sarah's visit

Sarah's first view of the South Island - Golden Bay, Farewell Spit & the Abel Tasman
(this is where the Laings live, for you Homerites)

Sistas Beggs take the south pacific - part 3! For adventures in Samoa, see two posts below: Savai'i & 'Upolu. This post finishes up our travels together in New Zealand August 15-29. We started in Christchurch, staying with Peter & Mary one night, which was fitting since Peter & Dad lived in the same house in Samoa in the 60s (Peter was a kiwi journalist who lived there 17 years, I think). It was great to share our samoan stories with them and get Peter's perspective, as he's been part of international aid projects for much of his life. And lest you worry, he and Mary are doing just fine after the quake.

We rented a car in Christchurch (another Nissan Sunny - 3rd time in NZ) and I drove for the next 10 days. Since I was always gripping that right-side wheel, Sarah has 10x more pix than me (that and she's a picture-taking fool), so I'll wait for copies before loading a complete photo album.

Our first stop was the Banks Peninsula, part of a huge caldera of the extinct volcano that formed the region. We skirted the dirt roads from Akaroa (a french settlement), always with a sheer drop-off sans guard-rail on one side or the other. Add to that: dipping in and out of a thick cloud along the ridges and meeting campervans on narrow dirt tracks (which had many sign posts restricting campervans), made for an exciting christening of our car for the road trip.

We overnighted in Timaru, then continued south toward Dunedin. It was fun to see the Moeraki Boulders again, this time at high tide (preventing Sarah from seeing as many as I saw at low tide in March). But they are still strangely spectacular and mysterious. 

We made it out the Moeraki Peninsula, which I hadn't done previously, and began our impressive count of fur seals. New Zealand fur seals are big animals, with the distinguishing characteristic of moving quite quickly across land, as they use their flippers to "walk" (and run!) rather than just flopping forward like other seals. 

Above is a photo of the peninsula we hiked out and some seals who made it quite far on that same peninsula (how precious are the pups?)

A pup like this actually 'ran' over to us in Kaikoura (then darted straight into the bushes).

After a morning visit to Oamaru and an afternoon visit to Dunedin, we headed down to Milton to stay overnight with my Homer friend Sue's sister and her kiwi family. Though we'd planned to head back up for more of Dunedin the next day and take a mountain route I hadn't tried, we soon learned just how long of a drive it would be. So we opted for a more direct route to Te Anau (fiordland) in hopes of catching the only decent day predicted for Milford Sound.

We cruised through southern Otago and Southland, stopping in Riverton for lunch and got a tip from a local woman to be sure to drive down to "Cozy Nook." Not a place we would've ever thought to turn, but her advice was great, as the road led us to surf battered coast where a few die-hards chose to huddle a handful of small homes and boats. Very 'end of the road,' with hints of Alaska and stark Scottish highlands.

After some daunting downpours, Manapouri greeted us with a rainbow and things were still looking good in Te Anau for a half-way-decent day on the fjord (that's all we asked). We took our chances and bought a couple boat tickets for a milford cruise the next day. Evening entertainment was the local movie theater, where their home-grown film on Fiordland, Ata Whenua, is shown exclusively (trailer below).

The next morning we jumped in the car and headed up the milford road, talking our time since the cruise wasn't until 2pm. We were fine with the low cloud, occasionally revealing breath-taking peaks and lifting as we ascended the pass. By the time we got to the Homer Tunnel it was full-on sunshine! Not quite the land of 1,000 waterfalls as I experienced in March (the cliffs drain water from every crevice when it rains - the milford road was also closed for 5 days then due to a huge landslide).

On the other side of the tunnel, the divide was complete - not a cloud in the sky - we'd left the weather on the other side of the mountains. Hurrah! We had an uncharacteristic glorious day on Milford Sound that people rarely experience (with 265" of rain per year, it's hard to find a day without).

 

mouth of Milford Sound, from the Tasman

Mitre Peak was brilliant. I can't believe these are the same 'rough waters' I kayaked in on my birthday. We had a good wildlife showing as well, with dolphins chasing our boat, a rare fiordland crested penguin and plenty of fur seals. With the calm weather we made it all the way to the Tasman and could look up & down the remote fiordland coast. It was easy to see how Captain Cook totally missed the fjord - that Tasman entrance is deceiving. Though the exponential increase in waterfalls is the pleasure of a rainy trip (only 5 permanent falls, but thousands when it rains), I have to say I'm glad we got the weather we did. 

We made it back to Te Anau in time to catch a tour of the glow worm caves, which rounded out a perfect day. After meandering through a limestone cave at night, you're put in a boat, everone turns off their torch, and the guide slowly rows you on a sea of black to caverns full of glow worms. Although I've seen plenty in the woods at night on my own, this was special. The 30-min cruise across Lake Te Anau in the dark is awesome too - Sarah and I braved the top deck on the way back since it was such a beautiful night.

