Ten Days of Road Tripping Goodness

Welcome to the Autumn Break Tour!

We will be taking a brief day-by-day journey through our wonderful perimeter trip of the South Island from April 13th to the 27th. Hop in the back seat and join Anjali, Liz, Thimo and I! Here goes...

The sun was setting as we left late on Thursday night. We stayed at the Pine Grove Motel, a quaint backpacker just south of the Copland Track.

Introducing: the Caldina - our beauty of a station wagon that facilitated our long trip around the island.

Friday morning we started the right way, with BEANS ON TOAST! Oh yeah, looks good. We needed lots of energy for the eight hour hike ahead of us.

Here we are at the western start to the Copland Track. Most people start from the west, because beginning on the Mt Cook Villiage side means taking the Copland Pass, a very dangerous area prone to avalanche and nasty blizzards. We were not sure whether or not this was a "welcome" sign.

Early on in the trip Thimo and I found this lovely, soft moss hanging from the canopy - fascinating!

I stand in the middle of the path on one of the few flats, the mountains in the distance which we would hike along. Notice my bag and its thrown-together-ness. The day pack proved difficult on this hike...

Oh, and there was MUD! In this photo, a mud monster ate Liz's feet and refused to return her shoes, so we had to dig them out of a metre of mud! Delish.

There were small waterfalls like this one emerging from the hillsides all over the place, oftentimes flowing onto the trail, or even becoming the trail. That is, sometimes streambeds were the easiest feature to create the track on.

There are many swing bridges along the Copland Track, some of which are only necessary to use during times of heavy precipitation. We didn't need those ones.

The Copland River is a constant feature along the track - not surprisingly. Just like other rivers in these areas, the heavy mineral content in the water makes it sparklingly blue. After following it for 8.5 hours, we arrived, ate dinner, and hit the hot pools! One of the most attractive features of the Welcome Hut, the one most people stay at, is its natural hot springs. We just had to be careful not to put our heads under the water, to avoid an amoeba that carries menningitis. We had a great night's sleep and returned the next morning.

Lake Matheson is very close to Fox Glacier Villiage, where we stayed on Saturday night. Reflected behind Thimo and I is the shy Mt. Cook, hiding in the clouds. They say you have to get up pretty early to see Aoraki clearly. We look really good, though, which sort of makes up for it.

We decided to take a walk around Lake Matheson to see the view, one of the most spectacular in Westland National Park.

Here we all are, Liz, Thimo, Dan and Anjali, our happy foursome, next to Lake Matheson.

Sunday was a major day of driving, and our first destination on our way north was the Pancake Rocks. They are a very famous and unique formation, and look like layers of rock stacked on top of one another.

Every trip needs a tree-hugging picture, so Thimo and I gave this palm some love.

Here we see the pancake rocks looking over the Tasman Sea, out toward Australia.

Thimo and I get a cameo with the rocks.

Cruising consumed most of our Sunday, as we got back into the car and headed north to spend the night at a slightly decrepit campsite in Motueka.

We had intended to hop right into the kayaks and into Abel Tasman National Park on Monday, but inclement weather and dangerous winds made us change our plans a bit. Not a problem! We drove around and saw some other things. Anjali is standing on Golden Bay beach.

Wainui Waterfall, at the northernmost reaches of Abel Tasman National Park, was incredible. Even though it was pouring down rain, we decided to take the 45 minute hike into the forest to see its magnificence. There I am chillin at the bottom. We stayed in Marahau that night, at a really great backpacker.

Tuesday proved an amazing day for kayaking, so we went to Abel Tasman Sea Kayakers and got all outfitted and introduced to the ins and outs. After an invigorating and tiring day 12 km of paddling we ended up in Mosquito Bay that evening, with the canoe-in only campsite all to ourselves - well, us and the possums. They are everywhere. We got to watch the sun set, the moon rise, and the sun rise. The picture shows the sun setting. It was absolutely gorgeous.

Just so you can see, we really looked like pros! Anjali and I were pretty hardcore, yeah. The water was like glass on Wednesday.

Mosquito Bay was the first campsite within the Tonga Island Marine Reserve, and so we decided to head north in the morning to see the wildlife at the island. These seals were chilling and playing on a northwest inlet, and put on quite the show for us!

Wednesday evening we stayed at Paradiso Backpackers in Nelson, the ClubMed of them all, where we relaxed with beers on hammocks, soaked in the hot tub, and sizzled for a bit in the sauna. So good. The roses were smelling very nice on Thursday morning in Nelson, where we decided to walk around for a little while.

We checked out the Nelson Cathedral, built on top of a Maori sacred site. It was a lovely church, however, spotted with cool native trees, which attracted a few pretty insects and birds.

After lunch we headed south through Marlborough, the site of these eerily bare rolling hills. This is wine country, and there are grapes and wineries all over the place! We made a short stop in Picton, one of the first places European settlers came to the South Island and streched out legs.

There was much more driving to be done. Anjali and Liz mostly chilled in the backseat, seen relaxing here. We passed right through Kaikoura, a main whale- and dolphin-watching city, and decided (stupidly) that we had enough petrol to get us to the next gas station.

Unfortunately for us, all of the small cities on our way from Kaikoura to Christchurch had closed around 6 or 7pm, and so we found ourselves without. The gas light was shining red for 120 km, as I put the car in neutral to coast down hills, and followed close behind other cars in the hopes that they could siphon us some petrol if we ran out. But, alas, we found a petrol station just before that happened, and a sigh of relief (especially from silent Anjali) occured in wild unison.

We made it to Christchurch safely, got into our backpacker, and got some dinner and drinks with Hailey and Libby, who had decided (after I gave them of copy of our itinerary) that they would stay in the same place.

I woke up Friday morning with a large, fluid-filled sac on top of my right foot, which felt like acid was being dropped on it. Not cool. So, I got to spend my morning at the Emergency Medical Service, who told me that I had a nasty infected sandfly bite, likely from the untreated hottub in Nelson. I knew it smelled funny in that tub. I got some antibiotics and we headed out on our way.

Banks Peninsula was our first Friday destination, and we made a stop at Onawe Pa before going to the quaint French town of Akaroa. A "pa" is a Maori fortified villiage, and this one is very special to the local "iwi" or tribe. In this picture I am wondering how long it took to cut down all the trees.

Thimo ponders things deeply theological, and what he will have for lunch.

Friday night we ended up in Oamaru, with hopes of seeing Little (Blue) Penguins and Yellow-eyed Penguins, for both nest just south of the city centre. We got in a little late to see a lot of penguins, but we did get to see a few of the cuddly guys - they just don't show up well in photos!

Here are two members of a larger species of penguin we saw. Sort of ugly. Later these penguins and their two friends ate pizza.
After spending the night in Oamaru and having a lovely homemade breakfast across the street from the Holiday Park. Our only legitimate stop on the way back to Dunedin on the cloudy Saturday was the Moeraki Boulders. There I am, paying my respects to the amazing, round boulders, which are slowly formed in the ground and birthed out of the beach wall.

Here we are, back to Dunedin, looking down on the "thriving metropolis." What a great trip! But we were actually pretty happy and ready to be home! Yes, we now call Dunedin, New Zealand home. It was hard parting with our dear Cladina, but we brought ourselves to do it, and nobody cried.

That is all! A ten day autumn break well spent.