Wednesday, April 29, 2015

April 8-Arthur's Pass Again

We've got another workstay booked on a farm in Fairlie, which is Canterbury, east side of the alps near Christchurch. So we left the rainy west coast in a downpour, and of course it cleared up as soon as we get to the dry side. It is noticably colder after leaving the west, the west coast is in some kind of microclimate and tends to be warmer than elsewhere.

We were in Arthur's Pass in December, but didn't go all the way through to the west coast. Back in December it was busy, I remember driving past Klondyke corner campground and it was full- this time of year there's only a few cars, so we pulled in to camp since it's just off the main road.
There were 3 resident Kea's here that love to play- you're not supposed to feed them, but they're a very smart parrot and you can give them things to play with. I put a tent peg in the ground and they took turns trying to pull it out.

March 28-April 7: The West Coast

From Wanaka, we took Haast pass, the southernmost pass through the Alps to the West Coast.
The West is like Fiordland, it gets hit with a lot of rain, and the Alps create a wall that prevents a lot of that rain from getting to the east side. Its amazing how quick everything changes when you cross the pass- when we left Wanaka it was sunny and dry, the hills were covered with yellow grass and tussock, and the beech and other hardwoods leaves starting to change color because its fall... then half an hour of driving and we're surrounded by lush green ferns, palm trees, dank mossy forest and its pouring rain!
The luck we had with the the rain in Fiordland didn't hold up for the West Coast- we spent close to 2 weeks there and it poured almost every day.
The west is cool because you're so close to the mountains, standing on the beach among the palm/fern trees you can see Mt. Cook from the west side. But of course with all the rain and clouds we only got a couple glimpses of the alps and couldn't get those picture perfect photos you see on postcards.
For most tourists, the West Coast is only about seeing the pancake rocks and the 2 glaciers and then rushing through to Queenstown. But if you can stand the rain, there's quite a bit more to see. We went all the way to Karamea, which is way off the beaten path, we were by ourselves there!

Highlights for us were Motukiekie beach, with its starfish colonies and endless fields of green-lipped mussels.
Hokitika is a nice town to visit, it happens to be the jade capital of NZ. There are several jewelery shops selling the stuff, and every 10 feet on the town sidewalks is a tile made of jade.
The over-hyped pancake rocks were ok, but I thought the nearby Pororari river walk was better with its palm tree jungle and limestone cliffs.
I caught another rig shark, so more beer-battered shark for lunch!
Charming Creek was a cool walk between the rails of an old coal-mining operation, and Karamea's limestone arches were nice.
But it was nice to cross the alps at Arthur's Pass to the dry side again!

March 24-27: Wanaka

Wanaka is like a calmed-down Queenstown- same kind of scenery, a large glacial lake surrounded by dry mountains. Way less of the commercial tourism.
The Rob Roy Glacier track was amazing, although a long, slow gravel road to get there.
Rocky Mountain was a solid climb, but a hell of a view- apparently Shania Twain's ranch is in that picture somewhere.
The campsite on Lake Hawea was one of those amazing holiday parks with a million dollar view, and we were able to park right on the water. We had a quick swim in the lake, but its starting to cool off this time of year, its not summer anymore!

March 21-23: Glenorchy

This place is west of Queenstown, on the drier side of the mountains from Fiordland.
The Routeburn Track starts in Fiordland and ends in Glenorchy.
A lot of LOTR and Hobbit filmed here, it was the location for Isenguard.
We did a walk up the Dart river, and lake Sylvan was nice- we saw our first Red-Crowned Parakeet.

March 12-15: The Milford Track

The Milford Track is a 4 day, 3 night hike- walking about 6 hours each day, and staying in huts (cabins) each night. It's one of NZ's 9 official "Great Walks".
There's thousands of hikes/tramps of all levels of difficulty throughout the country, but the government chose nine "great" walks to represent a 3-4 day hike that best represents the region in which they are found. Because they are heavily promoted by NZ tourism, they are all more popular than regular hikes around the country, and the Milford is the most popular of them all.
The Milford Track has a lot of history behind it, it was cut in the late 1800's to be a route to Milford Sound, since before the Homer Tunnel was finished in the 1960's, there were no roads to the sound.
Someone once dubbed it "the greatest walk in the world" in an article, and so over the years the tourist demand has evolved it into the most popular and strictly regulated great walk.
Every day during the open season, 40 independant and 40 guided walkers are allowed to start the track, and it's likely fully booked for every day of the open season- we had to book 6 months in advance.
Now, I have heard a lot of complaints from some writers that the track is overrated and takes too much planning and expense, as there are alternative great walks in the same region that arent as strictly regulated.
I'll admit, It is a lot of planning, you need a ferry to reach the start of the track, and a ferry at the end to take you to shore, then a bus back to your car- and it is expensive.
Plus, planning six months ahead means the weather is totally up to chance.
However, all that said, having made the effort to get there, it is totally worth it and one of the highlights of our trip, if not the best scenery we've seen in New Zealand.
Starting out on the emerald-clear Clinton river, the track follows through 2 u-shaped, steep-walled glacial valleys with waterfalls streaming down in every direction, over the steep 1154 meter Mackinnon pass, passes NZ's highest waterfall, and ends at Milford Sound. Some unbelievable views, and the scale of the place is huge, plus this entire area is unaccessable from Milford road, and there's plentiful wildlife.

