Pupu Springs, Takaka

On my road trip I made it over the massively windy Takaka Hill to see the Pupu Springs - some of the clearest water in the world - my friend had highly recommended it to me. Apparently you used to be able to go swimming in it, but due to fear of didymo or some other such water weed nobody is allowed to touch the water anymore - although two men that were there as the same time as me told me the water was very cold - I may have given them a sideways glance & asked if they had touched it - they wouldn't answer me, which is fair enough. It was the most AMAZING colour blue I have ever seen anywhere! Wow.

When I came out to leave I was really gutted to see that sometime during my drive from Hamner Springs that morning (I left at 5am) I had managed to hit a bird which was dead in the front grill, I had to find a stick to knock it out, I felt so bad (especially as I had no recollection of hitting anything that morning, though I was driving for about 2hrs through fog).

The Pinnacles Walk, Kaueranga Valley

When I was a kid our family used to camp in Kaueranga Valley (that was before a tourist couple got killed there) so it caused me some nostalgia to drive over the bridge that we used to go over (and the awesome waterhole right next to it). The walk up to the Hut was good but steep. I stopped there for lunch - it was an awesome sunny day (April 2014) and I was contemplating going all the way up to the top but the walk had tired me out quite a bit & I wished I'd worn my tramping boots instead of sneakers coz I could feel every stone on the track that I walked over. So I headed back down without going all the way to the top. The hut was full which was a pity coz it would've been nice to camp up there and drop all my gear and actually do the walk up to the top with just a water bottle and jacket - its a really flash hut. I remember staying there once with my youth group when I was a teenager.

So this is my family when I was a kid at the waterhole

And this is how it looked the last time I went

And these are a few of the pics I took on the way up - such a beautiful sunny day!

Road Trip March 2014 - Punakaiki Rocks

I had several days to spend sightseeing before I started the Heaphy Track, so I hired a car and went tiki touring - and saw some amazing things! I had a really good time, even though I was pretty much by myself except for the nice little asian tourist I picked up in Greymouth on my way to Punakaiki rocks. I never think its a good idea for girl tourists to hitch hike alone, which is the main reason I picked her up, also I thought it might be nice to have some company for a change. So here are some of the photos I got at Punakaiki rocks:

Apparently its known that they were created by layers being put down but its unknown exactly how all the formations came to be, which I think its curious that scientists haven't figured it out yet. I'm sure it can't be the only place in the world with formations like this.

Kepler Track

I loved the Kepler track even though it was quite a workout. We pretty much went straight from doing the Rakiura track to starting the Kepler the day after. The first day was flat for the first hour then it climbed through many many switchbacks before levelling out after you passed the bushline on the way to Luxmore Hut where we went to explore the caves. I didn't stay long though, I got a bit claustrophobic and turned around. Didn't see my cousin til way later. The next day it was crazy misty and we were hoping it would clear so we could see the views of Mt Luxmore and such. Unfortunately it hadn't cleared by 12 so we headed off anyway, walking through the mist. At the foot of Mt Luxmore we met some israeli guys who were super funny & we ended up chatting to for a while that day. There were a couple of shelters on the way which was good, then the track descended steeply downhill for ages and then we ended up going over a hill where we could've taken a shortcut (if we'd known about it - gutted) then we found a lookout which was totally worth the detour. Our late start meant we didn't get to the hut til 8pm just as the rangers talk was starting - he was funny, and got the last choice of beds, then had a quick dinner and went to see the Iris Burns Falls (which we couldn't see at all, since it was pitch black). I did see gloworms on the way back to the hut though, only a tiny handful but still cool. We heard a kiwi too, though we never saw one. On our last day we met a nice belgium boy who was quite homesick so I got talking to him in french (though Naomi talked to him more than I did, I was quite tired from our previous late night). It was a bit uphill but mostly down, gradually to the last hut. We didn't stay there the night though, we walked about an hour and a half past there to our bus pickup point back into Te Anau, and skipped the last days walk for the track. It was brilliant, even though the mist enshrouded mountain was a little bit of a disappointment.

Rakiura Track

This was my most remote of the 9 great walks - all the way over on Stewart Island (which I opted to fly to since the price difference with that and the ferry was actually pretty close). It reminded me on one side of the Abel Tasman great walk, and on the other side it reminded me of Lake Waikaremoana with lots of islands and inlets. I had my cousin and a friend join me, which was a novelty and worked really well. I don't know how I managed to carry 18kgs around with me - I had a heap of food left over at the end (crazy!). Short walks but we were jammed for time a bit, but still had a good time.

Heaphy Track

The Heaphy Track was my last of the 9 great walks - which I left til the end, precisely because it was so long (just under 80kms). I wanted to do it in 5days unfortunately a big group had nabbed the middle hut so I was stuck with cramming it into 4 days (one of which at 24kms was a killer) even though the tracks were quite gradual up and down and not too bad. The sandflies were ghastly though.

I was really happy to start even though I was going by myself but I made friends with a group of three on the ride there who said they would look out for me. I had a few people keeping an eye on me which made me feel quite good. I also had a cute little fantail that followed me and twittered to me non stop at one point.

Day one was several hours uphill but it wasn't steep so it was doable. Also I met a couple of campers, a guy from Ireland and a girl from Spain (not together) they were both really lovely and we had some nice chats on the way.

Some awesome views on Day One:

On the second day we got to see the giant snails that this part of NZ is known for, but alas I did not manage to see the elusive albino giant snail that they were talking about at the DOC office for the Heaphy Track.

I also got to see the massive shoe tree I had heard about - though why anyone would want to carry their shoes all the way there just to dump them on the second day I don't know. And I also got to see my first whio (blue duck) in the river just before this tiny old fashioned hut we passed.

Day 3 was when we descended from up in the heights down to the river and followed along to where it reached the sea at Heaphy Hut which was by far the best (and newest) hut on the track. Sunset there was something spectacular, despite all the biting bugs.

And finally Day 4 where I got to leave the hut early to walk along the beach and try to make sure I avoided high tide (apparently some people did die a long time ago when they tried to cross at high tide and got sucked out to sea - the waves here are quite dangerous though the lagoon near the Heaphy hut was a great place to swim) of course the problem with that was I arrived really early and had to wait hours for our van, which had broken down somewhere and they had to send us out another one. It was really good to stop in civilisation (Karamea) to eat on our way back to Nelson. A few more assorted pics from the trip, including a lovely walking group from Melbourne who I shared the van home with - they were crack up characters.