadly, that meant no duty free wine from NZ.

Flight was an uneventful 3 1/2 hours - they have about 20 new release movies available, so I was quite happy and could have stayed on the plane longer.  Imitation Game and Horrible Bosses 2.  Landed at 8:30am (2 hour time change).  Got through the airport and into a taxi in a record breaking 30 minutes - including customs, etc.  We stayed at the Park Hyatt on Sydney Harbor (thank you Hyatt points) with an astounding view of the harbor and the famed Opera House (see FB picture from our balcony). 

After quickly dumping our stuff, we took off - with only one day in Sydney, no time to waste.  We walked to the opera house for a tour and while waiting in line, a woman walks up to us and says she has free tickets that she got from purchasing opera tickets and they weren't going to use the tour tickets - she gave us two tickets for the exact tour we wanted ($76 savings) - we just had to be them.  Thank you John and Patricia Sampson!  The opera tour was interesting - the inside has a bunch of different theaters and we got to go into a few while sets were down (could see behind the scenes, literally) and while the Sydney Orchestra was practicing.  All and all, a good show.

I was starting to fade, so we grabbed lunch on the wharf, which perked me up a little, then we walked  around downtown trying to find the local office of my new company so we could take a picture by the sign.  Given that we hadn't showered and were pretty grubby, we decided not to go up to the actual office.  Barely made it back to the hotel before collapsing - keep in mind we had the bridge climb still scheduled.

We relaxed for about 38 minutes and took off again for the bridge.  We had to walk pretty far and up a bunch of stairs to get there (exhausted) and made it with 10 minutes to spare.  The climb organization is amazing - they have a system of safety and processes that is really thorough - we noticed this a lot in NZ, too.  We harnessed up and again, off we went. 

After jumping off a 43 meter bridge, climbing to the top of a 141 meter bridge was no big thing.  Very windy as we went up (40-50k winds), but the views were spectacular.  Yeah sunny skies!  Lots of good stories from our climbing guide about how and when the bridge went up. Totally rejuvenated!

Post bridge, we scrapped our plans for further touristy things and a fancy dinner.  We had some local pizza and beer on the way back to the hotel and then just relaxed.  It is now morning - we have about an hour left before leaving for the airport.  We are looking at the sun rise over the Opera house.

It has been a once in a lifetime experience and we are so thankful to have been given the opportunity to do this.  For those of you who followed our journey - we hope you enjoyed reading about it even a fraction as much as we enjoyed doing it.

G'Day.

Kia Ora New Zealand! :(

Blog Post 13:

NOTE:  Kia Ora in Maori is the basic "hello, goodbye, good tidings, good life" greeting that you get everywhere.

Well, here it is, our last night in NZ and it has been an absolutely fabulous trip.  Very sad to be leaving, but as anyone who knows me knows, I'll be thankful to get home to Thorkey - of course we still have one more adventure in Australia, but that is for later. 

To round out the last day or so, I left off yesterday on our way back to Manapouri.  From Manapouri, we drove to Te Anau, about 20 minutes away and we did find wifi - more coffee, more dessert - you have to buy something to get free wifi, and we have basically been eating our way through these blog postings trying to find wifi anywhere in this country that actually works! 

We had one final tour yesterday out of Te Anau to see the famous NZ glow worms.  We took a (nother) boat out to more caves, hiked into a cave with a guide, got on a boat and turned out all of the lights and looked up - it is pitch black except for these little glowing blue dots all over the cave ceiling.  It is pretty cool.  Without going into too much detail - the glow worms are some sort of fly in the larvae stage.  The make "fishing lines" - sticky silk lines (like spider webs,) a few inches long that hang from the ceiling.  Then the larvae butt (not the official terminology) has some glowing blue junk (also not official terminology) in it to attract other cave bugs who fly to the light and get stuck in the sticky silk lines. All in all, it was pretty interesting.

As this was our last scheduled outing in NZ and we had an 8 hour drive back to Christchurch to return the Campervan, we decided to knock off as much as possible in the evening.  Plus, we still had 4 hours left in The Martian.  So, we basically drove until the book ended somewhere North of Dunedin (we stopped for a delish Italian dinner in Dunedin).  I won't tell you the ending - it is a great book, though.  Will be a movie one day.

We found a place to freedom camp near the ocean - NZ is awesome about letting you camp in certain areas gratis.  In the morning, we were very rudely woken up by a chicken. Damon says it was a rooster, but it looked like a chicken.  Anyhoo, this damn thing was cockadoodle doing from a ways away and walked up to our camper pretty much yelling at us to get out - about a foot from our front door.  I have pix and video - it was kind of funny and did get us moving. 

