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Hello everyone!!!
Sorry I have been so neglectful! As most of would know we arrived back in aus on the afternoon of Feb 8th. So have a bit of caching up to do. Last blog entry ended in Te anau and we were going to Milford sound the following day. It was absolutely beautiful. We went on a nature cruise that went for around 3hrs with redboat cruises. The scenery was absolutely spectacular and words just cannot describe its beauty, and my pictures just don’t do it justice. It was very cold tho. Especially when the boat was moving. we went up one side of the sound (which is technically a fiord not a sound - the difference being a sound is carved out by a river and a fiord by a glacier and they have a different shape about their basins) and beautiful waterfalls and learnt a lot about the history, saw green streaks of oxidised copper in the rock faces that cannot be touched due to the pace being national heritage land, apparently there’s a lot of gold in the area, also there’s a seam under fox glacier too. we made our way right out into the Tasman sea where we turned around and came back along the north side of the sound and stopped and saw some seals, we also went under a waterfall that is 3 times the heights of Niagara falls, although it doesn’t seem so since it is absolutely dwarfed by the mountains and sheer rock faces.
On the way back we stopped at the underwater observatory which was absolutely brilliant. It’s a 360 degree viewing platform about 15m (I think it was) under the water. There was so much life from fish to starfish, sea urchins and cucumbers, coral, kelp. Mum even spotted something unusual what appeared to be some sort of white fluffy/spiky ball. My thoughts were it was some kind of albino sea urchin (mum didn’t think so) and we asked the guy that was down there with us and he didn’t know so got another guy to come down and look and what do you know? It was a sea urchin. Can’t remember if it was albino or what but he did explain why it was white but I don’t remember but apparently they’re fairly rare. We spent about 40 mins under there and it was spectacular, a real experience to be under the sea with the life that lives there. We got on board another boat that took us back to the docks.
On the drive back we stopped a number of times, a place called the chasm which was where a stream had carved out through rock, on the other side of the Milford tunnel (goes straight through the mountain for a bout 2ks) we stopped because mum spotted some kea. They’re a native parrot (very big, about the size of a small hawk) that is apparently making a pest of themselves (especially from people feeding them) and they will rip the rubber bits off your car. One actually landed on the side mirror of Phil and Ann’s car. We arrived back in Te anau about mid afternoon and I did a bit of gift shopping. Got myself a really nice jacket (that I lost at Carindale the other day, luckily we found it again) and had dinner at a place up the road. Think it was a steak house. Was very good tho. Did I ever mention how god the lamb is over there? OMG it’s to die for. So sooooo good. They have a bit of a joke that when the sheepies get too old they repackage the mutton as lamb and send it to aus. Lol they might not be joking. The lamb is soooo good. Especially with mint sauce.
So the next day we had an early start as we were heading to Dunedin and had limited time with a number of activities we wanted to do. The drive over there was fairly boring mostly low land farming communities. It wasn’t until we stopped for brekkie that we found out why the place was so dead. It was Waitangi day (kind of equivalent to aus day). We got to Dunedin early arvo and upgraded our hotel rooms to separate bedroom ones which was good. We then headed on down to Speight’s (pronounced like eight not height) brewery where we did a brewery tour. Was very interesting and learnt a lot of history (and that the company owns or produces or something pretty much every beer you've heard of).
After that we drove right out to the end of the Otago peninsula to go on the natures wonders naturally eco tour. It was brilliant. Probably one of the greatest highlights of the trip for me. We buzzed around on these 8 wheel drive buggy thingies which were a lot of fun. First stop was at the highest point on the peninsula which had some great views. We then headed on down to the seal colony which was amazing. We were so close. At Kaikoura except for the lone seal practically in the car park the rest were all on rocks at the very least 500m away prob more. At cape foulwind we were close but still a couple of hundred metres above them on a cliff. Here we at the most 100m away. Prob closer. And there were so many pups! There was one that was having a lovely game with a bit of kelp, grabbing the end of it and swimming around in a rock pool. Another one was trying to climb up some kelp onto the rocks but every time a wave came he'd slide down again into the water. 3 were having races across the rocks. and they were all playing around having the best fun while their mothers all slept and would occasionally put up their heads and call to them to find out where they are then the pups would call back and the mothers would go to sleep again. There was also a hide that we were able to sneak up to quietly and peak in where there was a little blue penguin (fairy penguin) chick in there halfway thru its moult. We then headed on to the next stop which was to a cliff above a beach. We walked down this steep walkway to a view point. There they pulled out the binoculars (we were a long way away this time) and scanned the beach. There were a number of sea gulls, a mother and pup seals, and 5 yellow eyed penguins! These penguins are extremely rare as they are losing more and more habitat to human destruction and disturbance (why we were so far away). We were very lucky to see these creatures and one of the guides also saw another little blue penguin chick hiding in the bushes waiting for its parents to come back so we saw another one of them. After staying too long (we ended up with a total trip of 1hr 15min instead of 1hr :P) we headed back once again going up to the top of the rise and saw that 3 huge cruise liners were leaving the harbour. But all in all that was an amazing trip.
Dinner that night we went back to the Speight’s brewery ale house. Omg what a dinner. We had a package deal as part of the tour and dinner package we did so had a limited menu to choose from but it was amazing. And huge! Entree was a garlic loaf. No joke. Half a loaf of the freshest brown and white bread smothered in garlic butter. It was incredible. For dinner I had a steak with salad and chips. I was lucky to eat half of it. But it was soo yummy. U know how at most restaurants u get a huge plate so it makes the meal look small but really it’s an average sized meal. Well they had huge plates here. Full to the brim! And dessert didn’t do much for me was a strawberry cheesecake but was very sickly sweet. Recommend it to anyone who visits Dunedin. Even if u don’t do the tour u have to eat at the ale house.
The following day we went on the taeiri gorge railway from Dunedin to pukerangi return. It wasn’t as good as it sounded and the scenery wasn’t that spectacular but we’d seen some fairly awesome sights. Was good, but not worth the money we paid in my opinion. That afternoon we headed up to Lake Tekapo where we were to stay our final night. Saw some pretty views with some great sights of mounts cook and Tasman the 2 highest peaks in nz. The lakes (actually in most cases man made by damming) are the most spectacular colour. They’re this most beautiful turquoise blue almost the colour of the sky. Absolutely gorgeous. We got to Lake Tekapo late afternoon and just relaxed until dinner which wasn’t much to rave about. Mum and I had a nice lamb salad but nothing spectacular and dad left half of his which meant it must have been bad for him not to eat something. That evening mum and I went for a walk to the church of the good shepherd a quaint little thing right on the lake. Was very pretty. We also saw the monument to the sheepdog.
The next day we had an easy start and headed back to Christchurch arriving around 1. We dropped off the car and got our things sorted and waited for Phil and Ann to arrive as they had detoured to drop m at her hotel as she was staying in nz to do a coach tour of the north island. We caught our flight at about 340 and made very god time arriving back in aus almost half hour early. Bypassed customs completely which was time saving and headed on back to nanny and granddads to have dinner and collect our puppy dog.
So 1700 words later u now have the final days of our trip. It was an amazing holiday and something I would definitely do again visiting more places staying longer and seeing the north island as well. Now I got to upload the rest of the pics!!!! :O
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