From Te Anau, we took an 11 hour bus trip north to Christchurch and checked into our hostel around sunset. Christchurch is the largest city on the South Island, and had recently been devastated by a series of earthquakes. The first occurred in September 2010, and was a magnitude 7.1. Nearly six months later in February 2011, a second earthquake struck with a magnitude of 6.3. It was located closer to the city and the intensity was among the strongest ever recorded in an urban area. This one caused major damage to the already weakened infrastructure, and 185 people were killed. We arrived a few days after the one year anniversary of the second major earthquake. We knew it caused major damage, but had no idea how devastating it really was until we got there.
Our first clue should have been that we had a hard time
finding a place to stay. We did manage
to find a room at the YMCA, which had just recently re-opened after major
repairs. After we checked in, we set off
to look for some dinner. We walked down
the street past restaurant after restaurant, but all of the buildings were
vacated. We walked for about 12 blocks
before coming across a Subway sandwich place.
It wasn’t what we were looking for, but we stopped anyway, not knowing
how far we would have to walk to find another restaurant that was still in
business. We returned to our room that
night and reconsidered our plans for Christchurch. It seemed that just about everything was
going to be closed.
The next morning we walked across the street from the YMCA
to Hagley Park. This is a big beautiful
park in the heart of the city with a botanical garden, and that weekend they
had an outdoor art exhibit on display. We
spent a couple hours walking through the park, looking at the gardens and the
art exhibits, as well the boats punting along the Avon River, which winds
through the park. We also visited the
Canterbury Museum in Hagley Park, which was one of the few museums that were
actually open.
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| Hagley Park |
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| Christchurch earthquake damage |
When we were walking around, we stumbled on an area a few blocks
just outside the Red Zone that was actually quite busy. There was an outdoor shopping area, with all
of the stores made from brightly painted shipping containers lying side by side
and stacked on top of each other. There
were boutique stores, souvenir shops, bookstores, and food stands. There were quite a few people there, and the
retail shops seemed to be doing well. It
was nice to see some signs of recovery.
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| container stores in Christchurch |
We only spent a couple days in Christchurch. It was a bit depressing to see all of the
empty buildings and streets. The road to
recovery will probably be a long one. Many
of the businesses have relocated to other parts of New Zealand, and a year
later earthquakes are still occurring.
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| Art installation 185 Empty Chairs, in remembrance of the lives lost |
From Christchurch, we caught another bus and headed north. The last stop on the South Island would be
the city of Picton in the Marlborough region.
Picton is one of the two commercial hubs in the region located at the
head of Queen Charlotte Sound near the northeast end of the South Island. We spent one night there and didn’t do much
other than walking around town, as it rained during most of our short
stay. The next morning we took the
Interislander Ferry across the Cook Strait to Wellington, a three hour trip
that covered 58 miles. The ferries were
huge compared to the ones we were used to in the Puget Sound, and we were a
little surprised to see a train unloading as we boarded. In all, we had spent ten days exploring the
South Island, which was not nearly enough time.
There are so many things we missed, and we really hope to make it back
sometime.
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| Interislander Ferry in Picton |
We spent some time strolling through the section of town
that houses Parliament and the other government offices. It was a nice day, so we rode the tram up
from the downtown area to see great views of the city and the bay. The tram ends at a botanical garden and
observatory, and we enjoyed walking around the gardens and taking in the great
views.
We also spent a few more hours walking around the waterfront
again and visited the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, which was free
and had many interesting exhibits on the native Maori people. The next morning we checked out of our hostel
and caught the bus back to the airport, where we left the car. It was nice to have the flexibility of our
own set of wheels again.  |
| Wellington |
Our next stop was the Tongariro Alpine Crossing in Tongariro National Park. This was a half day drive ending near the
center of the North Island. The Crossing
is one of New Zealand's
most spectacular hikes, and is the most popular one-day hike in New Zealand. The closest town is Turangi, and since the
trail begins and ends in different places, we would need to arrange
transport.
We stopped at the visitor center in Turangi, but we were
informed that the track was closed for the next three days due to severe
weather. Apparently, the winds were
forecast to build and eventually reach 60-70 mph by Saturday, so they closed
the trail Friday to Sunday. It was a
bummer, but after the lousy weather we had on the Kepler Track, we didn’t want
to take any chances. We drove back to
Napier and spent a couple nights hanging out with Matt, April, and Frazer, and
then headed back on Sunday to do the hike the following day.
