Come Fly With Me – Currently in England

Out of the many people in the world I would like to think I understand the plight of the New Zealanders when compared to Australia. As a Canadian I too have a Big Brother complex living under the shadow from the south and have been coined ‘Satan’s little buddy’. I wanted to like New Zealand better than Oz but am sad to say that bubble burst.

It all started with our first introduction to a Kiwi. It was at the Sydney airport and we had been instructed to go to the ticket desk to get our tickets re-printed after changing our flight over the phone. On approaching Air New Zealand the man behind the counter didn’t acknowledge us, but working so long in the service industry I know sometimes you’re in the middle of something and all you need are those last few seconds to finish or you will have to start all over again. 30 sec went by and my patience had worn out, so I smiled and started with a “pardon me…” My smile was not returned and he answered with a simple, short, “yes?” After explaining what it was we wanted to do, I turned to Annamarie to make sure she had the dates that we had set the night before, ready. As she rummaged in her bag for them he turned back and carried on with whatever he was doing before we approached. She had them out in 30 sec but we waited in silence thinking that he was preparing the system for our changes. 3 min was my limit and I prompted him again when he looked up and said “oh..are your two ready, because I have plenty to do to keep me busy”. I was shocked and thought how rude! It took two minutes to change 5 flights on the system and then he proceeded to place stickers on our tickets and write the new date in pen on them. (I must now explain that in 6 months of traveling half way across the world, we have never had to pay to change our dates or times of our flights. Such is the nature of our RTW tickets. Air New Zealand despite being part of the Star Alliance, operates a different policy and charged us $20 AUS for the effort but assured us that it was for the re-printing of our tickets.) By placing a sticker on our ticket we believed the $20 was no longer justified. For this reason and many more, we class Air New Zealand as the worst airline either of us have flown taking over from Air Canada for me and British Airways for Annamarie. To add further to the lack of friendliness, we were not even greeted by a stewardess on boarding the plane as two of them were in a deep discussion on what type of tights they should buy to match their new uniforms!

It seems to me I have ranted long enough (or shall I say for now) about Air New Zealand but I felt it important to mention as it was a poor introduction to a country famed for friendly people. What you really want to hear is how magical the country is and despite the poor first impression it is a stunning country.

We arrived in Christchurch in the south island late at night. The shuttle into town didn’t unveil much and the streets were empty and the city lights off. The YHA had left a guy on to get us settled and in true angelic fashion we tip toed into a dorm room for the night. We awoke to discover that when the guidebooks compared Christchurch to a slice of England they were on the money. There was punting on the Avon River and the stone architecture felt very familiar. The main streets were called ‘Manchester’ and ‘Gloucester’, and the city centre was full of cathedrals and church spires.

We hadn’t figured out our mode of transport yet as we had found it easier in the past to get a deal once in the city. New Zealand was an exception; there wasn’t a deal to be found. We spent many days trying to solve this problem and finally decided on relocation. This is an industry term for rental car companies who have had a car picked up from one city and dropped at another. We are the people who return it to their rightful place and all for $1 a day. We picked up a 6-berth campervan (for those of you who are campervan virgins this is a big mama!) Mercedes, with tiptronic and all the bells and whistles. We drove it down to Queenstown and had 2 days to do it and 600 km to do it in. (This seems like a great deal as the normal rental price was $175 a day and we had it for $1 but in reality it wasn’t great. It cost me $8 to get the shuttle to the airport to pick the beast up, the diesel tank was huge and drank as if I was driving through the desert. To fill the tank at the end it cost $70 and on top of that NZ has some weird system of recharging the gas tax to the renter so I had to pay $20 when I returned it. For both of us to get into Queenstown from the airport it cost a further $10 each so total for two days transport cost $120.)

The trip however was great and we saw some beautiful scenery on the way. Most remarkable was Lake Tekapo where we chose to stop in the early afternoon. The water was an unbelievable blue and I was sad to see my camera had not picked up the incredible colour. In the backdrop was the snow capped Mt Cook, the highest peak in NZ. Mt Cook is just one of the many stunning mountains in a range that travels down the middle of the island like a spine. Glaciers carved out this picturesque lake, and the finely ground powder it left behind combined with the water attributes for the unique colour. We chose a beautiful site to pull in for the night and spent the afternoon taking in the view. Every time you look away and look back 5 min later the scene had changed. The light hits the mountains from a different angle and casts rippling shadows and exposes grooves you had not seen before. Anyone who has seen our photos will no doubt see repetition but I couldn’t help it with such variety in a single frame.

