New Zealand II - South Island (Part 1)

DDR: South Island is epic. Incredible nature, great wine, more glow worms, even more beautiful lakes, whales, seals and a little bit of hiking.

Where to begin with South Island?!? If North Island was beautiful, the South is spectacular. We began this leg in the Malborough region. Officially the sunniest spot in NZ, Blenheim is what I imagine Arizona looks like in the US. A low, flat town, with lots of vineyards, surrounded by dramatic, dusty mountains. I recently watched the Wes Anderson movie Asteroid City, and the mountains and the light match the colour scheme. Nik was unwell for our first day, so I went for a run and made us some dinner. Luckily he was suitably recovered in time for an amazing lunch at the Saint Clair vineyard the next day.

Early next morning we set off for Kaikōura, Kaikoura means eat crayfish in Māori. It used to be a whaling spot and has now gone full circle and is a nature reserve, particularly famous for whales. As we drove towards it, dusty mountains were soon replaced with snow topped peaks and a jaw dropping coastline of beautiful blue waves. We pit stopped for a delightful, if very windy, breakfast and then to spot our first nature sighting - seals! Seals are adorable, they seem very happy and just chill on the rocks in the sunshine. In Kaikōura we spent the afternoon hiking around the peninsular, enjoying more seals and crystal blue waters. Nik ran through a field of wheat like the rebel he is and we spent the night in a pub car park that was much more beautiful than it sounds.

The morning was a big day - seeing a whale was top of my New Zealand bucket list. Kaikoura takes the wildnerness reserve aspect very seriously, and has just 1 whale watching company that sends out several trips a day. These are then limited on hours they can approach animals and how many vessels can get near any given creature. The weather had cancelled the trip we'd booked the day before, and it was all riding on if they would squeeze us on the next days fully booked trip from the waitlist. The gods were with us, with high chance of seasickness perhaps accounting for the dropouts that enabled us to board the ship. Before long we were admiring a whole pod of Orca! They were beautiful, gracefully emerging out the sea and diving again over and over. Apparently they were hunting sting rays, causing them to come to more shallow water (also a blessing as no seasickness) and repeatedly come to surface to facilitate the dive. They are much bigger in real life than the movies, and look so powerful. It was incredibly surreal having just been listening to a podcast about rebel Orcas while in India. We also saw some dusky dolphins, Hector's dolphins and a Souther Royal Albatross which was enormous, their wing span is 3-4m! Check out the video of the impressive sea takeoff.

Buzzing from our morning of wildlife, we hit the road towards Jackson's Alpine retreat. As we drove, the scenery passed from new, stunning climate to new, stunning climate. The sharp, volcanic mountains ranging from looking dry and Martian, to Forrested Alpine, grassy and lush and everything in between. Having made our way through a fair few audiobooks, now was time to focus on the Roadtrip and sing a long to some bangers. Jackson's Alpine Retreat was nestled in the forrest/ jungle in the middle of nowhere, just after Arthur's Pass. It boasted a beautiful waterfall, glow worm spots and some jaw dropping stars. Every turn and time of day is so epic, it's almost difficult to keep being amazed and none of the photos do it justice! Next up we passed through the Franz Joseph glacier. Global warming has dramatically reduced the glacier so our visit was fairly fleeting, and we kept going towards Wānaka.

Wanaka is set on a beautiful lake, reminiscent of Lake Como or Garda. The water is deep, navy blue and is surrounded by mountains with lots of tall, dark trees that could be pines or Cyprus's, and elegantly twisted willows. For Valentine's Day we decided to do a famous hike, Roy's Peak, and we're rewarded by an incredible view of the lake. There is a famous spot for photos at the top, the people queuing before use took arguably a rude amount of time, perfecting his and her's insta shots. Our response was to spend about 30 seconds at the viewpoint, and quickly snapped some pretty average shots. Undeterred we headed to the very top for the ultimate motivator, lunch. Having made it up in 2.5 hours, we were pretty chuffed with ourselves as the guides online had said the the whole thing would take 5-7 hours. We were quickly put in our place by a German who arrived to the top and proudly announced the ascent had taken him 1 hr 45. Still, we had a nice picnic before making our way back down again. That evening we continued to reward ourselves with pizza at Francesca's before quickly getting out of town as a triathalon was descending on the lake.

The department of conservation in Fjordland has a number of wild camping spots along the way to Milford Sound, very rustic sites along various lakes, typically equipped with a single loo for the price of $15 or ~£7.50. We decided to stay at one of these, Henry Creek, to celebrate our 2 year anniversary. It was stunning, we were almost the only people staying in the woods on the edge of a beautiful, Fjord style lake. We cooked, played some games, skimmed stones and swam in the lake which was surprisingly not that cold, being a glacier lake. Waking up in the woods with a tea on the beach was magical, and we felt well and truly off-grid.

Fjordland's epic beauty kept coming. On our way to Milford Sound we kept stopping at equally dramatic and awe-inspiring spots including the mirror lakes and a several waterfalls. To view Milford Sound itself we took a boat round, the boat we'd selected was nice and small, and we got a great spot at the back of the boat that allowed us to soak up all the atmosphere, and also at times waterfall spray. Other ways to view Milford Sound include propellor plane and helicopter. Seeing the tiny planes darting through the prehistoric cliffs and waterfalls stirred up visions of Jurassic Park. While we didn't see any dinosaurs, we did see some of the local wingless birds in the car park, so close enough.

Full to the brim with wonder at New Zealand's seemingly endless epic beauty, we spent a chilled night in Te Anau. At this point we were both almost feeling guilty that we still have so much travelling left ahead of us on this trip, feeling very sated on the majesty of the past few days. This post may read as a tad hyperbolic, but words and photos really don't do New Zealand justice 💙.