Foxy and Franzy

In a country that so far seems to have every geoogical formation, it should be no shock that there are 2 glaciers about 25 km apart on the west coast. And of course both being glaciers, we had to make some comparisons.

Fox Glacier: We first visited Fox Glacier, the more southern of the two. We did a steep 2 hour climb through lovely native bush with sharp turns across steams, until we got our first drmatic glimpse of the glacier about half way up the mountain. The ultimate lookout point was great, with views of the entire valley left by the receding glacier ringed by sheer cliffs that looked how we imagined Yosemite may have looked 100,000 years ago. Pictures don't adequately capture how steep the ice wall is--its terminal face gives a sense of how the ice chews away the rock. The face is pretty grey--brown, kind of like dirty snow, which I guess it technically is, but above are cathedral-spire blue peaks. On the walk to the actual terminal face of the glacier, we were flanked by masive rock falls that fanned out along the edge of the valley.

Interlude: After our Fox hikes, we decide to squeeze in another hike to nearby Gillespie Beach to see an abandon gold mining operation and a not-abandoned seal colony. We learned a valuable lesson here--carefully study the trail map before setting out. If you don't, you'll end up on a deserted beach walking towards a point for over an hour before turning back convinced this can't actually be a trail, especially as it would be washed away at high tide. Having said that, the pounding surf and the desolation of the place made the walk worth it. Upon returning to the beginning of the trail, we learned that we just needed to walk around the point to reach the miners' tunnel and seal colony. Heavens to Mergatroid!

Franz Joseph Glacier: The first difference we noticed was that Franz was much more visible from the town and seemed larger, stretching back further into the mountains than Fox. We began our exploration by hiking to a viewpoint at the opposite end of the valley. The valley created by Franz is more narrow with less rock falls, but covered with cool red rocks. On our second hike, the approach walk, the glacier was in view the whole time. There's more consistent aquamarine ice, but it lacked Fox's impresive peaks.

So in the final glacial show-down, there is no clear winner--you just have to see them both.

-K & D

You Can Drive a Bus and Give a Commentary

Our very first organized tour was amazing, and probably set an example that will be hard to follow, in large part because of our bus driver Max. To understand the genius of Max, you may need to be familiar with ex-DC United Coach and now color commentator for the spanish soccer league, Ray Hudson.

To give a taste of the Hudson flair for the overdramatic, the following is an example from a Barcellona match we watched recently, where a player made a run for goal, but didn't score:

Ray: Put that boy in handcuffs and a set of shackles...put that boy in a safe...put that safe on a ship...sail that ship into the middle of the ocean...then sink that ship...and the boy would still get out!!!

Keep in mind that the match was still in progress and that the other commentator was trying to talk about what was happening on the field.

OK, now on to our bus driver, Max. To give some more context, Max is a middle-aged guy who grew up on the South Island and became interested in the environment as a young boy of eight, running through the bush at night with a knife and his trusty dog, hunting possums and pigs. As an introduction to an eco-tour focused on the birdlife and geology of Fiordland, we were already impressed.

At our first stop at the Te Anu Birdlife Sanctuary, I couldn't help but crib some notes, and so now present,

'Max's Guild to Birdlife in New Zealand':
Takahe: An endangered flightless bird with a distinctive red beak. When hand-raised, they use a special glove that looks like a takahe, otherwise they found the birds will fall in love with the human hand that feeds them. They can become quite mental.
Kea: NZ's naughtiest bird. World's only alpine parrot and the only bird that can store fat. Smart as dophins. They'll take apart a car in minutes, probably because they're interested in the mechanics. They probably like jazz, too. If you got mad at a kea and wanted to strangle it, you couldn't, they're protected by law...And they know it.
Kaka: Related to the kea, but less naughty. They can still be a bit cheeky.
Tui--NZ's cheekiest bird. They an imitate the call of all 3,000 bird species in NZ. You'll recognize them from the beer label (NZ's 'Milwaukee's Best' is called Tui).

Other interesting facts we learned from Max:
-Shania Twain just purchased one of the largest sheep operations on NZ. She also has a crush on Max.
-On multi-tasking: "Women always say men can't multi-task. Peter Jackson can direct 3 different films in 3 locations at the same time, you can drive a bus and give a commentary, you can iron the clothes and watch the baby."

So not only did we see some amazing sights and learn a bit, we got treated to the incredible storytelling of Max. Thanks!

