The Beautiful South

We were super early for our ferry to the South Island; I vow I'll never even miss a bus again. The view from the ferry was awesome - although I couldn't get Abi and Rach to come upstairs so I had to run around on the top deck on my own. Once on land we travelled down the East Coast to Christchurch. We pretty much stayed by the sea the whole way and made lots of nice stops - including a massive seal colony.

We stayed just one night in Christchurch (didn't see much because we were knackered). The next day, on our bus to Queenstown, we enjoyed the company of the BEST bus driver yet. A charming man who entertained us for the entire 9 hour journey with interesting facts about NZ geography, and great stories about the Maori, the gold-rush and a sheep stealer called McKenzie. We passed through miles of vineyards and over the Southern Alps, and got a pretty good look at Mount Cook. The driver stopped at several massive bright turquoise lakes. Beats the M6.

Queenstown is probably my favourite of all the New Zealand cities we visited. Its really small and quaint, and sits on the edge of another huge lake. We arrived about 6 in the evening, settled in, had dinner, and shared some wine with the 3 Brazillian (funny) guys in our room.

The next morning we made a quick stop at the village fete opposite our hostel (felt a bit like home) before we headed for the birdlife park where we met the kiwis! Oh, they were even more endearing than I had expected them to be - after seeing kiwi symbols all over New Zealand our expectations were high. They're quite hard to describe because they aren't really like any other bird. NZ had no mammals before the Maori arrived, but the kiwis are pretty close. Flightless, they have a hilarious walk, and their feathers are more like hair. We sat for ages in the dark enclosure trying not to laugh too loud at them (didn't want to scare them - apparently their also "profoundly disturbed" by camera flashes - we didn't try it). We spent the afternoon sunbathing on the village green that sits right in the middle of the city - has a really nice stream running through it (full of ducks, yessssss). Later on we sat on the lakefront and ate fish and chips (not as good as British ones though).

The next day we got up early to catch our bus to Milford Sound. It took us about 5 hours to get there, but the views from the coach were really incredible. We travelled up and down huge glaciated valleys and into rainforest, saw the aftermath of snow and tree avalances, and made stops at the Mirror Lakes (true to their name, and crystal clear), and a huge chasm. Its impossible to describe the scale of the valley we suddenly found ourselves in.

Milford sound is one of the wettest places on earth, and it rained (proper proper heavy rain) the entire time we were there. Initially we were dissapointed by the rain. But we've learnt since that Milford is best in the rain because of the hundreds of waterfalls that suddenly appear. Seriously, I've never seen so many. Even from the lodge (the one place you can stay in Milford) I could see over 20 waterfalls. Due to the downpour we couldn't really do much but sit in the lodge, drink tea and play cluedo, scrabble and monopoly (in that order lol). Despite that, though, it was really nice to be in such a remote and literally awesome place. The next day we braved the rain and wind and went on a cruize of the fiord. The visibility was bad, my photos almost look black and white, but it was spectacular. I'm going to try not to go on too much about it; you should all go and see. The next day we got on our coach back home. We wound our way back up the valley and went through the (relatively) tiny tunnel that cuts through the mountain. When we came out the other side it felt like we'd left Narnia lol -leaving a whole world behind.

We're back in the North Island now - ready to fly to Fiji tomorrow. Hope all is well at home. Don't worry Mum, I do miss some stuff, like you and Dad, Eastenders, Silent Witness, tea and Oscar :-)

P.S. FOA Durham folk: I saw Saggy in Queenstown! Weird. I was in a tiny supermarket, looked up, and there she was! Even stranger... I saw her AGAIN in Milford. (Also saw the same French girl in Christchurch, Queenstown, Milford, and then again in Christchurch airport). SMALL WORLD.