New Zealand – Wandering LeFebers

The Wild West

April 10, 2019 wanderinglefebers2 Comments

The South Island’s West Coast is marked by spectacular mountain, river, and coastal beauty. The Southern Alps range runs along most of the coast. Its rivers and rain forests tumble dramatically into the Tasman Sea. It is no wonder we passed through four national parks while sight-seeing this area: Paparoa, Westland Tai Poutini, Anraki Mt. Cook, and Mt. Aspiring.

Highway 6 twists between the Alps and the Tasman Sea. We nicknamed it “Harrowing 6” because it was curvy, narrow, devoid of shoulders, and had minimalist guard-rails. It is also punctuated by long one-way bridges. Drivers are alerted to the right of way by signs approaching the bridge—the bigger arrow wins. But sometimes it was difficult to see the other end!

On a sad note, several days after we left this area it suffered a 100-year rainstorm. The storm washed out the only bridge south of Franz Josef. The result is a twelve-hour detour to reach anything south of the area. This has, of course, had a severe impact upon tourism and daily life in the surrounding communities. For dramatic photos (I couldn’t get the link feature to work on this blog, sorry!) search “Franz Josef bridge washout” on Google.

The highway connects a series of small towns. Today most survive on tourism and some dairy, but many were founded on a gold. We could still see glints of gold in the sand and stones. We loved every town, but our favorite was Hokitika. It was founded in 1864 when gold was discovered. In just three years it was the number one port in New Zealand, with records indicating its river port harbored 41 ships–rapid growth! (For a vivid description of the Hokitika gold diggers’ wild lifestyle, read the mystery The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton—it’s fun!)

There are unending scenic gems along the West Coast. There are quiet coves, long beaches, dramatic coastlines, and a series of unique cliffs made of thin rock stacks, appropriately named “Pancake Rocks.”

The rivers are turquoise with glacial flour—fine particles of rock ground by glacial action. The rain forest is dense and rich with plants and bird life which we discovered while kayaking on Okarita Lagoon.

The Alps and Mt. Cook tower over the forests and rivers, jagged and intimidating, and their glaciers are impressive. We enjoyed hiking as far as we could to see the Franz Josef Glacier, but were discouraged by how far this glacier has receded in recent years.

Best of all, the West Coast offers some of the most scenic picnicking imaginable. New Zealand provides picnic spots every few kilometers, many nicely marked. We thoroughly enjoyed our outdoor lunches, but I will probably never eat another peanut butter sandwich. (We tried to add variety with the popular local spread Marmite, but that was a failure.)

Fun Fact: The McDonald’s menu in New Zealand (yes, we did cave in to an American food craving after the Marmite debacle) includes a Kiwi Burger. It has a fried egg and beet slice on it!

Thank you very much for taking a look at this–as always, we appreciate your sharing our travels! Love, Bob and Sally

Tongariro Crossing . . . We Made It!

March 21, 2019 wanderinglefebers3 Comments

Tongariro National Park lies in the center of the North Island. Established in 1887, it is New Zealand’s first national park as well as a UNESCO site. A Maori chief named Horonuku Te Heuheu Tukino IV gave the land to the British to preserve its beauty for all to enjoy. We are grateful to Chief Horonuku, because we certainly did enjoy this park’s stunning scenery. Much of the scenery features three volcanos: Ruapehu, Ngaur, and Tongariro. These massive peaks are all still active. The most recent major event was in 2012 (Tongariro), but every day steam puffs around the peaks.

One of the most popular “tramps” (New Zealand word for hikes) is the Tongariro Alpine Crossing. A little over 15 miles, the crossing snakes between Mount Ngauruhoe and Mt. Tongariro. The trail ascends a relentless set of stairs connected by paths, then descends an impossibly steep (very steep, as in EEEEEEK!) scree slope before switch-backing down to a bus pick-up area. The hike takes 6-8 hours to complete. Our knees and feet pleaded with us not to go. But we couldn’t resist the challenge. We told our body parts to buck up, and off we went.

Nature’s wild variety was on full display throughout the tramp. As we climbed (and climbed and climbed and climbed), we saw flora specimen from sub-alpine to tussock to nothing but scree.

We saw steaming vents, vivid blue/green lakes, odd moonscapes, and a gorgeous red crater. Nature’s violence was evident from the blown-out mountainside.

When we finished, our toes and knees were screeming (couldn’t resist the “scree” pun). According to Bob’s phone we had walked 33,368 steps and climbed 162 flights of stairs! But every step was worth it. It was the hike of a lifetime and I’m grateful we had the opportunity to do it. Again, thank you Chief Horonuku, and the Government of New Zealand, for making this possible!

Travel Lessons Learned:

I am no longer a snob about using a hiking stick. Our light-weight Black Diamond sticks were so helpful!
Cheap hotels are terrific and allow us to travel for extended periods of time. However, sometimes a hotel is worth the splurge, and Chateau Tongariro is one of those hotels. At the end of that hike, coming back to this lovely landing spot and its delicious Chateaubriand for two was simply divine. (We would include a photo of the meat but we ate it too fast—no chance for a photo!)

As always, thank you for following along. We appreciate your friendship and interest! Next installment (coming an a bit): Wellington, the Crossing, and the Wild West.

Another Adventure!

February 22, 2019 wanderinglefebers6 Comments

Moss is growing under our feet (and on our mailbox, and on our driveway, and on our patio. . .) So we decided to explore a new part of the world, New Zealand and French Polynesia. If you are interested, and have time, you can follow our trip here. We’ll include lots of photos and not too much text, keeping it simple!

We look forward to bringing you photos of our own (these are from Pixabay, a terrific free photo source), and a little commentary soon. Thanks for looking!