Hi everyone. My apologies for the lack of updates but last week was pretty crazy to be fair. Thankfully, I made it through my two exams and the illness has been conquered (well, I'm out of penicillin and feeling pretty good). Because of the busy schedule, there hasn't been a whole lot that has happened recently other than some good old fashioned Dunedin town fun. So, just to get the update ball rolling, here's a few pics from our trip to Abel Tasman National Park which, as you would've read from the previous post, happened during the mid-semester break. Here goes...
Just before getting to Thunder Creek Falls (pic from previous post), we crossed this bridge that was named the "Gates of Haast." We passed many cool bridges on our trip but this probably is the most picturesque of them all.
Speaking of Thunder Creek Falls, here I am posing in front of the loud waterfall.
After emerging from the inland portion of our drive, we hit the West Coast of New Zealand. This pic comes from a lookout (the name escapes me right now) that we stopped by on the way. Essentially, the drive up the West Coast was this beautiful the whole way up. Not too many towns or people on the drive up at all. Just plain lovely.
After a full day of driving (and with the gas light flashing it's warning message), we stopped off at the Fox Glacier to have a look. The trail to the glacier warned that you shouldn't stop for the next 200m. Since we're really good at following instructions, we stopped to take this picture. Ryan looks in horror as boulders come crashing down the mountainside...
This is what we walked all the way to see: the Fox Glacier in all its twilight majesty. Not the best of pictures, but this is as close as we got. We decided it was plenty close since we were tired, hungry and darn ready to find our accomodations for the night.
We were intending on setting up camp near the town of Fox Glacier but we basically drove through it before we knew what was going on. We continued on to the Franz Josef Glacier town (luckily there was a petrol station there) and that, sadly, wasn't much bigger. We had hoped to have a nice sit down dinner but the only thing that was open at 7pm on a Sunday was the local supermarket (which was gonna close in a 1/2 hr). We bought our measly dinner from the grocery store and headed out to find a camp site to plant down for. It was pitch black and we luckily found the Department of Conservation camp that was just off the side of the road. We downed dinner in record time after promptly setting up the tents in anticipation of an early night.
We spent about a half hour trying to make a fire but we couldn't get it to stay lit for very long since we couldn't find really good, large, dry wood pieces. This is as successful as we could get it. After warming up a bit and letting dinner digest, we tucked away for the night in anticipation of a long journey in the daylight.
Unbeknownst to us (since it was pitch black at night and we could only see as far as our little flashlights), our camp site was right next to a gorgeous lake.
This is what we were sleeping next to all night long. BEAUTIFUL! Hands down one of the most memorable images of the trip so far. Still, pristine lake complete with fog and reflections of snow capped mountains. How did we miss this?!?!
Here we are pausing for the group picture, complete with morning hair. Ryan, Me, Ben, Stuart & Jon. We skipped rocks on the lake, broke down the tents and then were off on our way.
We passed many bridges on our travels including "Doughboy Creek" and other funnily named crossings. All I have to say about this pic is that Ryan is in the process of acquiring a little souvenir. For fear of legal repercussions, that's all I'll say.
More scenic driving was to be done in the morning as we continued our journey up the West Coast. Here I am above the fierce ocean at the Strongman Lookout. Such an awesome sight...
Next stop along the way was the Punakaiki Pancake Rocks. It's hard to see the layering of the rock formations (sorry for the tiny picture size) but that's why the rocks got their pancake name.
It's maybe a little easier to see the layering in this picture, particularly on the left hand side. Here's another view at one of the many lookouts.
We lunched at another supermarket in the town of Westport before we finally had to bid farewell to the West Coast. After lunch, we journeyed inland through more foresty, rocky and hilly regions on our way towards the Abel Tasman region. We reached Motueka, the town most close to the Abel Tasman trail head, a couple hours before sundown. Unfortunately, that meant that we were also too late to get our campsite permits from the Department of Conservation. We had to camp out once more and delay our start of the trail one more day. Motueka was much larger than Franz Josef (thankfully!) and there were actually several choices of accomodation and dinner. We tried being smart by getting a campsite for only 3 people since everywhere we went charged far more than we were willing to pay for. Unfortunately, the owner saw us all despite our best stealthy efforts. We setup camp for 3 of us and Stuart & I decided we'd sleep in our cars in the DoC parking lot. After the lodging fiasco, we went out for dinner at an Indian restaurant called Maharaja. The food was delicious but, as many of you have probably experienced, the spicy food played havoc with our digestive tract. We all took full advantage of the restaurant's restroom facilities before buying our food stocks for the hike. We then played a bit of pool in a sports bar before getting kicked out of there just before 11 pm. It was then bedtime for us all before our long day of hiking.