The Ecstasy of Life in a Van

Just a quick note on our van, Delicious V. Delicious has brought us to the west coast of the South Island and found, with a little help from us, the best free night of camping ever. The picture above is from the back of the van.
-K & D

Te Anu to Queenstown, Wanaka, and Beyond

Queenstown is the place we thought we were going to go for a mid-morning to afternoon hike. As the picture above might indicate, we were underwhelmed by the town. The scenery was amazing but it's as if all of the tourism board's energy has been focused on this boomtown. For a rather coarse metaphor, the town is what Vail, CO might vomit up. Every storefront is filled with people wanting to relive you of you NZ dollars and in return show you where the Lord of the Rings was filmed, throw you off of a bridge with a bungie attactched to your ankles, send you skydiving, jet-boating, etc. It was all just a bit much after the relaxed beauty of Fiordland.

After a couple of hours, we decided to move on to Wanaka. The Rough Guide book on NZ described it as a sleepy version of Queenstown, which seemed more to our taste. The town was in fact a wonderful balance, having all of the beauthy without the frantic pace. We spent the afternoon by the lake and decided to try our hand at finding another free night of camping a bit further north.

The search brought us one of the most pleasant surprises of the trip. While not as lauded as much as the rest of the South Island, Mount Aspiring National Park was quite impressive. The area is one of the most remote in NZ, the small highway through its center was only completed in 1995. Though it was late in the day, we squeezed in a few hikes, including our first suspension bridge which led to the blue pools.

P.S. Though the highway was completed in 1995, it still has a ridiculous number of single-lane bridges, each its own adventure in trusting the right-of-way signs.

-K & D

Milford Sound? Milford Awesome

First off, since arriving in NZ, everyone has told us how quickly the weather can change, i.e. it can and probably will turn freezing cold and rain on you at any moment. We've been incredibly lucky so far with weather--almost no rain, sunny, and unseasonably warm so far. However, we ran out of luck on the haul from Dunedin to Te Anu across the southern part of the South Island. The intermittent downpours and unbelievable winds fortunately cleared up as soon as we pulled into the tiny tourist town of Te Anu, which would be our base for exploring Fiordland and the Milford Sound for a couple of days.

On our first night, we took a lovely walk around Lake Te Anu and decided to book a 'coach cruise coach' tour for Milford Sound the next day, partly to avoid driving the intimidatingly narrow and winding road without gas stations along the way. As many good things can be said about 'Delicious V,' fuel economy isn't one of them.

The tour experience had to be an entry in and of itself (see the next entry highlighting our bus driver, Max). Letting someone else do the driving was a nice change of pace and allowed us to view the scenery, like the mountains becoming more severe and beautiful as we approached the fiords. We took a two hour cruise through the Milford Sound, the skipper deftly navigating our small cruise ship close to the sides of the fiords for great views of the flora, the waterfalls, and sunbathing sea lions. We saw some bottle-nose dolphins swimming along with the boat as well. We even got a brief taste of the ocean waters past the sound, before carefully turning around in the choppy waters. The firodland area was the most unique landcape we've seen in NZ so far, and possibly our favorite.
--K & D

A Day in Dunedin

If Auckland is LA, Wellington is San Francisco, and Christchurch is Charleston, SC, then Dunedin has to be Chicago...or maybe Baltimore. When we pulling in and found parking on the edge of the warehouse district and the local cricket oval (?), a Bad News Bears-style cricket match (?) was already in progress, and we felt right at home (sort of).

The city is nestled around a bay--much like Wellington, but much less 'flash' or 'posh' (notice our attempts to blend with the natives and their peculiar dialect). Walking through the warehouse district reminded us of Chicago, and we mean that as a good thing. The town's Scottish heritage plays out in more than just the names of places; it's decidedly blue collar. We enjoyed walking around the central city octagon and finally, having some lunch, and stumbling on the bustling Saturday retail and entertainment district.

The day was capped by a walk to the beach and the chance to watch intrepid wet-suit-wearing surfers making the most of the 3 foot waves at the nearby beach.

-d

What Else Is Between Christchurch and Dunedin?

Thanks for asking! The quick answer is not much. Think sheep, grass, and rolling hills--but that's pretty much the default setting of NZ. The one exception to the least scenic drive we've been on were the Moeraki boulders.

It's hard to imagine that these boulders were made by nature, especially when you look into te hollowed out broken balls on the shore. But we were assured by the signs that they were naturlaly-occurring cyst-like depostis that were eroded and slowly exposed from the hillside.

Perhaps adding to the sci-fi-ness was the fact that we had slept in the parking lot mere steps from the beach and a herd of deer, neither of which we saw when pulling in the night before. Not a bad way to wake up!

-K & D