“All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware” – Martin Buber
They say you travel the world before your own country which couldn’t be more true. Growing up, we were very fortunate to have summer holidays away at the beach but this was always at the beautiful beaches of the North Island. When I was about 12, we took a winter family trip down to the South Island but apart from that and a few work trips, I haven’t done the great South Island road trip which so many travellers come to NZ to do. So when I saw the Mount Cook marathon, I thought this was the perfect opportunity to visit somewhere I’ve never been before and tag on some south island road tripping.
From our home town of Wellington, we flew into Christchurch and picked up a Jucy rental. With Tekapo as our destination to spend our first night in the Jucy, we stopped short and ended up finding a peaceful camp group in Fairlie. The next day with a full day under our belt to explore, we drove towards Mt Aoraki (Mt Cook) stopping along the way at Lake Tekapo and Lake Pukaki. Lake Tekapo was beautiful, the stillness of the water complimented by the snow capped mountain, I didn’t think it could get much better. That was until we drove over a hill and was struck by the phenomenally, stunning glacial Lake Pukaki – a vast body of turquoise blue water which serves as the foreground to Mt Aoraki.
After the stunning drive, we finally reached the our destination of Mt Aoraki where I was to do my (now) half marathon (following a stress fracture and doctors orders to not to the full marathon). We still had an afternoon for exploring and decided to do the short walk up to Tasman Glacier which is the NZ’s largest glacier and then Hooker Valley. Both of these walks provided us with amazing scenery of snow capped mountains and of course Mt Aoraki – NZ’s highest mountain standing at 3724m. The day was beautiful but we had read the weather forecast for Saturday (run day!!) as windy and rainy. After talking with a few of the locals about the weather, we were to discover that the weather in Mt Cook can change at the drop of a hat therefore I held onto hope that the next day would be okay. We woke up to rain and wind but as 10am drew closer, both of these died down a bit and I was left to run in drizzle and a head wind on the way back. Of course, by the time I had finished the blue skies were back!! All in all a good run and ended up with a finishing time of 1 hour 47 mins and 4th in my age group so was pretty stoked.
We had decided that Saturday night was to be spent in Wanaka – a town that very much reminded us of Taupo in the North Island. We found a somewhat secluded campsite and was fortunate to have a beautiful sunset over the lake. The next day we woke up and chose one of the many walks available around Wanaka to do and were rewarded after 1 1/2 hour hike by panoramic views of Lake Wanaka and Mt Aspiring.
It was now time to hit the famous tourist town of Queenstown – home of adventure tourism!! I had to tick something off the bucket list while we were here and decided to do the Ledge Swing. I never thought I had a fear of heights but watching the guy before me I felt sick to my stomach. As I was being harnessed up, I questioned why I had chosen to do this but there was no backing out – as the staff member told me. What makes the Ledge Swing bad is that you have to pull the pin yourself to release you while dangling over a cliff. As the guy counted down, I knew that if I didn’t do it straight away, I wouldn’t do it. I was expecting a nice gentle swing but alas, I free fell and then swung suddenly, all the while screaming in fear at the top of my lungs. Its safe to say that I will never be doing that again. Apart from all the adventure tourism, Queenstown itself is a lovely town to walk around and home to the famous Ferg Bruger. We had also heard Devil burger was equally as good so of course we had to try both. They were amazing and I can see what all the hype is about.
With Jamie’s job as a Tourism lecturer, he had a pre-planned field trip this week as well. His students arrived on the Tuesday and we all headed to Arrowtown and then Te Anau for the night before seeing one of the most famous tourist attractions in NZ – Milford Sounds. The drive to Milford itself was stunning and we were lucky to see the NZ alpine parrot – the Kea (my inner ‘birder’ was super excited). Once in Milford, we took a 1 hour boat ride around the sounds, absorbing the breathtaking scenery of sharp cliffs, mountains and waterfalls. The rich history around how the sounds were discovered make it that much more interesting. Jamie then went on to take his students jet boating, luging and bungy jumping – he has a pretty sweet job while I headed back to Wellington.
I have see some amazing natural sights in our years of travel but this trip has really cemented in my mind just how lucky we are to live in such an extraordinary country with so much beauty in our back yard. Friends from overseas, I know I’ve said it before but you must come visit us here in Aotearoa!!
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