Heritage Gateway South Island

... too much now. I'll be happy for the rest, as I feel most of this holiday has been on the road. I wish to come back, don't get me wrong its amazing, need more time to see it all, but hopefully I'll spend 3 weeks in NZ to do both islands and do a self drive with more stops in between, oh and it needs to be in the summer! No offence, although spring is pretty, its a tad cold in comparison to Australia, and so I can't wait for 35C+ in Brisbane!


Night all..

... a fan. Hit the road at 11:15AM. Driving along to Ashburton I was struck how flat and boring the landscape really is. Its just that...flat and...boring. The Cantabury Plains are another part of the country that falls in the same catagory as Wellington & Christchurch, ones I dont like much. Feeling peckish by 12:30 so I stopped at a choice bakery just out of Ashburton and stocked up on Bread, Coke Zero & Water...all I need to survive! Not long after driving ...

... and believe and I don't want to lose that. Tonight I'm staying beyond the elephant rocks in another one horse town called Kurow, in a bunk room at the motor camp because its way to cold to camp. It's quite basic and I'll be happy to set off in the morning. There also seems to be a poker contest going on in the TV room so I'm hiding in my room, where its only a little warmer than outside, I'm wearing all my clothes and it's freezing!

... we decided to try and find this Rail Trail - an old railroad that they took out and replaced as a bike/walking path. If we had planned better I would have loved to rent bikes, but the ride took 5 days. So we got in the car tried to find it - to at least walk for a few hours. Along the way we got side tracked and went to an old damn. There was a truck there hidden behind some trees and we saw a guy at the bottom of the damn with a ...

... picks up a large bucket of water and drops it in areas where slides might occur. They allow traffic through for ten minutes on the hour and half hour. We just missed the window but the wait was short. I wondered what would happen if they actually triggered a slide which covered the highway-we would be stranded for days. We stopped quickly to view a restored gold mining site along the highway and then in Twizel, a real hick town we had lunch. Most ...

... inexorable. Un peu comme nos grosses montagnes de neige au mois de juillet ! La moraine (allez, a vos dictionnaires !) est immense, tout ca tassé par la force de la nature. Je rencontre au glacier Colin et Terry qui viennent d'Australie. Ils on tout vendu il y a trois ans et voyagent maintenant dans leur seul bien, un beau camper. Il me font penser au Rubber Tramp du film Into the wild. Ce sont des gens simple mais bien ...

... une petite roupillette de récupération. Une petite heure au beau soleil et avec des paysages super autour et hop, je reprends la route. Je vais jaser avec les guides de montagne. C'est vraiment pas une bonne idée de monter la haut. D'ailleurs, personne n'y monte ces temps-ci, il a de grosses crevasses dangereuses qui barrent la route. Y'a rien la, alors plan B, des petites marches dans le coin, si je suis assez en forme. La place fait un peu ...

... ins 2009 gestartet. Am 1. Januar haben wir bei "Black Cat" in Akaroa eine Tour gebucht, in der Hoffnung, mit frei lebenden Delphinen schimmen zu koennen. Schon nach kurzer Zeit sind einige Delphine um unser Boot geschwommen, als wir mit den Neopren-Anzuegen ins Meer gingen, sind diese leider sehr bald wieder verschwunden. Wir fuhren mit dem Boot ...

... hot & sunny day today, so after the 45 second walk around the town, we sat in the sun with a few cold ones. This is definitely a place you could lose a few days in. It is so chilled and quiet. We watched a film later in the afternoon before having our dinner outside on the lawn. Damn good to think it's probably wet and miserable in the UK. Also, saw our first Christmas decorations today. It's weird seeing Christmas decorations when the weather is so hot and beautiful.