After a good night's rest, we stopped by the DoC to get our permits and then headed to the trail head. We were finally ready to begin the Abel Tasman Track!
Here's a view back towards the start of the trail after we had been on it for a while. If you look at that sandy bit, we hiked across most of that and up the foresty hill to the point at which I took this picture.
Another one of the lookouts we encountered was Stu's Lookout. Sorry Stuart, but I think this was definitely one of the weaker views that we saw all day...
Here's one of the many bays typical of the Abel Tasman Track. Lush forest, beautiful sand and gentle ocean. Mother Nature impresses yet again!
After the initial sandy bit and the hill climb, the trail weaved from overlooking these beautiful bays inland towards these peaceful streams. This particular stream had a lovely waterfall nestled within plenty of greenery.
A detour off the main trail led us to the Yellow Point lookout. Here, you could see the ocean spread out in front of you (from behind some trees that is). Off to one side, there was an outstretched rock that offered a view of some fiesty birds. Looks like there was quite a bit of competition for the coveted branch!
We hit a peak along our inland trek where we were afforded this beautiful view of the ground we'd have to cover in the near future. From this point, we hiked downhill to reach Anchorage beach on the right. After a little photo session and beach frolic, the trail continued through the forest before reaching the Torrent Bay Tidal crossing just visible on the left hand side.
The tidal crossing was our last main challenge before finally reaching our campsite for the night. A mixture of sand, mud and freezing cold water made for a rather painful barefoot walk which covered probably near 800m. Those little dots on the left center are Ben, Jon and Stuart.
We reached the Torrent Bay Campsite where we setup shop for the night. Since we arrived early (around 2 pm), we had a lot of time to kill. We had knocked off a good 11+ km in just over 3 hrs of hiking and lunch never tasted so good. My illness was really kicking in by now so I opted for an afternoon nap while the other guys went off to explore the Torrent Bay Township (really just a collection of about 4-5 little houses). They returned from their uninteresting exploration and split up for more afternoon fun. Stuart & Ryan went for an afternoon run while Ben & Jon hiked up to Cleopatra's Pool. I stayed put at camp and napped to my heart's content.
After Stuart & Ryan came back from their run, I felt well enough to have a little dip in the ocean. Here we are just before hopping into the freezing cold sea. This was, as it turns out, Stuart's first time in the ocean and one of those cool "guy bonding experiences." None of us spent too much time in the cold water but it was great and refreshing...in that shocking, bone-chilling cold sort of way.
The next day, I unfortunately had to say goodbye to these guys who I had spent the last several days with. As much fun as the Abel Tasman had been, I definitely was not well enough to keep going for the rest of the way (they were on the trail for 2 more days). I also had to zip back to Dunedin in order to make it back for my flight up to Auckland! I waited 3 hours on the beach for the Aqua Taxi to swing by and give me a lift back to the town where I had left my car before starting my arduous drive back to D-town. This time, I got to enjoy the wonderful views of the East Coast. After making it into Nelson just after midday, I took a break for lunch at McDonalds. Wondrous...well, it was food and I was hungry and in a hurry. From Nelson, I drove non-stop to Christchurch where I arrived just before 7 pm. There was lots of great coastal and hilly, inland scenery along the way but I was too sick and too motivated to keep driving to lose any time to photo taking. Sorry guys... Chch was a welcome break from hours of driving and I stopped for dinner (went back to Dux de Lux for salad & pumpkin soup), a well deserved nap, more petrol (managed to fill up my tank with $1.47 per Liter gas even though the attendent was in the middle of changing the price to $1.51) and a V (energy drink...I wouldn't have made it back alive without it). At 1 am, after having to drive slowly the whole way down because of THICK fog, I made it back to Dunedin. After a long, hot shower and an hour of packing, it was bedtime before the flight home. Just for the record, that was almost 13 hours on the road between Marahau (where I had my car parked) and Dunedin (with a handful of pitstops along the way). What a looooong day!
