New Zealand Snapshots - The South Island

by Alex in New Zealand, In Transit

So, you may remember that we posted snapshots from the first half of our time in New Zealand a while ago. Like... almost exactly a year ago. But I know, dear reader, that you've been holding out for our snapshots from the South Island since then, and all I can do is give it to you now, on (basically) the anniversary of our first post. As for why it's so late, well, I can apologise and take responsibility for my procrastination or blame the constant technical issues we've been having for the last few months... (seriously this post is haunted!) Or maybe I'll stick to... 

It's not my fault! My... dog ate my computer?

Wellington

Wellington is, as you may have noticed, not on the South Island. I may have left Wellington out of our last Snapshots and I felt slightly bad for him.  

So here we go. Wellington! So....it's a city. We walked across most of it, got lost in parts of it, found a couple of truly awesome eateries, but overall... it wasn't really anything we hadn't seen before. We did go up to the Botanical Gardens and did some Lord of the Rings location-hunting, and we ate at the Batman-themed Gotham Cafe (no joke, a Batman-themed cafe!), tucked away on a small side street. Some of the food can be a bit expensive, but they do serve a very affordable and seriously awesome grilled cheese.

We also spent a day at the Te Papa museum - one of the best museums I've been to, (until we hit London, anyway) where we spent hours wandering from wildlife exhibits to earthquake simulators to an art gallery to - no joke - a miniature igloo complete with giant fluffy penguins. We also ran into a couple of friends that we met in Taupo, and maaaaay have lost an hour or three standing around talking to them instead of looking at the exhibits. Maybe.

Picton

After hopping off the Inter-islander ferry, you stop in at the very small port town Picton. I seriously loved Sequoia Lodge hostel - not only for its free chocolate pudding, it's actually a really cute little hostel. With free pudding. They also have a spa, and hammocks for guests, and all this is less than 5 minutes walk from a gorgeous tiny little seaside town.

Everyone in town was really nice and friendly - we went into a pub for lunch one day, and we were the only customers there, so the owner pulled up a stool and sat and talked with us while we ate (filling up our drinks for free along the way!). And did I mention the free pudding?

Nelson

We heard a lot of hype about Nelson as "the place to be" at the top of the South Island... honestly - it was just sort of "meh". The surrounding area is beautiful, sure, but the town - meh. Also, Nelson is home to the worst hostel we stayed at in New Zealand - a tiny, squishy room with 4 3-storey bunk beds crammed in, no space for bags, a kitchen that was only open for 2 hours a day and staff who were nice, but in that Stepford Wives kind of way. We ended up cutting our stay short after 2 nights. We did find a good Indian restaurant, though.

I have zero photos of Nelson - so here is one of the Pancake Rocks!

Franz Josef

The definition of a two street town - literally, Franz Josef is comprised of two streets, one supermarket and one petrol station. So naturally we ended up spending almost a week there. After a week of heavy rains, the road heading south decided it didn't want to be there anymore. Trapped by a mudslide, we hung around after being told it would take a day to clear.

We took a trip out to see the Franz Josef glacier, and just hung out. The next day, we were told it would take another day. The next day, we were told the same again, and so on. We decided to change our plans and head back north after six days. Apparently, it ended up taking another 2 weeks to clear the road.

Now you see me...soon you won't!

Arthur's Pass

The pass across the centre of the South Island is, in a word, beautiful, with its bullying birds and beautiful mountains. The drive takes you through some of the most picturesque parts of Middle-Earth, where huge chunks of Rohan were filmed, as well as stopping off in a small town populated by Keas - large, mischievous parrots with a tendency to open backpacks, steal passports and try to break into cars.

Around 2 hours in, there is a moment, a beautiful moment straight out of Fern Gully, where the mountains open up to a gorgeous valley, green and luscious with a cascading waterfall that you drive under. Seriously, how gorgeous is that? One of the best accidental views I have seen in my life. ...or, that I would have seen. Unfortunately, I wouldn't know, as by the time Tash's persistent tugging on my sleeve caught my attention, we had rounded the corner and moved on.

...I'm still not 100% sure she's not making it up.

I will do it! I will take the bus to Christchurch! Though I do not know the way... photo by: siju

Christchurch

There's something sad about visiting Christchurch. After the city was devastated by an earthquake in 2011, very little of it was standing while we were there. As of late 2013, they had only just begun to tear down the buildings that were damaged beyond repair, leaving boarded-up shopfronts and cracked pavements and cordoned-off buildings as far as the eye can see.

In the centre of the CBD, just near where we were staying, a new commercial development has sprung up, with shops, cafes and restaurants built out of shipping containers. This area, called Re:Start, is certainly unlike anything else you'll find in New Zealand - the entire temporary community feels like a modern shanty town, or something that dropped out of a dystopian sci-fi film. Also, it's the first suburb I've ever seen that officially has a punctuation mark in its name. And that makes it awesome.

photo by:joceykinghorn

As Christchurch is being rebuilt, you can see the scars of the earthquake all over the city, both physically and mentally, on the buildings and the people who are residing in them. From cracked pavements and broken windows, to the population that's just a little bit too small for a city of its size, Christchurch is loaded with a thousand tiny signs of something that has changed the city, deeply and permanently. Cities like this exist all over Europe, bearing the centuries-old scars of wars, invasions and disasters, but Christchurch is fascinating because you can see the recovery as it happens.

