Milford Sounds Great

Milford Sound is actually not a sound, but a fiord. That's ok, because if you're like me, you probably don't know what a sound is and only know that fiords are those weird squiggly things on the coast of Norway that Slartibartfast won an award for. Well, SW NZ has its own fiordland. (It even has its own species of parrot to do some pining.) Milford Sound is a big valley cut by glaciers and now filled with seawater. The mountains are mostly covered with greenery and great scenery.

I think it's the glacier bit that makes it a fiord, but don't quote me on that...

Milford is pretty close to Queenstown as the crow flies. Unfortunately, since we are not crows we have to drive 300km. Fortunately, we have been tipped off to take an overnight cruise rather than stay somewhere on route (thanks Matthew!) so we have a nice leisurely drive - and although I sound like a broken record - much of it is again through stunning scenery with mountains, rivers, valleys and lakes.

This culminates with a rather ominous tunnel hacked through a mountain. It is currently a one-way tunnel (alternating direction every 15 minutes), and there are some lights inside - both of which are recent innovations so it must have been fun to drive through 5 years ago.  And until recently covered with snow - a huge snowbank sits at the side of the road.

Milford Sound is notorious for its rain (when we were in Queenstown the 4-day forecast was rain every day in MS) but fortunately we had quite a lot of sunshine. On the downside, it's been a very dry spell. I understand that Milford Sound is at its most spectacular when there are numerous waterfalls down the mountains on every side. We still got to see one of the best, Sterling Falls, 155m high. (If you've seen the film Wolverine, Hugh Jackman leaps off the top of it. It's a fairly bad film that I half-watched on a plane a few months ago and I just about remember seeing it.)  

Distances are very deceptive out here and initially nobody can believe it's that high - but the boat goes right underneath it and we catch the spray. It's an impressive sight. In the morning a giant cruise ship pulls into the sound for a few minutes. It is one of the biggest ships I've ever seen. It is also a lot smaller than the waterfall.

Bit of perspective in play... trust me, the waterfall wins by a distance

A little video to give some idea of scale as we cruise up to the waterfall

It feels very windy out here and we curtail our cruise short of the Tasman Sea, but we are allowed to go kayaking. Lilly and I and half a dozen others take them up on this - individual kayaks today. We joke that we'll finally find out which one of us has been making our double kayaks veer to one side like a dodgy supermarket trolley, but in the wind and waves it's hard to tell! Good fun though.

I can't help comparing this to Halong Bay. It is different - the mountains here are taller (some over 1,000m), the water is choppier, the wind is much stronger, and the sun is shining. It lacks the never-ending feel of Halong Bay, but it is a lot quieter in general (esp on this overnight trip - I believe it's pretty busy during the day). Beautiful place, and a good cruise (Real Journeys) - the food is great and after dinner there's a very good slide/video show from the onboard nature expert. Highlights include pictures of the infamous tunnel 3 months ago completely buried under an avalanche, and the Sound in wind so strong that the waterfalls blow back up in the air.  Amazing stuff, though I'm not too sorry to have missed this kind of weather.

In the morning the wind is a little calmer and we make it out of the sound into the Tasman Sea. The entrance to the Sound behind us is small and hard to spot - many early explorers apparently missed it and sailed on past.  And on the way back the ship takes time to spot seals lounging on a rock and - a treat - some rare yellow-eyed penguins on the beach. It's not a cheap trip but it's nice that they take the trouble to look for these things (we doubled back to see the penguins after the sister ship spotted them).

Nasty tan line that seal's got...

On the drive back we see three separate instances of birds of prey on the tarmac eating roadkill. I've never seen roadkill like NZ roadkill - probably not an exaggeration to say that we've seen more dead animals than live ones in NZ. On the bright side they're mostly possums - to the extent that we can tell - which have no natural predators other than cars and need controlling. Good old mother nature, always finds a way.

Finally, not far away, the mirror lakes - you can see why they get the name

Off to Dunedin now - in a neat bit of labelling, part of the road takes us from Gore to Clinton along the 'Presidential Highway'...

Ferg Loves You (apparently)

We spent the last four days* in Queenstown, a really enjoyable place not least because it seems that everyone there is on holiday - even the employees, who are almost all from overseas enjoying the NZ summer (which, according to one woman who spends every summer here and every winter in "someone else's summer", didn't really start until the day we got here. We had three scorching days and one decent one so no complaints from us).

* Hence this is a bit of a long post after a few days of nothing, sorry.