Our weather for the trip could not have been better, it only rained once on our second day during morning when we were passing through beech forest. When we came out into the open valley, it cleared up- yet the rain had turned on the waterfalls, 90% of which dry up without rain.
The rest of the trip was mostly clear, so views were not affected by clouds. It would be  dissapointing to come all this way and have those mountain-top views obscured by clouds.

Sutherland falls is impressive to see, at 580 meters it's NZ's highest, and I believe is in the world's top 15 highest.
We had such a nice sunny day on the 3rd day that a quick dip in the waterfall pool was an option- a fall that big creates enough spray that I was soaked just setting foot in the pool.

At the end of the track we were exhausted, since we're not used to carrying big hiking packs with 4 days food in them.
We got some good camera shots, but unfortunately pictures just can't capture the scale of the place when standing in those valleys, or on Mackinnon pass- everyone will just have to do this walk for themselves!

Thursday, April 23, 2015

March 9-21: Fiordland

Fiordland is the best of the best as far as NZ scenery goes. There's a lot of beautiful places throughout the country, but this place has it all- lush beech rainforest covers the steep hills and valleys, with snow-capped mountains in the background, plus countless waterfalls, rivers, lakes and fiords.
Fiordland national park is the rainiest part of the country, the rainy season runs from january to december- they get up to 8 meters of rain per year, and they say more than 200 days per year of rain. Hence the lush layer of vegetation covering everything, plus the excessive number of waterfalls.
Most people's experience in the region is pouring rain every day. But by some miracle, we managed to catch the region in a couple of ultra-rare dry weeks. We were in Fiordland for two weeks, and only saw 2 or 3 days worth of light rain.

Fiordland is a massive national park, and its a very wild place, most of it inaccessible to anyone without a helicopter. There's only one road in, the road to Milford Sound- which passes through the Homer Tunnel, which cuts through a mountain.
Just the drive alone is breathtaking- the scenery gets better and better the closer you draw to Milford sound.

We did a hike to Key Summit, which is a viewpoint that's a side-option on the Routeburn Track. Some great views up there of lake Marion, a glacial lake suspended high up between two mountains. We later did a hike right up to the shore of the lake- it was cool to see it up close, we looked for the outflow and couldn't find any, then found a little gurgling whirlpool where the lake must drain through the rocks!

The Gertrude saddle was a great hike, we found one of the most photogenic waterfall pools there.
The Milford Track was of course magnificent, kind of the best of the best of Fiordland- more on that later.

Gunn's Historical Hollyford Camp was a great place to stay, had a real cabin-in-the-woods feel with their wood-fired hot showers and no electricity except when the generator's on.
We did an overnight trip on the Hollyford track, just a taste of the longer 4 day one-way track, but its an amazing place and a beautiful river.
The only downside to all that wild scenery is that being such a wild place, sandflies are bad, and there's lots of mice. Campsites were a little rough, and of course every decent walk or hike means ascending 300-400 meters. By the end of our 2 weeks we were exhausted and took a couple days off to rest!

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

March 4-8: Queenstown

I can't count how many times we were told by people around NZ that we'd love Queenstown- it's probably the most prominent tourist center in the south island. For many, its their favorite part of the country, for some I think its the only place they visit. Queenstown reminds us of any ski resort village in Canada, but with more Gucci stores and just thriving with tourists. The local airport brings in jetloads of fresh tourists daily, and all the young travelers flock to Queenstown to work and party, live in overcrowded super-hostels, jump out of planes, bungy, jetboat, etc.
Queenstown is in a beautiful setting on lake Wakatipu with the Remarkables mountain range as the backdrop, but this town is all about commercial tourism.
To be honest, although we loved the areas surrounding, we just aren't big fans of QT. We are in NZ for a long time and have to stretch out our funds, plus we're just not into the manufactured adventure-tainment- theres always a pricetag, and you can easily drop thousands in a couple days. We were more than happy to do our usual hikes into scenic viewpoints and explore, and of course every 30 mins we'd hear screams from the sky above, and a few seconds later 3 parachutes would open up. You can always hear the jetboats in the river valleys, and any campsite near town is always heaving with people.
We did find a campsite off the beaten path that was just beautiful, Moke Lake. Not a long way from town, but a long gravel road to get in. It was set between the hills and the lake was swimmably warm.
We did the walk up Queenstown hill for an awesome view. The Bendigo gold ruins were very cool, it looked like the wild west,very dry and dusty hills, with ruins of entire towns. There's so much in Bendigo you could spend days there if you were inerested in the history.