Thanks a bunch to Cat & Adriel for the ride to the airport! When I got there, I learned that all domestic flights had been delayed because of the HEAVY fog that blanketed all the major airports. That gave me time to read through most of a rugby magazine and a car magazine before boarding my flight. To continue my tradition of taking pictures on flights, I present you with the above. It took me a little less than an hour in the plane to cover what took me 13 hrs in the car yesterday. It's a bit hard to see but the view above is of Abel Tasman National Park. You can see the sandy bit near the middle is where Marahau and the trail head are. Upon closer observation, you can see the islands that were seen a few pics above! I can't believe those guys got amazing weather after I leave! Oh well, it was beautiful either way and I'm glad I went.
Auckland was incredibly interesting considering the fever didn't go away until I went to see the doctor for some penicillin. I did manage to spend some quality time with the family and I did make it to my cousin Nat's birthday party. Thanks a bunch to my family whose loving care and generous helpings of food probably played a huge part in my recovery. I love you all!
And there you have it folks! My break in a (rather large) nutshell. Sorry I don't have more pics but I'll try to steal a few more from Stuart and Ryan. All in all, a great time and I only wish I could've been at two places at once: Abel Tasman with the fellas & Auckland with the family. Anyhow, I have a couple more pics from the past week but those will come in a future update that will cover both this week and last week. Stuart bought a (American) football so look out for pics of us trying to control our College Football withdrawals. We'll also be barbequing this weekend so hopefully that'll be good times all around (weather permitting). This Saturday is also Election Day! Yay! I'll try to document that as well as I cast my first ever vote in a New Zealand election. Excitement!!! On that note, peace be with all of you and I shall catch you guys later. Take care and stay healthy!!!
Just to update you all. I'm still around and I'm alive (last I checked). I had an awesome break that included seeing the All Blacks narrowly beat the Springboks, a trip up to the Abel Tasman National Park (via the West Coast) and a trip up to Auckland to visit the family. I'm also sick and I have two exams coming up. So, this is just a short little hello to stay in touch with everyone. Take care and keep an eye out for a real, much more substantial update with plenty of pics. In the meantime, enjoy these pics:
Look at all of us rabid All Black Fans cheering on our team. Not the best of pictures but it's the only one with all of us in it: Stu, Jen, Lily, Cat, Ryan and Myself.
The South Africans have never won in Dunedin at Carisbrook and this night wasn't to be their lucky night. They got mighty close at the end but the All Blacks fought to the very end and after heaps of pressure on the tiring Bok defense, they got through and scored the game winning try! Good on the AB's!
After the game, Lily ran off with Stuart's All Blacks hat and we just decided not to run after her. She never came back and we ate dessert at Tull. They have an amazing reputation for awesome desserts and they did not disappoint. By desserts: the Gateaux, Brownie and the Bananarama (or something like that).
A closer look at my gateaux. It had thick, fudgy chocolate layers on top of chocolate mousse layers for a nice alternating taste. You get both richness and sweetness in the same bite without being overwhelmed! Amazing!!!
Thunder Falls was 5 min off the road on the way to Haast on the West Coast. The drive up the West Coast was nothing short of breathtaking and a thoroughly scenic way to see NZ.
Finally, here's a look at a beach in the Abel Tasman National Park. This is a beautiful coastal hike that passes through some really pretty looking areas. I only wish the weather were nicer while I was there.
More pics to come when I survive this week. Wish me luck and I hope to be in touch with you all when the time allows it. Cheers!
*edit* More pics added from Stuart's camera (of Long Beach & Sandfly Bay). Also, best of luck to all you USC Trojans out there. Enjoy the start of another school year!
Howdy folks. Another exciting update from the deep, deep south. The title refers mainly to the fact that this weekend was supposed to be pretty low key in comparison to last week (Mesopotamia, etc.) and next week (mid-semester break). While we did stay in the Otago region, this weekend was anything but low key...
