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| Nelson |
10/5-We departed Blenheim on May 10th, after packing up the car and giving the house a quick wipe-down and vacuum. As I stated in my last blog, we had a basic idea of where we were going…for a couple days at least. We were set for Motueka, with a stop-over in Nelson so I could get some well-deserved Starbucks and we could stop at the i-site to get some info on Abel Tasman. Aside from NZ Starbucks not carrying the toffee-Nut flavoring, the Seattle-espresso-experience-in-a-cup was no less than fulfilling. The simple “double-tall-soy-latte with 1 ½ pumps of toffee nut (half vanilla/hazelnut) flavoring” was enough to make me feel like a human being again. Sean thanks Starbucks of Nelson, and the entire franchise for this breakthrough.
We arrived in Motueka and pulled into the backpackers of our choosing, the Happy Apple, chosen for the free SPA. Wooo hooo! It was a great backpackers, my favorite of the whole trip. Big, open, spacious kitchen, hotel quality room, clean shared facilities and a little t.v. with cable (I think they call it ‘Sky TV’)! Great outdoor cooking area, hammocks and the rest…awesome spa…that was drained due to immense recent rainfall. Shit. Aside from the broken spa, we saw a couple girls we knew from Blenheim who were working in a fruit sorting factory and a mussel factory and another couple guys I lived with in Blenheim whose car we saw but they were apparently working night shift so we didn’t catch a glimpse.
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| Sean's friends (are real pigs) |
We took a cool marsh/beach walk in the late afternoon, and made friends with some farm animals. Beautiful beach! Then hit a local fruit stand for a bag of pears for $2! Gosh I LOVE those farm stands, plus they work on the ‘honor system’, it’s nice to see some humans still trust each other!
We hit the local store for produce and made some curry…watched some T.V. and slept soundly in a comfy double bed (if I haven’t mentioned it before this, we had been sharing a single bed…on the floor….for nearly a month).
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| Moo |
11/5 We checked out of the Happy Apple around 10 am and headed to Tekaka. AWESOME drive, took around and hour and a half…if I remember correctly. Saw a few sheep (by a few, I mean hundreds), some deer, quite a few cows. As soon as we got into town, we stopped at the i-site again. At some point we nixed Abel Tasman tramping due to the rain. There are some cool multi-day hikes and stay-overs in cabins…but not so much fun in the rain. So, instead of a tramp into AT, we did the #3 “MUST-DO” of the region: Pu Pu Springs/Hydro station hike, 2 hours return. The nice weather we had didn’t hold out…well it did for a half the hike. The second half dumped rain on us…so we happy tramped in the rain, but didn’t stop for lunch. The springs were incredibly clear, and the path around the through the area was rad. Lots of bird-life. The hydro-contraption had been set up during the NZ ‘Gold Rush’ of sorts. There was water being funneled to a ‘water race’ (a ditch 2-3 feet wide, 1-2 feet in depth) that went to a pumphouse that shot the water down the hill a few hundred feet to the turbines and what-not. Pretty cool system.
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| Water Race |
We made our way back to the car, soaked to the underwears, and had our lunch. We cruised past a creepy old hotel backpackers…who had a spa…which was broken…and even in our tired and wet state, decided to move on to the next backpackers on the list. Kiwanas…they had a spa too….which was outside and only open from 6-9 pm or some silly thing. What it lacked in spa accessibility...it made up with a pushy owner. The place was great….but she wouldn’t even let us make our own fire! Little did she know of my girl scouting- Alaskan background….whatever, we just sat back and let her fiddle with the fire.
Unfortunately, this was the evening I introduced Sean to Rummy. We played every night until we got to Wanaka 4 days later, and I got sick of him beating me, made him throw the running score in the fire, and we haven’t picked up the cards since.
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| Reminds me of the view from Ragged Point, CA |
12/5 Our longest day of driving. I was still set on seeing the Farewell Spit (the longest sand spit in the world, said one source). We got half way to the spit and it was all clouds, so we headed back Motueka way to catch the highway to the west coast. But not before grabbing another bag of pears :). I got to drive a good portion, and didn’t do half bad…ya know for driving on the opposite side of the street on narrow mountain roads! It was one of our only beautiful sunny days full of farmland…and the west coast (which reminds me a bit of Big Sur). We stopped the ‘Pancake Rocks’, which were a slight let down…and got chowed on by sand flies.
