So it’s been a while since I’ve updated but I swear I’ve had good reasons! My most recent reason being my adventures in New Zealand!
Last week was “Spring Break”! Although they don’t do that here, so they just call it semester break or study vacation. I made plans to go to New Zealand on a tour of the south island with a company called Extreme Adventures. So on Thursday September 22nd my roommate and I got on a plane to Christchurch and our adventures began.
We arrived in Christchurch around 1am. We happened to be on the same plane as some of our friends from uni so we went through customs with them. We were hoping to get through quickly and head to our hostel to get some sleep but we weren’t so lucky. One of our girls forgot that she was carrying apples in her backpack. They found them and she was automatically fined $400. It sucked. After figuring out when the fine needed to be paid by and officially throwing out the apples we hopped on a shuttle to our hostel, Point Break. It took us a whole hour to get there and I don’t think we officially checked in until almost 3am. We had to get up early the next morning but I was still wired from the flight and too excited for the adventures to start, so I don’t think I slept much.
Day 1
7am came fast, so I packed up my stuff and headed down to the café for some breakfast and to meet all of my tour-mates. Everyone was crowded into the café waiting in line for breakfast. People were friendly, and introducing themselves. As I got to the front of the line I found my first surprise of the day, bananas for only $1! I was so excited. So I ordered a toasty, smoothie, and a banana. Breakfast of champions! Then I went to find Adhi. Then came surprise number two for the morning, Adhi was sitting next to David, a guy we know from uni in Sydney. I knew that David was going to NZ for break but hadn’t known he would be on our tour. It was nice to add one more familiar face to the group though.
In total there were 34 of us. As we piled on to the bus we learned that there were 28 girls, 3 guys, 1 tour guide, and 1 bus driver. As we began our first day of adventures our tour guide, Chappy, started the introductions. Most of our group was originally from the U.S., two of the guys were German, and several of the girls were from Mexico. Our bus driver, Clinton, was the only Kiwi (New Zealander) and Chappy we learned was originally from Oz. We had an entire day on the bus ahead of us, so off we went.
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| Our tour bus for the week |
On our way out of Christchurch I was looking forward to seeing the city. Because we came in so late the night before, we didn’t get to see anything until the morning. The city is clearly still devastated. The roads are horrible and there are construction cones everywhere and yet no reconstruction is going on. They are still experiencing aftershock quakes that have made re-building very difficult. The entire CBD (central business district, what we would call downtown) is still shut down, you can’t even drive through it. It’s very sad, it reminds me of many of the places I’ve been to on mission trips. Maybe I’ll go back someday on a service trip.
A few hours later we stopped in the mountains at Arthur’s Pass. It was a perfect stop for some photos and to learn a little about the Southern Alps. The Southern Alps run North and South, almost the entire length of the island. There are only 3 places you can cross them. Arthur’s Pass is one of them. I also learned that Captain Cook named them and that Mount. Cook is the highest peak of the whole range. Yay for name related trivia!
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| Arthur's Pass with Adhi, Dana, and Eileen |
Later we stopped in Hokitika for lunch. Adhi and I ate burgers with two girls from the tour and then ran errands around town. I went to the grocery store and bought a few things that I had forgotten. Then we headed to the beach to hang out before we had to hop back onto the bus. It was freezing but I still took my shoes off and ran to the water.
After a long day on the bus we finally arrived in the tiny town of Fox Glacier. We checked into our hostel, made some dinner, and headed out to the pub to watch the Wallabies crush the U.S. in the Rugby World Cup. After all that I was exhausted and so I headed to bed early.
Day 2
Saturday was another early morning. We checked in at Fox Glacier Guiding at 8am. After getting all suited up with waterproof pants and jackets, socks, boots, gloves and hats we loaded onto the bus and drove out to Fox Glacier. The weather was crappy, cold and raining, but we were all excited for the hike anyway, plus all the spiffy new gear helped keep us warm.
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| Yay we made it to the terminal face of Fox Glacier! |
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| Hanging out in an ice cave |
The hike was amazing! The views were so cool and we learned lots of cool stuff about the glacier itself. Fox Glacier is one of only three glaciers that start in the mountains and end in the rainforest. This is only possible because it rains 200 days out of the year. This means that at the top of the glacier there is a steady supply of snow that gets compressed into ice. Even still though the glacier is now receding due to global warming.
As some of you may know I sprained my patellar tendon a few weeks ago and so my knee was killing me after this hike! Anyway, we had all worked up an appetite so we walked to a nearby pub and ate lunch before hopping back on the bus to head to Wanaka for the night.
Five hours later we arrived in Wanaka and checked in at Base. We had 8 share bedrooms at Base, which is the most we ever had to stuff into one room. It was fun though. After settling in at the Hostel we explored town a little bit before the sun went down. Some of us ventured to the lake while others sat and got a drink. Then we all headed back to the hostel for a bbq and to watch the All Blacks (New Zealand) play France. It was a lot of fun but again I was exhausted and so I went to sleep early. Don’t worry though, there were plenty of nights that I was out late. I wasn’t a loser the whole time.
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| Lake Wanaka |
Day 3
The next morning we got to sleep in. Wanaka is a very quiet town. There isn’t much to do and so we walked out of town a ways to Puzzling World to entertain ourselves. A big group of us went and it was actually really fun. We started out by doing a maze! Emily, Adhi, and I walked the maze together and were the first group to get through! We didn’t quite beat our tour guide though, but he had done it before so he doesn’t count. After the maze we explored the museum a little bit more. It was full of optical illusions and puzzles.
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| Hanging around at Puzzling World |
After Puzzling World we walked back into town and hung out at the lakefront and went to a café for breakfast. Then we piled back onto the bus and headed out to Queenstown. After 2 hours on the bus we arrived in Queenstown, the adventure capital of New Zealand!
In Queenstown we checked in at Reaver’s Lodge and figured out our room assignments for the next few days. We all had four shares and I was lucky enough to room with Eileen, Abby, and Kristyn. They’re a fun group. After settling in we decided to head down the mountain and explore town a little bit. We stepped out of the hostel and to our surprise it was snowing! Just flurries, but still really truly snowing. It made me miss fall/winter at home. I love the smell of snow.
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| The amazing view from Reaver's |
We went into town and got some lunch and some souvenirs. Later we had pizza for dinner at World Bar. Then some teapots! They were not normal teapots full of tea, they were full of mixed drinks. It was fun. We shared a few between a group of us so that we could taste multiple flavors. After World Bar, we went to a bar called Altitude. It was crazy for a Sunday night. The bar was packed and we ended up staying there until almost 3am. After Altitude we went to Fergburger. Fergburger is the best burger in NZ! We were there until probably 4am. Then we hiked back up the mountain, the steepest freaking hill ever, to Reaver’s. My knee was killing me all week from dancing and hiking up this stupid hill. All in all it was a great first night in Queenstown.
There's more to come so stay posted!
