New Zealand Day 3: The most beautiful sound I’ve ever seen

We left Lake Ohau and drove through the Lindis Pass (above). Just looking at the mountain ranges you can imagine the sheer force needed to make mountains. New Zealand sits on two tectonic plates, one on the west coast and one on the east coast. Because of this, its mountains are still growing, at a rate of 1-2 cm a year. Pretty crazy.

We made our morning pitstop in Cromwell, known for its fruit growing. We stopped at a famous fruit stand, where we saw how the leaves are changing for fall (above). In the fruit store, there were various kiwi-related products, like kiwi chocolate (above, yum!) and kiwi fruit. This is because the New Zealand national bird is the kiwi and New Zealanders themselves are called “kiwis.” In the back of the fruit stand was a rose garden, again pointing to NZ’s British heritage (above).

Then we drove near Queenstown and saw the Remarkables mountain range (above). They are remarkable because their peaks line up exactly north to south, and they are one of two mountain ranges in the world that are this way. Also, any Lord of the Rings geeks may recognize them, they make up the Walls of Mordor and are seen in other parts of the movie too.

We drove through Fiordland National Park, a World Heritage Area, to our final destination: Milford Sound. It turns out that Milford Sound is actually a fiord, as fiords are glacially formed and sounds are formed by rivers. Basically the entire west coast of the South Island is separated from the east by the Southern Alps mountain range, and the mountains go into the ocean through the fiords. There are tons of them (see map).

When we got to Milford Sound, we boarded the trusty vessel that would be our home for the night, The Wanderer (above). We threw our stuff into our bunks in the bottom of the boat, and checked out the view from our porthole (above). We began cruising around, and of course it was raining, so my pictures are very misty (above).

In the afternoon we had a chance to kayak on the sound. While the weather was terrible and the water was freezing, it was a chance we couldn’t pass up. They lowered the kayaks off of the back of the boat (above) with a rope, and we got in one by one. I have no pictures from this, I didn’t want to risk it with the rain. Kayaking was really awesome. We all thought that Milford Sound in the rain looked like something from Jurassic Park, with the really green forests poking through the mist. Mary and Brittany went swimming for about a minute (I didn’t because I got separated from them). They thought it was pretty much the coldest water they’d ever been in.

We warmed up with a fabulous dinner. Before we went to bed we helped our new South Korean friends translate our trip’s itinerary. One girl was an “American Studies” major, so her English was quite good, but the itinerary used some flowery language that we helped her with. It never occurred to me before that someone could major in American Studies. Crazy.

New Zealand Day 2: Sheep, Lakes, and Mountains

We met our tour group (above) at 8 am on Sunday. We got rolling on the tour bus, introduced ourselves, and took inventory of the different nationalities represented (British, Canadian, Danish, Swedish, South Korean, Brazilian, French, Australian, American). We heard our tour song for the first time (an old 80s New Zealand punk song), which was played many times throughout our travels so we could have a song to associate with the trip.

First we drove through really really green land that was spotted with little white dots (above). Upon closer inspection, these white dots turned out to be sheep (above), and we learned that wool is a huge industry in NZ. I saw easily 50 sheep pastures during this week. We made our first pit stop in Geraldine, home of the world’s largest sweater (above). I think I can die now that I’ve seen that. ;-)

Our first real stop was to Lake Tekapo, a lake with really blue water (above). I know the water doesn’t look very blue in my picture, I guess the cloudiness messed with the picture. All of the water that is in my pictures after this is very blue, I promise. This is because it’s glacially-fed water. Silt from the glacier washes into the lakes and rivers, and the silt reflects blue light, making the water look really blue.

Then we visited Lake Pukaki, which had that crazy blue water (above). Lake Pukaki is part of New Zealand’s hydroelectric scheme, which supplies 85% of New Zealand’s electricity (I think that figure is right, I don’t remember exactly). The red pipes are part of the hydroelectricity plan (above). One of the reservoirs around the lake gave a great reflection of the mountains surrounding it (above). Sadly, this was the only awesome reflecty picture I was able to get (more on that later). There were “crop circles” in the hills by the lake, apparently caused by a weed that grows out in a perfectly circular pattern (above).

After that we drove to Mount Cook (above), the tallest mountain in New Zealand. Its Maori name, Aoraki, translates to “cloud piercer.” To give you an idea of the scale, there’s 1.2 km between its two peaks (above, shown by the red arc), and the thick white strip of snow is about 100 meters deep (above). Mount Cook is near the biggest glacier in New Zealand, so there is glacial runoff in the area (above). The area surrounding the mountain is a great example of how glaciers shaped NZ. There was a huge plain leading up to the mountain where the glacier had previously been. Left in the plain were big boulders that the glacier had picked up and deposited during its travels (above). It was pretty cool.

We then traveled to Lake Ohau, where we stayed for the night. On the way, the sunset turned the mountains pretty colors (above). We had a great dinner catered by the hotel and then walked down to the lake to look at the stars. It was easily the most stars I’ve ever seen in my life since we were in the middle of nowhere. It was amazing.

New Zealand Day 1: I’m sleep deprived, but I’m in New Zealand!

For Spring Break, Brittany, Mary, and I went to New Zealand. The process of getting there was quite lengthy (see picture). We left Hobart about 11 am on Friday and flew to Melbourne, where we had a 6 hour layover. Then we flew to Auckland, New Zealand, and spent the hours between midnight and 6 am in the airport. I now have my first sleeping in an airport experience, which wasn’t too terrible but didn’t really result in much sleep. We got into Christchurch at about 8 am on Saturday, wanting nothing but a hot shower and a bed to sleep on.

Which of course meant that our hostel wouldn’t let us check in until 2 pm, thwarting our plans of resting. So, we decided to explore Christchurch, the South Island’s biggest city with a population of 400,000. Christchurch is very British (see phonebooth), as New Zealand is a Commonwealth of the UK just like Australia.

We wandered around and found the Christchurch Arts Centre (above), an old school that had been converted into many specialty shops. One was a weaving shop, so we all learned how to use a loom (above). Outside of the buildings was an open-air market, complete with street performers like those fake statue guys (above).

Then we visited the Canterbury Museum, a free museum that was really cool. We learned about Maori history, the history of the indigenous people of New Zealand. The Maori actually immigrated from islands near Hawaii many thousands of years ago. How they survived that ocean crossing in canoes I’m not really sure. The museum had lots of Maori woodcarvings, which I impersonated (above). It had interactive things like a huge bike that I sat on (above) and a stagecoach that Brittany and Mary pretended robbers had just jumped on top of (above). There was a special exhibit called “Around the World in 30 Lounges,” which had 6 living rooms decorated like they would be in different countries. The countries rotate on a weekly basis, and when we were there we saw Romanian, Chilean, and Kurdish living rooms (above). Like any good museum, it was home to a dino skeleton (above).

Then we went to the Botanical Gardens (Christchurch is known as the “City of Gardens” because there are so many). We saw huge trees (above), pretty flowers (above), a lily pond (above), and a UFO (above). Apparently this UFO was a prototype for futuristic housing that never caught on. Weird.

We finally checked into our hostel and went to bed (somewhere around 7-8 pm). Our real adventure began the next day.