New Zealand Trip, December 2002 (part 2: Queenstown and Milford Sound)
| Part 1 (Diving, kayaking and glaciers) | |||
(See part 6 additional photos for more pictures.) |
We should have expected the next day (our first in Queenstown) to dawn rainy, but after the lovely afternoon, we were a bit surprised at the chill rain. Brian, one of our hosts at the lovely Dairy Guesthouse Bed and Breakfast, called Dart Stables, the horse trek folks, for us and rescheduled our 2 hour ride for the next day (hoping the morning weather would change). Then we wandered around the shops of downtown Queenstown, dropped off film for processing and consulted with the Milford Track guides on how best to carry David's passel of camera equipment (which resulted in a small purchase at the camera store). In the afternoon we reviewed our Christmas shopping and planned a final assault on NZ shopping. | ||
| An odd find: whiskey; the rumor is Wilson's distillery was based in Milford Sound (settled by Scots) and they produced a regular blended whiskey and then started to market a single malt using a very Scottish sounding name that started with an L and had some au's and gh's in it. Seagrams then bought them out and closed the distillery, even tearing it down and sending parts up north. Some enterprising sole bought the last casks of single malt and is now marketing it as Milford whiskey. So once this current batch is gone, there will be no more. (That's the story from the Wine & Deli guy we bought our second bottle from. We bought a second bottle because David wanted to try it before passing it along as a present and none of the bars or restaurants we checked in had it. While nice in it's way, it has none of Laphroig's smoky flavor -- no peat in Milford Sound) |
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The next day the weather was much nicer -- it rained a lot at night but the morning was cloudy but rain free (and the clouds were much higher, off the mountains). Glenorchy (home of Dart Stables), about 30Km down the road, had lower clouds and some spitting rain, but not especially hard -- still cool for a summer rain, at least in comparison to the Mid Atlantic. The horse riding was fun, we got out into the river delta and our guide was happy to point out where bits of the Lord of the Rings were filmed and talk a bit about her role as a "Rider of Rohan." Then we headed off to Gibbston Valley vineyards for a late lunch and wine tasting but were not super impressed with the wine there, award winning though it may be. | ||
| The day after the horseback riding, we did some shopping and headed to Chard Farm Winery to taste their wines (we didn't like the wine at Gibbston Valley). We found a couple we liked and went back and forth about how to get it back to the states and how much to get. After we settled our bill we made the trip back on the hair raising, one-lane, muddy road precariously perched between the shear cliff up the hill and the gorge down the Kawaru river; then back to highway 6 and Queenstown and the Dairy Guest House. (Unfortunately, they didn't pack exactly what we'd expected, but we do like each of wines we brought back with us.) |
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(See part 7 additional photos for more pictures.) |
Then we went to "The Station" for our pre-hike briefing on the Milford Track Guided Walk. The briefing was mostly what we had read in the flyer with some chilling (literally) news on the weather. Fortunately, Katmandu, an outdoor shop, was having a Christmas sale and we stopped by after the briefing to pick up more polypro long johns. A nice dinner followed and we packed our packs (which were much better than we expected for loaner gear). The next day, we had another nice Guest House breakfast before walking down the hill to our bus to Te Anu. | ||
| The bus ride (like most of our travel in NZ) was spectacular: snow capped mountains raising straight up from lakes with a myriad of rivers falling down the sides. And we saw the Kingstown Flyer steam train (above) chugging through the valley. We also noted the snow line continuing to come down as it had each day we stayed in Queenstown. At Te Anu (on the shores of lake Te Anu) we had a nice lunch at the hotel were the crown prince of Japan was staying later in the day, picked up a couple more members of our group of 21 (normally 50, but a couple large groups backed out at the last minute) and heard that our third guide would likely be flying in as the road out of Milford was closed due to heavy snowfall. (A good thing we bought extra polypro). Then we drove around the lake to Te Anu Downs and the boat to the head of the trail. The boat ride was damp as it was misting a bit but not raining too hard. At the trail head, we swapped Tevas for boots and strapped on our packs for the mile shakedown walk to Glade House (where we met Leaf, our lead guide, and watched the snow line drop even more). |
