Artsy fartsy Nelson

Our next stop was Nelson, it took us a full day to get here, about 8 hours sitting on a coach. 

Unfortunately our few days here didn't start off smoothly. The owner of our hostel 'bug' forgot to pick us up at 7pm so we had to walk a 45 minute walk out of town with our huge backpacks. Luckily it wasn't in the heat of the day and we needed to stretch our legs after that long coach journey. 

We finally made it to the hostel and the only thing on our minds was 'why did we decide to book into a hostel this far out of town' it was surrounded by a primary school, residence housing and an industrial estate. nothing particularly appealing at all. Then, Cj remembered it being rated the best quality hostel in New Zealand. To be fair, the hostel was pretty good, really clean, had good wifi and one of our cheapest. We stayed in an 8 man  dorm. We both ended up with a top bunk. We didn't have our best nights sleep here as being in a 8 man dorm normally means  you are not far from your next door neighbours feet. It was a cozy room had a few snorers, along with it being pretty stuffy.

Dorm room aside, we woke from our first night not feeling totally refreshed but ready to check out Nelson. 

We did the art walk. This is basically following the map around the town to each numbered destination. These were craft shops and galleries  by local artists. It was actually really interesting, watching them work and seeing loads of cool handmade things. One of the shops 'jen hansen' was a jewellers. This is where the one ring from the lord of the rings was made. The rings were displayed on the counter. I even got to try a couple on, a tad out of my price range though. 

(Nelson high school...posh!)

This artsy walk was a little boring for Cj, but he did take a shine to one particular craft shop...the handmade soap boutique. This was because they made the genius beer soap. Made with and smelt of different kinds of beers. 

The next day was another exciting day for Cj as we were visiting the famous Nelson Saturday morning market. It wasn't anything on Asia's amazing markets but it was pretty cool. We ended our day with a cheap veggy pasta dish that we cooked in the hostel kitchen before making our way back into town to watch the American Sniper in the cinema. As we don't have the luxury of a TV, and because cinemas are a hell of a lot cheaper then in England, we have been making the most of the cinema's abroad when wanting to avoid our hostel and spending lots of money on alcohol in the evenings.

The next  day (our last) was a quiet one. It was raining and didn't start off too well as i realised i'd some how lost my really cool bright pinky/red mac. Cj was happy but i was pretty annoyed as i managed to get that for a bargain price and now had to buy another one (they are not cheap in New zealand) and it was pouring with rain all day. we originally wanted to go on a day trip to Abel Tasman national park. In the end we decided not to as if was quite expensive and we knew it was going to rain. 

The rain did eventually ease off so we decided to head into town. We had seen everything in Nelson so we thought we'd just go to the cinema again as we wanted to watch the film Wild. We arrived at the cinema and it seemed everyone had the same rainy day idea. The cinema was fully booked for the rest of the day. This meant one thing...to the pub. So we spent the rest of the day in one of Nelson's locals.

A foxy few days on the mountains

The drive from lake wanaka to Franz Josef was about 5 hours. It was in a mini bus on winding roads through the mountains. Again, some very good views. The driver was crazy, he seemed to be in a rush, he was as bad as the drivers in Laos on the mountains. 

The bus stopped at a place called Fox glacier to let people off. Cj and i looked at each and thought 'sh*t'. we stopped right outside the Guided Fox company building where we where doing our glacier tour. We didn't realise fox glacier was a place we could get off the bus and stay at. So we drove on about another 30mins to Franz Josef where we were due to get off and had booked our hostel. We had to do a bit of thinking as we had no idea how we were going to get to fox glacier for our tour. The town is tiny, about 20 shops/cafes/ buildings on the main strip, so we knew there would be no public transport between the two towns. This tour cost us about £200 already so we didn't really want to spend a lot of money getting to the tour when we shouldn't have needed to. so after speaking to the locals our options were...

1. Change the fox glacier tour to a franz Josef tour (turns out they are run by different companies so this wasn't an option, we also chose Fox because of its reviews, so we didn't want to do Franz)

2. Stay 1 night in Franz Josef, then move to Fox the next day for 2 nights (this meant we had to pay double on one night as our hostel in Franz would only let us off on our 3rd night)

4. We found out there was a $20 mini bus that leaves Franz for fox at 8am and back from fox at 3:30pm. We couldn't book this bus, and we may miss the 3:30 bus back so this seemed too risky. 

