New Zealand Continued

So in my last post I was residing in the Mount Cook Township. I still count that as one of the highlights of my New Zealand journey, Beautiful alpine scenery with treks and hiking tracks into some of the most amazing glacial landscapes combined with snow capped mountains and more glaciers than I could count. I did indeed go kayaking on a glacial lake the next day, Lake Tasman at the base of the Tasman glacier. Here we paddled among leviathans of ice floating silently around the 250m deep lake. We even had the opportunity to handle some of the baby icebergs and roll them over, showing us how true it is that we can only see 10% of the ice above the waterline. The paddle was a really worthwhile experience and was topped off at the end with a glass of scotch whiskey with 500 year old ice from an iceberg!

Big Berg


mmm tasty


trying to knock over a berg


Lake Tasman


Yours truly enjoying a Glacial Whiskey


After my excursion paddling I was ready for more adventuring so off I wandered to the highest one day track i could find. The red tarns track led away from the village and up past the snow line into the strange mountain landscape. After this I had yet more energy so i headed for the Hooker Valley track to catch a glimpse of the Hooker glacier, hours of trekking overall but certainly worth it for the views and landscape

One of many swing bridges


Glacial river coloured grey from the powdered crushed rock


Red Tarns


Myself at the top of the red tarns track


Mt Cook village from the peak


So after all of my adventuring in the Mt cook region I decided to make tracks to my next destination Wanaka, Before i left Mt Cook YHA however I got talking to Michael Carmody an Irish doc on his travels through NZ like me, we caught up in Wanaka the next day and booked ourselves in for a skydive, An incredible experience!! Being thrown out of a plane at 12000 feet Then freefalling at 200kmph! Your body freaks out for a second or two convinced you are going to die but once you level out and start lookin around the spectacular views and incredible feeling of speed make you forget about the rapidly approaching ground! after freefalling for around 60 seconds your divemaster pulls the ripcord and the parachute deploys. This results obviously in massive decelleration and almost silence as opposed to the wind screaming past your face. With still a few thousand feet to descend my divemaster pointed out the places of interest below us, from lake Wanaka to Mt Cook and everything in between. I would definitely reccomend it to anyone who gets the opportunity to go skydiving!

Kitted out and ready to jump


The Turboprop we were thrown out of!


So after our skydive we spent a good few hours wandering around Puzzling World which was actually very entertaining with perception bending rooms and a great maze which looked easy to start with... after that Michael and I parted ways and i headed for queenstown for my birthday weekend. Without realising the timing I arrived in Queenstown to find it was also easter weekend so the town was packed to capacity, I booked into a large budget hostel which although well furnished and central was full of drunk teenagers and made me feel very old! however i did have fun for my birthday and met a group of irish lads in the bar below the hostel. The rest of the weekend was rather uneventful and after relaxing for a day or two I hopped into the car and made tracks for Fox glacier township. On the way i stopped in a very remote hostel near the town of Haast, properly in the middle of nowhere it was a little gem along the coast and one thing that sticks out is the silence at night and the brightest stars i have ever seen at night. From here the next morning i drove on and reached Fox glacier.

Mountain roads


Sandstorm in Haast valley


Jimbos backpackers in the true middle of nowhere


Johnstons pass beach


sunset at the end of the world


Here I ran into Tanya from Canada whom I had met previously in queenstown, so together with her friend Kristina we ventured throughout the area, seeing a very nice forest trek to lake Matheson and from there we drove to the Fox glacier itself,

Glacier face with cavern from the glacial river


Fox glacier


Again


One of many stream crossings


Mirror lake


From Fox glacier I drove to Franz Joseph glacier which was another small township but with a nice hostel and some homely bars, here I got talking to a great barman called Jason, he hunts deer in the area and showed me some of the mounted heads which he had shot cleaned and preserved himself. Anyone who is into their hunting and shooting would Love the mountain towns on the southern alps, Deer are plentiful and range from big Red Deer to Elk and Chamois. Some gamekeepers who have large ranges to cover for seasonal culling also offer a seat in their helicopter to hunt with large bore semiautomatic rifles, yes they genuinely shoot running deer while in persuit in a flying chopper! Sadly my budget and time constrictions meant i wasnt able to partake this time although I am assured that there is a lot of work in australia culling kangaroos on the big farms so I will definitely look into that!