It's only a small town but the central area appears to be entirely composed of shops (fun rather than practical, i.e. Lilly's kind of place), restaurants, bars and activity/tour companies, so it feels like a place set up entirely for tourists. And why not? It's on a huge, beautiful lake and surrounded by scenic mountains.

On our way to Queenstown we took the scenic route, rather than the longer but quicker highway, and boy it was scenic. We stopped for lunch at the Cardrona Hotel - not many pubs are built over an old gold mine shaft and still display it in the floor. It feels like a tiny abandoned township from the Old West outside (I'm not sure if the Post Office, general store etc were just closed when we passed through or merely well-preserved unused buildings) but the beer garden was a great spot for lunch.

We continued a lovely drive full of views and switchbacks to picturesque Arrowtown - like a little village that has been waiting patiently in its Sunday best for a century for history to drop by and pick it up. It also features a preserved/restored Chinese settlement which is of so little interest that it made me think NZ must have a shortage of things to preserve.

Look - no, really - it's a hut!!

The town somehow supports its own microbrewery and a really cute little boutique cinema - the main screening room was small, but we went in the second screen which seats about 14, and being the first ones there we were able to grab the sofa to watch The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (sorry UK folks, not out yet back home, but it's a decent and visually stylish compression of an overlong and over-rated novel). I doubt this cinema - or at least the second screen - would have been possible pre-digital distribution - it wouldn't have been worth sending an expensive can of film out here for 8 people to watch, so here's a little bit of progress making a historic town a better place to be.

Queenstown itself is NZ's adrenaline town - possibly the adventure sports capital of the world - but all of that takes place a bit out of town (I meant to go and watch a bungee jump but ran out of time), whereas by the lakefront it can feel a very peaceful place and there are tourists of all ages.

On Saturday we took it easy - explored town and went on a boat cruise across Lake Wakatipu on an old steamship (the trip is nice but felt a little redundant the next day when we drove past the same views - but fun to see the coal shovelled and pistons pumped, etc).

We also investigated a Queenstown phenomenon. Now, everybody knows that the best takeaway burger in the world can be bought at Pepper's in Oxford, but Fergburger gives it a good run for its money. It has apparently "seen off" Burger King and Hard Rock from town, and seems to have a constant crowd waiting for their orders no matter what time of day. It has a variety of burgers, great buns, punning names (eg The Codfather for a fish burger) and I really wish there was a branch near me. (But the chips are too salty so Pepper's retains its #1 spot on a tiebreak.)

On Sunday we drove up the east shore of the lake, a beautiful undulating road, to Glenorchy, where we had a picnic lunch and did pretty much nothing. Driving is a real pleasure in NZ - we haven't heard a single horn (our nightmares filled with car horns from Mumbai and Ho Chi Minh City gradually receding) and when you get stuck behind a slower vehicle, more often than not it will pull over to let you pass at the first opportunity. I couldn't quite believe it the first time I saw it.

On Monday we finally did something exciting with a spot of white water rafting. We had spotted an itinerary which followed a scenic gorge as used in Lord of the Rings, with gentle rapids, ideal for first time rafters.
But apparently that's not exciting enough so they only do it once a week, and we had to go on a proper rafting trip.

My favourite bit was actually the drive up (I should note that Lilly absolutely loved the rafting itself so this is just my opinion) - an old 2WD minibus dragging a trailer full of 6-man rafts, following a narrow road that a mountain goat would balk at, up and down steep hills and hairpin turns. Bits of the road regularly crumble away. At one point our guide opened the door so we could see tyre-tracks leading off the side of the cliff.

In our raft (one of 8) we were grouped with an older British couple and two Korean girls - all in all, not the most power-packed raft on the river. Our American rafting guide was initially annoying - I can imagine her as a frustrated teacher who is really competitive but isn't allowed to make games properly competitive, saying things like "It's important we try really hard, so even if we're not very good, at least we can say we tried."

I'm told that rafting is most fun when water is either high, so there's lots of it, or low, so there are more rocks in play and smaller gaps and generally more chance of capsizing. In between, it's not as good. And the water is very low at this time of year.

Apparently the key to successful rafting, bearing in mind that you are holding a paddle with both hands, sitting on the edge of a rubber boat and getting thrown around, is to wedge your feet firmly into the edges of the raft. This may be fine if you have well-formed knees. It is quickly agonising if you are me or Lilly. Still, we quickly learned all the requisite commands and manoeuvres, apart from "Hold on, get down!" where the survival instinct faces off against the fact that the available area to get down in is far smaller than the volume of rafter trying to get down in it, and said rafters start with their feet wedged underneath them.

