17/01/2008.
In the spirit of the lord of the rings the New Zealand installment to the blog page will be in the form of a trilogy. It is a bit long but don't worry it is not full of Tolkein references. However, it does end with me climbing up Mt Doom, but don't worry I didn't go up there to burn my ring.
Can a guy do New Zealand in two weeks? No. But he can give it a bloody good go.
Starting in Dunedin, a seaside university town on summer holidays, I jump on the Taieri Gorge rail train and started heading north. The Otago central railway originally travelled the full 220km, or so inland to Clyde/Cromwell, servicing the farmers and gold explorers in the day.
In the spirit of the lord of the rings the New Zealand installment to the blog page will be in the form of a trilogy. It is a bit long but don't worry it is not full of Tolkein references. However, it does end with me climbing up Mt Doom, but don't worry I didn't go up there to burn my ring.
Can a guy do New Zealand in two weeks? No. But he can give it a bloody good go.
Starting in Dunedin, a seaside university town on summer holidays, I jump on the Taieri Gorge rail train and started heading north. The Otago central railway originally travelled the full 220km, or so inland to Clyde/Cromwell, servicing the farmers and gold explorers in the day.
The train traversed the first 60km through spectacular gorges, passing through mountain tunnels and over stone bridges, but then stopped in Middlemarch because some stooges decided to pull out the tracks. With my destination a further 160km away, I gave the train the two fingers, passed a kid $50 for a loan of his push bike and started pedalling. Following the old rail trail for the next day and a half, I passed through sheep filled farmland, nestled between modest mountain ranges, with scattered country towns. Being an old rail line the track was particularly gentle with only a soft change in grade. However, the northerly headwind made me earn my distance and produced the odd curse word directed toward the heavens and unfriendly kiwi gods. 
Arriving in Clyde, I dumped the bike and slipped onto a bus for Queenstown. This was my first experience of NZ roads and I was impressed, as we skirted along the edge of a lake bracketed between soaring mountains.Queenstown was a destination for two reasons; to catch up with my beautiful friend Dale, and to throw myself off a bridge. Dale and her friend were road tripping the south island, so I took advantage of their sorry little car and scammed a ride to the Kawarau bridge, site of the original commercial bungy. Handing over 160 kiwi dollars (which by the way felt like play money) I went and lined up on the bridge. The que of lemmings leaping off the bridge, one after another (some more reluctant than others) was a bit of a detractor from the experience, as was the cost. Although I may have been slightly less confident if it was a cheap operation. With my ankles banded together I hopped onto the platform and took the briefest of moments to soak in the river gorge surroundings and the drop below. Within very little time (they move you quickly so you don't think too much about what you are about to do, and so you don't slow the flow of dollars) the countdown began. 5 - 4 - 3 - a deep breath and I tried to imagine the band wasn't there - 2 - 1 - Bungy! I leapt out without the slightest hesitation. At the moment of free fall I had a pang of adrenaline and felt my entire body tense up at once (as though my body were screaming at my brain "what have you done"). My eyes were wide open the entire fall as I sped towards the water to be dunked up to my shoulders. It was not until the spring back up that I found my voice and let out a triumphant yell and enjoyed the swing down to the raft below. The buzz stayed with me for the next half an hour, but it quickly wore off. It was something I very much wanted to experience, but for the cost and short duration of the kick, I probably won't go out of my way to do it again.
(That's me at the end of the rope. My favourite photo. Thank you)
Back to Queenstown with a huge grin on my face, I took some time to lounge about in a hammock and calm down from the bungy. With an afternoon to pass, Dale and I took off up the Queenstown gondola (chair lift) to admire the views over the town, lake Wakatipu and the surrounding remarkable mountains.
Queenstown is solely a tourist town and the gondola is probably the number one tourist activity. At the top the crowds snap some pictures, ride around on the luge (billycart) track, eat at the cafe, buy some junk from the gift shop and leave. Not being one for crowds, Dale and I set off on a two hour wander around and up the mountain for a private viewing of the mountain, lake town scenery. We scampered along the ridge line and with smiles on our faces after finding something most people don't, we returned to the tourist centre for a quick luge ride and the gondola back down the mountain. That was my favourite part of my visit to Queenstown. It is funny, with all the expensive, pleasure island style activities you can do, I most enjoyed walking around a mountain chatting to my friend. Queenstown is not my kind of town. Ok, if you view it as a launching point to the nearby tramping tracks or ski fields. For me the comparison with Pinochio's pleasure island is pretty bloody close. I went out one night there and half expected the swarm of backpackers (there are very few kiwi accents in Qtown) playing drinking games to start turning into donkeys (or perhaps sheep is more appropriate).The next day I joined the girls' road trip. Squeezing into the back of Dale's match box car, which was being held together with sticky tape, we drove around the mountains and through the countryside to NZs claimed number one must do, Milford Sound. Along the way I experienced my only kiwi traffic jam, the result of a flock of sheep being herded between paddocks, several kilometres apart, along a major motorway, wedged between mountains and a lake. Surely, with all the NZ sheep jokes someone was taking the piss, but no, hundreds of woolly buggers clogging up the road.
At Milford we had a glorious afternoon for a cruise around the sound (which is actually a fjord, created by glacial force). The scenery was stunningly beautiful and it was wonderful to have someone to share it with. The cruise meandered beside the mountains, stopping under waterfalls for a quick splash and out to the edge of the Tasman Sea for a brief viewing towards home. When the cruise finished the clouds came in and within no time it was pouring rain. 
It rained all night and in the morning the sound of the rain was replaced with that of waterfalls streaming down the mountains. All the rain made me a little nervous as I was about to start a two day tramp across the mountains. The girls drove me to the starting point of my walk and with what would best be described as a drop and roll farewell, I found myself alone with my pack, climbing out of the mud, facing a fold in the forest which was the start of the track.