We made Queenstown in the early afternoon of the second day and sadly parted with our big bertha as I called it. Queenstown is where many backpackers start and finish their trip to NZ. There is plenty of work to be had and it is the adrenaline capital of the country. The first ever commercial bungee jump was started here and there are three in total you can do. You can call me a chicken s**t if you like but I had no interest in these after my experience in South Africa at the Bloukrans Bridge. There was jet boating in their massive lake that surrounds the town but I had read in the newspaper that the company had had two major accidents in the past year and was currently under investigation so I gave it a skip. There is a beautiful cable car ride to the top of a peak looking over the staggering mountains and Queenstown nestled in between the mountains and the lake. As the cable car is expensive I managed to persuade Annamarie to climb the mountain and take the cable car back down. I think many of her emails home always include her frustration with me and cable cars but in my defense I am in my prime and in my 50’s I promise not to over exert myself.

On the whole Queenstown felt very much like a ski resort town in the off season. There were lots of camping and trekking shops that no doubt stock Skis in the winter months, boutique shops, a buzzing nightlife, and cute little restaurants with beautiful fireplaces waiting to be lit. Mountains towered above on all sides and chalet type accommodation dotted the hillsides with more under construction. As Annamarie and I are both avid skiers we felt very comfortable here despite the lack of snow. We found a bar in town that was modeled off the famous Ice Hotel. We were given protective winter coats to wear and entered into a bar where our drinks came in cups made of ice. There were fantastic ice sculptures all around and even the seats were blocks of ice. We thought it was a great idea and could have stayed all night but policy was we could only stay for 30min (probably to stop lawsuits of causing hypothermia). We stayed in Queenstown for three days but felt we must push on. We had our heart set on traveling up the west coast, which is said to be one of the prettiest drives in the world. It passes Glaciers, mountains, and gorgeous coastline. With our budget there seemed no way to do this so we opted for another relocation back to Christchurch where we could get another deal up to the north island.

We stayed the night in Christchurch, dropped the car off and picked up a 4-berth campervan to take to Auckland. With this deal again we paid $1 a day but had 7 days to do it and 1600 km to do it in. We drove up the east coast, which Annamarie tells me was breathtaking (I was knackered and slept most of the way). We arrived in Picton, the launching point of the ferry that would take us to the North Island. Picton is a small town but is in the Marlborough area, which is known for its fabulous wineries and vineyards. The coastline reminded me of BC in Canada with little green humps protruding from the water the larger of these rising as high as small mountains.

We had to pull into a proper campground that night as there was a big storm coming in and we took shelter around other campervans. The wind was fierce and the rain pelted down but when we woke it had passed and the sun was shining which made for a pleasant ferry crossing. A highlight for me was the look on people’s faces as we pulled in an hour before the voyage, with all the cars in a neat line waiting to drive onto the ferry. I switched off the engine climbed in the back, opened the fridge and cracked a diet coke while Annamarie made sandwiches for lunch. I sat down on the sofa to find everyone out of their cars baking in the heat of the sun looking enviously at us. There were advantages campervaning, no doubt!

The cruise through Charlotte Sound was very pretty albeit windy on the viewing deck. At one point I thought I might lose my camera, which would have put a stop to the pics I send home! It was a restful time to reflect on our time in the South Island. It is fair to say we didn’t see half of what we wanted and that we must save the west coast for our next visit. We landed in Wellington, the nations capital. It was late afternoon and we took a little driving tour. When I say driving tour, picture rush hour in every city and place us in the middle driving a huge campervan! It wasn’t pleasant for me the driver, or Annamarie, the navigator! The city seemed nice but had zero places to park our Goliath vehicle so were pushed out to the outskirts. I believe it was a small town called Featherington. We had a lovely view despite the teenage kids who drove up and tried to conceal their make out session in the backseat of their car. Oh to be young!