We were rafting through a reasonably scenic gorge - sadly we were too preoccupied to take in the most scenic bits, although we did have time to notice a pair of mountin' goats* and some gold-fishers** - and quickly realised that we were mostly more stable than we'd expected. We could plop over tiny waterfalls with no problem, and get soaked unexpectedly. We even got through our first rapids without incident (although I was at the front and got soaked) - quite exciting and 20 seconds later I had blinked the water out of my contact lenses and could see again.

* I made this joke in real life. Lilly was very proud.
** This is gold-mining country. Further mining was relatively recently banned but we saw a couple of guys in wetsuits and snorkels looking for gold on the riverbed.

Unfortunately at our second set of rapids we found ourselves wedged sideways, at a 45 degree angle, on a big rock, with water pouring into the raft and, perhaps due to the inability to hear a screechy little American voice over the noise of the water, or slow reactions, or certain people not knowing their left from their right, we had to abandon raft and clamber onto the rock while the raft flipped.

No big deal, and our guide leapt into action (literally, as the raft floated off) and we were able to climb back into it. Since my seat was closest to the rock, I let everyone else in first. This proved to be an error as the penultimate rafter managed to fall into the water and, as they pulled him in, the raft floated off, leaving me marooned on the rock amidst a rush of water that made it impossible for our raft to come back.
The only way to get back to the raft was to get a lift from the support kayak. Well, 'lift' in this instance meaning jump into the water, grab the front of the kayak, lie underneath its nose and grip both sides with your feet. You can find a picture of me doing this at www.undignified.com.* I rounded the corner to meet up with my raftmates and the raft ahead of us, who hadn't seen what had happened, and assumed I had fallen in.** We then watched another 6 rafts come round, willing them to capsize. None of them did. Bah.

* Note to the literal-minded: you cannot really find a picture of me doing this.
** At the end of the trip, noting my wet state, someone asked if I had fallen in. "Sort of," said my loyal wife, who is, if you need reminding, ONE OF THE VERY PEOPLE WHO ABANDONED ME ON A ROCK LEAVING ME SOAKING WET THROUGH NO FAULT OF MY OWN, AND I HAD IN NO WAY FALLEN IN. But that's ok - it was fun taking my little rubber boots off to empty the water out of them.

Fortunately we did a lot better down the remaining rapids and through a tunnel. As we splashed down at the last rapids, I managed to duck and a huge wave went right over me and soaked Lilly. Sorry honey. All good fun - apart from my hands being eaten by sandflies. (I hate sandflies.) There had been a reasonably scary safety briefing but the reality turned out to be fairly manageable. Rapids are rated on a scale 1-6 (where 6 is Niagara Falls) and we got as far as a 3-4, so not bad. The only real downside was that we felt too much of a convoy as we went along the scenic parts - a smaller group would have had a different feel.

The previous evening we had explored the park and gardens and discovered what claims to be the world's first fully marked-out 18-hole frisbee golf course, so we had to try this out on Monday afternoon (after a quick Ferburger). You can probably imagine the rules.*

* But for those who can't, you have to hit a marked post or tree, or get the frisbee into a basket; you take your second shot from where the first shot finished, etc; and you score it like golf.

Some people take this pretty seriously - I hadn't realised until I went into a shop to buy/rent frisbees and was asked what type I wanted. We saw several people carrying round whole sets of frisbees - you can buy golf bag equivalents - one for long tee shots, one for mid-distances, one for 'putting', etc.

It will surprise nobody to learn that we were rubbish. We didn't quite lose our frisbees but we did both get them stuck on top of a 15-foot rock at one point. But at least we made it round the course.

Finally, Lilly very much enjoyed a wine-tasting concept store - it has lots of display bottles in dispensers, you use a smartcard to buy each tasting-sized portion, and at the end you get a printout of everything you've tried and a (probably hefty) bill and the chance to buy anything you've tasted. As a bonus it's run by a man who could be used as inspiration if you were making a film and wanted to establish in 20 seconds or less that a minor character is the quintessential wine buff.

Fun place, Queenstown, and even for a small town we left it thinking that there was plenty more we could have done there. But we have a trip on Milford Sound booked, so onwards it is.

