Queenstown to Te Anau

We let ourselves sleep in since we were in no rush, but made sure we were awake early enough to have our stuff packed up before checkout. We needed to get to Te Anau at some point that evening so that we would be in the right area for our cruise the following day in Milford Sound, but since we were sure there wouldn't be much to do out there, we opted to spend most of our day in Queenstown. We went around the little park surrounding the lake where they had lovely gardens and ponds. They also had a frisbee golf course which was really funny to watch people play.

From the park, there was a little path you could take along the lake where you could get beautiful views of the city on the other side. The lake was so crystal and turquoise- I've never seen a like that color before.

After walking around for a bit, we decided to grab lunch. Alyssa wanted to try the meat pies which are famous in New Zealand (although I consider them British) but since that didn't sound great to me, I went back to Fergburger to get a chicken sandwich. It was just as delicious the second time around!

When we ran out of things to do, we jumped in the car and made the two hour drive down to Te Anau. We checked into the "Backpackers Lodge" which was one of the stranger places we've stayed. It was most likely a motel in the past since the rooms were each set up with their own kitchen. The whole place had a strange, spread out feel to it. On top of that, they only allowed an hour of free wifi- after that it was $5/hour! That is insane!

Since most things in the town had closed at 5:00pm, we opted to purchase a bottle of wine and drink it down by the lake. We found a bottle called "savignoir" which was a blend of sauvignon blanc and red wine which Alyssa was really excited to try and we ended up loving.

Some of the guys staying at the hostel came out and chatted with us hike they ate dinner but it was very windy and cold so we headed inside as soon as the sun started setting to use our hour of internet and get some sleep.

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Fox Glacier

We woke up at 8:00am so that we could pack up the car, check out and drive the 30 minutes to Fox Glacier from Franz Joseph. We had booked a half day tour for this glacier so that we would be able to actually get onto the ice. We arrived just in time for our 9:35am tour, despite being caught behind a few slow moving busses on our way. I thought we were doing really well driving our car and having to drive on the wrong side of the road. The tour people gave us some boots and crampons to use on our hike through the ice. Since it had been so warm the day before at Franz Joseph glacier, we declined the big rain jackets they provided and just brought our own smaller jackets in case we got cold. We all piled in the bus and drove down the road to the glacier entrance. There were 33 people in our tour so we split into two groups. There were 16 people who spoke mandarin, so they went with a mandarin speaking guide and we went with the guide from Canada.

The walk up to the glacier was pretty easy except that there were rock slide areas where we weren't allowed to stop because the chance of being hit by a falling rock was high. We made it to the glacier entrance and strapped on our crampons. They are little spikes that you can attach to your shoes to make sure you have traction and don't go skating down the ice into a crevice.

We walked around the glacier for over an hour. I really wanted to climb up to the top but apparently that is too dangerous. From what I can tell, the tour companies don't want the liability that comes with the unknown which I can understand but in my head I want to just sign a waiver and take my chances. The ice is 300ft deep and in some places you could see massive crevices and caves. I loved the deep blue color that some of the ice was. Our tour guide said the color was because when the glacier was formed, the snow was under so much pressure from the weight of the other snow above it that it became extremely dense ice and that ice cannot absorb the blue wavelengths from the sun so they are reflected to our eye as a brilliant blue.

We did stop before leaving the glacier to fill our water bottles up with cool, clean glacier water. Mmmmm, delicious!

Once we had finished our time on the ice, we headed back into town on the bus. After returning our equipment, Alyssa and I grabbed lunch at the little cafe connected the the guide shop and headed out of town. We were staying in Queenstown that night as a stopover on our drive down south to Milford Sound and it was a 5 hour drive to get there. Our only concern was that the Haake pass closed at 6:00pm since it was too dangerous to drive at night and the pass was two hours away from Fox glacier, so we needed to make sure to get there in time.
I drove for the first three hours as Alyssa slept and we made it through the pass with plenty of time to spare. When we arrived in Queenstown, it was nothing like what we had expected. We had been to other major cities like Auckland and Wellington that were nice but had no charm. Queenstown was like an alpine ski village but set on a lake. Everything about it was so nice and quaint- we really liked it! We checked into "Bumbles Hostel" where we had a six bed, shared dorm. Luckily, 5 out of the 6 people were girls and we were able to share a bunk (Alyssa prefers the top bunk now and I always let her chose her preference since she has such a hard time sleeping). The hostel had was in an amazing location overlooking the lake and less than a 2 minute walk into town.