5. Book a mini bus with our hostel owners friend, Murray for $30. 

We chose option number 5 and booked murray to pick us up at 9am then bring us back once the tour had finished. The hostel was nice and had free yummy soup in the evenings and free breakfast so we didn't really want to leave. 

It actually worked out better in the end as staying in the wrong place meant that we got to see two glaciers. On our 2nd day we walked to the Franz Josef Glacier valley. It was a hot day so it was strange seeing the ice forming up to the mountains. It was about a 2.5 hour walk one way to the glacier from our hostel. We stopped off at a waterfall. The valley where the glacier used to be was really cool to see. The glacier is disappearing back so we were lucky to see the top of it. 

We got back to our hostel in time for free soup and i found a shop that sold coconut cadburys chocolate, only in family size form but i still managed to eat it all. 

We were sharing our dorm room with a german lady in her 30's, she seemed to love getting tucked up in bed by 8pm every night, so every time we entered the dorm room for bed (not even late) we'd have to stumble around in the dark trying to find our toothbrushes. 

The next day we packed our warm clothes (not Cj) and met murray for our lift to the fox glacier. We arrived at the fox building over an hour early for our helihike tour so we had a coffee. 

We checked in and were given the low down on the refund policy as there was a cloud over the mountain. If the helicopter cant land then it means we wouldn't have been able to do the tour. We were given waterproof jackets and were given the go ahead so we made our way to the coach which took is to the helicopter. 

At the helicopter port we were given our special boots, backpacks and instructions for the helicopter. The helicopter flight to the glacier was fun. I got to sit at the front next to the pilot. Its a lot smoother than a plane and you just rise. Its really cool seeing the view and it flew quite close to the trees on the mountain. 

We landed on the glacier and we were greeted by our tour guides. A native Kiwi and a British guy. They gave us our crampons and we made our way over the ice. It was quite easy to walk if you dig your crampons in flat footed. We were guided round the ice caves and over mini waterfalls. The glacier has formed in the mountain valley from the cold air, snow and water. 

We didn't walk all the way up the glacier as over a certain point humans have never walked. It wasnt cold but the air was quite bitter and the ice is obviously wet and freezing so when you go in the ice caves you get dripped on. We drank some of the pure water and it was icy and fresh.

The experience was amazing. Climbing the glacier is definitely a highlight of mine. The view was incredible and it was really fascinating seeing ice cravats (we had to step carefully around these as if you fall down them its a horrible death), streams, caves, waterfalls and ice formations. 

This glacier is also reseeding up the mountain due to global warming. 

After our 3 hour trek around the glacier we hopped back into the helicopter. I got to sit in the front again (it is because I'm small). They did squeeze 7 people into the helicopter. 

A picture taken in 1930 and 2015

Throw back Thursday (in NZ). Where are Cj's flip flops now?

As we leave January and enter February we are beginning to  realise we only have roughly 2 months left:/

So we have already started to reminisce about the time we spent in Asia. We have decided to write a throw back blog post as we remember some real gems, which we don't think we have necessarily mentioned in our blog or really went into a lot of detail.

1. We joined a game of spoons in Laos. Cj started the game off with luck whilst i lost the first few rounds and had to do a few shots. We joined two people which later turned into 8 of us (an american, english, dutch and germans) It's a card game that involves spoons and drink.  It turned into a pre-drink as we moved onto Sukura bar for a free drink after spoons.

2. The people we travelled with in Vietnam. We met these guys (1 guy and 3 girls from England) at our first stop Hanoi as they were staying in our dorm room. We ended up following each other down the coast so we met up in Hue and Hoi 'an with a few nights out. 

3. Dance off on pub street. A local Cambodian was pulling off some dance moves and Cj pushed me to challenge him so i pulled out a scorp (cheer move) he didnt even try and attempt.