I omitted to mention Puzzling World in Wanaka, just north of Queenstown, which is full of puzzles, mazes, and optical illusions - Lilly loves it mainly for this trompe l'oeil photo:

Yes, we are both the same distance from the camera

Postscript - unrelated to QT but I was reminded of it because like Rotorua it has a Skyline gondola and luge ride - on a riverbank in Hiroshima we read about an anti-nuclear gesture whereby they sent cherry blossoms (emblematic of Japan) to New Zealand. At the Skyline in Rotorua we stumbled across those cherry blossom trees, which was a nice reminder of Japan.

Possums (not foxes), glaciers, mists

There are two glaciers as you pass down the west coast - Franz Josef and Fox - and you have to go pretty much past them, so it would be a shame not to stop off.

On the road there we briefly stopped at a bizarre cafe and wildlife exhibit (recognisable by a giant fly sculpture above the door) which explained that it would like to sell us possum pies but is not allowed to by law unless the possum has been supplied by a licenced possum supplier, of which there are none in NZ. But! They have caught and killed some wild possum, and would happily give a wild possum pie to anyone making, say, a $4 donation.

We got back in the car and went to look for a normal cafe.

We got to the glaciers in light rain and were advised to head straight out to see them. You can go on walking tours or even helicopter drop-offs onto the glaciers, but we went on a glacier in Canada last year so decided to save a little money for once. It didn't seem the best day for it, as it turned out, with rain and a bit of mist hanging atmospherically around some of the slopes.

 Meet Franz Josef...

You can't walk up to a glacier without an organised tour for safety reasons - they are always shifting, chasms open up, rocks and ice fall - but you can get fairly close, and they are impressive. I think Canada spoiled us a bit, because the Columbia icefield there is perfectly situated to be visible from miles around in various directions, whereas here they are tucked around corners with a bit of a walk to get to them, but if I'd never seen one before I'd be pretty excited. They are properly craggy, with unexpected shades of blue, and both of these have a cave underneath with aluminium-grey rivers of water surging out of them. (Glaciers grow from rain falling on top and freezing, and shrink from meltwater running off, so they advance or retreat according to which is happening faster. These guys are on the advance at the moment, and they move pretty fast - 1-5 metres per day, so the safe area gets marked out afresh each morning, and the guided tours have to hack out new ice steps each day.)

Franz Josef is the bigger and more popular.

 ...And his friend Fox

Fox, half an hour down the road, is a bit smaller but quieter and you can get a lot closer to it.

Specifically, this close

We walked to Franz and back in the rain and decided to get to Fox straight after - the rain mostly let up for that one, which was nice but a bit too late.

Very pleased that we saw both glaciers when we did, because by early evening the rain had turned torrential - and stayed that way till lunchtime the next day, making for a fun drive combined with fog. We paused at one scenic lookout point on the coast, Knights Point, which was pure fog - whatever was supposed to be there, we mist it.

The rain abated after lunch but had probably charged up the tall Thunder Creek Falls and pretty Fantail Falls...

...and finally the sun broke out as we drove along the shores of Lakes Wanaka and Hawea, both such a stunning deep blue that I tried to take my sunglasses off to see what colour they really were, then realised I wasn't wearing any. Against a wall of spectacular mountains that wear a little belt of cotton-wool clouds halfway up and a second layer at their peaks, it is everything you could ask from a scenic drive.

Willing and Abel

At the NW of the South Island is Abel Tasman National Park - a long run of coastline with beautiful bays and beaches, and one of NZ's famous tramps - a 3-day walk from end to end. That sounded a bit ambitious for a couple of Londoners so we went for a one-day package of kayaking and walking.

We are, obviously, kayaking experts after a couple of excursions in Halong Bay. Here we got luxuries like skirts (to stop water getting into our kayaks) and basic technique instructions, and the rudder on our kayak was deployed, which I can assure you makes a big difference to two slightly malco people's ability to steer. I was soon getting compliments on my technique from our affable Californian guide* - "I can tell you've done this before, Paul" - so I had to admit that I had tried to forget the way I'd done it in Vietnam in favour of this proper tuition. Maybe I'm a quick learner.

* He was every inch the Californian but seemed to be loving NZ.

We had a stunning day's weather - blue skies, blue seas and rugged limestone coast make a great combination.

 
After 10km of paddling we were picked up by a water taxi and taken up to scenic Torrent Bay to eat our packed lunch and then walk to Bark Bay. The walk took us away from the coast a little but up hills for the occasional spectacular view, and over a swinging rope bridge - only holding 5 people at a time. Unfortunately we seemed to be walking contraflow so we eventually had to call across to ask the neverending stream of people on the other side to stop and let us across. I think this caused us to hurry across enough that we didn't think about the height of it.

