For 99% of the time, this travelling lark has been wonderful, but there have been some lows too. Several of the bus journeys in Vietnam and Lao were very long and, at times, it started to get boring just looking at the beautiful scenery through the window of the coach; your mind begins to drift and you start to miss family and friends, as well as some home comforts. Those bus journeys were a breeze compared to the flights from Zanzibar to New Zealand. Five separate flights, covering about 12,000 miles, over three continents, 10 time zones and 40 hours actual travelling time is draining in the extreme. All the air-conditioned air makes you feel grotty, you get very little proper sleep because of the cramped planes and changing time zones, sitting down all the time leaves you longing for some physical exercise and there is nobody to talk to. On top of this was that the last fresh air I encountered was twenty degrees warmer, so my trip to New Zealand was not the most pleasant experience. At least I managed a bit of retail therapy at Singapore airport to get a new pocket camera to replace the one broken in Zanzibar!
Another of the low points is that, with meeting so many people, you have to say a lot of goodbyes, and I have never been particularly good at goodbyes. Some of them, in the case of Zanzibar, have had to be said twice! Despite having the best intentions, I am sure that some of the future rendezvous that have been arranged will never take place and, a few years down the line, I will start to forget the names of some of the faces in my photos. Thank god for Facebook!
Travelling alone is ideal in many ways, as it forces you to meet new people and, overall, I am glad to have undertaken this trip alone. Most of the people I have met have been great and I'm not sure I would have met them all, or at least spent as much time with them, if I was travelling with a companion. However, sometimes you want to share your experiences with somebody as it would provide somebody you can talk to on the long journeys, moan to when things or other people get on your nerves, give you the excitement of planning together, and you get to share the special moments with somebody.
But, as I said, for the vast majority of the time the travelling has been great and these low moments are few and far between, so back to the travelling and let's see what New Zealand has to offer...
Arrival and Christchurch
The final flight of my monster journey was from Sydney to Christchurch and we were lucky to have clear skies throughout, which gave me my first sight of Mt Cook. It is easy to see why the mountain range is called the Southern Alps, as there is a clear resemblance to their European counterparts. The mountains then gave way to the vast Canterbury plains which, with their patchwork of fields, could easily be mistaken for England.
On arriving at the airport, I didn't have any hostel booked so a quick visit to the tourist information beckoned and 60 minutes later I was in jail! Staying in a recently converted prison was a bit of a novel experience; it was all very clean and modern, but the rooms (well, cells) were a bit cramped! Think of the rooms at the Euston Travelodge, but a bit nicer!
Christchurch itself is a beautiful garden city that had been decimated by the earthquake last February. The river that runs through the city, and the large trees that line its banks, seems to have been unaffected, but in the centre, which is still closed, the place is a building site and you can see all the cracks in the paving and buildings where they were damaged. I never thought I would think of a McDonald's as being poignant, but there are still meals discarded in the ruined outlet, left where they fell ten months ago, and it brings home just how sudden the earthquake strike must have been.
My body clock seems to have been a bit messed up by the long journey, so for the first few days I hardly slept, which at least gave me a chance to wander the streets of the city in the early morning when they were practically deserted. The Occupy Christchurch camp must have one of the most pleasant settings for a protest, and I had a bit of a chat with some of the occupiers, but I bet it gets a bit cold at night. In fact, coming from the tropical climes of Zanzibar, I know it does! Seeing as I am heading to the glaciers next, I think buying some warmer clothes may well prove one of the best ideas I have had on the trip. As well as the river, the parks also seem to be relatively unscathed and you can easily see how beautiful the city must have been before the earthquake. As it is, having walked through the town in the morning, there was very little else to do (I had had enough of markets after Asia!), so I spent the day planning the rest of my trip around the island - quite an expensive way to pass the time!