4. Table dancing on pub street

5. Cj's dance pal in Cambodia

6. Weird icecream thing that i bought in Laos, it turned out to be just ice we also made this mistake in japan too. 

7. The day Cj chopped his beard off in Bali (it's ok, he's growing it again)

8. Eating a scorpion on Koh San road, Thailand. 

9. Moped taxi  scare on our way to the club in Hoi an. Everyone suddenly veered off in different directions, including us. Apparently its to avoid suspicious police. 

10. Cj getting his first tattoo in Singapore and meeting the lovely Jen who was his tattooist. 

11. Getting caught in the rain in Penang malaysia. We had no coats and we were wearing flip flops. We ran across the road and i stacked it with a skid and ripped my trousers:( 

12. Cj's parasol moment in Malaysia. It was raining so we asked our hostel in Mallaka for an umbrella. The guy gave Cj a huge parasol so we had to walk round town with it.

13. Hard rock cafe dinner in Mallaka. 

14. My first time riding a moped. 

15. Cj's size 5 stolen flip flops. He looked like an idiot in size 5's so i have them. 

16.  My trainer mare. I bought some knock off Nikes in China to replace the one's i came with, i threw them and now i have some cheap crappy one's i bought for £2 in malaysia. My feet are more worse off now. 

17. Cj's knock off Brietling watch from Cambodia which looks good but stopped working after a few hours

18. Sam's horrendous long bus journey from kampong cham to Siem reap (dodgy stomach from some dodgy food)

19. Seven eleven banana bread

20. The dogs of bali. They are so territorial that they literally  ran after us growling until we past a certain point, everyday. 

21. The couple who weren't a couple that we befriended whilst tubing in Laos. 

22. Beer pong in Laos

23. Arriving at the club on koh san road half hour before it closes and trying so hard to stay in the club until the last possible moment. (curfew) 

24. Sam making jewelery on the bus from malaysia to Singapore

25. And lastly, Cj's flip flops

Where are they now. He's lost 5 pairs which include knock off's and stolen one's. How he loses them is a mystery, but on many occasions he's walked home shoeless. 

Kayaking on Lake Wanaka

So, as mentioned in my earlier post. We missed our bus from Queenstown to lake Wanaka by standing at the drop off place rather then the pick up. 

Luckily for us lake wanaka is only an hour from Queenstown, so we knew we'd somehow be able to get there easily. The risky thing was that we needed to be at the lake for 1pm. I had booked a kayak hire for 1pm cheap on the book me website. 

We went into mcdonalds to use the wifi and search for a possible bus option and soon realised we'd just missed the connect bus and the next one was at 3pm. This meant we would miss our kayaking:( or we could try and hitch hike our way there. (very popular thing in NZ, you see loads of backpackers standing on the side of roads waiting for a ride to stop)

We decided to leave mcdonalds and try our luck at a travel agents. Then Cj, spots the connect bus stop man just outside. We asked him for advice and he told us the bus literally just left for wanaka and that he can try and stop it for us. Luckily for us, he managed to get the mini van to stop up the road and wait for us. We were willing to pay to get the bus but we were a bit worried about how much it was going to cost out of our weekly budget. It turned out it was only $30, which wasn't too bad considering he stopped the bus for us and wanaka was an hour away. We hopped on another bus for free to take us to where the mini van was waiting for us. Then our journey begun only an hour behind schedule.

We arrived in lake Wanaka to see its a very small town that literally just circles half the lake (the lake is huge). Its again very pretty though and the surrounding mountains are a lot closer then in queenstown so we can see more real scale. 

We dropped our bags off at the hostel as it was too early to check in to our dorm room. We were staying at the YHA purple cow. We knew YHA (youth hostel association accredited) hostels had a good reputation and were supposed to be very nice but we have not yet stayed in one. In Australia they were always the most expensive hostels. This hostel was the poshest we've stayed in so far. The kitchen was big, convenient and very clean. The lounge area had a huge window looking over the mountains and there was a TV room playing movies in the evenings. 

We had lunch and made our way to the lake. We found the wanaka kayak marquee and got kitted into a life jacket and a little lesson on the kayak (more for Cj as he had pedals to steer the kayak with, which we haven't come across in a kayak before, posh kayak!) i originally only booked an our on book me for about £8 each (instead of £16) but looking at the size of this lake, we decided to book an extra hour as it takes an hour to get to the island we wanted to kayak to. 