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Glade House was lovely and showed us how well we were going to be taken care of. the facilities and staff there were great and there was plenty of food to make sure we gained weight even while hiking -- hot showers and a drying room were great benefits. | ||
| The next day we hiked 10 miles to Pampolona lodge in generally great weather past innumerable waterfalls along the Clinton river. Pampolona was much more compact a lodge, nestled in the woods. It was also in Kea territory so we were told not to leave anything outside and to ensure the outside doors were all well closed. (We were introduced to Keas at lunch when one really wanted to get to a bag hanging out of David's pack.) |
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| The next day the weather was less nice, with a steady drizzle the whole day as we hiked 9 miles and gained 2500 feet to McKinnon Pass then dropped 3000 feet to Quintin Lodge. The trail, which had been fantastically maintained (we saw one of the tracked carts used to haul stone and fill dirt) deteriorated as the elevation rose and the trail became more steep and the mountainside provided less options for where the trail could go. Then the snow started to cover the slushy trail and it became some pretty ugly hiking. At about that time, the mist turned to fine snow. Then we saw Leaf in the wind shadow of a rock with hot drinks available. We passed on that and went straight to the Quintin McKinnon memorial marker for a couple of damp photos then we tried to find the path over the last hill and down to the hut for lunch. |
(See part 8 additional photos for more pictures.) | ||
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David traded a wool shirt for a polypro one and wet socks for a dry pair at lunch. Then the slog down the 3000 feet to Quintin Lodge, starting on the "Emergency trail" because of the avalanche danger on the main trail. (We heard a long one coming from the direction of the "Main Track" about halfway down.) Back on the main trail we hiked by the waterfalls on the 800 meter boardwalk section, but the weather was still icky so we didn't take any photos. A ways after that we saw Jeremy coming back up the hill and heard that one of the Japanese ladies was not doing well -- exhaustion and cold -- she was in an emergency hut at the bottom of the emergency trail and Simon and Leaf were working on a helicopter evacuation of her if the weather cleared enough. So we were a little subdued at Quintin Lodge until we heard the helicopter had taken her to the hospital and she was doing better. | ||
| From Quintin we had a longer hike (in beautiful weather) of 13 miles but blessedly flat to the aptly named Sandfly Point and a short boat trip across Milford Sound to Mitre Peak Lodge. Next day was perfect weather again for our short cruise on Milford Sound, out to the Tasmania sea and by the seals. Then a bus trip back to Queenstown and the Dairy Guest house for one last night. We had a celebratory dinner at Roaring Megs (which gets high marks). And got some more film processed after Sarah jumped off of hill above Queenstown with a paraglider and pilot strapped to her back. Then we drove back to Christchurch by way of Mt. Cook (Again with fabulous weather) and the ever lovely Charlotte Jane (where we were back in room 2). A final celebratory dinner and next day we headed back to the airport to start the trip back to winter. |
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(See part 10 additional photos for more pictures.) |
The trip back was not as smooth as the trip down under: no problems with the flight from Christchurch to Auckland but our flight from Auckland to LAX was 14 hours late leaving. That broke our connections from LAX to Washington, but we were able to re-book those from our temporary hotel in Auckland. We left the Charlotte Jane to go to the Christchurch airport at about 9:30am 12/20, left Auckland at 6:30am the 21st, left LAX at 1:35am the 21st (international dateline tricks), and arrived home about 10:30am 12/21 (about 43 hours after leaving the Charlotte Jane). | ||
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There and away: We truly enjoyed our stays in: Parua House, The Charlotte Jane and The Dairy Guesthouse. Knight Diver Tours treated us very well and we both felt safe in the care of our two divemasters. Dave Ritche and the rest of the folks at The New Zealand Kayak School were great, I can't imagine ever going someplace to rent a kayak and ending up with someone's personal fiberglass boat. And Leaf, Simon, Jeremy were most excellent guides on our Milford Track hike. We left November 26th (spent our wedding anniversary on the plane) and returned (a day late) on December 21st; it was barely long enough and we could spend twice as long on our next trip without repeating anything we did this time. |
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