So from Franz Joseph township i drove along the western coast to the northern point of the south island stopping in a few towns for the night as i made my way along the wild weathered coast. Most memorable of these stops were Greymouth, Westport, Nelson and Kaikoura.

Good Local Brew


Bex the retriever in Noahs ark backpackers lodge


Noahs ark


Hotrod in greymouth town




After Greymouth Westport was a much smaller quieter town yet it still had its charm



Seal colony


Can you see the face?


pancake rocks





After Westport i made my way to Nelson, a nice quiet town with some quaint old buildings and nice people. The next morning i drove on towards christchurch and while passing through Blenheim i picked up a hitchhiker called Barnaud from Belgium, however due to his small beardy appearance and accent the kiwis had christened him Baggins, so baggins it was then, we drove on along the coast and talked about our travels, once we got to Kaikoura we stopped to do some fishing and decided to find somewhere to camp for the night considering i hadnt gone camping in quite some time and the coast is full of empty beaches and forests. So away from the town we drove and found a perfect spot in the bush on the beach with large stone circles from previous campers. We ate like kings on beans and sausages even topping it off with shake n' bake pancakes! after some food we headed up the beach where we met some austrian guys and a kiwi called dave, good craic was had and baggins even provided the music with harmonica. Considering this was one of my last days in New Zealand it was a great way to just chill out and take in the surroundings with the sea crashing on the rocky beach behind us and the giant fire burning the wood we gathered from the beach and surrounding trees.

the campsite


Baggins at the fire in the morning




Diy cutlery


I really like this photo


And so after leaving Kaikoura I inevitably had to make my way into Christchurch.
Its a very sad place to go at the moment with grey tired suburbs covered in dirt from the liquefaction and random buildings boarded up with red posters telling of their danger, timber supports hold up failing walls, and every so often a fallen building lies in a pile of rubble blocked off by temporary fencing. This becomes more common and numerous as you move towards the city centre until eventually the streets are blocked by military vehicles and barricades. The entire city centre is in ruins with buildings in various states of collapse or boarded up and scheduled to be destroyed, there is no business any more, no people in suits getting coffee or shoppers returning with their bags, there is just a few bored tourists standing at the barricades taking sad photographs of destroyed lives and concrete, even the pretty river running through the city covered in weeping willows is tainted by the destroyed sewerage systems pouring into it. Hopeful posters speak of regeneration and development but i think it will be a very long time before this city returns to what it looks like it used to be, I have only seen this destroyed quiet place but its buildings and surroundings suggest a well developed city with a buzzing centre. see for yourselves...

The weeping willows over the tainted river





An abandoned highrise


One of many destroyed streets


The street blockades


A totally destroyed building with the elevator shaft exposed


The Centre of the city








What used to be a church


So thats a glimpse of the city as it stands today, there is so much destruction that they will be rebuilding for years to come, that is relying on the hope that no further earthquakes will strike, rendering the city centre a permenant disaster zone. With the possibility that it may cave in to an underground cavern were it to be hit by another 7.0 or higher shake!
After my day in Christchurch I returned my trusty ol corolla and headed to the airport, I am now writing this from the Railway central YHA and it is very late so i think i should get some sleep. I leave you with one final photograph of the sun rising over Christchurch as my flight rose above the clouds, Thats all for now

Talk Cha!

