Kiwi Experience – South Island

We left Queenstown and headed to Kaikoura to visit Adele an old friend of my from America days...it was lovely to catch up with her and meet her wee son Jack.  We spent 1 night with her then headed to Blenheim, Marlborough....the wine region!! We did a half day tour of the local vineyards which was brilliant, some lovely and some not so lovely wines in the various tasting sessions but it was definitely an interesting education for my wine palette.  Most of the vineyards we visited currently supply to the UK and Ireland so it will be nice to come home and say oh I’ve been there.  We visited Cloudy Bay, Mahi, Lawsons, Highfields and Villa Maria so I am sure some of you will recognise some familiar Friday night wines!!

We jumped onto our Kiwi experience tour bus in Nelson to start our trip down the west coast.  One of the highlights was the ‘Poo pub’ which is a country pub in the middle of nowhere where Kiwi have a fancy dress party for each bus.  The theme was world cup so James and I collected as many Irishy things as possible and basically looked as Irish and stupid as possible for the night – it was good fun!!

We headed further down the west coast to Franz Joseph glacier where we completed a full day hike.  The scenery is beautiful and it’s a really unique fun day.  It is pretty challenging as you wear your crampons to climb up and down steep ice steps, tunnels and slopes but it is so worth it for the views...see pictures!!

Next stop Wanaka, a small lake side resort with a few small ski fields off it.  We spent 1 night here and enjoyed a lovely walk around the edge of the lake, the scenery in the south island is fantastic lots of lakes surrounded in the background by snow capped mountains. 

Finally we made it round to Queenstown again which we were really looking forward to.  On the first day James completely took leave of his senses and completed the Nevis Bungy jump at 134metres along with a few of our friends on the bus.  I went to watch as a spectator and was terrified of the height just looking at it.  James always says that he is afraid of heights as he is afraid of falling off so he decided that having the ability to jump off might cure his fear.  It was so scary....initially I (and he) didn’t think he would do it but he ended up doing so well and when the guy said 3...2....1....he didn’t even hesitate and just went...admittedly not the most fantastic swan dive but he still jumped which was so impressive.  My heart was in my mouth until he came back onto solid land!!! He is now pretty pleased with himself and has watched the video on repeat more or less since then.  Check out the video on facebook if your interested!!  This is the same bungy that most of the Ireland team completed when they were in Queenstown so it has had lots of publicity recently.  Definitely a once in a lifetime experience and one that I have no doubt he will talk about for a while (lucky me!!)

The rest of our time in Queenstown was spent just chilling and catching up with friends we made on our first visit.  We had a few great nights out in Altitude (sadly I did not witness the Mike Tindall incident!!) and World Bar drinking cocktail teapots!!  Naturally we sampled Fergburger which is a must when in Queenstown.  One day we played Frisbee golf which was really good fun although alot harder than you would imagine, its basically laid out like a golf course with 18 holes and a basket you have to get your Frisbee into...turns out I am pretty rubbish at Frisbee haha!! It was a good laugh anyway and something a little different.  

We were sad to leave Queenstown again this time for the last time, it is a brilliant town with so much to do and so much fun.  Hopefully someday we will return here, probably as old foggies and reminisce about the good days lol!!

World cup mania has been in full force since my last blog.  The atmosphere everywhere during games is electric and we have been really lucky to see most of the matches live on TV, something I know is proving difficult at home.  Obviously the most brilliant night and match so far was watching the Ireland v Australia game, we watched it in an Irish bar in Queenstown called Pog Mahones and the banter was fantastic.  It was so intense and just a great night with everyone in such high spirits at the end.  While we are obviously delighted with the result we have mixed feelings (along with most of the irish supporters in NZ) as we purchased quarter final tickets on the assumption that Ireland would come second in the group and not first...oops!! So most of the Irish in NZ will now (most likely) be watching the Australia v South Africa quarter final grrrr....anyone know any Aussies who would like to swap tickets please let me know!!!!

So now the adventure continues up to the North island which I am excited about as I have not been there before.   We are going to the Ireland game this Sunday (25^th) v Russia so I can not wait for that....myself and BOD will be reunited haha!! I plan to wear as stupid an outfit as possible to try and get on tv so watch this space lol!! Get the sky plus at the ready!!

Hope this finds everyone well and settled back into school, uni, work routines without too much hassle, hopefully the next time I write I will have made my tv debut and will be able to update you all on our North Island adventures.  Time is passing so quickly we have started looking at getting things booked in Australia which is a sign that the time is really flying so we are definitely trying to make the most of each day.  Keep in touch people its been so nice getting unexpected but lovely emails from home recently...keep it up!! xxx

Adventure capital of NZ – Queenstown

So we finally arrived in the land of the Kiwis after 13 hours of flying and our first impression was brrrr...it was freezing compared to what we were used to in Asia, board the plane in 35ish heat and exit the plane in 10degree heat...bit of a difference.  It took us a few days but we eventually acclimatised – finally the bottom half of my bag was put to good use and my North Face has come in very handy!

We spent the first night in Christchurch with an old friend of mine, someone who lived beside me as kids and back in the day we did everything together (horseriding, ballet, speech&drama, brownies, swimming, badminton, hockey...you name it we did it together...no laughing at the thought of me and ballet please I can assure you it was short lived haha!!).  Claire has been living in CC and working as a nurse for a couple of years now so it was lovely to spend some time with her and meet her new fiance.  We were lucky we had her as an option because there are very little tourist accommodations since the earth quake as all the hotels/hostels have either been destroyed or are being used as emergency accommodation for local people.  Having been here 4 years ago I was totally shocked to see the change and destruction in the city.  It is 1 year since their first earth quake and since then there have been 7500 after shocks ranging from 2.0 to the biggest of 5.7...unbelievable it is totally normal for them to be sitting watching tv and feel the whole ground and building shaking around them.  There is still so much evidence of the quakes with buildings left as rubble, the town centre has never yet been reopened causing 1000s of residents and business to lose their homes and livelihoods.  The government are reluctant to start rebuilding things because at the minute they are unsure when the big shakes will stop...quite scary!!