The next morning we made tracks for Queenstown, where we ate lunch and strolled around in the sunshine before taking the Crown Ridge pass to Wanaka. It stayed beautiful, so we decided to drive out Mt Aspiring road before heading to Holly & Jeff's crib. (Sue's sister used to live in Wanaka and they still have a house where they were coincidentally headed that weekend, so invited us to stay with them again.)

We dared to ford rivers on the slowly deteriorating road, but opted to stop at the swing bridge, rather than taking the road to the bitter end. Sunset was fantastic heading back along Lake Wanaka and we found the 'crib' no problem. We dumped our stuff, then headed into town to eat. None of our picks worked out, so we took a recommendation from a local and went to The Cow - and were so glad we did. Had a wood-fired pizza in an old stone stable building with lots of charm and a great crowd. Our hosts had made it from Milton by the time we got home so we enjoyed the evening and all went on a walk on the Clutha River the next morning before we headed to the west coast.

Just after this stop overlooking Lake Hawea (above) we were detained by several hundred sheep in the road, a typical NZ hazard. Sarah about had a coronary because she is so in love with sheep - New Zealand had already been a dream come true without this little gift. We took video and slowly made our way through the herd. Maybe now is a good time for Sarah's favorite souvenir (that she didn't buy) in Queenstown.

Over Haast Pass New Zealand decided to obey its expected climate and it began to rain in the rain forest - imagine that. It helped us make progress toward the glaciers without too much stopping and, as our luck continued, the rain held off for our walks up to Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers. We appreciated the novelty of coastal glaciers at this low latitude and continued up the coast, enjoying our rain-soaked scenery until hitting Greymouth for the night. We stayed in one of my favorite hostels, full of african art and bright paint on every available surface. With our fast pace, it was a welcome comfort to just relax.

We visited Punakaiki the next morning and enjoyed the beautiful drive between Greymouth & Westport that is so reminiscent of the Oregon coast. Took a new route across the north end of the Southern Alps, aiming toward Kaikoura on the east coast.

Lewis Pass was nice - we had an interesting lunch stop in Reefton, took a short alpine hike near the St James track, and checked out Hanmer Springs and Mt Lyford Village on the way. The inland road (a 'shortcut' from the Waiau River to Kaikoura) was unexpected - both in length and beauty.

Kaikoura, the Homer of New Zealand

We stayed at a quaint old post office and telephone exchange in Kaikoura - now the Albatross hostel. Kaikoura bore a bizarre resemblance to Homer. We reveled in the sunny day, hiked around the peninsula, kayaked with Matty, and seal-spotted. We unfortunately learned of our Grandpa Beggs' death that day, so just had a quiet afternoon & evening and were glad to have each other's company. That night we turned in early and were woken up at 4am to the town's emergency siren blaring. We'd heard a siren the day before and learned that all ER services were volunteer, so this was a common (daily) occurence. We didn't worry until Sarah bolted up and told me to open my eyes and look at the window. It was bright orange and dancing with flames!!! I jumped out of bed and opened the shades to see a huge conflagration one house away. It was the historic district court house (above). And the fire was in no way contained. We got on our shoes and waited. After about an hour the volunteer fire fighters had it reasonably under control, but we were plenty rattled and didn't sleep much more before an early exit the next morning.

We drove up the coast to Picton to meet our afternoon ferry across Cook Strait to Wellington - a scenic drive along rocky, seal-infested coastline and marlborough wine country. The weather held for a smooth crossing and we got into Wellington just as the sun was setting and adding its glow to the buildings that climb the hills along the harbour. We hopped on a train to my place and dragged our bags down the path to my house under a nearly full moon reflecting on the inlet. A nice introduction to the north island for Sarah!

The next day we just hung out in my neighborhood, recovering from our manic pace. We had beautiful weather for a beach walk on Mana Harbour and the weather continued through the next day, which we spent exploring Wellington. We capped off a long day in the city with night walk in Karori Park, where we listened to kiwi mating calls and stalked nocturnal birds, lizards & insects for a few hours - very fun!

For our last weekend together we decided to head to Taranaki, just to let Sarah see another part of the North Island. We took the Forgotten World highway from Taumarunui to Stratford - a winding surprise of gorges, native forests, double-rainbows and the north island's tallest waterfall (which we hiked to in the dark). We stayed at the foot of Mt Taranaki - Egmont Village, in a hostel that we would find ourselves locked inside the next morning! No one was around to help us get out, so we climbed out the window.

Sarah's final day in New Zealand began (after the hostel escape) with a loop through New Plymouth, down the surf highway, and a visit to cape egmont lighthouse before we finally gave up on seeing the mountain (still shrouded in cloud). We made the best of the trip home, though, with a lunch stop in Whanganui and extended play time in Kowhai Park, with it's amazing equipment (just wait 'til you see the octopus!). I'll be sure to upload the album of our park photo shoot, but for now, here we are in mother hubbard's shoe.

Well that's as good of a farewell as we could manage - we made it back to Wellington with enough time for a couple hours at Te Papa before Sarah's evening flight. After a teary departure, she left me in the shadowlands, Te Ata Whenua. (is that my cheesiest closing, or what?)