Cindy is Here! Traveling by car to South Island

Hi All,
We (me) have been very lax about updating the blog. This is just a quicky to let you know what is happening. We are in the sleepy little tourist town of Hokitika on the wild west coast of New Zealand's South Island. I picked up Cindy (at last, together again) at the Auckland airport after her long flight from Denver last Wednesday the 2nd and we left from there in our trusty little Toyota car. The car is packed to the gunnels, if it had gunnels. Cindy brought two huge bags and two smaller ones. The had many more boat parts for projects including a new GPS to install to replace our Garmin which corroded itself to death after over 10,000 nautical miles.

We stopped in Rotorua the first day. Rotorua sits on top of a massive geothermal area and has hot springs, bubbling mud geysers and steam everywhere. Our motel room was heated by hot water from a hot well on the property. The town reeks of sulphur but is very pretty and very popular with the tourists, especially backpackers. In fact, NZ is a backpacker heaven with cheap places and cheap travel options for these hordes of young adventure seekers. The South Island is a hiker, and backpacker, mecca with huge moutains, glacieres and trails all over.

To get here though, we had to get to Wellington on the southern tip of the North Island. Wellie is the NZ capital and was a fun place to people watch and have some drinks. We had a $93 Mexican meal but the margaritas at $26 each did not help. They were good though. We are eating cheaper now and in our kitchen equipped rooms where possible. These are easy to find though and since it is winter here, are easy to book, and a bit cheaper than summer. Lots less people too but it is cool and rains some.

The ferry ride from Wellington took over 3 hours across the Cook Strait over to the little town of Picton. From there we went to Nelson where we spent two nights and just relaxed. Yesterday we went from Nelson to Kaikerikeri (a good example of a Maori name which half the towns have) which is a gateway in to the Abel Tasman National Park. We got a ride on a Water Taxi along the coast in to the park and then walked for 4 hours back to a bay where they picked us up again in the taxi. The tide was going out in a rush though and they sent the little dinghy in for 6 of us on shore and we got wet up to the knees (cold, cold seawater). I got several sand fly bites (I can't tell you what I really think of sand flies on this PG website but let's just say I %**#!!)^ hate the little critters). I am scraching my hand as I type now.

The walk in the forest of the park along Cook Strait was lovely though and good for both of us. We got to the pickup point just short of blisters and got our aerobic exercise in for the day. The long drive farther south ended driving through big moutains on twisty roads in dense fog. We were relieved to get to a motel just outside of Westport right about the crashing breakers of the waves on the Tasman Sea. The motel was a nice little botique spot with fine, fine amenities and breakfast included.

Today we are in Hokitika where they make and sell local NZ jade (greenstone) but it really is too touristy for us. The one place with good prices and pieces made by local Maori the old way is closed and no one knows when they will be open as this is off season and very laid back. So, we will push on to the glaciers at Franz Josef and Fox a little over 100 km down the road. We will post some pics and may be even catch up with some photos of caving and other things here later.

Our plans are to go back to the North Island to Whangarei by the 22nd or so. We will get MD back together and ready to go in a week or two but have to sell our little car first and wait for suitable weather. We will be following all our friends who have mostly already gone up to Fiji but we should be able to find most of them either there or in Vanuatu in the following months. Our big question is where to go after Vanuatu - either on to Indonesia and then up to Thailand or go south to Australia. Australia is even more expensive then NZ but would be fun to visit. Thailand is much, much cheaper but, as with all these places, has very strict rules about how long you can stay. We will make a decision though, probably along the way after talking to more people.

Cheers for now!
Joe & Cindy