And we're off. Paddling our way to the island in the middle. It was a hot sunny day so perfect weather to be in a freezing fresh water lake. I'll admit that Cj and his muscles got us to the island. I was too busy playing with the go pro to get on the paddles as much as i should have. But on the way back i put some arm work into it. We stopped at the island and hopped off the kayak (trying not to capsize in the process) the water was freezing so i got back in the kayak. 

We made it back to the beach in time for the end of our 2 hour session. We actually accidentally managed to get that 2nd hour free. It was a different guy that check us back on to land and he didn't ask for the extra payment and we forgot to mention it as we paid online with book me. Oops!

We headed back to our hostel to check in to our room. As i mentioned before, YHA hostels are very nice and we where gutted we were only staying in lake wanaka for 1 night. Our room was very posh, it had an en suite bathroom and a kitchenette and modern bunk beds. The TV room had 8mile movie on at 8pm so after our dodgy microwave dinner that we picked up in the supermarket we watch that film with a few others from the hostel. 

It was an early night ready for another early morning bus to Franz Joseph. 

A lil ski town called Queenstown and Milford Sound

Queenstown is a lil ski town, so it's surrounded by pretty snowy mountains and a lake in the middle. The buildings are mostly chalets and all  of the pubs and cafe's have log fires. 

Since being in New Zealand, Cj and myself have been wondering where all the young kids are. We have been one of the youngest in most of our hostels so far. We soon realised that they are all in Queenstown. It's definitely a more vibrant, loud, buzzing place then the rest of the south island. 

Our hostel had an amazing view as it was on top of the hill leading out of the town centre. A lot of workers where staying at the hostel (mostly loud mouth British lads) so it was quite clique. We met an odd but very friendly and outgoing Israeli couple and many germans. The hostel was pretty young and loud. We stayed in a dorm room for 1 night and managed to somehow bag a budget private room for only $3 more then the price of a dorm bed, so we stayed in there for 5 nights. Yes, we were staying in Queenstown for a week as it was recommended. 

On our first day the alarm went off at 7am. I got up and showered and i was sure i woke Cj up but to my surprise i came back from the shower to see him still sleeping. So, i had to wake him and warn him that he had 20mins before we had to leave. So, a moody Cj left the hostel un-washed, no hair gel and wearing the same clothes as yesterday. 

All of this was soon forgotten as we made it to the pier for 8am. Ready to board the boat for our paraflight over the lake. New zealand has loads of cheap deals on things like this off a website called book me. It means you may have to do these crazy things at 8am but its over half price. 

We were first up on the parachute so we got kitted up and put 600 metres into the air. Its not scary at all as its very smooth and you just look out into the mountains across the lake. Its a spectacular view. 

Lucky for me, i brought a woolly hat the day before as i was cold and i got it for a tour later on. Thankfully i brought it with me on the para flight because it was bloody freezing in the air. Definitely worth it though. It was also, finally a bright sunny day so the sky looked good.  

After our para flight we warmed up in a local cafe and got some breakfast. After a walk around the town, we headed back to our hostel to check-in to our private room. 

We spent the rest of the day chilling in the hostel garden.

Day 2, ended up being an admin day. We have nothing planned or booked in for Fiji and America so we needed a day to sort it out, otherwise it'll get too late and we'll have a problem. So, we planned our american route, and the cheapest option for Fiji. Turns out Fiji is pretty expensive unlike Asia.

Day 3. We were up at 5:45am to get into town for 6:45. We were going on a Milford Sound tour today. Mitre Peak is the company we decided to book with as we'd heard some good things about them by talking to people. Apparently its a much smaller boat then the other companies. The tour cost us $175 so it was one of our big one's for New Zealand. We hopped on the specially made coach at 6:45 ready for a 4 hour drive to Milford. The coach is like a conservatory. Glass walls and a glass roof. This is because the views to milford sound are one of the highlights. We drove through the Fiord-lands, up mountains. Through tunnels carved out of the slate rock and over streams with waterfalls. First we drove 2 hours to a town called Te Anau to pick some people up and grab a coffee. After this, the next 2 hour drive was the one to stay awake for. The views were breathtaking. This country is very, very pretty. The tops of the mountains were covered in snow so i reckon in winter it's even prettier. 

