It's All About The Journey

Tag: New Zealand

  • Oamaru to Queenstown

    Oamaru to Queenstown

    We left Oamaru on Saturday morning and made our way to Queenstown. As we turned inland the roads became windier and hillier. Eventually we were in mountains and were driving through Lindis Pass.

    We stopped along the way to take pictures of the scenery and had a snack of freshwater salmon sashimi at Lake Pukaki. In the distance, at the far end of the lake, and covered in clouds, is Mount Cook, the highest mountain in New Zealand.

    Our campsite in Queenstown, Lakeview Holiday Park is our home for the next two nights. Queenstown is a report town and is crowded with tourists. There are hundreds of restaurants and services catering to us. For dinner we went to Fergburger.

    Queenstown is also known as the adventure capital with bungy jumping, paragliding, zip lining, jet boating, and so much more. We would have liked to do one of these activities (probably the jet boat) but our time here is limited and we chose to book a day trip to the Fjordland National Park and Milford Sound. Thats where we will be tomorrow.

  • Penguins

    Penguins

    Today was the day we picked up the camper van. We rented a small camper from Jucy Rentals. It’s bright green and purple and is just big enough for me and Libby.

    We arrived on time to pick it up but it wasn’t ready for us. The Jucy shuttle dropped us off at a local shipping area and we had some breakfast and bought our groceries.



    Libby getting out groceries out of the trundle.

    Then back to Jucy we went, were the van was waiting for us.

    We said goodbye to Christchurch and drove to Oamaru. The drive went well and I was happy to get my first few hours of driving on the other side of the road on some straight flat roads.

    We chose Oamaru so we could see penguins. The blue penguins that live in the Oamaru area are the smallest penguin. Most average around 10 pounds. Our activity of the day was a visit to the Oamaru Blue Penguin Colony. The penguins return to land at sunset after spending the day at sea feeding. The “show” lasted a few hours and included a talk about the penguins and watching the penguins return. They trickled in slowly over two hours in small groups or rafts. We had to be very quiet and there was no photography allowed. So the pictures I posted are of the post cards I bought.

    On the walk back to our campsite we came across penguins that were making their way back to their nests. They live in the area but outside of the sanctuary. We watched them as they waddled home for the night.



    Oamaru coastline
    Wharf in Oamaru

    Oamaru, view towards the penguin colony

    Dinner time, we found a brew pub a short walk from our campsite.

    A few more pictures from Omaru. The birds are called Shags, they are different species of Cormorants. We also saw our first seals.

  • And we are off to New Zealand

    And we are off to New Zealand

    We left San Fransisco around 11:00 pm on Tuesday January 22 and arrived in Aukland, New Zealand on Thursday January 24. Sorry mom, I missed your birthday! The flight was long but I managed to sleep for at least half of it so it wasn’t as intolerable as I thought it would be. We didn’t leave the airport in Aukland but made our way through customs and a screening of what we were bringing into the country. Everything was ok except for the dirt on our shoes from the redwood hike in California. Not a big deal though, they washed the shoes and we were off. It was back to check in and security for our next flight. We flew from Aukland to Christchurch, which is our starting point for our camper van experience. We checked into a hotel (will pick up van tomorrow), after the flights a bed and a shower were in order. But, that had to wait as we wanted to explore Christchurch. We got an Uber to the centre of Christchurch and hopped on the tourist tram which gave us an overview of the city.

    We were so happy to be off the plane and out of the airport. Libby couldn’t resist trying the bean bags.

    Riding the Christchurch Tram.

    A city under construction…

    Christchurch was severely damaged by earthquakes in 2010 and 2011 and while much has been repaired there is still much to do.

    The infrastructure was severely damaged after the earthquakes and residents had to improvise and make outdoor toilets, or as they have called them, “long drops”. The last photo above shows shipping containers being used as a protection barrier wall at a damaged building.

    But many areas have been restored and Christchurch is a nice introduction to New Zealand for us.

    Then it was off to bed, even Canga was exhausted.
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