South island part 4: Southern Lakes, Fiordland

made it through the "Gates of Haast" to arrive at the top of Lake Wanaka, marking the arrival to the great Southern Lakes District.
a night in an unfortunately cloudy Wanaka meant no scenic shots, off to Queenstown via Cromwell

wine tasting in the Gibbston Valley, great stuff!, this is at Peregrine
another vineyard, Internationally acclaimed Gibbston Valley winery. With a boutique cheesery on premises! nice.
they age the wine here in a cave in the mountain!
Arrowtown, another goldminers town, but this one is a totally functioning town with schools and everything. but they've kept the main street totally old school. choice!

Queenstown! NZ's number one ski resort town. I always get the tingles when I'm here! even though the ski fields closed the day we arrived, enjoy that springtime slush guys.if you've never been here, boo for you. Its my favorite place on the whole island. this is the lakefront, which the town is built around.
here's some work i did in the Queenstown Hell pizza store.

up the top of the lake from Queenstown, is an almost town called Glenorchy, another dead end. Its near Saurumans house. we were hit with a mad snowstorm whilst enjoying lunch on the lake and had to do the bolt!
we went the whole way round Wakatipu, and were rewarded with same amazing views! this is from a secluded little pebble beach. Skimming stones country

at the end of the lake was a tiny town called Kingston, home of the historic Kingston Flier train that starred in the Crunchy Bar commercials.
what a soft target. Too soft! maybe i'm getting old, but there ain't no graffiti in this part of nowhere and maybe its fine just like that.
here i am in Te Anau township, the gateway to Fiordland. or did i go the wong way?
we didnt have the time to go all the way to Milford Sound, but got to enjoy some time on Lake Te Anau, largest lake in South Island.
then further south we went to Manapouri, nz's second deepest lake. pristine
then it was see ya later fiordland. end of the line... the southern coast, looking west towards fiordland

South island part 3: west coast

here goes a big post i prolly should of split up, oh well, let the adventure continue...
Once we got to Westport, we took a turn to avoid the township and headed for Cape Foulwind:
this was the first part of the country viewed by a European, the Dutch "discoverer"Abel Tasman to whom we owe our country's unfortunate name. we were in for plenty more amazing rugged coastline.
then we went to a spot where the seals frolic: zoomed in
here's the girls at Punakaiki, with the unique pancake rocks.

here's Punakaiki beach at sunset, just by the campgrounds. went for a beach walk that night and saw too many stars including two shooting stars :)
next day, trying on the local fashion (possum furs):
river to the sea
after a regrettable stop in Greymouth (advise would be to avoid), we stopped at a replica goldmining town Shantytown, which had an old steamtrain ride. coolest part was the end of the line:
Josie and Cybie on the old steam tractor/train log moving thing:
Lol @ next photo too. the masons had big lodges all through the goldmining country, no surprise. what is weird is that this lodge, in the replica goldmining town, was still functioning. I took another photo in here which shows some real serious mason business that i will share in the future.
next stop, Hokitika Beach. as there are other people in the photo, you could say this is a pretty crowded part of the coast.
for dinner that night, locally caught in-season delicacy Whitebait! cooked by me in the RV.

we stayed at Franz Joseph township, next day went up to see the glacier. waterfalls on the walk:

me at the Glacier: wowmoving on... this here is a spot called Bruce Bay... about 1km of beach where local hippies and travellers have made driftwood and rock art all the way along. you could spend a day there looking at it all. if you were into that sort of thing.
Look out! mad weather coming in, further on
then another deserted beach on the Haast highway... this one made up of tiny pebbles
we'd almost run out of road by then so we turned inland, through Haast Pass, stopping at Thunder creek falls to hear thunder and taste the raindrops

south Island part 2 - Tasman & Buller

following a quick stop at Kaikoura (unfortunately cloudy), headed for the top of the South Island. Nelson the main town is quite boring with a fairly average beach (Tahuna), bit too exposed and windy every time i've been there. Motueka , further north, is a nice town and on the way is a 1km stretch of river bank where locals have spelled out their names with rocks... strange how everyone deep down wants to do graffiti


further north from Motueka are the magnificent beaches of Kaiteriteri:
and Breaker Bay:

without a doubt, best beach country in the South Island. And lower half of the North i reckon! from there it was Southwest through the spectacular Buller Gorge:

bit of an ugly throwie sorry, i blame the prickle bush in front of the shed. NZ's longest swing bridge, over the Buller River:



this here is a gold miner's hut from the 1860's

next stop west coast

South Island tour part 1 - Canterbury

Hi folks, I'm back! from the following epic adventure:


for the benefit of my foreign friends, thats NZ's imaginatively titled "South Island". Our country has 2 main islands, the North where i live is smaller but has 70% of the population, while the southern one is mostly farming and wilderness.

Me and wifey Josie and baby Cybela set off from Christchurch, this is the view from just past the airport:first stop was lunch at Waikuku beach on the east coast:
nice day for it! then we headed west for the thermal pool resort Hanmer Springs. it was dark by the time we arrived but here's some nice scenic shots of the drive.