Things got off to an awesome start with Goldenhorse coming to Dunedin to play a show at the Regent Theater. The show was damn cool and a nice contrast to when I saw them in LA. The LA gig was in a small bar and most people probably had no idea who they were. Here in NZ, where they are quite well known, the Regent was full of fans and people danced in the aisles through half the show. Here's a quick pic from the concert (L->R: Geoff, Ben C, Kirsten - Vince is behind her, and Ben K). The band were very cool and I had the privelege of popping backstage and catching up with them after the show. They play their last show of this tour in Queenstown tonight before heading back to Europe to do some shows in Scotland & England. Best of luck to them as they embark on yet another long journey!
Saturday was quite an active day but, unfortunately, I left my camera at home (which means I'll post some more pics when I get them). I headed out to explore some of the outskirts of Dunedin with Stuart & Ryan. First stop of the day was Long Beach. We came here because Ryan's flatmates recommended it.
They told us we could see a giant cave with large chambers. It doesn't really look all that big in this picture, but trust me...it's quite cavernous.
Inside, there were a couple of smaller caves within the larger cave. It was pitch black in this cave and here are Ryan & Stuart showing the camera some love. That clenched fist is merely a sign of affection.
The sides of this smaller cave had a bit of a low ceiling so Ryan & I had to crouch a bit to fit into this pic.
Here we are, standing in the large central cave chamber. In the blackness behind us is that smaller cave chamber. In front of us, the cave hangs over for another 20 m or so and remnants of a bonfire could be seen.
To give you all better perspective, this is us standing at the entrance of the cave. You can see how massively large the cave mouth is. Ryan had to mess the photo up by playing with his sunglasses. Denver, Carolina, Local Motion?! I also realized that I'm the only one not wearing my university sweatshirt. The next time we head out, I'll have to make sure I wear that USC sweatshirt of mine...
Inspired by a group of rock climbers we saw, Ryan and I decided to have a go while Stuart decided to document our feeble attempts.
After a nice lunch break at Port Chalmers, we drove around the Harbour to the Peninsula (polishing off a box of eclairs along the way). After finding out that we would have to pay to go to Larnach Castle, we decided to check out Lover's Leap.
After a long trek and some encounters with sheep, we made it to the lookout. This is the beautiful view that greeted us and we were reminded how awesome NZ is.
Looking down towards the rocks & ocean below, it's quite clear that this leap for lovers would be quite fatal.
We then went to Sandfly Bay/Seal Point to view some sea lions & blue penguins. Here, we see one of the many (well, 5 total) sea lions we saw napping on the beach. What a peaceful sleeper...
The penguins are easily frightened by the sight of a human being so in order to view the penguins, we had to hike over and around a hill before getting to a wooden bunker structure known as a "penguin hide." From within, we gazed and gazed for a few minutes before finally spotting these blue backed penguins climbing up a slope. [The pic is quite blurry because it has been cropped from a much larger image. The penguins were far away and none of us had a camera with a large enough zoom lens to get a better pic]
On the way back to the car, a couple of the sea lions woke up and had a bit of a chat with each other. It provided us with a nice opportunity for an action shot. Oddly enough, after about 2 minutes of wiggling their heads at each other, they returned to their napping.
After that little adventure, we headed home for a bit before making our way to Carisbrook to watch Otago play Auckland in Round 2 of the National Provincial Championship (NPC). Otago were in it for most of the match despite trailing but Auckland's classy backline prevailed in the end. Either way, I was just happy that North Harbour ("my team") beat Wellington while I was enjoying Goldenhorse the night before. Next week will be great because I'll be on hand to see the All Blacks play South Africa at the 'brook.
Sunday was spent on a nice drive down to the Catlins area. This region, just under 2 hours south of Dunedin, features many nice beaches and foresty locations to visit. We began the journey by leaving Dunedin on the "Southern Scenic Drive" as depicted above.
We left before 9 am (pretty early for a weekend in my books) and caught some breathtaking views, like the picture above, of the sun as it began its journey across the eastern coast of the South Island.
Next stop on the drive was Kaka Point. This little township lies just within the Catlins region and along the coast (one of the many bays/beaches we visited today). Cat, Jen & myself were the participants in today's activities.