At the far end we reached another fantastic arc of beach with only a handful of people and terrific clear seawater (you could wade in up to mid-thigh and still see every shell - and giant starfish - on the bottom). We went in for a quick swim, and noticed a big dark cloud of seaweed 10 metres away. It set off away from us at high speed, which was when we realised that it probably wasn't seaweed. Apparently the bay is full of stingrays - fortunately we are much hardier that Steve Irwin. Our water taxi driver guaranteed that he would drive some more up from the floor of the bay - but he failed.

 

 Check out that clear water

Our water taxi took us back to base (well, close to, the tide had gone out about 60m so we finished our boat ride being towed by a tractor), swinging past a seal colony. Apparently they have only returned to the area in the last few years. We only spotted one - we're told we were unlucky, there are usually loads. No complaints though, really good day and the weather was perfect.

 The split apple rock

Next day we headed for the west coast and south along it. The west coast is full of fantastic limestone formations and with the sun shining, it was a really memorable drive. The one downside was our first real encounter with sandflies, NZ's apparently infamous insect pest. We stopped for lunch and sat outside, and both noticed that we were being bitten - we could feel bites, and some of them were drawing blood. In about 3 minutes outside our feet were bitten about a dozen times each. We went indoors for lunch.

The outstanding sight on this stretch is the Pancake Rocks at Punakaiki.

Close-up - all the rock along the coast looks like this

Apparently science cannot explain how this section of cliff formed into layers, like a stack of pancakes, but they are - unscientifically - 93.2% impressive.

If you catch them when the tide is right and the wind is blowing, the crashing waves produce a big blowhole effect through some of the rocks. But we missed this by 3 hours. Oh well, still worth stopping here.

We stopped for a couple of nights at Greymouth, one of the biggest towns around - which isn't saying much. Over the last few days it's really struck me how sparsely populated NZ is. Only 4 million people in an area similar to the UK, so you can count the number of cities on the fingers of one hand, and you'd probably get towns too if you used toes. Huge stretches of beautiful country with nobody living in them. Well, I guess that's why they're still beautiful.

Speaking of beautiful, the brilliant sunsets went up a level here. The colours on our first evening were amazing.

Sadly no scenic backdrop...

 
Greymouth is the original home of one of NZ's three major brewers, Monteith's, and they have a fun little brewery tour. It's now one of three breweries Monteith's operates, but we were amazed how small the staff is - just 6 full-time people including the woman giving us the tour, regularly working 12-hour days. Apparently they love their job.

We took it easy the second day, with a short drive out to the beautiful lake at Brunner with a backdrop of mountains. We pretty much had the place to ourselves and Lilly went for a swim. The weird thing around here is the very brown rivers - must be some mineral - but fortunately the lake was blue. (The following day we'd see blue rivers - full of glacial particles, just like we saw in Canada last year - and gray ones running off the glaciers here.)

On the way back we stopped in a tiny place called Blackball, an old gold mining town - NZ had its own little gold rush - that switched to coal mining and should then have died. It persists, and in Formerly The Blackball Hilton it has one of our favourite pubs in NZ, oozing with character without feeling contrived. Felt a bit jealous of the people checking in for a night here.

Bully for Picton

The ferry between islands gets us up at the crack of dawn, but even on a grey day parts of the voyage have great views. At one point a whale was spotted. I could tell where it had been, but I can't honestly say I saw the whale.

Picton is an OK little seaside township but the weather ain't great. We booked to go on a winery tour in the afternoon and are sceptical when the driver promises us sunshine, but he's right. Just south of Picton is Marlborough wine country, a big flat valley full of vineyards. The mountains stop 90% of the clouds and it rarely rains. Bizarrely, the hills to one side are green but the 'dry hills' to the other are arid and yellow because they never see rain.

Only one of us really enjoyed the wine-tastings but we picked up some interesting wine facts along the way. Next time you drink a NZ sauvignon blanc, it probably came from here.

The evening is pretty disastrous. First we stick some laundry in the local laundromat but it closes 2 hours ahead of schedule with our clothes still in the washer. The advantage of a small town is that someone in the pub knows the owner and gives him a call for us. Then our dinner takes so long to arrive that we give up (having chased it 10 minutes earlier and being told it is "just being dished up") and Lilly insists that we storm out without paying for our drinks. The waitress seems fine with this, but it does leave us looking for dinner at 9pm in a sleepy township... Fortunately we sneak in somewhere else just before it closes.

