New Zealand (en zed) 1

The land of the kiwi (people, fruit and birds) was the ideal spot for our girls tiki tour. I left Braden at home to head across the Pacific and visit our dear friend from Colorado School of Mines, Juli Park. Juli has been living in Christchurch, New Zealand for two and a half years and was an excellent tour guide and travelling partner. It was wonderful that Juli was able to take the entire time off work to travel. We were also excited that another friend from college, Jody Celler, was able to travel from her current home in Perth, Australia for a week of wine tasting and trekking near the end of the journey. Cool as bro!

Juli and I spent the entire trip on the South Island and majority of the trip tromping. The first couple of weeks were spent on various day hikes. Around Christchurch we hiked from Juli and Gareth Oddy’s home to the sea overlook of Taylor’s Mistake and the following day went to the highest point in the Bank’s Peninsula, Mount Herbert. Christchurch is a marvelous town with fun sites to see. Juli and Oddy’s house was a fabulous house high above Sumner that overlooks the ocean. It felt like a vacation home and the hospitality was stupendous.

Juli and Oddy's view from their beach house. Hiking Mt. Herbert.

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On day three, Juli and I borrowed Oddy’s Jeep (aka ‘Big Red’) and headed towards the mountains. Mount Cook was a huge monolith piercing the clouds and lived up to our expectations for New Zealand’s highest peak. We hiked up to the terminal of the Hooker Glacier and around to the Tasman Glacier.

Big Red and Mt. Cook.

Hike up the Hooker valley.

Mt. Cook and glacier.

Juli on cool walking bridge.

Burr.

Check out the glacier at the headwaters of the lake.

Glacier arch.

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A side trip over to the Clay Cliffs was an interesting jaunt. To be thrifty, we walked the eight kilometers rather than paying the $5 entry fee. It was so windy on our hike to the cliffs that we had to crouch down and push our way forward; on the way home we merely jumped to make progress back to Big Red.

The next stop was wonderful Wanaka. This is the place that I am encouraging Juli to move and open her dream job of being a mountain bike guide. This little town is located on a lovely lake and we were lucky enough to be hanging out there during the Agriculture and Produce (A&P) show. We saw sheep, ate sheep, bought wool products and did other things with sheep that we are not going to discuss here. (No! Not that; disgusting.)

Our next hike took us to the Rob Roy Glacier in the Mount Aspiring region. We were beginning to feel strong and fast by now and were proud to outpace the estimated travel time by half. The glacier was an amazing site and the wind blew so hard that it reversed the flow of a waterfall.

Beautiful waterfalls.

Mt. Aspiring valley.

Waterfall near Rob Roy glacier.

The next day we challenged ourselves by doing our first overnight adventure over Sugarloaf Pass. We had no idea how much of a challenge this hike was. Sounds like an innocuous enough name: Sugarloaf. It wasn’t. Man, this was a toughie. After a grueling five hours straight up a mountain we assumed the worst was behind us. Silly us. We forgot about the down. The saving graces for this hike were the views and the serenity. At the top of the pass we walked along the Sugarloaf saddle and could see for miles and miles without any evidence of man and didn’t see another person the entire hike.

Prepping for Sugarloaf.

The brutal hike on Sugarloaf trail. Juli is still smiling.

Sugarloaf Pass.

Sugarloaf pass.

Going down, down, down.

Pretty nice views!

Oh, so tired...

Where's Juli?

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New Zealanders have created a network of hikes called the “Great Hikes” and have done an incredible job to make tromping easily accessible and fun. Trails are well maintained, nice huts have been built to accommodate the 30 to 50 people that stay along the trail, and maps and waypoints are easy to follow.

Stairs! Amazing!

The lovely Kepler trek.

Relaxing after a long hike (check out Juli's socks - they have been working hard too).