Australia and New Zealand

View from the roof deck of YHA Sydney


Restored galleon planning to circumnavigate the globe


Sydney Operahouse


Harbour Bridge


Darling Harbour


Time has passed me by so quickly i barely realised how long it has been since i last updated this blog, much has happened since i wrote from kuala lumpur on my last day in malaysia. From Kuala Lumpur airport i flew directly to Sydney starting my day at 5am only to arrive in Sydney at 6.30pm the time difference played havoc with my body clock so i spent the first day or so in a haze of fatigue. Sydney city itself is a very busy, modern, and clean city, i didn't like it at first, i suppose because i missed Asia. but over the week i began to warm to it. On my first day i just walked for hours, through the bustling city centre down to darling harbor, across the harbor bridge and took in the views and skyline of the city. The harbour area is very well developed with public parks and pedestrian areas providing a beautiful area to walk and take in the city without traffic or fumes tainting the views. Staying in the city was quite nice too as after my first night in a dive of a hostel i moved to the Sydney Central YHA (youth hostel association) The biggest hostel in Australia and a massive shock to me, having become accustomed to small friendly hostels, this place run by a large international association was more like a giant hotel, with a swimming pool on the roof and even a small cinema provided for the 8 floors of dormitories! there were nice people alright but the large scale made it hard to feel at home with so many people coming and going.

After arriving in the hostel i established contact with Trish O'Callaghan, Having gone to school in Rockwell back in the day it was good to meet up with someone familiar who was on the same route. The following day we booked into the Blue mountains tour and spent the day on a bus being driven by a rather loquacious tour guide. First stop was the Featherdale wildlife park. Here we found a great population of animals starting with 10-15 wallabies and kangaroos wandering freely around the koala enclosures. Birds of all varieties ranging from eagles, owls and hawks, to pelicans and even penguins. along with all kinds of marsupials, rodents, and even a Crocodile!



Tazmanian Devil


Roo!


Koala


I think this is a member of the kookaburra family?


From here we drove to the blue mountains Sceinic centre. Some amazing views and forest treks awaited so i immediately headed for the forest trail and wandered into the waterfall dotted landscape. the most famous landmark at the blue mountains are the Three sisters, three rock pillars which in Aboriginal legend were formed by a protective father defending his daughters from attacking rival tribesmen. although I myself think it was probably freeze thaw erosion. I spent a good few hours trekking around the mountainside and returned to the centre via the worlds steepest railway climbing the hill at a 52 degree incline!! After here we returned to Sydney city via some picturesque small towns and had a nice quiet evening in the hostel before venturing out the next day to investigate the Sydney operahouse.

Sunset over sydney harbor


Travelling up at 52 degrees


Forest Track


Waterfall


The Three Sisters


So after only a week in sydney i decided to hit the skies once more and head to the land of the Kiwi. Partially because Trish was continuing to new zealand, but also because i realised it may in fact be my last port of call before i settle down in australia for the forseeable future. So onto the internet i went and booked a cheap flight into christchurch. Upon arrival at 1am i realised how devastated the city really is, without even having to leave the airport. people were sleeping on the floor everywhere, all of the rental agencies i rang were closed or shut down, and the girl at the information desk gave me a map and told me to just cut the centre out of the map as it was "not there anymore" So off i walked to the far corner of the arrivals lobby and set my place on the floor along with most of the people from my flight, i befriended Ludwig from berlin who was on the same kind of journey as myself and we talked about our plans for new zealand and got a taxi into the city limits that morning. During the taxi trip we could really see the devastation with fallen or demolished buildings everywhere and almost every major brick or concrete structure had support struts holding up the fractured and warped walls. Thankfully we experienced no earthquakes and by 9am i had rented a good ol Toyota corolla manual and was on the road to Queenstown. The drive was amazing, with breathtaking scenery around every corner, friendly locals in the service stations and a feeling of home brought on by the eerie similarity of the landscape and farmlands to Ireland
at times i thought i was driving through the farms of tipperary, and then 50kms later i could have sworn i was driving through the ring of kerry with mountains surrounding me covered in sheep and gorse. However this soon changed as i arrived near lake Tepako which rivals lough derg in size but is Bright Blue! due to the glacial waters filling it. surrounding this are the alpine mountains that peak at mount Cook, NZ's tallest peak covered in snow and Glaciers.
From here i continued to Queenstown, picking up some interesting backpacking hitchikers on the way, Arriving in queenstown i deposited my travelling mates and found my hostel, the lakefront hostel YHA, possibly the most sceinic and serene place i have stayed since Lao Liang in Thailand.

