Category: Simon

There’s a few things you could say about the Driving Creek Railway, like it’s the only narrow guage railway in New Zealand, or the owner is committed to being eco-friendly, but basically this is one man’s rather large train set. Started as a way to get clay down from the hill, the line meanders then reverses a few times up the steep hillside until it reaches the Eyefull Tower view point at 173 metres high. It was only reluctantly opened to the public about 10 years ago, well if you had such a big toy, would you share it?
We also stopped off to see some Kauri, New Zealands second tallest trees. Doesn’t sound impressive when it’s put like that, but they are the largest by volume, and that’s what really counts in my book. The relatively young 600 year old trees we saw were a mere 2 metres across, and given that they can live to 4000 years old, these monsters can get to some impressive sizes. What a shame someone thought it was a good idea to chop most of them down.

Mount Taranaki is supposedly an almost perfect cone shaped volcano, made more impressive as it stands alone on flat coastal land. That’s also the reason it’s normally covered in clouds, and as the tourist information lady said: if you see it, photograph it as it’ll be gone again soon.
We were going to do some walks around the mountain, but just counted ourselves lucky that we did manage to catch half of the mountain peeking out from behind a cloud for a few seconds. As you’d expect, when we were about 75km up the road taking sunset photos the mountain was there in the background in it’s full glory without a cloud to be seen!

Sometimes plans don’t work out, and today we had to resort to plan c. We were planning on doing the Tongariro Crossing, said to be the finest one day hike in New Zealand, crossing between two not-so-dormant volcanoes. We were a bit dubious about attempting the 16km trek anyway, but as we visited the information centre yesterday and saw that alpine conditions were in effect, (meaning ice picks were required) we decided to give it a miss. There was also the possibility of rain, so that sealed the deal.
This is New Zealand though, always lots to do, so plan b was to catch a scenic flight over the three volcanoes and see them that way. Unfortunately as we woke this morning, the cloud cover was so low you could almost touch it. Instead we took the scenic route around the national park, the mountains still hiding behind clouds. Eventually we were far enough south to get out of the cloud cover and see Mount Ruapehu, New Zealands tallest volcano, in all it’s glory (apart from the power cables obscuring the view…).
The volcano had erupted 8 months ago, and had a large eruption in 1996, so quite an active one! The 1996 eruption threw out 5 to 15 metre boulders (that must be like a house flying at you!) along with hot ash and other debris. The volcano is currently under alert as there is increased activity in the crater, meaning a possible eruption could occur. There was also a map indicating where lava flows and water from the crater lake would go if an eruption occurred. Came in quite useful for us when picking a campsite!

Those Aratiatia rapids from yesterday were way too good to only visit once, but this time we added one more ingredient: speed. There have been ample opportunities for jetboat riding, however this one is special as it’s the only jetboat that goes over rapids, along with going airborne and sinking a few boats in the rapids over the years. Small mercy is that we don’t go over the rapids we were looking at yesterday, and instead head downstream. Twisting, spinning and coming within a knats whiskers of things sticking out of the river, we hurtled down to some other rapids. The river was five times higher than normal, which meant lots of water churning, and waves to ride as we went up and down, getting airbourne and soaked quite a few times. So, putting an 8 litre Chevvy engine in the back of a small speed boat makes for just about the best mode of transport, ever.

The rain was lashing down, but we stuck to the schedule and went to the thermal reserve of Te Puia. Mud pools were happily plopping, and geysers gushing (probably, there was a lot of steam obscuring the view but there were a lot of whooshing noises), and the ever present eggy smell was more than abundant. In fact the whole hill, and indeed the rest of Rotorua was gently puffing steam, a quite surreal view! The ticket also included a cultural show from the Maoris, the highlight being the Haka, where warriors slap their chests, recite some scary words, stick out their tongues and bulge their eyes in a uniquely Maori way. It’s meant to scare any opponents before a battle, and I reckon it probably would’ve worked a few times.
The sun was starting to peek through the clouds, just in time as we were off to the luge, as recommended by Pete. Seeing there was some other ride called the Skyswing at the top of the hill as well, we eagerly bought tickets, and were up the gondola in no time. The Skyswing looked so innocent, a nice little cage suspended by cables that would somehow do a swing. Laughing off the suggestion the ride was scarier than bungies and skydives, we climbed in and were strapped in, twice. That’s when the little seed of doubt was sown, the cage winched the three of us up, tilting so we were face down and we had no option but to trust the harness. At the top there was one thing left to do, come down, and I had control over that with a release cord. With a couple of screaming girls next to me, I gave the cord a tug and we were off, 150km in 2 seconds.
The ride was definitely scarier than it looked, helped by the cage pushing you down the free fall, and swinging out over nothing but a long drop down to Rotorua. At least I know my adrenalin glands still work.
That wasn’t even the reason we were up the hill, the luge beckoned, and true to Pete’s word it was great fun. Sitting on a little black tray with wheels we careered down a concrete track, screeching around corners on two wheels (me!) and over kerbs (Caroline!), although some of us took it a bit too easy (Cat!).
We caught the gondola back down the hill with Caroline renewing her vow to retire from these danger sports, we’ve all heard that one before! 😉