About an hour into the journey we stopped at a mirror lake. The reflection was so clear, you can see the mountains both ways in the pics. 

We then drove through moss forest and alleys of mountains. I wish we could have filmed the whole journey but we were saving the cameras battery for the cruise.

Whilst the driver was on the microphone telling us all about the place, i noted down some of the key bits of information.

So we drove through/past...

- the divide stream, we were on the east side. This stream flows into the tasman sea.

-lake Ferguson

- Hollyford valley

-Mount Christina

-we drove through the 1952 rock tunnel

-Cleardale Valley

-through beach/moss forest

He also told us that milford sound is the 2nd wettest place on earth. 

We finally arrived to Milford sound after that journey. We got off the coach and made our way to the Mitre Peak cruise boat. Everybody was correct. Our boat was half the size compared to the other 2 companies moored up.  We situated ourselves right at the front of the boat outside. This is because if there was any chance of seeing dolphins i wanted to be at the front. We set off through the fiords on either side of us. It was pretty cool seeing the tall slate fiords with waterfalls next to us. 

We went past a colony of seals chilling on rocks. Our boat got pretty close. A little while later we spotted dolphins racing to our boat to chase us in front. I love watching dolphins play with the boats. These were bottle nose and they were big. Double the size of the dusky's we saw in Kaikoura. One did a back flip which was really cool to see. 

We sailed on to the end of the fiords. After an hour we head back. On the way we saw a pretty cool waterfall. The tour guide told us that we were going to get quite close to the waterfall so we may get wet. Luckily i had my mac already on and the go pro out ready for some waterfall action. The spray was pretty cold as it was water from the mountains. After a while in the spray, the boat just kept getting closer to this waterfall. We were starting to get pretty wet at this time. I turned and headed in doors as the boat was heading under this waterfall. Cj, was slightly slower then the rest of us who dived indoors so he was last in and only had his hoody on. Yes, we had to ring his hoody out. He got very wet. 

Luckily the sun was out so he stayed in the sun for the rest of the cruise to dry out. 

Once the cruise had finished we got back on our coach and headed back to Queenstown. We didn't get back until about 7pm so it was a pretty long day. 

Day 4. We went on a little stroll around the lake and botanical gardens. We pretty much just chilled by the lake and on the beach on this day. In the evening we pre-drunk with a game of go fish and headed out to town. We'd heard that the place to go was cowboys. So we went down the lil pub lanes to this chalet/ski style bar. It was good. There was a bucking bronko indoors that a few people tried out. We decided not to stay here as there was no dance floor, so after a few bevvies we left to find a more dancing place (more for me) we found a pub with a band playing and then a pretty terrible Dj. It was a fun place though. Had a good vibe. 

Day 5. Our last day and our one mission on this day was to get a FergBurger. They are famous and the queue to this place was always up the street. So they must be good. I chose a chicken, mango and chilli burger whilst Cj chose the Mr big. Cj is a huge burger fan and I'm not so much, but omg, this burger was amazing. The best thing ever. I don't know how they do it but it tasted good. They were not over priced either. 

For the evening we were umming and arring as to whether go out. It was a really nice, hot day, a saturday and the town had a huge vibe so we got the feeling that it was going to be a good night. Cj was knackered (getting old) but we decided to get some ciders and hit Whinnies. This club was good, very busy. 

We woke the next morning, ready to catch our bus to lake wanaka. 

This was the first time in all of the transport we have taken that we officially had a mare. First of all, 10mins before our bus was due to arrive Cj realised he left his tablet jn the room. So he ran back for it. Then, the other guys waiting for the bus too, came to me asking of we are standing at the right place for the bus. This is where we got dropped off so i assumed it was but it was 8:40am and the bus wasn't here. Alarm bells started ringing to the group of us as we realised we were standing in the wrong location. They all left to see if they could catch the bus whilst i stayed and waited for Cj.

Once he arrived we ran to the correct place to see if we could catch it. We saw the other guys standing at the bus stop so we knew we'd missed it:(

When we post up the next post, we'll reveal how we managed to make it to lake wanaka on time.