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| Pancake Rocks |
We stayed in Greymouth that night, the largest, and most un-interesting town to us. The hostel was kinda cool…an old hotel/bar that was painted purple. We got a free beer and soup, plus got to hang with some interesting people so we called it a decent night!
13/5 The next day we decided to take it easy on ourselves….since the prior day had been an all-day trek…about 10 hours including stops and all the rest. So we took the short 2 hour-ish drive down to Franz-Josef glacier to spend the night and soak in the hot pools. If you haven’t caught my theme of trying to find a backpackers with a spa, or don’t know about my passion for natural British Columbian and Alaskan hot springs, or my near addiction to the Sycamore Hot Springs in Avila Beach, CA…I was hard up for hitting the ‘Glacier Hot Pools’.
We checked into the Glow Worm Cottages backpackers, our room was equipped with not one, but two heaters, neither of which worked. It was a pretty cool backpackers though, very chill and quiet; and, coincidentally the only one with a functioning spa. But I was determined to hit the hot pools, so we dropped the cash and it was SOOOO worth it, even the public pools. Three pools, 28, 29 and 30 degrees Celsius, outside with a removable cover (which was up due to the sprinkling rain) and hardly any people!
That night, we had buy-one-get-one drinks, plus a free ‘glow worm shot’ at the ‘Blue Ice Bar’…so we went out on the town. The first establishment in this damn country where I’ve been satisfied with the bartender’s pour. The hard alcohol in the mixed drinks here is usually poured with those damn clicking-off spouts. And, they aren’t allowed to flip the bottle and pour you a bit more (with a roll of their eyes) like we do back in the States. Oh, and their singles are only half a shot; to get a half-way decent drink, you need to order a double…and even that is hardly equal to a normal American single pour. But enough about the poor pouring quality…you’re all going to think I have a problem.
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| Franz Josef 'Glacier' |
So, drinks were good and the live (mostly cover) band was rad. Due to the cheap-drunk we achieved, it wasn’t long until Sean was swinging me around on the dance floor.
14/5 The tiniest glacier I’ve ever seen, came into view as we drove the 15 minutes from our backpackers, to the Franz-Josef glacier trailhead. But, as my South African boyfriend had never laid his eyes on a glacier, we tramped up 20 minutes to the viewing deck. Cute, little receded glacier, but fortunately, it has been expanding the last five or so years. I told Sean he needs to check out Glacier Bay, AK…or the LeConte glacier that’s just around the corner from Petersburg, AK. He was quite impressed that little ice burgs sometimes make their way down Wrangell Narrows, right in front of my house.
We departed Franz-Josef, and headed toward the Fox Glacier. Due to the disappointment of
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| Lake Matheson |
the last glacier, we opted to do a hike at Lake Matheson, per recommendation from a friend. Though we only did a short hike to the ‘jetty’, and didn’t actually see the famous reflection of Mt. Cook, the reflection of another mountain in the lake was quite impressive.
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| Our rock @ Bruce Bay |
Another really cool thing we did (while getting attacked by sandflies) was stop at Bruce Bay. People stop and create rock towers and such, and write their name and date or whatever inspires them. Some friends had told us about it, and the weather was ok, so we jumped out and Sean gathered some rocks. He decided we needed to build some rock-man like he’d seen in Whistler. Then it started sprinkling, and the sand flies found us…so we said screw it….and ran back to the car with one rock. We added our details, chose a cool place, set it in the rain, took a photo…and ran back to the car with the sandflies hot on our heels. I spent the next twenty minutes stamping out the flies that had snuck in the car through Sean’s cracked window.
Before heading through Haast Pass, to Wanaka, we stopped for some delicious (and expensive) Blue Cod and chips in Haast township.
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| Lake Hawea |
We’ve determined that the most beautiful part of the drive was through Haast Pass, by Lake Hawea and Lake Wanaka. So beautiful, we hardly took any photos (plus, I was driving and don’t feel comfortable pulling over…) We were in awe how the sheer cliffs and mountains shot up all around us, and watched as the greenery changed from the more tropical looking West Coast to the rugged more PNW inspired landscape and trees.
We finally pulled into Wanaka, our eventual stopping place for the winter. Currently, a quiet town, that goes off in both summer and winter. But over all a beautiful lake town, population around 5,000 ( I think). We checked into Wanaka Bakpaka and settled in for the evening. Arguably the most populated backpacker’s yet, and with the best view: on the hill over-looking the lake.
The next day we started our job hunt.
To be continued…
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