Dunedin

Two words sum up everything you need to know about our time in Dunedin: Chocolate factory. In case you missed that, I'll say it again. Chocolate. Factory. Specifically, we took a tour of the New Zealand Cadbury Factory, which is responsible for making the flavoured truffles and filled chocolates for distribution all over the world. Also, since we were there in early October, they had just started up production of eggs for Easter, and holy crap you guys, have you ever thought about how many Easter eggs get made each year???

As for the rest of Dunedin, well, it's not the most walkable city in New Zealand. Steep hills meant that we weren't really doing much walking, so we took advantage of that by looking for hostels where we could work for board. We did eventually find a great one (after calling every hostel in New Zealand) - but I'll get to that in a minute. Dunedin also had the only Yum Cha that we found in New Zealand - the waiter was so excited when we walked in that we got 4-5 free dishes which we didn't mind at all - I guess they don't get a whole lot of customers. I don't know why, it was really good.

And did I mention that we got lots of free chocolate at the Cadbury factory from a tenured tour guide? Most tours give out one or two small bars - this guy has been with the company for 40 years, so he's stopped giving a hoot, and hands out free candy like... well, candy. Also it turns out that chef knowledge kicks ass in chocolate trivia - which was the path to even more sweet chocolatey rewards. Also, Tash got the added enjoyment of watching me dance around in a hairnet and snood.

And now that enjoyment is yours. You're welcome!

Queenstown

Gosh how I love this town. We came out to Queenstown just under 3 years ago for our honeymoon, living it up for 2 weeks in a fancy resort, going skiing and horseback riding and on helicopter rides and having an awesome time. This time, we were doing on the (considerably) cheap(er) - Queenstown is still one of the most expensive cities in New Zealand, but it's just so damn pretty that I don't care. Sitting on the edge of the lake, surrounded by perfectly snow-capped mountains... if for whatever reason Canada falls apart (our citizenship hopes and dreams, that is - not the country!), Queenstown is our backup settling-down town.

Since we did all the fancy touristy things while we here last time (and also had no money this time around), we didn't get out to do as many activities, but had just as much fun walking around the town and exploring the local area... God, it's such a pretty town. And only a good road-trip away from Dunedin and the chocolate factory!

You may notice Tash is conveniently absent from almost all photos.

Doubtful Sound

When we were last in Queenstown, we attempted to take a day cruise through Milford Sound. Unfortunately it was fogged out when we got there, so we just had to take a helicopter trip through the eerily Jurassic-Park-esque Sound and land on the top of some mountains. Oh damn. This time around, though, we were determined to have our cruise. We were looking at a few different deals, when we noticed that for the price of a day cruise in Milford Sound, we could get an overnight cruise in the equally pretty, less crowded and much larger Doubtful Sound. So cruise we did!

The whole sound is gorgeous, and we got to see dolphins and penguins and wild seals, and we went kayaking and it was awesome - but the highlight for me has to be when we stopped on the first day and got to go swimming. It was a warm day in the Sound - the water was a balmy 7 degrees - so the crew set us a challenge. If anyone could dive in and touch the bottom of the Sound, they'd get free beer for the rest of the cruise. Did I mention that the Sound is about 140m deep? We all had a good laugh, took one jump into the water, screamed like little schoolgirls, and it was all good fun - except for the one guy who really wanted that free beer. He must have dived in no less than 8 times, trying to reach the bottom. And bless him, he really gave it his all - he was only short by 137m. Close enough, right?

(Note: I know there is more than one photo - one photo is not enough to do it justice!)

Kaikoura

Before we left Australia, my Kiwi friend Brad told me to visit for Kaikoura for one simple reason - its name. More specifically, what the name Kaikoura means. In Maori, 'Kai' means food and 'Koura' means ocean - so Kaikoura is located on a bay with such good seafood that the locals literally named the town after it. There are some simple geographical reasons why this is so, all to do with water temperatures and plankton and boring stuff, but the end result of this is a town built entirely around a tourist industry of whale-watching and dolphin-swimming and seafood. And it is awesome.

And seals!!!

After days of extensive searching (in Dunedin), we managed to find a work-for-board position in a hostel on the edges of town, where we stayed for 3 weeks until we were due to leave New Zealand. While we were there, we did 2 hours work in exchange for free rent, and then had the rest of our days free to explore, go to the beach, hang out with hostel friends and have movie days with our awesome friend Mandy, and just generally have a good time. Life is hard, you guys.

Leaving plenty of time for Ned Stark impressions

While we were in Kaikoura, we got to go swimming with wild dolphins, which has been a dream of Tash's for a very long time. Now, swimming with wild dolphins is an inherently awesome experience - you have to thrash around in the water and make noises to stop the dolphins from getting bored with you, and Tash came out with some awesome stories of close encounters which are really just... so cool. I, on the other hand, made a rather concerning discovery the first time we jumped out of the boat to play with the pod - it turns out I can't swim. So while everyone else was diving and kicking and snorkeling and having an awesome time, I got to bob there with a life-vest on, trying desperately to see anything through the water.

Not to worry, though - a few days later we went on a kayaking tour out to the local seal colony, and while we were on our way, a small nursing pod of 2 adult dolphins and 2 babies came past. The babies were curious and hung around and played with our kayaks for a little while, and in my mind, that makes up pretty damn well for almost drowning earlier that week.

Not pictured: Drowning

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