West coast, west coast

It’s only a week ago that we left Bluff, but already we’ve reached to northern parts of the south island. Travelling South to North on the South Island, we visited some pretty cool places. Not only was the scenery stunning, it was also quite cold and rainy. So unfortunately not the best views of wide mountain ranges, but we’ve still seen some amazing nature.
First of all: Milford Sound. In the NZ Fiordland, Milford is not actually a ‘sound’, but a fiord. The place called Milford is not more than a harbour where scenic cruises go every 5 minutes… And still it is a beautiful trip, especially since we were on the ship right before all the tourist buses came! Amazing to see the difference in the parking lot when we came (only 1 big touring car) and when we came back (more than 50 touring cars)!

In the harbour it was packed with the big cruise boats, but out on the fiord they seemed to disappear into the scenery, with all the high cliffs and mountains. All in all, a really nice experience, with spectacular views, even with the rain pouring down for the last 20 minutes (and definitely worth the extra 300 km drive).

Milford harbour and sound

On the way up to Milford we did a few hour trek to Key summit, and as you can see on the picture it was heavy enough that the parents needed a bit of persuasion for reaching the top

Geisha chocolate

We also spotted a Kea, pretty!

Further down the road (or actually we first had to get back down from Milford and then we continued our trip north) we came to Queenstown. Queenstown is a vibrant city where a lot of adrenalin-activities can be booked (not for our timetable or budget). We decided not to stay there, but went for a walk around town, and of course a nice cup of coffee! The coffee in New Zealand is really nice everywhere! The day was pretty rainy, so we didn’t spend that much time in Queenstown, but still managed to buy some clothes.
The Queenstown area is supposed to have spectacular views with mountain tops in the back ground, but we were unlucky with the weather, ending up seeing mostly rain and mist. But still, since we don’t know what we’ve missed we don’t feel too bad about it. Instead of admiring the scenery we visited some cute towns (we almost thought that there are none in NZ, but we found them!) and learned a bit about the gold rush in the 17th century.

Our next worthwhile stop was at Franz Josef glacier (because of lack of time we skipped Fox glacier). We really wanted to take a hike on the glacier, so we went on an organized tour (our first!) which took us up there and through some ice caves as well! And we all got to wear cramp-ons (although maybe mostly just for show )The glacier itself didn’t look too spectacular (it’s covered in dust and sand now in the summer), but we learned to respect it after all the stories from our guide –and after a big bang we heard! Later we learned that it was the glacier cracking! The ice caves were spectacular, though, so it we were quite happy even with our wet shoes and cold fingers.

On the Franz Josef glacier

On our drive north we stopped in Hokitika for a night, and spent the evening watching the most beautiful sunset so far, and later visiting a small canyon filled with glow worms just shining away –so beautiful! And since Hokitika is the greenstone (= NZ jade) capital of NZ, we spent the next morning spending a bit too much money…

We continued on to Punakaiki where we had a pancake overdose with first eating a bunch of them and then admiring the famous pancake rocks. Again, really beautiful –and really touristic- place

Pancake rocks

Now we’re in Motueka, waiting to start our (only “the kids” this time, the parents don’t care to have a go) 50 km tramp in the Abel Tasman national park. It’ll be our first “real” tramp (staying at a hut over night!) in NZ, and Judith’s first ever :D Even with a bit of rain to be expected, we’re really excited about the trip! We’ll try to report back as soon as possible, so that you guys don’t need to worry too much (mostly thinking of you Marion )