On Saturday we follow an immensely twisty coast road, in torrential (or 'driving', hee hee) rain to Nelson, which is a bit bigger - Lilly's preferred type of small town with a few 'cool shops' and a 'decent vibe'* - and we have a bit of a stroll around town.

* Or, as she said, the sort of small town she would live in if she were going to live in a small town - which she definitely isn't!

In the afternoon we pop over to Founder's Brewery for a quick taster menu of their multi-award-winning organic beers (must admit that none of them really won any prizes with me but a nice little garden for a tipple). It's set in a strange little compound of historic buildings - bakery, church, firehouse etc - that have been relocated here for preservation or recreated here. We got in free by explaining we only wanted the brewery, but had a cheeky look round on the way out - it's quite fun.

Finally we hit the beach. At 5pm on a lovely, sunny Saturday afternoon there are fewer than 100 people on a long curve of sandy beach on the outskirts of Nelson. If I threw one of the many shells there is maybe one other person within range, if I picked a really aerodynamic shell and spent half an hour practicing. Lilly has just bought a new swimsuit but for some complex reason connecting with "changing" she has stolen my spare shorts and the T-shirt off my back to go for a swim. Six hours ago it was coming down in buckets, now it's buckets and spades weather. I might go for a dip too. See you later.

Postscript - thanks to the nice people who (unlike us) realised that the tide was coming in while we were swimming and saved our stuff from a bathe!

*re the title of this post - Think about it. Maybe say it out loud.

SWellington

Wellington is not having much of a summer, and it's been cloudy throughout our 36-hour stay. Despite that, it's a very likeable city - it feels like Auckland's more sophisticated little brother, with plenty of good bars and quirky shops.

And quirky museums, too

 Wellington is apparently the nation's capital when it comes to beer and live music (as well as being, um, its actual capital). We decided to put this to the test on a grey Wednesday evening. After happening upon an open mic night we headed for one of the few advertised gigs, at a long-established (but apparently recently renovated) spot called the Bodega which does host reasonably big-name acts at times. Wednesday was not one of those times and we saw about 20 people there all night.

The bill was, shall we say, eclectic. First up was a blues band, Charcoal White, and they were actually excellent - 9/10 and well worth a bigger crowd. They were followed by an accordion player doing covers of things like "Sweet Child O' Mine" and his own compositions such as "I'm Really Awesome". If I describe this as an 'only in NZ' experience I hope nobody will be offended - he was actually good fun (although 15 minutes would have been enough), and there was no crowd to turn on him. The headliners then produced enough noise to drive us out - but we finished the evening with an Irish band in an Irish pub.

We explored central Welly the next day - the gloomy weather and mizzle suggested it wasn't worth exploring the coast.  Easily the most high-rise spot we've seen, as Welly tucks in between hills and a bay so doesn't have Auckland's room to sprawl. The sun popped out very briefly as we took a tram up the hill and walked down through the botanical garden - Mums would have loved the flowers.  (Hint - don't get a return on the tram, by the time you've walked halfway down the hill to the roses and begonias, you won't want to walk back up.)  Also squeezed in a little shopping, as I carelessly left Lilly briefly unattended while I was distracted by the excellent bookshops here.

We also popped into the Museum of Wellington, which was celebrating its 10th birthday with a collection of curios from its collection, and spent a couple of hours in Te Papa, the museum of NZ (it's huge, and they're justifiably proud of it - it's very well presented and pleasingly interactive, from the colossal squid to the little computer games* - although the simulated earthquake is a little underwhelming).

They call this a 'colossal squid' for some reason

* We discovered that if Lilly was an alien colonising Earth, she would have barely survived because she didn't pack her chocolate bar tree; and if she was project managing a building in an earthquake zone she would have spent lots of money reinforcing everything but failed to insure anything. Although this latter game was sponsored by an insurance company it turned out reasonably well.

We rounded off the evening with dinner in Mac's Brewery*, an attractive red-brick building at the harbour, and a cinema trip to see A Serious Man** - would have liked to see more of the nightlife but we had an early start to get the ferry to the South Island.

* Probably my favourite NZ brewer, partly because of their attractive design sense and tongue-in-cheek descriptions, but mostly because of their good beer.
** Pleased to catch this as I just missed it on leaving the UK. Somewhat baffled by it though. At this point it would be an anticlimax for a Coen Bros film to actually have an ending.

Had a good time here all round - wish we had a bit longer.

