South Island, New Zealand
Click here for a map of South Island travel route. Click images to see bigger.
Christchurch Cathedral (7211 bytes)
The Cathedral

Canterbury Plains

Wed. 4/29 - Mon. 5/4, 1998: From Brisbane, AU, we arrived in Christchurch, NZ. We had booked a room via the web in the Amross Court Motor Lodge and Russell,the owner, picked us up at the airport on his way home from work. We spent Thurs. 4/30 touring Christchurch and plotting our adventures in the Canterbury area.

Canterbury Plains (9910 bytes)
HO Train Layout?

Fri. 5/1: We took the TranzScenic train from Christchurch on the east coast to Greymouth on the very green west coast. It was a grey, rainy day, but we enjoyed the trip; especially the Jade Boulder Gallery. The next day more than made up for it...a perfect fall day.

Biking in Hanmer (8751 bytes)
Picnic Stop

 Sat. 5/2, 1998: We booked a tour to Hanmer Springs with Brilliant Tours of New Zealand and turned out to be the only two people on it. Malcolm let us pick whatever we wanted to do. So we rented mountain bikes and enjoyed an awesome day riding in the experimental forests there.

Hanmer Springs Thermal Reserve (8259 bytes)
Aaahhhhhh.......

 Before we left we took a soak in the Hanmer Springs Thermal Reserve. It was a really nice facility with crystal clear, HOT water. Very soothing after the bike riding! We had another lovely afternoon tea break on the way back to Christchurch.
Whale Watching (5334 bytes)
Wow, Sperm Whales
(But we wanted dolphins....)		 Sun. 5/3, 1998: You know how every trip has that one infamous, memorable day? Well, this was it for us. The tour bus neglected to pick us up, so Canterbury Tours rolled an off-duty driver out of bed to drive us (in his own car) over two hours to Kaikoura. Tony was great and got us there as the boat was launching. We jumped on and found it was the wrong boat! So, as we watched whales, Glenn & Lisa scrambled to arrange to get us on the next Dolphin Encounter boat.
Swimming with Dolphins (6559 bytes)
Worth the Wait		 As the Whale Watch boat pulled back onto its trailer, we jumped off, onto another boat, and headed right back out into the harbor to swim with the dolphins. They had held the boat for us and radioed ahead to have wet suits ready. We had a blast jumping in and out of the 56-degree water and seeing dolphins up close & personal.
Dusky Dolphins (6734 bytes)
Dolphins Playing		 The Dusky Dolphins love to ride the bow of the ship. We had a fantastic trip back to the harbor watching them play. Glenn had held the tour bus for us and we hopped on for the ride back to Christchurch. A day that could have been a bust was extraordinary, thanks to some wonderful people! (And lots of Dramamine...)
Helicopter Ride (7762 bytes)
Wow, Snow!

Mon. 5/4, 1998: We took an InterCity Bus from Christchurch south to Queenstown via Lake Tekapo and Mt. Cook National Park where we stopped for a helicopter ride. Again, there were no more than a dozen people on the bus, which made for a relaxed, fun trip. There were the usual morning and afternoon tea breaks and spectacular scenery. Ewan, our driver, was kept busy with commentary, as well as wheeling & dealing room and attraction reservations on his cell phone.
Queenstown (10037 bytes)
From the Gondola at Dusk

Queenstown

Mon. 5/4 - Fri. 5/8, 1998: We arrived in Queenstown in the early evening. Crashed at the Alpine Sun, where Nancy was kind enough to let me use her industrial dryer to finish the load of wet laundry we had hauled with us from Christchurch....
TSS Earnslaw (7150 bytes)
TSS Earnslaw

Tues. 5/5, 1998: We arose at the crack of noon and wandered downtown to see what we could see, which turned out to be a singularly perfect day here at the foot of the Remarkable Mountains. We immediately signed up for a cruise on the beautiful 1912 coal-powered steamer, the TSS Earnslaw.
Walter Peak (6503 bytes)
On Lake Wakatipu

The Earnslaw took us across Lake Wakatipu to the Walter Peak Sheep Station. This was the McKenzie Family's working ranch until the 1960s. Now it's a tour destination to see how it used to be...a lovely place.
Sheep (8337 bytes)
Weaving Possibilities		 I spotted a multitude of weaving possibilities; they spotted a snack. We also saw sheep dogs in action, a shearing and enjoyed afternoon tea in the original homestead. The ride back to Queenstown was fun with Betty's piano music and sing-a-long. In honor of Cinco de Mayo we celebrated with a pitcher of margaritas at Saguaros.
Fiordland National Park (9678 bytes)
Rainforest Tramp		 Wed. 5/6, 1998: We took off on another bus through Fiordland National Park (with many, MANY, other busloads of tourists.) There was time to stop and stretch on the nearly four-hour trip to Milford Sound.
Milford Sound (8013 bytes)
Milford Sound		 We cruised Milford Sound all the way out into the Tasman Sea aboard the "Friendship." It was one of the smaller ships and Capt. Phil & 1st Mate Patrick were great. It was another dry day, unusual for this area which gets about 18 feet of rain per year.
C&B Again (5703 bytes)
Tourists		 We saw fur seals, common dolphins, lots of birds, waterfalls and some gorgeous scenery. An altogether superb, relaxing day.
Lake Te Anau (7200 bytes)
Lake Te Anau		 We passed through Lake Te Anau on the route to Milford and wished we had some extra time to spend here. It's our opinion that the tour bus drivers on this route compete for shortest driving time from Queenstown to Milford; whoever is back in town last has to buy a round or something. Our driver must have come in first today.
The Bungy Jump 1 (6499 bytes)
No brains...		 Thurs. 5/7, 1998: What can I say? If you're gonna do it, might as well do it right at the original TJ Hackett bungy site on the Kawarau Suspension Bridge. Chris took three jumps off this perfectly good bridge.... The Bungy Jump 2 (8376 bytes)
...no headaches!

Leaving Queenstown (9122 bytes)
Lake Wakatipu

 Fri. 5/8, 1998: We left Queenstown (reluctantly) to head to the North Island. Queenstown is definately a tourist town, but when you're a tourist, hey, it's great!
When we left home, we had intended to rent a camper van to see the South Island. But we found we were disoriented by that left-hand side of the road driving thing, even after a couple of weeks of exposure.

Had we been on our own, we would have liked to have seen Haast Pass, the Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers. We would have gone further south to Dunedin and Invercargill and north to Wellington. But, what the heck. We both had a relaxing time letting someone else do the driving. Besides, when the tour bus drivers refer to the rentals as moving roadblocks, you know they'd just as soon have the tourists riding with them, not cluttering up "their" roads.

Being off season, with an exchange rate almost two to one, it wasn't such a big deal to book a bus or flight at the last minute and just go for it. The AA guides we picked up free on our AAA card helped a great deal. Everyone was so overwhelmingly friendly and helpful. It was a fun and spontaneous way to travel; something new for us! We held no expectations and therefore were delighted by most all we did.

On to the North Island of New Zealand.

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