NZ2

Wellington is a pretty nice little city. It's sort of like Bellingham, but 4 or so times as big. Apparently it is almost always windy and cold, but when we were there the weather was great. For the first time in over a year I got to go to an Indian restaurant. It was really nice to have that option. I don't think it was as good as Saddam's place on Roosevelt though. There's a nice pedestrian only street there with a bunch of little restaurants and bars that is well set up. It was so weird to be out in sort of a real city with people walking around at night.




We flew from Wellington to Christchurch next. Apparently, in NZ, the baggage weight limit for domestic flights is half the usual US amount so we got to pay an extra $100 to get our stuff to the South Island. But, whatever... we got there and picked up our car. We tried to get out of Christchurch as soon as possible to make it to a campground around Wanaka. The grocery store we hit before heading out was enormous and we just couldn't get out of there in less than an hour and a half. It is hard to make decisions when you have so many choices. Which kinds of the 50 different kinds of fruit and vegetables you want is much more complicated than deciding if any of the fruit and vegetables are not rotten.

We drove for many, many hours but it was starting to get dark around Twizel. There is a pretty crappy holiday park (like awful, depressing KOAs) in town and no government campgrounds. That's kind of crazy because Twizel is sort of a crappy little place about 5 km from this huge and beautiful lake, Lake Pikaki. At the end of the lake is the tallest mountain in NZ, Mt. Cook. We decided to steal camping if possible but Pixi (the rental car) couldn't make it up the first gravel road we tried. This turned out to be lucky. The next gravel road we tried was right on the lake and even had picnic tables (somewhat rare at campsites in NZ). It ended up being one of the best places we camped the whole time. We were all set to make dinner though when we realized that we didn't have any propane, and of course fires were banned. I'd left the last canister in Wellington because you can't take it on the plane and just forgot to get another one once on the South Island. So we had salami sandwiches and Greek salad; still great.




The next day we drove to Queenstown where it was just pouring down rain. We had lunch, picked up some propane, and headed to Te Anau. It was cold and most of the drive there was through a downpour. After getting our Milford Track passes and leaving Pixi's lights on, we tried to find some accommodations. The holiday parks were just too crappy and depressing, so we decided to drive up to a govt. campground. So after borrowing showers from a hostel in town, we headed to the campsite and this time we actually could cook.

The next day we took the boat down Lake Te Anau

to the start of the Milford Track at Glade House:

The first day of hiking is pretty short and really easy. It is just a 5km walk from the lake up the Clinton River valley:

to the Clinton Hut:

The trail is about 33 miles long over 3 nights. Each night is spent in a hut, so you don't have to pack a tent; that's not even an option and you're required to use the huts so that the number of hikers are limited. 40 people a day are allowed to start the hike unguided and 40 on guided tours. The guided tours come with food and their huts have showers, but it is also about $1500.


The next day you keep heading up the Clinton River valley towards McKinnon Pass, but you don't actually get to the base of the pass climb until the end of the day, so it is a long but pretty easy day.



You gradually climb up the deep glacial valley. There's a short side trip to a waterfall that flows into a lake:

It is a nice walk because all day you are walking by waterfall after waterfall:






Just when it starts to climb a little more, you're to the second hut:

This hut was great. It was cold up there and inside was a small coal stove. We got the fire going and sat around it most of the night and hanging out with other hikers. The next day was supposed to be really hard because with a steep climb to the pass and then a steeper decent.


Movie review:

Darjeeling Limited
Weird, but pretty entertaining. 6.7