Lilly's Highlights & Recommendations # 15 (North Island, New Zealand)

On the ferry to the South Island now (vineyard tour this afternoon!)
so it is time for a North Island update. This needs to cover a couple
of weeks so it will be a top 10 this time (vaguely categorised by
region).
1. Russell - a very small bayside town in the Bay of Islands. Has a
lovely strip of restaurants on the sea front from where you can watch
a beautiful sunset while eating lovely seafood. The sea view is broken
up by other small islands and the curve of the bay which makes it even
more beautiful. It is a much nicer village than the more touristy and
commercial Paihia on the other side of the bay (although this is where
the nightlife is). The trip to Paihia is also worth it for the walk to
Waitangi island, where the treaty that defined modern NZ was signed.
It is not that striking in itself but has important historical
significance and a really nice cafe!
Our hotel in Russell was also worth a mention. Russell Cottages is
(unsurprisingly) an avenue of self-catering cottages with attractive
wooden plank facades and modern decor inside. Ours came with a small
garden and there is a communal pool if you don't want to swim in the
sea. It felt very homey and there is a local supermarket so we enjoyed
a really good night in (with some excellent local wine, which I think
might have been called Omata Estates).
2. Gallery Cafe - an out of the way cafe on the road from Auckland to
Russell. A beautifully done external balcony with amazing valley and
sea views. We only had drinks but would be an amazing place for a
sunset dinner. Nice little souvenir shop too.
3. Waitomo gloworm caves - on the drive from Auckland to Roturua. The
cave itself is pretty good especially the large Cathedral area, but it
has two really special features.
The first is a large area of feeding gloworms where you can see 100s
of the mucus strands they use to feed hanging down. Sounds really
disgusting but the appearance is more like spider's webbing and it
looks pretty special.
The second and best feature is the boat ride you take through a
completely dark area of the cave which is filled with glowing
gloworms. The effect is like the most beautiful night sky. A definite
'wow' moment.
If you want to see a live kiwi you can also stop off at the Otorohanga
bird park on this drive.
4. Wai-o-Tapu Thermal Park - in the Rotorua region, which is basically
an active volcanic region this park has an amazing collection of
boiling mud pools and lakes, geysers, sinter terraces and all the
other trappings of geothermal activity. The most spectacular features
are all the different colours of the rocks and waters which range from
lime green to red as a result of all the sulphur and other minerals in
the area. It is totally unlike anything I'd seen before. The only
downside is the pervasive eggy sulphur smell which is everywhere
including the centre of the town where you will stumble across natural
boiling mineral pools everywhere - there was even one in our hotel (42
degrees and very smelly - quite a bathing experience!)
Rotorua town also has a decent museum and a cheap baseball batting
cage in the Government Gardens which was easier than expected.
5. The Zorb - there are a million outdoor activities in NZ, but
Rotorua and the Taupo area are particularly famous for them. The Zorb
(just outside Rotorua) was the first one we tried and involves getting
rolled down a hill in a giant inflatable ball. Lots of fun but don't
do it after lunch!
6. Skyline Luge - there is a cable car that takes you up Mount
Ngongotaha in Rotorua. You can enjoy the views but most people seem to
go in order to luge (basically a sledge with steering) back down
again. There are 3 different courses with different levels of
difficulty but you can get up a pretty decent speed on any of them
and there is little in the way of crash barriers so it can be scary
but it is loads of fun. A don't miss in Rotorua.
7. Lake Taupo - the biggest lake in NZ and a very nice spot for a swim
or to skydive over if you're mad!
8. Huka Falls Jet Boat - the Huka Falls are worth seeing whether from
a boat or not. Although not high the sheer amount and force of
(perfectly blue) water is very impressive (and sufficient to provide
power to the local area). The best way to enjoy it though is on a Huka
Falls jet boat which is basically a speed boat thrill ride which zooms
you around the waters doing various tricks and eventually takes you
right up to the bottom of the falls. Totally recommended.
9. Wellington - in my opinion a much nicer city than Auckland and my
favourite city in NZ so far. A fun, arty vibe (even the civic
buildings are cool) with great shopping, eating and drinking
especially on and around Cuba St. The sort of place to take in a gig
(we saw a blues band, novelty band and terrible band in the pretty
empty Bodega club) and a film (we saw 'A Serious Man' - strange, I
still don't really get it!) It also has an excellent museum (Te Papa)
- the only one in the world to feature a colossal squid which is
impressive and scary! Finally the rose garden and begonia house at the
Botanical Gardens (travel up via cable car) were stunning. As a whole
the City reminded me a bit of a small San Fransisco.
10. Mac's Beer - we drunk this all over the North Island and found the
brewery in Wellington (which has a really nice bar and restaurant near
Te Papa). I liked the Spring Tide lager. Paul is torn between the
Amber and the Sassy red. Doesn't really seem to give a hangover
either. I wonder how well it travels to the UK...
I feel I should also mention Napier, a small town which was completely
rebuilt after the 1931 earthquake in the Art Deco style. A lot of the
buildings remain and it feels a bit like wandering around in an
episode of Poirot. A good stop off.
The South Island has a lot to live up to now!

