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.

Vodafone New Zealand

Life of the traveller is so much easier these days...here is our mobile number should you want to give us a call.

0064210400266

Looking forward to your call/text?

New Zealand - The Challenge

We arrived in NZ on the 22nd November, at about 4:30pm, and 24hrs later we had a car - a toyota hilux surf 4WD. It is the most red thing you have ever seen - inside and out. An ex fire vehicle, which we have named Sam. Although we are only in NZ for 5 weeks we thought we would buy one and then sell it once we finish. That way we can go where we want when we want and really get off the beaten track.

Our challenge now is to camp for free in the back of the car for the time we are in NZ. So far we are one night down, this was our spot...

We've already used the 4wd to get down some pretty hairy tracks, so there will be more to come as we venture into Lord of the Rings country.

Surf Safari

We picked up our surf safari from Byron that was going to take us, over 5 days to Sydney. It is about 700kms, but luckily most of the driving was done in the first couple of days. There were 7 girls and me... lucky me!

The idea of the surf safari was to go to secluded beaches along the coast, avoiding the crowds and learn to surf, or in my case turn professional! ;) It didn't disappoint, all the girls were standing by the first day, and the beaches were beautiful and very quiet.

For the final 3 days we stayed at a surf camp, which was in the middle of a national park, and in the middle of nowhere. It was a great spot, and a bit wild. The rules were. There are no rules (except you can't use a hairdryer or straighteners - I was gutted).

On the 3rd day we went to a beautiful beach called boomerang bay. The water was crystal clear and we were greeted by a few dolphins and some nice waves.

The fourth day offered a bit more excitement. On arriving on the beach there were masses of dolphins, over 70 across 3 pods, with the closest pod only about 10 metres from the shore. So we went in with them - amazing.

A bit later on, a dingo was spotted chasing a wallaby from the dunes and into the sea, a couple of the guys and another 4wd chased the dingo whilst the wallaby was rescued from the sea, with a gash to it's leg. Wallaby is a bit tougher than kangaroo, but still a nice rich meat and went down well at the meal that evening...

Rella is now going to take over the telling of this story. WE DIDN'T EAT IT! Thankfully an hour later animal rescue came to the beach to take the wallaby to safety - quite rare, so they were glad we'd saved it.

Back to Ed "Animal Rescue" mmmm more like butchers!!

That evening there was a party as two northbound trips rolled into surf camp so there were about 80 of us and many drinking games were played. As you can see the evening deteriorated pretty quickly.

The final day of surfing included a twenty minute surfing competition, won by Rella. I think I got docked points for pulling a mooney!

You may be wondering why there are no shots of us 'hanging ten' or 'carving it up', well our surf instructor was only blessed with a six pack and a few other bulges and not brains. He left my camera in the car.