I've been near the equator for the past four months or so, and it was strange when it passed 6.30 and there was still daylight. As pretty as the city is, there is an element of Jekyll and Hyde about its character. The prison/hostel was in the suburb of Addington and the bars surrounding my hostel were rough; so rough, I struggled to resist the temptation to count the fingers on the locals! Having said that, they were very friendly and I whiled away a few hours chatting with some strangers - so maybe it is just me: I do have a habit of picking out the biggest dives in any place I go to!
Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers
The following day, I took the transalpine train to Greymouth, through the Southern Alps, passing first through Canterbury plains (and, it has to be said, thousands of sheep!) and then through various tunnels and over several viaducts. At the start of the ride, the scenery is pretty (with the broken river gorge especially nice), but not massively different to the Lake District, Wales or Scotland. Trying to take a photo that does justice to the views was tricky, as it is the scale which is most impressive, so I put the camera away and soaked up the views (which also gave me the chance to leave the outdoor viewing platform and return to the warmth of the carriage!). However, as we headed further west, passing by Waimakariri river (more of a stream in these summer months), the peaks started to get higher and more impressive and you start to realise why the journey is described as one of the most picturesque train rides in the world. After passing Arthur's Pass (which probably has one of the nicest views from a railway station in the world) and Otira tunnel (10 minutes and a 1,000 feet descent) the peaks start to get more angular and rugged, as erosion hasn't had as long to smooth all the edges (the range was still under a glacier 20,000 years ago), and the rest of the four hour journey provided gorgeous view after gorgeous view.
I didn't stay long in Greymouth before boarding a bus down to the glaciers, with the journey south snaking along the narrow strip of coast between the mountains and the sea. We had a quick pit stop at Hokitaki, where the black sand on the beach provides a reminder of the power of the glaciers we are travelling to, but other than in that small town there was hardly any other traffic.
Franz Josef is a tiny place. It basically has two streets, one shop, a handful of bars/cafes, and lots of tour companies organising trips to the glacier. I arrived late afternoon and having checked into my hostel, by late afternoon plus 15 minutes, I'd finished exploring the town so went for a few drinks with a couple of guys from the hostel.
The next morning, I jumped aboard a helicopter which flew up and over the face of the glacier, with some great views of all the crevasses and weird ice formations along the top. We landed on the ice, put on our crampons, and spent the morning hiking around the ice flow. It was very impressive and good fun, climbing along the narrow gaps in the ice, sliding through tunnels and walking under the caves. I had always thought that blue ice was more of an optical illusion than anything else, but in fact it really is blue and some of the colours on the glacier were amazing. Although we were walking on a river of ice, it was hot: the hiking took place only about 800m above sea level where the glacier carves its way through the rainforest that lines the slopes of the valley, and the sun was beating down on us, which in a place where they get up to seven meters of rain a year was a bit of a blessing.
In the afternoon, I managed to cadge a lift off Sarah to visit Fox Glacier: a very picturesque town, nestled on the slopes of the mountains 30 minutes south of Franz Josef. However, rather than go to the glacier, we went for a walk around Lake Matheson. On a good day, the lake is mirror-like and the reflection of Mt Cook and Mt Tasman in the lake us one of the iconic images of NZ. The day we went, there was a slight breeze, which was enough to make small ripples on the surface and, together with the clouds in front of the two main mountains, it was sufficient to prevent the picture perfect image. It was, nonetheless, stunning, as you would expect from a lake recently voted in the top 12 most beautiful in the world (although I'm never sure who votes in these things; I've never been asked and I doubt that all the judges have seen Pennington Flash, so perhaps we should have a re-count...!) Sarah did try to make a few more ripples by dangling her feet in the water, but soon took them out when a massive eel came to investigate! The drive back to Franz Josef followed the same winding road which made getting out of third gear difficult, which was fortunate, because third was the only gear that Sarah's car had!
Later in the evening, we went to the hot pools to soak away the aches from the day's hikes and then hit the bars. You know it is a small place if a pub crawl can take you to every bar in town and still leave you sober.
After the glaciers, it was time to board another bus to head further south. Next stop (and next blog): Queenstown, adrenaline capital of the world.
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