What Taupo fun activity

Great, adrenaline-fueled day in Taupo.

We drove down 75km or so from Rotorua. Taupo is also on the bank of a huge lake, with plenty of fun tourist activities, and still in thermal territory. I think it's nicer - Rotorua had the feel of a new town, with a small grid of shops and eateries, but it always felt pretty dead. Taupo seems a bit livelier, and its lake is a lovely clear blue with people swimming etc, whereas Rotorua's is grey and off-putting.

Two good reasons for moving on to here today: it's on the way to Napier, and it's maybe the skydiving capital of the world, with 3 operators, cheap prices, the best safety rates and beautiful scenic landscapes. It's also rare (they tell me) for jumps from 15,000 feet to be allowed as they are here - 12,000 is the norm for freefall.
I have wanted to do this for ages, though I knew Lilly wouldn't (she wouldn't fancy getting in the small planes, let alone out of them) and I was a bit surprised she wasn't freaked out by the thought of me skydiving when I suggested it. But she was very encouraging, so that was my main excuse out of the way.

The sky was heavily overcast when we set off and I was worried it would be called off. But gradually it cleared into probably the sunniest, hottest day we've had here, so that was excuse #2 gone and I'm committed. So I figured, I may only do this once - let's go for the 15,000.

 I wasn't really nervous - there's very little that can go wrong (well, one main thing) and this is a tandem skydive, so I'm firmly strapped to an experienced, well-motivated professional called Jon. But there is the odd nervy moment as the little plane climbs through the clouds and I look down at the beautiful view.

First of all we dropped 4 jumpers off at 12,000 feet. The door at the back of the plane rolls up and there's a bit of cold air gusting in. But I was too far away to see how scared they were. The door shuts and we head up to 15,000, me and another girl, our instructors and a video guy.

Jon gave me my instructions and reassured me by telling me how many thousands of jumps he had done and was in fact a month from retiring. This gave me a bit of a Lethal Weapon-style worry, but I decided a month was far enough that things wouldn't necessarily go wrong.

The most nervous moment was when the girl had gone and I was the last jumper and we shuffled up to the door. What if we fall out, I thought. Oh yeah, I realised, that's kind of the point. Jon is in charge of getting us out of the plane, I just have to relax.

We tumbled out and for a second I was facing up, but then we hit the more traditional skydiving position and I could stretch my arms out any enjoy it. I had a massive grin plastered on my face and couldn't get it off for all the air whistling past!

All too soon - after 45-60 seconds that felt a lot less - the chute opened and we seemed to jerk upwards. I actually found parachuting more nerve-wracking than freefall because you have a lot more time to think about what you're doing! But once the chute is open you're pretty much ok. I was able to take a turn at steering, which is pretty easy on a nice calm day like this, although a bit stomach-churning at times. And, finally, a nice smooth landing right on target. Very cool.

Lilly had obviously caught some adrenaline off me because she wanted to get on a boat. A very fast boat.

On the way to Taupo we'd stopped off at the Huka falls, a not-very-deep but extremely fast-flowing and violent drop. The water is a lovely clear blue, reminiscent of glacier run-off in the Rockies. And the Hukajet boat runs up and down the river below the falls, doing mad 360 spins and stunts. So we went back and took a 30-minute ride. It gets up some serious speed and the driver throws it at rocks, trees, and under construction bridges, dodging and spinning away at the last second. A pretty impressive display of driving - and a fairly wet one. Lilly managed to pick the prime seat for soaking. The river is lovely, too - it runs down to a dam where they filmed the flooding in LotR: The Two Towers.

Now we needed to find some cheap activities to balance this out! Doesn't come cheaper than a quick swim in Lake Taupo. Then we enjoyed a fairly scenic drive to Napier through rolling hills - it feels like proper Lord of the Rings territory now, albeit only the less impressive bits with bands of wandering hobbits and fellas on horses.

Finally, Napier - flattened by an earthquake and rebuilt in the 1930s in an art deco style that it retains to this day, nicely maintained. We had time for a stroll round the centre before dinner. A good way to wind down.

Just a typical building in art deco Napier