After our arduous backpacking trip on the Sugarloaf trek, we were happy to try our first ‘Great Hike’. The Kepler Trek had stunning views, and best of all, had a developed trail with stairs, wooden walkways and a wide path. After all of this luxury, it seemed very appropriate that the first hut we stayed at was named the Luxmore hut. Near the Luxmore hut there was a cave to provide a perfect evening adventure where Juli and I tested our spelunking skills. That night we slept with 50 of our closest friends hearing (and smelling) the night visceral needs.

Starting the Kepler trek.

Entering the Luxmore cave.

Juli caving.

The Luxmore hut.

Neato photo in the Luxmore cave.

Fun in the dark!

Hiking to Mt. Luxmore.

Juli looking hard core; wait, she is hard core.

Hiking the Kepler.

Ridge walk.

Throughout the six-week trip, we had amazing weather even though New Zealand is infamous for its rain (the Milford Sound receives a whopping 6.3 meters of rain per year). Generally, it rained when we drove and cleared up when we wanted to go on a hike. Our motto was, “We started at the perfect time”.

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The final day of the Kepler trek and the following two days were the exception to our perfect timing. At that time we learned just how hard and long New Zealand rains can be. Our fancy backpack rain covers and rain suits were put to the test, the rain won out, soaking us and our gear. We camped in a Holiday Park in Te Anau where we thought we were going to float away in the tent. The wind was gusting most of the night and we could hear the nearby forest shutter, then at the count of three, we would brace the tent and ourselves for the horrendous wind. It was like an adventure film on a boat and Juli would scream with barely a sound heard, “hold up the tent mate!” And I would raise my arms to protect us from being squashed by the tent. It really was quite comical. The next morning we had to pour two inches of water out of our shoes and our plans to drive to the Milford Sound were foiled by a mudslide across the road.

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Even the rain turned out to be perfect timing. We desperately needed a couple of days rest and had a hard time doing so without being forced by the rain. We made the most out of the inclement weather by checking internet, playing poker, reading, and watching our favorite show, Grey’s Anatomy, in the common room of the Holiday Park.

Also during the rainy days, Juli and I headed to the Fox and Franz Joseph Glaciers. We were not able to go very far to see the Fox Glacier due to flash flooding concerns, but again the weather cleared for the two-hour hike to see the Franz Joseph. It was a mesmerizing site seeing the giant mass of ice sculpting the hard rock. New Zealand was covered with textbook U-shaped valleys characteristic of glacier settings and it was great to see geology in action since both Juli and I are geological engineers.

The Fox glacier.

The Franz Joseph glacier.

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We left the rainy south to head north for greener pastures, literally. Greener pastures also meant more rain. We drove Big Red along the western coast, taking wee side trips such as Pancake Rock Blowholes and ended up on the far northwest of the south island to hike the Heaphy Trek.

The Heaphy (pronounced hee-fee) Trek followed the coast line for an entire day. It was unusual for me to be carrying backpacks and having the sea as the view rather than a mountain range. During our hike there was a storm out in the Tasman Sea that made the waves crash with force making our journey a spectacular one.

Juli trekking along the coast.

Amazing!

One-person walk bridge.

During our stay at the Heaphy Hut, we were lucky enough to be invited to the nearby Field Cave by a guide and her group. The cave turned out to be only a ten-minute walk from the main Heaphy trail, but the vegetation was so overgrown that we never would have been able to find the cave without guidance. The Field Cave is giant, with rooms the size of a small house and a mile-long maze of tunnel. We saw some amazing cave geology and even saw wettas (giant cave crickets) and cave spiders.

Entering the Field cave.

Caver.

Cave crystals.

Wetta.

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After our cave trip, we were included in show-and-tell and games with a group of kiwi ladies. Here is Loma showing off her show-and-tell of a palm leaf head dress.

After the Heaphy Trek, we drove back to Christchurch and Gareth (Juli’s partner [British for boyfriend]) kindly made us tea (British for a huge spread) of baked chicken, potatoes, broccoli, and courgettes (British for zucchini). Dinner and company was fantastic. The next day we picked up Jody from the airport. Jody is a mutual friend of Juli and mine from school who is working in Perth, Australia and was able to visit for a week of our journeys.