Thought that title might grab your attention, but beyond a respect for the great mammals, and more than a few laws preventing you from even attempting it, we did no such thing as riding whales.
Our journey to the remote East Cape of the north island took us past swan filled lakes to Gisbourne, the last civilization for a few hundred kilometres. It’s also the site of Cook’s landing at New Zealand, with a couple of statues marking the fact, even though it’s now obscured by a small container port.
The area is also the setting to a Maori story recently told in the film Whale Rider, where a girl from a tribe fights against adversity to prove that she is the successor to the chief of the tribe whose ancestor arrived in New Zealand on the back of a whale. A good film, and a little unusual from the norm, along with teaching a bit about the Maori culture – watch it if you can!

Our time on the South Island has come to an end, and so we boarded the less-than-glamourous ferry (the two trucks full of sheep and associated smell did not help), and were soon weaving our way through the Marlbourgh Sounds and out into the open seas. As the ferry left the Tory Channel and we waved goodbye to our home for the past few weeks, there were clear skies to the south and omnious grey clouds to the north, hopefully not an omen of things to come! Wellington greeted us (well me, Caroline was inside hiding from the sheep smell) with low flying clouds zooming overhead and a matching wind. The ferry dropped us off in the middle of the city, and there was the unusual sensation of other cars on the road, something not experienced on the South Island back roads! We also found that camping doesn’t suit city visits, with our campsite being more like an overpriced carpark with showers, still it does have the advantage of having a bar onsite!

Waking up to a wet morning in New Zealand should not really be a surprise, but we’ve managed to avoid pretty much any rain until this point. Worse thing is that we have to walk the 5 or so hours back to the vans. Wasting no time in getting going, and hoping that the new shoes really are waterproof, we start back up the track. Not really stopping at all, just plodding on we get to the saddle, by which point I’m in shorts and t-shirt, figuring that the waterproof jacket is not really going to stop all the rain, so I might as well get as few clothes wet as possible. At least my feet are still dry! All downhill from that point, but it was still a mighty trek, especially when you run out of brunch bars!
The viewpoints over the Marlborough Sounds, when not completely covered in cloud show thin whisps of rain cloud floating over – even when the heavens open, this country still has a charm to it!
Campsite for the night was Smiths Farm, a favourite from the last time we were in Picton, even though they still gave us the fresh banana muffins. With the rain not showing any sign of stopping we got the log fire going and planted ourselves in front of that for the night. At least we’ve got our tramping done!

One of the must-dos for New Zealand is to do a tramp (i.e. hike) across their fine land. As they tend to take more than a day, we opted for the Nydia Track with a convenient hostel halfway along, saving us from staying at the DoC hut (think four walls and a bench to sleep on).
With a fried breakfast in our bellies we set off with a spring in our step, rounded the headland and started the climb up to the saddle between the mountains. The climb continued up and up, and our blood sugar and resolve started to drop, not forgetting we were getting to the lowest point between the mountains. But we made it, and as you can see had some difficulty getting somewhere to rest the camera for a group photo.
The rest of the walk was downhill, and as our tired little legs rounded the final corner we were greeted by the ramshackle sign of our “eco lodge”. Expecting the worst, our hippy host showed us to our little wooden cabins that were actually new and as nice as can be. Home brewed lager and freshly caught green lipped mussels and flounders followed for dinner, all cooked on an open fire barbeque. I guess tramping has it’s upsides.

We’d seen the lively Dusky Dolphins from the shore, the seal swim and also from the whale watch boat. At any given opportunity they are jumping, back flipping, tail slapping and generally having fun. So now it was time for us to slip into the neoprene one more time and get up close to them. The boat dropped us into the icy water ahead of the dolphins, and we were told to entertain them in anyway possible so that they would stay and take a look at you. So as the 400 odd dolphins swam past (wasn’t too sure whether to be amazed or slightly concerned by the numbers), we all squeaked through our snorkels and swam in circles playing a mini game of chase. At one point I had three or four dolphins swimming around, until I got dizzy and had to concede the game. There were also a couple of yellow-striped dolphins (ok, technically called common dolphins, but my name is better) swimming with the duskies, and Caroline also saw a seal in there too.
After four or five drops into the water, it was time to head back to shore, our thirst for swimming with marine life, cold water and wet suits well and truly quenched!