Wanganui/Raurimu/Turangi

We got the bus to Raurimu and did our 3 day canoeing trip. I unfortunately had to do some paddling and it was quite hard work. The scenery was amazing and it was very peaceful until we hit some large rapids on day 3 and capsized. Luckily there were some other people eating lunch at a nearby beach who came and rescued our boat and me. It was all rather exciting!!!


This is the bridge to nowhere - it was completed in 1936 when all the settlers had gone!

This is the Mauri meeting house at the campsite that we stayed at on the 2nd night.

On Saturday we managed to get a lift to Turangi and on Monday we did what is supposed to be one of the best one day walks in the world - the Tongariro Alpine Crossing. You start at 1100m and climb to 1886m. It was easier that expected and the views were out of this world!

The last time this erupted was in 1995!

This is me trying not to fall on the steep loose ground.

The wrist is still not better and we may be forced to hire a car - nightmare or what!!!

Sprain stops Play. Whataroa/Lake Mahinapua/Greymouth/Reefton/Maruia Springs/Hanmer Springs/Kaikoura/Picton/Wellington/Wanganui (18/2/10 to 1/3/10)

Yes we are back in the North Island after cycling up the stunning west coast to Greymouth and then getting over Lewis Pass to Kaikoura. En route we popped in to see Brian and Julia who we'd stayed with 2 months before and we had a lovely chat over a cup of tea and some cake.

The weather continues to be roasting hot. We spent our last night in the South Island in lovely Kaikoura and then got the train to Picton and the ferry to Wellington. Very sad to be leaving the South Island but looking forward to doing some fun stuff in the North.

We got off the ferry and headed on the dual carriage way to the city centre with a huge tail wind when I slipped on some railway tracks and fell heavily on the road. Luckliy the traffic stopped and we got me and bike (and broken-off saddle) off the road. I got some first aid at the IT store next to us and then we pushed our bikes for about and hour to the hotel.

Anyway, I've got various aches, pains and bruises and I've sprained both wrists. The right one is pretty much OK now but I've done something to the left one which means I have to rest it for 10 days!!! This means no cycling. We got the bus from Wellington to Wanganui and instead of 2 nights we'll be here for 4. On Thursday we plan to do a canoeing trip on the remote Wanganui river and Nic will paddle whilst I sit and enjoy the view!

Can't believe we only had 2 weeks of cycling left to do and this happens. We've now cycled nearly 6000km and only had 600 left!

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the nice sunset photos; these will have to keep you going until we do something worth photographing! Keep following us.

moving house kiwi style

Now I like most cyclist have had many things shouted from passing cars over the years most of which can't be published here but i have never had anyone shout "you'll have to pull over there is a house coming the other way". At first we thought yeah ok it can't be so big two little cyclists will get in the way but when we saw it come round the corner we were glad we had pulled over

Te Anau/Milford Sound/Mossburn/Kingston/Queenstown/Cromwell/Wanaka/Makarora/Haast/Jacob's River/Franz Josef (5 Feb - 17 Feb 2010)

This is me and 6'6" Johan, the lovely cycling Dutchman that we met and cycled with for a couple of days.
The beautiful west coast:

Milford Sound kayak trip. We had a lovely day out (with no cycling) and the road to Milford Sound was spectacular.

This is a picutre of Mirror Lakes:
Milford Sound:

Amazing river on the road to Milford:

Another snow capped mountain:

Nic standing near the snow on a boiling hot day:

Nic cooling his feet down:

The tunnel through the mountain (very dark):

Eating lunch at Puzzling World in Wanaka:

Another beautiful lake (Lake Hawea):

Arrived at the car park at Fox Glacier:

Fox Glacier:

Franz Josef Glacier:

Franz Josef Glacier:

The best thing we've done so far - Doubtful Sound (3 and 4 Feb 2010)

We left Manapouri and headed off on a ferry for an hour and then on a bus for another hour until we reached our boat which would be home for the next 22 hours on the Doubtful Sound. Our skipper was Daz and our cook and general wonder woman was Yvette. There were 6 other guests on the boat and we had an amazing time. Words cannot explain how magical this place is.

Here is a picture of us looking down before we got on our boat.

Nic caught a Blue Cod - Yvette cooked it up for breakfast - delicious!

We had this (and other) crayfish for our starter that evening - you can't get much fresher!

I caught my first fish - a Spotted Spiny Dogfish - they appartently taste bad so we set him free. He was wriggling around like crazy due to being very angry and this is why I look a bit concerned!

One of the many waterfalls in Doubtful Sound. There's not been much rain here for a while so they were a bit less impressive than normal!

Here our a silly tan lines - 4 months of cycling sandals!

We saw bottle nosed dolphins - they are very large and very beautiful. They swam with the boat in the evening and then the next morning. As the sun over the past week had warmed up the water we got in to swim near them. We were smiling from ear to ear!

Here are some of the guys doing their thing.

In the morning we woke up at 7am and it was misty. We got off the boat at 9.30 and drove through the mist. This was the view of the valley at the top of the pass. The valley was filled with mist and it looked like the icing on a cake.

This place was unbelievable and we didn't want to leave. I hope you enjoyed it too?!

The catlins

Spent a few days in a lovely area on the south island called the Catlins (down on the south east coast)

stayed at a fantastic hostel at Surat Bay overlooking the sea and met a great guy peter who took us out for the day in a car ;-). we went to see cathedral caves which is a huge cave in the rock face carved out by the sea that you can only get into at low tide. We also went to some amazing falls and will post pictures once we have sorted them out some more.


We then went down to Porpoise and Curio bay and after a lay in due to the rain outside we went down to the beach to find two sealions come ashore to "mate" on the beach.


After half an hour of of watching them frollicking we left them to it. Then headed down the beach

Only to find a pod of small hectors dolphins surfing in the shallow waters of the bay what an amzing place to stay!!

we had to leave the dolphins who were there for about 4 hours playing away, to go and see the penguins round the corner. More of the comical yellow eyed variety who are extremely rare these days
After making there way up the beach the brought out the chick to show us all. He looked like a surly teenager with only have his down feathers left and a horrible squeaking squark.

we have taken a great video but I don't think the site could cope with the size may have to look into youtube or something else!!

I was awoken at 4am by the sound of footsteps and snuffling in the tent and after working out it wasn't jeanette I had a look out too see what it was only to find a bloody possum had nicked our toastie loaf!!

we chased him off but decided to ditch the loaf, leading us to have no lunch tomorrow!!

We finally reach Bluff then continued south!!

Finally got to the bottom of the south island (ish) at Bluff
Jeanette gets friendly with the locals on Ulva a small island off Stewart island, a small island off South island....these little guys follow you around the tracks


As we sat and had lunch on Boulder beach Stewart island we were joined by these friendly Wekas (a bit like chickens) who seemed intent on stealing our bread!!This is Peter the guy who get you safely over to Ulva and back hopefully also spotted some blue penguins on the way


Yes that really is a kiwi on the beach honest we saw about 4 but they proved elusive to photo

Sunset on Native Island just off Stewart Island we had kayaked there in the late evening what a blissful place to watch the sun go down