We came back from 7 weeks touring on
It has been tremendously fun driving around in a car. It is almost too easy, and we are getting so soft! We stayed primarily in "Backpackers" and enjoyed the shared kitchens, interesting common lounge areas and international crowd. I especially enjoyed the varying architecture and interior design as these buildings are often remodeled private residences. In several the restoration work was immaculate; the varnished native woods of Kauri, Totara and Rimu gave a special ambience. Our stay was typically for 2 nights minimum, so that gave us one travel day, and then at least a day to enjoy the attractions of our new environment. The travel day was often a productive home school day for Claire.
We spent 4 days on a dairy farmstay owned by Mark and Phillipa prior to our heading far South. The day to day milking of 120 “ladies”, twice a day was interesting to be a part of. We were not required to assist in the
We watched at Steve, Mark’s helper, coerced the herd out of its pasture with an ATV quad. We followed through several gates and down a long “runoff” (alleyways adjacent to grazing fields) to the milking shed, about a half mile away. Once corralled onto a concrete pad, gates were opened to allow lines of about 20 cows to be packed into a steel framework which lined up their udders in neat rows. Then 2 men walked down in a pit to attach milking cups to the udders. When it came time for me to try my hand at attaching the cups, I squeamishly struggled among cow shit spattered pipes to reach the udders with the hissing contraction, and not be hit in the head by a tail or, God forbid, an issuance from an impatient beast above.
During a quieter moment as the cups were dutifully sucking the life blood out of the girl’s udders, Steve enlightened us with some bovine facts: “Guess how may liters of milk a cow produces a day? 40! And how many liters of saliva to digest all that grass? 70!” I think I could guess where the other 30 liters went.
So it was a fairly smelly experience. Kelley tried to become a cow wisperer, since the animals are very curious of humans, and not unfriendly, but at the same time very wary as well. It seems that evolutionarily, they know that they possess great food potential to carnivores, but little in the way of defenses, hence best to quickly scramble away once our presence is established.
I was actually able to help the farmer in a productive way as he was remodeling another farmhouse on the other side of town. He needed to replace several decorative barge rafters, collar ties and finials at exposed gable ends of two roof sections. So he attached a palate to his mowing tractor’s front end and lifted me up in front of the roof so I could remove the rotted rafters. A builder in his employ used the old ones as templates to fabricate new parts, his painter primed all the surfaces and I rode the palate up off the lawn to re-attach the new ones to the roof, with his help. I was proud of my contribution. Kelley and I also weeded a pretty large section of flowerbed and decorate shrub border on their front lawn.
Sadly we lost all our pictures of the farmstay in a digital disaster somewhere near
We took off to
We spent two days in the Marlborough Wine Region where we rented bicycles and toured a half dozen wineries on a dedicated bike trail bordering vineyards, across meandering brooks, and past rock sculptures. We sampled some delicious Chardonnays, Savignon Blancs and several Reislings which had distinct kerosene noses and flavors. Weird, but life is for learning.
We headed to the fabled West Coast to see the mountains rush into the sea and found the scenery to rival California around Big Sur. Here, however, golf course quality grass grows naturally in the picnic spots due to the near constant rainfall. Claire and I had explored a beach at a river mouth, and then went back to a picnic table for lunch. As I munched on apple and cheese, I casually gazed back to the coast to find in horror a rock outcropping where minutes before Claire and I had been romping being battered by frothy crests! The rocks were far from the surf line and quite dry when we had explored earlier, but I began to understand that “We weren’t in
Our next stop were the only glaciers in the world which occur in a tropical rainforest: Franz Joseph and Fox. We booked the longest tour on the glacier possible given Claire’s age (6 hours) and we were not disappointed.
We arrived at the glacier guides shop early to get suited up in raincoats, rain pants, insulated boots and “ice talons” sort of small crampons for walking on ice. Kelley noticed that she was the oldest and Claire the youngest among the group. We hiked to the Franz Joseph viewpoint carrying our ice talons in a bag around our waist. The terminal face looked a half mile away. In fact it was more than 3 more miles of rocky riverbed, walking across several small streams before we were actually at the face itself. My mind was not able to comprehend the scale of this thing. Ice blocks the size of apartment buildings were deposited to the right of the stairway carved in the melting ice. A ferocious river of glacial milk roared out of a black cave under the center of the terminal face. I was DEFINITELY not going in there!
We tied on our ice talons and got a cursory safety lecture, then approached the stairway and the cliff of ice and gravel. The steps were big, some about 18” tall. There was a rope bolted into the high side for balance. We followed two guides around snaking paths into the ice pinnacles, skirting crevasses of reasonable depth and size. It was clear that if you lost your footing and slipped into one, you could get seriously hurt bashing into the ice walls before you would stop in some very uncomfortable and injured position. Best not to dwell on it, just keep moving forward and dig your boots in with every step, as advised earlier.
Our group continued up stairways, down stairways, around in switchbacks and zig zags until our guide stopped and radioed the other guide. It soon became clear that he was a little lost, as we started up a stairway, stopped and then were advised to turn around and climb back down some exposed steep edges. Keeping my center of gravity low, I assisted Kelley and Claire more than a few times before we got to an enormous ridge of shattered rock. This feature (the name of which escapes me now) was formed not too long ago by immense pressure at the bottom of the glacier. The trapped water and loose rock churned up by the glacier’s weight had burst forth from the surface in a jet the force of which I could not even begin to imagine. I could not see the beginning or end of this river of rock 5 stories tall. I hoped that we might not witness a similar occurrence during our brief tour of the glacier that day.
It was near this river of rock, up about 2 kilometers from the terminal face, that we elected to eat our lunch. The views of the rest of the glacier up the river valley into the main snow catchment area were spectacular. The scale of this river of ice was put into perspective when you saw little black dots inching along on its surface, a party on a longer hike today. These dots were in the near foreground. As your neck craned to see, the ice field continued far, far beyond those black pin points, up into the clouds.
The walk down, while not as adrenaline charged at the walk up, was unfortunately more tiring and difficult. The ice steps seemed bigger, though I doubt they were. It was with great relief that I untied my ice talons and packed them away on the waist bag. How light and nimble my feet suddenly felt, wearing only insulated hiking boots! Our quads would remind us as we moved about for the next several days just how heavy that footwear was and how much up and downhill we had conquered. The walk back down the valley was filled with satisfaction.
We spent 5 days in a campground cabin visiting with friends we had not seen since
We hiked the
We also sampled day hikes of both ends of the Routeburn Track, and the Queen Charlotte Track. We crossed about 9 rivers at one end of the Routeburn, most on “swing bridges”: wooden slats supported by 2 suspension wires that were often quite kinetic. The forests were incredibly fecund, some with bright green moss floors and tree branches.
The Rob Roy Glacier trail in
Hiking around Milford Sound area in the
The Lonely Planet for
The wilderness beauty on this island was richly rewarding. So, to break the monotony of sensory nature overload we visited every city along the way. See PART 2.