Here's a pic of the Kaka Point beach which had a fair number of rocky areas (as you can see). In the crevices of these rocks, you could find many shellfish (looked like mussels to me) holding onto the rocks for dear life.
A short drive from Kaka Point took us directly to Nugget Point. This reminded me quite a bit of Makapu'u, probably because there's a lighthouse here too.
The lighthouse overlooks the islets (very dangerous for ships at sea) below and the name Nugget comes from the resemblance of the rock stacks to gold nuggets (shapewise).
Here's a better picture of just the "nuggets" which are, as Jen pointed out, arranged in a 9 sort of pattern.
Me, Cat & Jen posing at the lighthouse lookout. We were quite happy that the sun was starting to peek out from the clouds which, up to that point, had been obscuring it.
Next stop on the drive was Roaring Bay, named because of the winds & surf which cause the bay to be very noisy. We had hoped to see elephant seals and penguins but none were visible (even though we took a look from the penguin hide). It was a nice walk though and by this time, the sun was out in full force.
As you all have probably heard, sheep are everywhere in New Zealand. This picture just serves to back up that statement.
After seeing lots of ocean, we mixed things up by checking out the Tunnel Hill walk. This short 10 min hike leads you to an abandoned train tunnel built to help transport logs from the Catlin region up to Dunedin for use. This is the entrance to the tunnel. As the picture suggests, it was really dark inside.
None of us brought flashlights so I had to use the 2 bright, white LED lights on my mobile phone (they usually serve as the camera flash) to light our way. They worked very well and I was disappointed that I didn't think to use them yesterday in the Long Beach cave. Here's a picture looking back at the entrance from about 1/3 of the way into the tunnel.
This is the end of the tunnel, which leads out to a foresty area. The tunnel is about 246 m long and, if not for the light from my phone, would've been pretty scary walking through.
In the middle of the tunnel, there were little places you could duck into.
We ate lunch at the Lumberjack Cafe in the town of Owaka, which is situated deep in the Catlins region.
Turned out to be a good choice for a place to eat. They even had a nice little fireplace to keep the patrons warm.
I had a tasty salami & capsicum quiche accompanied by a light salad. Very yummy indeed!
Lunch was a great break and we were very satisfied before continuing our drive to Purakaunui forest. Only in NZ can you go from coastal beaches, to rolling hills to lush rainforests in the span of minutes!
Possibly the highlight of the trip was the above: Purakaunui Falls. Falling water is such an amazingly relaxing sound.
The three of us in front of the beautiful falls.
Not content with getting a picture from the lookout area, I ventured past the barriers to get a pic closer to the action.
Cat also did so and decided to take a moment out of her hectic schedule to practice her yoga & meditation.
Our last stop of the day was Cannibal Bay (hey, what a rhyme!). Cannibal Bay's name comes from the fact that they found human remains here way back in the day. According to our guide book, it's probably more likely that "the poor chap" was killed in a battle rather than eaten by cannibals. Whatever the case, it makes for a cool name.
I walked off to one side while Cat & Jen ventured off in the opposite direction. This pic looks back at the shore and, if you look carefully, you can see Cat (dot on the left) and Jen (dot on the right).
On my side of the bay, the rocks were interestingly shaped. You can see in the pic above that the rocks have an odd, "track-like" shape to them. Very likely man made, but for what purpose I'm not sure.
After rejoining Cat & Jen, I took this picture to get a view of that left side of the bay that I had been on.
Last but not least, I have this picture of a little ladybug on the Cannibal Bay beach. Very random and very cool indeed.
All in all, another fun weekend in New Zealand. I really can't complain too much about being here. Even classes are pretty cool! Well, other than the fact that I have class at 8 am most days of the week and I have a class scheduled for Friday afternoon! Anyways, I'm really, really excited about this coming weekend and what might happen during the mid-semester holiday. I've got a week to do whatever I can fit in and that should be pretty darn cool. Preliminary plans are a trip to the Fiordlands for a few days before jetting up to Auckland to visit family for a bit. Keep checking out the blog and you'll be kept up to date with the latest happenings (as soon as I can get an internet connection to let you all know what's been going on). Take care everyone, until next time...
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