We were going to just knock out the last 3.5 hours but I convinced Damon to do 2 more stops that our guidebook recommended,  They were right near where we camped and we had the time, so we went.  The first stop was a lighthouse that somehow became a penguin habitat for one of the rarest penguins around - the yellow eyed penguin - or something like that.  We found the place and started walking around the bluff and sure enough, we came across a few penguins, took like a billion pictures, and kept walking - there were a bunch of penguins roaming around (always in pairs) and we got close to a few of them - they are endangered and in a loosely enclosed area, so no touching, but we were maybe a foot or two away from them.  We kept walking - more penguins - and then we saw the fur seals - everywhere,  Lots of babies playing in the water, and adults sunning all over the bluff - with no barriers.  NZ lets you get up close and personal with nature a lot of the time - we are on a bluff, with huge cliff drops on both sides, and a bunch of seals between us and where we wanted to go.  We just kept a few meters (I speak metric now) between us and them and hoped none got pissy.  I'm sure they are used to people up there, but they are also very aware of what is going on.  One movement and 25 seal heads turn in your direction.  The babies just race to the water if they get scared.  Lots of pix and videos.

Back to the car and to our second pit stop, the Moeraki Rocks - imagine a big gray sand beach at low tide (there are not many beaches in NZ that we saw).  In the middle of this huge beach, clumped together, are these completely random out of place perfectly round rocks about 4-5' in diameter.  Think big balls from Wipeout, only rocks, not red balls.  Some of them have broken apart - almost like they have exploded - and you can see some sort of yellow mineral all through the rocks - but the surfaces are perfectly rounded rocks. I'm convinced they are alien rocks and the split ones have just hatched already.

The last few hours of driving were brutal mostly for Damon - we hit the "Iowa" section of NZ - nothing but flat and farms for the last few hours.  NZ has about a gazillion deer (on farms), about 10 gazillion cows, and about 100 gazillion sheep.  We saw a lot of them en route.

Got to our final hotel in Christchurch and went downtown for dinner.  You may have heard CHCH had two huge earthquakes in Nov '10 and Feb '11.  The city was devastated.  Here we are more than 4 years later and the city is still in pretty bad shape.  Buildings are down everywhere, lots of empty spaces, tons of fences, buildings still being propped up and the early stages of new construction.  They made a temporary shopping mall out of shipping containers which people say will be permanent.  We had dinner on the main restaurant drag and I'd say easily 1/3 of the buildings were barricaded.  Every building has cracks on it.  Very sad.  The huge "Christchurch" cathedral is in ruins and there are signs everywhere trying to get funding to restore it.  Meanwhile, it stands as it was after the earthquake, propped up with a gaping hole in the side and slightly crumbling.

We are now getting ready for our 4:30am wake-up so we can spend our one day in Sydney tomorrow.  But before I sign off, a few things about NZ toilets - first, while we love Duke, we have a no "Duke" rule inside.  It will be nice to have regular toilets again.  Second, they have strange flushers here.  There are always two buttons - presumably one is for a light flush and the other for a heavy flush.  I've flushed about 500 toilets and still have no idea which button does what.  And finally, regardless of the button you push, the toilets flush like a jet engine, no matter where you are - so for anyone who wanted to know if NZ toilets swirl backwards, we have no idea - the water generally just shoots out like a canon without swirling.

Off to Australia tomorrow for our final blog post.

Seals and Dolphins and Penguins, Oh My!

Blog Post 12

Woke up early and made ourselves a nice hot breakfast (thank you Duke) and then made the easy drive (only about an hour and a half) to a tiny town called Manapouri and waited for our tour. 

To get to Doubtful Sound, we started with an hour boat ride across Lake Manapouri, followed by an hour bus ride in a completely remote area to get to our boat (ship?) "The Fiordland Navigator".  Solid pouring rain the entire time, but in Fiordland, that is a good thing - the rain makes thousands of waterfalls off the mountains that typically dry up about an hour or two after the rain stops.

We had about 68 people on the boat - the cabins were really spacious and we had a private bath and shower.  The Kiwis who run these tours are amazing - everyone is friendly and all of the guides infuse humor and history into their talks - everyone seems very proud of what they do.  Refreshing.

How to describe Doubtful Sound… Imagine mountain forests with occasional breaks in the green where the trees have fallen down to the water creating a rock "path", which is where the waterfalls tumble down the mountains.  The first half of our day was a very spooky grey - mist, low clouds, rain - everything was one color but very shadowy - think of a pirate ghost ship backdrop and you'll nail it.

A few hours in, the rain let up so we stopped in a cove for kayaking.  Of course, the minute we get in the kayaks, the rain starts back up again in full force.  The temperatures were not bad and we were well prepared, so it wasn't cold or uncomfortable despite the rain.  Of course Damon forgot a change of pants, so he went out in his "ranger panties" that happened to be stashed in his pack for emergencies (think 1980's running shorts.  SHORT shorts).  Made me proud.  After kayaking, they let people jump off the boat and go for a swim - Damon went, it was just a bit too chilly for me.

Post swim, there was a lot of hanging out on the various decks taking pictures.  As soon as we got out of the water, the sky cleared up and we got sun, which gave the Fiord's a whole different look.  We made it out to the Tasman sea, saw a bunch of fur seals and some blue penguins, and then turned around.  We had an amazing dinner and eventually docked in a small cove for the night.    The sky cleared up and it was dark enough for good stargazing, and then we went to bed - the overnight was so calm, you wouldn't suspect you were sleeping on water.