We went out to walk around and get a feel for the town. There were tons of great little shops, bars and restaurants so it would be a great town to vacation in. Queenstown is also renown for its adventure sports, so it's definitely the place to try sky diving or bungy jumping.

We had perused all of the menus in town without settling on anything when we came upon a restaurant with a huge line out front. We checked it out and the line was for a place called "Fergburger". I vaguely recalled that my friend Te Tee had recommended that we go to some burger place when we got to Queenstown and based on its popularity, I figured this was the one. On top of that, the prices were much more reasonable than anything else we'd seen, so it was a no brainier. I got the "codfather" which was a fish burger and Alyssa got the "little lamby". I liked how much variety they had and the burgers were huge! It was delicious and I could see why it was such a popular option in Queenstown.

After dinner, we headed back to the hostel to go to bed. Unfortunately, the couple staying in our room had decided to watch episodes of "How I met your mother" on their iPad and although they were using headphones so we couldn't hear the show, the guy kept hysterically laughing out loud which was keeping the other four people in the room who were trying to sleep awake. It was so annoying and I wanted to kick him in the face. I guess that's dorm living though!

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Franz Joseph Glacier

Today we had determined to see Franz Joseph glacier and do a lot of the hikes in the area. We wanted to get to the glacier in the morning since every afternoon the clouds rolls in and block your view of the mountains, so we made to sure to be up by 8:00am. When we arrived at the glacier, the sign said that the entire hike to the glacier viewpoint and back was an hour and a half, so we had expected a challenging little hike to start off with. We quickly found out that the majority of visitors to New Zealand are not at the height of fitness. The approximate times are really geared towards people over 60, so we made it there in no time. I was sad that you couldn't get closer to the glacier- they had ropes put up to prevent people from hiking any further up but there was clearly a trail to a better viewpoint beyond the ropes. I decided that I was going under the ropes to get a better look. Alyssa decided not to come with me and went to sit on a rock that had a decent view. Sometimes I feel like I am channelling our father and she is channelling our mother when it comes down to these decisions, hahaha.

When I got to the next view point, I could see the glacier much clearer. Obviously other people do exactly what I did because there was another set of ropes blocking me from going further and signs warning that you will die in an ice collapse if you try.

Since I had gotten some decent pictures, I decided to turn back and meet up with Alyssa. I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting from the glacier but I was a little disappointed by it. It is a massive block of ice, but I really wanted to get a view from above so that I could see the full scale of it. And I wanted to walk on it. Apparently the glaciers have been receding for the past 18,000 years due to a warming climate. They used to extend all the way to the ocean but are now 19km from the water. You used to be able to do day hikes on the Franz Joseph glacier but in recent years it has receded so much that there is no longer a safe access point onto the ice. You can still access it via heli-hike which Alyssa and I really wanted to do, but at over $400 it was a bit outside of our budget.
We left the glacier and walked back down to where the path started. There was another short walk called "End of the forest walk" we could do from the same path, so we did that hike as well to a higher viewpoint.

Then, we left the glacier to do some rainforest hikes that had views of the glacier as well as the ocean. The south island has a temperate rainforest which had the strangest foliage I've ever seen. It was a mix of pine trees, ferns, bushes and tropical trees. There was really no knowing what you might come across; it was as if any type of plant could life there.

There were two hikes we wanted to do here: The Okarito costal walk (3 1/2 hours) and the viewpoint walk (40 minutes). We started with the Okarito walk because the viewpoint walk broke off from it about 30 minutes up the trail and then you could continue back on the Okarito when you came back down. From the viewpoint, there were really great views of the oceans as well as the mountains.

We climbed down from the viewpoint and continued our hike up the Okarito trail. This was more of a hike than the others as there were very steep inclines and declines. We didn't see any other people on the entire hike which led me to believe it wasn't suitable for the older visitors. There are two parts to the Okarito trail: the pack track and the costal walk. When we finished the pack track, we ended up overlooking a black sand beach. There was a bridge that crossed from our mountain down to the beach but it had a sign saying it was closed for repairs. I thought it looked plenty sturdy and so we decided to cross it anyways (I was very proud of Alyssa for this).

In my opinion, the bridge couldn't have been more sound- I have the feeling they just didn't want people going to the beach for some reason. We walked over to the black sand beach to check it out and take a break for lunch. As we approached the beach, we saw a strange black bird. We thought he was interesting so we approached it to get a picture.

