South Island Adventure: North, West and East

The part of the night when we were attacked by a Moose

The part of the night when
we where attacked by a bear

A never-ending happy hour, a bucking bronco controlled by an unhinged barman and some surprisingly talented open-mike performers were the highlights of an enjoyable evening in Queenstown, South Island’s tourist capital (I was there too - Dora).

View over Queenstown 

In the morning Simon and I (Roger) ran up towards the top of the Queenstown Gondola to clear our heads...

...before we grabbed some pastries and dived into some hot pools overlooking the nearby hills and power boat-ridden river (thanks to Greg and Becky for the voucher than funded this!). Onsen Hot Pools, for any future visitors. Beautifully set up with fancy changing rooms and showers (Dora). 

After a pleasant lunch in Arrowtown we drove north over the Crown Range, with further awe-inspiring views over the Southern Alps delaying our trip to Wanaka as we regularly stopped to add to our photo hoard.

The road to Rob Roy

Arriving in Wanaka, we shot out west towards Mt Aspiring, fording several streams in our aqua van then donning trail shoes to run to the Rob Roy glacier.  

The path wound its way up a narrow river gorge with rushing water below us and the glacier looming bluey-white ahead. 

Mt Aspiring from the clearing

We emerged from the trees onto rocks and into the shadow of Mt Aspiring, clouds and blue sky rolling through, and had the clearing to ourselves! 

Every now and then the creak and groan of the glacier was followed by a crash and a new snow waterfall cascading down the rock. 

As we ran back we saw peeks of golden mountainsides through the trees, running faster and faster down the trail and emerging into sunlight streaming down the river valley. An exhilarating moment.

We picked up supplies then camped on the bank of Lake Wanaka. We allowed ourselves to watch 20 minutes of Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers as a reward for overcoming a potentially lazy day.

Morning swim in Lake Wanaka

The next morning our climber van conquered the Haast Pass to cross the Southern Alps. The town of Haast itself had little – aside from a coffee shop, a bin, and a loo – to distract us from our continued glacier hunt.

"Will this be Franz Josef Glacier in 2100?" (or now?!)

The Fox Glacier was the next major stop, followed by the Franz Josef. The latter in particular was incredible, but a shadow of its former self. Indeed, it more closely resembled projections of ‘what the Franz Josef Glacier could look like in 2100’ than pictures of ‘what the Franz Josef Glacier looked like in 2010’. The information boards were also pretty much silent on the cause of all these glacial retreats…

Morning swim/wash in Lake Ianthe

Nevertheless, the next morning we jumped into our CO₂-belching van and continued north up the coast. We’d stayed the night on the shore of Lake Ianthe, waking for a morning swim before driving to Hokitika.

Hokitika (or, as Simon pronounced it, "Hokitikiraka") is the setting of the Luminaries, the Booker-award-winning novel by Eleanor Catton. A twisting, turning tale of opium, intrigue and gold - found, lost, banked, stolen and sewn into the lining of dresses - I (Dora) enjoyed peering down old-looking streets with names from the book and imagining the characters there. The characterisation in the book is particularly good - if you haven't read it you must!

The next best thing after the self-guided Luminaries walking tour (wouldn't stand a chance in Wellington!)

After downloading some more tunes onto our road playlist, our musical van darted east into Arthur’s Pass to escape some inclement weather that was making the West Coast a Wet Coast for the next few days. Avalanche Peak, Lake Pearson, the Waipara wine region and Banks Peninsula awaited.