New Zealand

Day 1

The beginning!

Day 2

View from thut hut, early morning

Day 3

The end!

Our legs were hurting after The Kepler, we relaxed for three days at our hostel in Te Anau and took full advantage of their great video collection! We needed that even though The Routeburn Track would be the shortest of the lot.

We realised now that we didn't need our mats, gas or stove, making our packs that little bit lighter. So, David (sorry..He-Man!) took some of Nic's stuff meaning she got to carry a day pack and save her knees. We caught a bus right to the other side of the track - four hours later we were at the beginning, waterproofed up and ready to pump our legs!

The Routeburn is the only link between two valleys and the next three days were spent going from one national park to the other. The views were fantastic! We got up to around 1500m and there was snow and ice on almost all of the surrounding peaks and occasionally ours - making for hard walking conditions on some genuinely challenging terrain. We could see the sea amongst the snow capped mountains and were threatened by rain and snow (they have around 7m of rain in this area annually!). There was a good combination of alpine and woodland walking and the second day was especially rewarding walking alongside gigantic mountains - whose heads were constantly covered by cloud.

We were glad about getting the long bus journey out of the way at the start of our walk, meaning we had a short 1hr trip back to the hostel. A perfect walk with fantastic valley walking, alpine traversing and mysterious woodland. A descent 35km (22mile) tramp!

Day 1

The beginning

A quick stop...

View from the hut 1st night

Day 2

Day 3

We know how to spoil ourselves....

Day 4

View from the hut

The end

The Kepler Track is 70km (44miles) long over 4 days of walking. The difference with this one compared to the others is that this is designed by the bionic people that are the Department of Conservations (DOC). The other two walks we would complete are old mining routes taking a more direct route from A to B - the Kepler is purposely made difficult! With around 2000m of overall ascent and descent our muscles were in for a whipping.

We reached our first hut with fantastic views, the hut was also brilliant. These babies have gas stoves, flushing toilets and sleeping mats all provided (we wouldn't need a poo stick for this walk). The second day is what the Kepler is all about - high, exposed, alpine views! The track narrows down in a few spots to just a couple of feet wide - not forgetting the tumble you would make either side of this. Nic's knees were quite painful after descending a few hundred metres. David did the gentlemanly thing and carried both packs - he now goes by the name of He-Man (the power of greyskull). After waving goodbye to the jagged peaks we were amongst bush again. The last two days were spent walking over waves of hills with a kaleidoscope of colours from the trees and moss. We reached the lazy persons exit (where many people exited the track and caught a bus!). We carried on - right to end! Probably the best walk we have ever done....so far......

The Wizard

We knew Christchurch would look a lot like England from what we had read. There was an eerie feeling of being back home, even things like telephone boxes were similar. We had a few decent walks ahead of us and realised very quickly that our current gear wasn't really sufficient. So after several hours of tramping the streets we made our carefully selected purchases and felt the most prepared for our pending Great Walks. Whislt in Christchurch we were entertained by the famous ranting Wizard and generally got to grips with all the different ways that were New Zealand. Christchurch will be visited again before we go to Auckland!

We left Cairns after seriously downgrading our gear (Linda, expect a couple of large parcels over the next few months!) to start our three day travel to New Zealand. Two days on the train, passing all the stops we'd previously jumped off, this journey took forever. Eventually arriving in Brisbane we were glad to see the back of anymore Oz trains and the colourful characters we had the privilege of travelling with over the months!!!

We were greeted in Brisbane with an extremely warm welcome by Taryn, Dawn and Dave. We were immediately plied with food and alcohol and a delicious bbq courtesy of Dave. We drank whiskey late into the evening and were really sad not to be able to stay longer. Thank you very much!

The following day involved a quick en-route tour of the area before arriving at the airport. The first of our flights, butterflies fluttering, New Zealand here we come!

The bio-security that greet us on arrival in Auckland was thorough! All our camping and walking gear was meticulously checked and cleaned. Our plane was delayed and we were really against the clock to catch our internal flight. With minutes to spare we caught our next flight to Christchurch. By the time we arrived we were both knackered. The hostel, thankfully, would have to take the number one spot for best place we've stayed at (apart from Sydney of course Les!). We had a great base to explore Christchurch.