It started cawing like crazy and suddenly there were two of them. Before we knew what was happening, they were airborne and dive bombing us. I wish I could have gotten it on video because it had to have been the funniest thing in the world to watch. Alyssa and I were half freaked out and half hysterical. We could not believe how unafraid these birds were, literally trying to attack us. It was like being in a Hitchcock movie. Finally, they landed about 50ft from us and were keeping a watchful eye.

I picked up a big stick and resolved to smack them right in the face with it if they tried that again. Alyssa walked down to the water to feel how cold it was but when she returned, she had a big handful of wet sand. I watched as she chased after the birds with the sand. They suddenly were totally fearful of her and flew over to a stick on the beach and cowered under it. It was hysterical because the stick they were hiding beneath was not big at all and they were hiding under it like we wouldn't be able to see them.

We hung out for a bit longer at the beach with no further bird incident and then made our way back across the bridge. We found a sign on the other side that said the second half of the Okarito walk along the coast had been closed because it was impassible due to erosion. We both shrugged and decided we were going to do it anyways. For me, it was a full day of rule breaking!

As we descended down to the beach, the path disappeared and we were just walking along the shore with the cliff face on the other side. It was perfectly passable unless it was high tide, so we had no problem. As we walked, I couldn't help but notice how interesting the rocks were on the beach. The entire beach was covered with rocks of different colors, all striated with minerals. Some even glittered like they had Formica in them. I wanted to take some with me but then I really would have rocks in my bag to account for how heavy it is.

As we walked along the beach, there was no one out there as far as we could see. We talked about how lucky we were to be able to be out on a deserted black sand beach in the middle of New Zealand. Just then, Alyssa spotted a seal up on the rocks. He was so cute and seemed confused by our presence. We watched him for a while until he lost interest in us and went back to sleep.

We finally made it back to the parking lot and decided that 7 hours of hiking was enough for us. We headed back to the hostel just in time for the evening soup. Luckily, the chef had been made aware of the pepper issue from the night before and this soup was edible. Somehow, the soup made me even more hungry than I already had been so we went off in search of a cheap restaurant. There were only 5 restaurants in town since Franz Joseph is very small and although many of the restaurants promote backpacker meals, their cheapest options are still $20. Plus, it was some holiday we'd never heard of so they were adding a 15-20% surcharge to all meals. Finally, we got annoyed with the prices and went to the store to buy some pasta. Pasta is always the cheapest meal in any country and that way we could also afford to split a bottle of wine, lol. There were apparently some night clubs in town but that sounded ridiculous to us so since we didn't have any roommates in our room, we just stayed in and watched some movies on TV.

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South Island!

I got a few minutes of sleep here and there but it was so cold, there was no way to get any actual rest. Finally the ferry landed in Picton and we went down to claim our car. Once we were out, we plotted our course to Franz Joseph in the GPS (making sure to first stop at a McDonalds to get some coffee) and were on our way. It was a 6 hour drive to Franz Joseph and since we had known that we would be wrecked from not sleeping on the ferry, we had elected to travel all day and just get it over with. We made sure that the non-driver stayed awake as well since it would have been very easy to nod off being that we were so tired. There was no radio reception in the area, so luckily I had my iPad with hundreds of songs that my good friend Te Tee had loaded onto it for us to chose from. As we drove, I still couldn't get over the fields of sheep, cows and deer. There are actual deer farms here which I've never seen in the US. It's funny to see them raised like any other farm animal. I love seeing the little lambs with their mothers; they are so damn adorable!

It was a scenic but rainy drive and when we arrived in Franz Joseph we were ready for some lunch and a nap.

 

 

We checked into our hostel called "Glow Worm Cottages" which I had picked because I thought the name was adorable. We were in a four bed ensuite, complete with its own little kitchen. We also had free wifi which means a lot to us these days. From our hostel, there was an amazing view of the snowy mountains as well as the mountains covered in rainforest which I just couldn't get over. It was so cool looking!

We got our stuff set up and then headed to the main kitchen because every evening at 6:00pm, they provided free soup! We were really excited that the soup might count as a free dinner, and scooped a large bowl of what looked like chicken soup.

Sadly, someone had used far too much pepper in the soup and although both Alyssa and I love spicy food, neither of us could eat more than two mouthfuls. It was so spicy that it burned all the way down to your stomach...not worth it. We dumped the soup and walked to the little corner grocery store. We weren't very hungry so we settled on yogurt and fruit for dinner before succumbing to our exhaustion and heading to bed. We were surprised to find that the sun still hadn't set and it was almost 10:00pm. Apparently here on the south island, the days last much longer than we had anticipated!

 

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