Woke up bright and early - they start the engines at 6:30am, and a delicious breakfast, and started the cruise back - exploring different Fiord arms along the way.  Everyone was on the lookout for the resident dolphin pod, and (thank you very much) I happened to be in the captain's lookout area (the "bridge") and I spotted the dolphins first, informed the captain, and we bee-lined in that direction to see a pod of dolphins swimming around - a few came close to the boat.

Rest of the ride was uneventful - no rain (yeah) and we saw a few more penguins. Well, I saw some ripples in the water and maybe a head or a tail feather - they are tiny and don't like to come near the boat and mostly stay under water.

We are now on the boat back to Manapouri as I write and hope to come across Wi-Fi soon so we can post.  More later!

Rain rain you can stay

Blog Post 11

Aahhh, glorious hotel bed (sorry Duke).  We slept in and had a leisurely  morning, yeah right, that was right up until I convinced Damon that the Shotover Jet Boats were listed as a "must do" and we had to schedule that in before we left Queenstown.  So, we ran to breakfast, gobbled quickly, and then sped over to our next adventure.

The jet boats are crazy - they put about 14 people in a boat - you sit like a roller coaster - 4 across - with a handlebar to hang onto.  Then they whip up and down a river gorge in these specially designed boats getting you super close to the canyon walls, doing 360 degree turns and basically giving you an exhilarating 25 minute ride.  With no time to stop and watch the video, we jetted (ha ha) off to our next activity - a four hour drive to Milford Sound.

You may think that all of these long drives are awful and boring, but the reality is that they seem to fly by.  Partly because the scenery is generally awesome, partly because Damon has to concentrate driving on the twisty turnys (while I still clutch my armrests), but mostly because we started listening to "The Martian" - book on tape.  A great book about a guy who gets stuck by himself on Mars (obviously fiction), but a really good read (or listen).

The scenery on the way to the Fiords is crazy - from rain forest to open grassy plains to gorge-like mountains.  It rains something like 200+ days per year in these parts, so needless to say, the weather was not great - on the positive side, it is the rain that makes the Fiords so spectacular.  Imagine black granite rock walls covered in dark green trees with waterfalls coming through everywhere - literally hundreds of them.  A jaw dropping site.

We were the last Milford Sound boat out - we did that on purpose so our views were not blocked by other tour boats. We steamed through the Fiord out to the ocean and back over about two hours,  The views are truly amazing with those canyon walls and waterfall after waterfall after waterfall.  We also got up close and personal with a bunch of baby seals that lounge around on the rocks.

After the boat tour, we found a campsite in one of the big grassy areas, made dinner, listened to more book, and crashed.  Weather was rough overnight - crazy wind gusts and rain, but the Duke kept us safe, sound and dry.

Tomorrow we go on our overnight cruise through Doubtful Sound - another Fiord,  a cave tour of glow worms, and then it is back to Christchurch for our final stop before heading to Australia.  Hard to believe our time in NZ is winding down.  Of course, there is still the Sydney Bridge climb for our final hurrah!us hotel bed (sorry Duke).  We slept in and had a leisurely  morning, yeah right, that was right up until I convinced Damon that the Shotover Jet Boats were listed as a "must do" and we had to schedule that in before we left Queenstown.  So, we ran to breakfast, gobbled quickly, and then sped over to our next adventure.

The jet boats are crazy - they put about 14 people in a boat - you sit like a roller coaster - 4 across - with a handlebar to hang onto.  Then they whip up and down a river gorge in these specially designed boats getting you super close to the canyon walls, doing 360 degree turns and basically giving you an exhilarating 25 minute ride.  With no time to stop and watch the video, we jetted (ha ha) off to our next activity - a four hour drive to Milford Sound.

You may think that all of these long drives are awful and boring, but the reality is that they seem to fly by.  Partly because the scenery is generally awesome, partly because Damon has to concentrate driving on the twisty turnys (while I still clutch my armrests), but mostly because we started listening to "The Martian" - book on tape.  A great book about a guy who gets stuck by himself on Mars (obviously fiction), but a really good read (or listen).

The scenery on the way to the Fiords is crazy - from rain forest to open grassy plains to gorge-like mountains.  It rains something like 200+ days per year in these parts, so needless to say, the weather was not great - on the positive side, it is the rain that makes the Fiords so spectacular.  Imagine black granite rock walls covered in dark green trees with waterfalls coming through everywhere - literally hundreds of them.  A jaw dropping site.

We were the last Milford Sound boat out - we did that on purpose so our views were not blocked by other tour boats.  We steamed through the Fiord out to the ocean and back over about two hours,  The views are truly amazing with those canyon walls and waterfall after waterfall after waterfall.  We also got up close and personal with a bunch of baby seals that lounge around on the rocks.

After the boat tour, we found a campsite in one of the big grassy areas, made dinner, listened to more book, and crashed.  Weather was rough overnight - crazy wind gusts and rain, but the Duke kept us safe, sound and dry.

Tomorrow we go on our overnight cruise through Doubtful Sound - another Fiord,  a cave tour of glow worms, and then it is back to Christchurch for our final stop before heading to Australia.  Hard to believe our time in NZ is winding down.  Of course, there is still the Sydney Bridge climb for our final hurrah!