Me and Claire in Christchurch

Anyway then we got the bus down to Queenstown – 7 hours on a bus but absolutely stunning scenery passing through places such as Geraldine, Mount Cook, Lake Tekapo and many other small villages surrounded by snow capped mountain ranges so the bus journey passed  very quickly and also gave us a good opportunity to catch up on some of the jet lag.

Lake Tekapo

We arrived in Queenstown and absolutely LOVED it from the minute we arrived.  The hostel we were in was small and very cosy with very friendly people and we made some nice friends immediately.  (Although it is never a good sign when the boy checking you in says to James ‘did you go to Regent I recognise you do you have lots of brothers?’...Oh no I thought we were going to have to find a new hostel haha!!) The town itself is basically situated in the valley of 3 or 4 different mountain ranges on the edge of a large lake so the scenery and backdrop here is breathtaking.  We took plenty of pictures obviously!!

Queenstown

One of the main reasons for visiting Queenstown was to go skiing.  It was brilliant – I loved being on the slopes in September!! It was actually quite warm for skiing with people just skiing in tshirts so it was fantastic fun.  James actually picked it up quite quickly (by his standards!!) and by the end of the second day had mastered a chair lift and a few parallel turns....he enjoyed it, after a slow start and a few mishaps and plenty of falls but with a good teacher (!!) he actually did really well, naturally he found it tiring but hopefully ski trips in the future are on – YES!!! Haha!! On the third day he stayed in the town and I skied on my own...its a bit lonely skiing alone I missed my dads shouts of ‘’Richard slow down....you are going the wrong way.....don’t drop your poles off the chair...dont lift the bar yet’’ good times!! But I still enjoyed getting some good runs in for the day.  

Pretty scenery

Budding skiers!!

Proof that James can ski!!

Pleased with himself!

Showing off haha!

At one point I ventured up a rather large cliff at the top of a chair lift carrying my skies on my back to a viewing point (as advised by someone on the chair lift who assured me it was definitely a worthwhile hike)...half way up I thought it was a complete waste of time and that I might die but eventually I made it and WOAH it was so worth it.  Completely breathtaking scenery looking down into the valley and lakes of Queenstown and surrounding villages...see pictures to follow!! I felt like I was on top of the world!!

View from top of the world

Down into Queenstown

me on top of the world

Posing!

The other major highlight of our Queenstown visit was that the Ireland team were staying in the town for their pre world cup warm up week.  We spotted them around town a few times at Fergburger, Lick ice cream shop, Remarkables sweet shop, Patagonia coffee shop and generally just wondering around town...once someone spotted them somewhere word spread pretty fast of their location.  Best of all they held an open training session for supporters on Sunday for 2 hours...the actual training part was kinda boring but at the end they came over and spoke to everyone signing autographs, taking pictures and chatting to folk...it was brilliant!!! They were so friendly and it was great fun...I was like the Cheshire cat...see some of the pics below!!

One of the most interesting people we met in the hostel was a guy who worked in the vineyards in Marlborough making ‘The Ned’ wine...this is the wine that myself and my 3 besties like to consider ‘our wine’ for a special occasion so I was chuffed to meet him and hear his story.  It was even better when on Saturday night he produced 2 bottles of wine from the boot of his car for us to drink.  1 was proper Ned with the label and everything and totally yum and the other was a ‘workers’ version of Ned which they bottle off the record for themselves without the label on the bottle and just very slightly different...both were fantastic  and I still cant believe I met the ‘Nedman’!!Haha!!

On our visit here we met alot of people who were just meant to be visiting Queenstown or passing through and have ended up stopping there for months working and living...we could totally see how this could happen it is such a friendly relaxed place and the people are so nice, certainly if you were considering going to work somewhere (only in hospitality though) this would definitely be a great choice.

We loved our time in Queenstown and are glad we will visit it again in a couple of weeks time on our tour.  How could we say no to revisiting Fergburger (the worlds greatest and biggest burgers), drinking cocktails from a teapot, home made fudge at Remarkables sweet shop, cookies and milk   and generally the most stunning scenery I think I have ever seen.  On our return J will also have to man up and choose which of the ‘adventure thrills’ he is going to participate in....having already done a skydive I am pleased to be exempt from any craziness on this trip but what will he choose?  Nevis bungy (which most of the Ireland team did), Canyon Swing, The Ledge bungy, Nevis Arc swing or a skydive...the options are endless in what really is the adventure capital of the world!!!  

The only downside of NZ so far is the lack of internet availability...they don’t have unlimited plans so its relatively expensive to go online so the blog may only be weekly for a while...people keep telling us to look for a library as wifi is free there so I may discover my inner bookworm and hit the library where possible!!

World cup mania is in full force here, they are rugby mad.  The atmosphere is fantastic and it’s such a nice and memorable time to be in the country.  Every lamppost has a sign or an advert and every shop is displaying some sort of flag...one of the ski shops had an Irish flag in the window with a sign on it saying ‘The Kiwis in this shop do not in any way support this window display’...everything is in such good spirit and banter.  The opening ceremony is in 2 days so it’s quite exciting....come on BOD and come on Ireland!!

xx