My Trusty ol Corrolla


Queenstown


Middle of nowhere


Lake Tepako




Queenstown is a beautiful place and the people are all very friendly and accomodating
I chilled out here for a few days and even splashed out on getting a shave and a haircut! I met up with trish once more and we planned our route further south,
Departing queenstown i followed trish and her roomate george in their car down to Te-anau, a tiny town on the southwest coast famed for being the gateway to Doubtful sound and the glacial Fjords. We stayed the night in Possum lodge motel which basically consisted of some small timber huts with bunk beds and a separate kitchen shack, the next morning Trish departed on her cruise to the doubtful sound while i rented a small rowing boat with two french girls from our dorm and the 3 of us rowed up the river to a trek point on the far bank. From here we trekked for over 4 hours up to the famed viewpoint through eerie fog filled forest, beautiful and silent forests remeniscent of the scenery from lord of the rings.

An amazing deer skull plus antlers we found on the track


Sitting at the peak where the forest is literally hanging off the cliff


The track through the forest


Our rowboat to the track


Fishing boat going up the channel


After our day in Te-Anau we travelled the famous southern scienic route along the south coast stopping in a quiet town called Invercargill for one night then continuing the next day, stopping in Bluff however for a photo with the signpost at the end of the world. From here we continued through the forests and coastal towns to the southern capitol of Dunedin which is actually the scottish for Edinborough.
here we booked into a really nice homely hostel called penny's and stayed the night here, the next day we began with a tour of the Cadbury factory which sadly was a bit of a let down considering it was a saturday there was no production going on so we were not allowed into the manufacturing sector. we did however see a tonne of liquid chocolate fall through a waterfall and some other interesting attractions. After this we headed out to the Otago peninsula where we visited New Zealands only castle Larnach castle, although being built in 1872 it seems like more of a stately home. Every so often i saw odd comparisons with the house at home Raheen. Matching black and white fireplaces, or floortiles in the same pattern as hallways at home, even furniture brought from england that is similar to many things at home. All the same it was nice to see and is very well maintained. From here we continued to the apex of the peninsula where we found the royal Alabatross reserve, the worlds only albatross nesting site on mainland populated by humans. sadly we didnt see any albatross in flight but i was expecting this as they are famously elusive and rare.
That evening we hit the road once more and made it as far as Oamaru, a small one street town where we settled into the red kettle hostel and had a well deserved rest
The next day was a cross country drive to Mount Cook (Aoraki) the tallest peak in new zealand and that is where i currently reside relaxing beside the fire with a full moon outside and snow capped mountains draped in glaciers surrounding this small settlement made of little more than a few houses, the Heritage hotel and the Edmond Hillary alpine centre which is a museum dedicated to Hillary and the mountain climbers who have lived and trained here for expeditions to the antartic and everest.
Tomorrow i am going kayaking on a glacial lake at the base of the tasman glacier famed for being dotted with icebergs and stunning views, I will update with photographs once i return tomorrow evening. As always i will leave you with a selection of photographs from the last few days of hectic travel, and from here on i think i will be taking a more relaxed approach to things. that is until i book my skydiving adventure...

Talk Cha!!


180 million year old fossilised trees


The end of the world!


Larnoch Castle


Crunchy mountain in the cadbury factory


Signpost at the end of the world


Glaciers


Mt Cook


Hillary Centre


Avalanche Alert


Signposts to everywhere