Four Wheel Driving

Ed is loving his new car, every four wheel drive track he finds, we're on it. There have been arguments, there have been moments of not being able to move and there have been moments of sheer terror - on my part rather than his. But, it is fun. After visiting this beautiful lake (we were supposed to sleep there but the sand flys scared us away) we went on a 10km track. Nail biting. The following day we embarked on a 120km one, on a personal road through the mountains. Rocky, sheer drops, mountains to climb, fords to drive through.

Fox Glacier

More driving, more free camping, more fishing (without any fish!) and we arrived in Fox Glacier. We landed ourselves another free night at Gillespies Beach, where we enjoyed the sounds of the sea from our very own cozy cabin.

Ed parking his boy toy on the beach

Sunset views from the car

The following morning we were early to rise and ready to enjoy the helicopter ride we had booked to view the glacier...thought we'd push the boat out. AGAIN!

I think I will let those pictures speak for themselves!

Mountains of Milford Sound

Leaving Henry in our wake, we bombed through the country roads to Milford Sound, a place of renowned beauty. On arrival we had two options, seeing the sound from a boat or from the windows of a tiny plane. We chose the latter. Our pilot was worryingly young and had that breathy tone of nervousness to her voice as she strapped us in. Probably her first day on the job. Thankfully she did a good job and we got to see the mountains and lakes from about 5,000 feet. Here's a little idea of what we saw...

Before take off

During flight
Waterfall views

Frozen lake

The beautiful Milford Sound

Henry

The following day we headed on to Milford Sound, about a six hour drive from Queenstown. Due to setting off quite late, we stopped over in a camping spot called Henry's Creek. New Zealand has loads of "nearly free" camp sites, charging about 2 pounds per person per night, Henry's Creek was one of these.

As we drove into the bush you couldn't help thinking of horror movies where someone was being chased by something through the woods with no escape. We quickly got into bed and tried not to think of what was outside or nearby - there were no houses for miles. At about 3 o'clock in the morning both Ed and I woke to the car being rocked from side to side. It was not the wind...there was only one other camper in the site. Was it Henry? Needless to say, we didn't stay another night!

Lord of the Rings Country

Well, I am kind of wishing that I had stuck at it and actually watched each of the movies so that I could recognise some of the film set locations...the map kind of gives us a couple of clues, so for those of you in the know we will include the LOR names as well as the ones we know. For our next night of camping we headed to paradise or filming location of "Isengard", Lothlorien" and "Amon Hen". You could see why they had chosen it, beautiful; doing nothing but sucking up the scenery we chilled out and enjoyed the scenery.

Cmaping spot night 5

Stunning Scenery around Queenstown - views of Wilson Bay or possibly "Ithilien"

So there you go mum, I've tried! No doubt you will recognise other LOR locations during our trip, even though we are completely clueless. Heading for the "Shire" at somepoint and I think even I might be able to get that right!

Jet Boating

Before we work our way up to sky diving we are taking a steady incline in the adrenalin fuelled action of New Zealand. Today saw us take a jump up in scale with a jet boat rid through a river gorge and rapids, wth 360 spins and hair raising manoevers close to the rock faces.

Our camping spot last night - the car had ice all over it in the morning, twas a chilly night!

Before jet boating!

Part of the river we jet boated on.

For the next couple of days we are exploring some of the Lord of the Rings scenery, and seeing if we can off road 10km of track and river or if we have to make a 10 hour road trip instead to Milford Sound!

There has got to be a way, surely...

Glacier Kayaking...Brrrrr!

Whilst in Mt Cook we partook in a spot of Glacier kayaking on the glacier lake. The water was freezing - definately no skinny dipping here, might have fallen off.

Again amazing views and an amusing Japanese guide...

Four Wheel Driving to Mt Cook

OK it was now time for some off roading. On the way to Mt Cook, New Zealands highest mountain, we passed Lake Tekapo, so we engaged the 4wd and got on the lake bed, as it is still spring there is a lot of snow and ice still on the mountains so the lake levels are low allowing us to drive over the rocks and get to the lake, taking time for a quick snap (below) and to fill up on some water for washing up and cooking with.

Then for more we took another 4wd track across an Army reserve. The sign on the photo below says " MILITARY TARGET AREA DO NOT TOUCH ANYTHING IT WILL EXPLODE AND KILL YOU ". So we didn't touch anything and we didn't get killed.

Fear not though this sign was for the land either side of the road. The army dude we asked if we could go through didn't seem to bothered, and I missed the 5 or 6 guys in cammo gear lying by the side of the road with machine guns!

The scenery the other side of the army training area was amazing. Mt Cook is the mountain towards the right on the photo below.

... and in the middle of this one.

We also took a quick, very quick skinny dip in the lake. It was f f freezing...

Well, if you saw this. What would you do!?

Another shot of the lake and Mt Cook - we took quite a few. This one looks as if the mountain is smoking a fag.

Here is where we camped for the night, below the mountain. You can't see the car very well, but it is there somewhere. Below is me, nice and warmish in bed, with our trusty road atlas given to us by Mark with hints and tips and his very own rough as guide stuck in on various pages - cheers Mark!

Camping night 2

From the dolphins in Akaroa we headed south and ended up somewhere between Akaroa and Mt Cook on the side of a gravel track for the night. Rella can be seen here cooking a 1 pot special of venison, red wine and mushrooms. Behind the camera was a small stream, but as we had washed that day it was far too soon to get the soap out!

Swimming With Dolphins

Our first bit of NZ activity (apart from sleeping on the edge of a mountain) was to go swimming with some dolphins. The dolphins are called Hector dolphins and are the smallest in the world, only growing to just over a metre in length.

Below is a photo of Rella trying to attract the dolphins with her own snorkel tune - it didn't work. We saw quite a few but none really wanted to come in really close and play with us. As a result we got a pretty good refund, which wasn't expected.