Lana and Adam go Travelling

So here is a little bit about our time in NZ....

We picked up our “camper van” in Christcurch, as you can see below it is designed to look “cool”. Not sure if i agree but it just about did the job. The camper van had a mattress and a sink, plus a gas cooker which were the bare essentials, but thats about it!

We decided to head out of the city as most of Christchurch centre has sadly been destroyed due to the earthquake. First, we headed to Lake Tekapo which has really great views of mount cook (NZ tallest mountain) and the lake itself was actually a turquoise colour due to the clear glacier ice melting.

Lake Tekapo

We then headed down the coast to the ‘Otago Peninsula’ region and stopped off at Sandfly Bay, we saw some sea lions having a nap plus plenty of wildlife, it was amazing but the waves and wind were so wild we were getting regularly whipped in the face by sand! We didnt let that deter us and actually caught a brief glimpse of a rare a yellow eyed penguin in the water.

Moeraki boulders

Sandfly Bay - where we saw the sea lions!

After that we went for a drive down the very south of the island which was pretty quiet with nice coastline, we also ended up giving a hitchiker a lift which adam wasnt very happy about but luckily we survived. Seeing as she was 4ft 10 i suspected we may be ok :)

A seal that popped up only a few metres from us

Then we went over to fjordland and stayed on the fjord Milford Sound overnight cruise. It must be one of the most beautiful places in the world. At night a seal was fishing under the boat so we managed to watch him from only a metre or two away which was amazing and we didn’t tell anyone for a while so that we could have him for ourselves!

Milford Sound

After the cruise we spent a couple of days in Queenstown, which has beautiful views of lakes and mountains. We rode the gondola to the mountain peak and then braved the luge at the top where adam nearly fell off the edge! It has lots of nice restaurants and cafes, which made the fact that we were having baked beans for dinner even more painful.

Queenstown

Adam needed a bigger backpack for all his stuff :)

Next up on our trip were the glaciers, first to Fox’s glacier (no not the mint) and then to Franz Josef. We walked to about 100 metres from the bottom, as you got closer you can feel the air getting colder, even though it was a warm day.

Franz Josef glacier

Next was the Mariua springs which are natural springs pools and they smelled like egg. It also had black algea in it which is apparently good for you, but looked like black bogies! After some wine tasting we then jumped on a ferry to the North Island.

Our next stop was Rotorua as didnt have much time in the north. It was easter weekend so everyone was travelling for easter aswell. This is when it started raining. The whole city smells eggy as is an active We went to a living maori village, where they use the natural hot springs and vents to provide heating, cook, bathe...pretty much everything! We also saw a geyser shooting 20 metres into the air.

Sweetcorn cooked in a the springs!

After that decided to investigate the waitomo caves which we heard were spectacular. We explored them while blackwater rafting which means floating through the river in an inner tube and meant we got to jump off mini waterfalls. Apart from frozen feet and a cold bum it was amazing, the caves were huge and dotted with thousands of glowworms..at one point we all turned off our headlamps and just floated along.