When we got there, the weather forecast was stellar, as is
often the case after a big storm blows through.
We spent the night in a hostel in Turangi and caught the 6 am bus to the
trailhead. The hike is in an area with
three volcanoes and the entire trail, except for the final descent through the
forest, is over raw volcanic terrain. It
is not a circular trail, so hikers are dropped off at the west side of the park
in the morning and picked up at the north end of the trail by a bus in the
afternoon. The entire trail is 12 miles
long and there are a couple of optional side trips that you can make.
The sky was just beginning to lighten as we started the
hike, and the clear weather made it very cold. We were bundled up in hats, gloves, and heavy
coats and pants, as we started down the first section of track that wound up
Mongatepopo Valley to the saddle between Mount Tongariro and Mount Ngauruhoe. Once
you arrive at the saddle, you have a couple of options. You can continue on the trail and just do the
12 miles, or you can do a side trip up either Mount Ngauruhoe or Mount
Tongariro, assuming that you can do them quick enough to make it in time to
catch the bus at the end of the trail.
Adam and Di decided to do the side trip up Mount Tongariro
(6,457 ft), which is estimated to take an extra hour and a half and is a
gradual hike on a trail up to the summit.
Andrew decided to climb Mt. Ngauruhoe (7,513 ft) which is estimated to
take an extra three hours. There wasn’t
a trail going up to the summit, and it turned out to be a challenging scramble
on loose rock and then snow and ice on the top third.
The views from both mountains were spectacular and the sky
was really clear. The snow and ice at
the top of Mt. Ngauruhoe was striking against the black and red rock,
especially on the rim of the crater.  |
| Base and summit of Mt. Ngauruhoe |
After our side trips, we met back up on the trail, had some
lunch and continued on. The next section
of the trek led through barren volcanic landscape. There were solidified lava flows, active
steam vents and several lakes along the way.
Some of the lakes were at near boiling temperatures and deeply colored
by the minerals from the volcanoes. It
was a beautiful moonlike landscape.
The trail finished with a final decent through a forest,
which we rushed through in order to catch our bus. With the side trips, the hike turned out to
be about 15 miles, and we were exhausted by the time we reached the end. It was definitely worth it though – it was
probably the most beautiful landscape we saw while in New Zealand and certainly
one of the nicest days. |
| Tongariro Alpine Crossing |
We caught the bus back into Turangi, got in the car and
drove that night to Rotorua about two hours away. Rotorua is major tourist destination and
known for its geothermal activity, including geysers and hot mud pools. Adam’s trip was coming to an end, and we only
had a day to spend in Rotorua. Andrew
and Adam rode the gondola up to take in some views of the city and Lake
Rotorua. They also had a luge ride at
the top, which was even better than the one in Queenstown, and they took a
couple of rides down that.
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| gondola and luge in Rotorua |
Another attraction near Rotorua is the ZORB, a globe riding
site. Globe riding is the experience of
rolling down a hill in a large inflatable globe. Di’s cousins, David and Patty, had done it
while in New Zealand and recommended it to us.
They have a wet ride, where you roll down in a globe partially filled
with water, and a dry ride where you are strapped into a harness inside the
globe. Di was the only one who was
willing to do it and she signed up for the dry ride since it was a bit chilly
and she didn’t have her bathing suit with her.
It was an exciting 20 seconds tumbling head-over-heels down the hill.
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| ZORB near Rotorua |
Auckland is known as the city of sails, and while we were
there, preparations were underway for the stopover of the Volvo Ocean Race
boats, a round the world race. We only
had a couple days in Auckland and spent most of it just walking around the
downtown area and the waterfront. We
also rode up to the top of the Sky Tower to see the views of Auckland and the
surrounding area. You can actually jump
off the Sky Tower with a long cable attached to you and free fall before the
cable slows you down to land near street level. We decided to pass on that, but watched a few
people do it.
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| Auckland sights |
And, just like that, Adam’s three weeks with us were over. We made our way to the Auckland airport to drop him off and say our goodbyes. It had been a fast-paced visit, with a lot of ground covered in the short time he was in New Zealand. We had a lot of fun and were sad to see it come to an end.