We pushed on the next day and drove through some amazing scenery. At times there were rolling hills and towering mountains in the distance, other times it was flat volcanic desert or endless fields of sheep. The view changed dramatically around every bend in the road and despite being a tired passenger I didn’t dare try to sleep in case I missed something spectacular. As we were on a schedule to get the campervan home, we pushed as far as the south tip of LakeTaupo. It was a glorious spot with the sun setting behind ancient volcanoes, fly fishermen waist deep in the dusk, and the water at our feet. We managed to contact a good friend of my mother’s who lived in Taupo and met her the next day.

Mary was a gracious hostess who looked after us well and put a roof over our heads, which made a change from getting out of a drivers seat and walking further than 2ft to get into bed. Her house was amazing with a wonderful view of the area. We sipped wine and she made a fabulous New Zealand feast. After a good night sleep Mary took us for a hike and then to Huka Falls, and impressive force of stunning turquoise water. We topped the day off with lunch down by the water while watching huge powerboats race in front of us. It was all very exciting! We loved Taupo as it had so many things to do to tempt us off Mary’s deck but we chose to press on to Auckland.

As we left Mary’s quite late in the day we chose Rotarua to stop for the night. They should call it ROT-arua as we knew we had arrived by the rotten egg smell of sulphur sneaking through our vents. It the cultural hub for the Maori people and they control many of the tourist sites. Many are overpriced so we chose not to see them but were told they were nice despite the putrid smell. After Taupo, Rotarua had a dingy look to it and lacked lustre. We had a little look around and then made tracks. (I must say this was the first time we emptied our campervan’s septic tank and I am glad the smell of Rotarua overpowered every other aroma. What a disgusting job and I would hate to watch Annamarie do that again!).

Leaving Rotten-rua we wanted to get as close to the Auckland airport as possible. After arriving at the airport, we spent 3hrs driving the surrounding area looking for a place to park up for the night. We were so frustrated and it was getting dark that we found a two building town that claimed it had an information office. After driving past it 5 times we finally realized it was a jewelry shop that doubled as an information place. They were just closing as we pulled up but the owner promptly announced she had a campervan space and it was only $10. She told us to follow her as she was on her way there. When we arrived we discovered it was her house we parking at. There were no other cars besides hers in the driveway, and she said to just come in if we wanted a shower or anything. It was a bit strange but after the driving we had done that day it would have to do!

We wanted to be close to the airport as that was the place we were dropping the beast off that day. We got there and took a taxi into Auckland. The first thing that struck us was how hilly it was. It was like I imagined San Francisco to be like. We checked into the YHA there and went walking to explore. We spent some good days catching up on Internet and sleep but ended up moving our flight to Fiji up a few days. We couldn’t find an affordable way to explore more of the country so we made a decision to ear mark it as a place to return when our wallets are fuller.

We loved what we saw but I must say it is the only country on this trip I feel as though we walked away without seeing half of what was there. The local people we met were rude and unwelcoming which made the decision to leave easier, but we may have just found the bad apples on our journey as so many other travelers tell of the great kiwi hospitality. I know I will return to give this country another go and I look forward to that day!

Now that our travels in Africa are over I can look back and reflect on the 5 week adventure. We made mistakes and I can’t say I don’t have some regrets. Would we do it differently if we had another chance? A few things yes, but the majority we wouldn’t change for the world, not even the mistaken death drive through Swaziland!

I was excited to start the world trip with South Africa as in my head I had designed a picture of what I thought it would be like. In this picture was a flat brown landscape with Lions peeking out of long grass, Elephants drinking at a nearby watering hole and tribal African men herding their scrawny cattle over the plains. This is what I would label as “The African Experience”. This is what I set off to see, expecting to see it 10 minutes after landing. Although naive you have to let me have an imagination and expectations even if it doesn’t come true!

Did South Africa deliver “The African Experience” as expected? I can give it an A for effort however we discovered it to be too modern a country with modern day problems it needs to focus on, rather than working hard feeding the tourist need for safari. That said, Kruger park was amazing even if I felt a little safe in the car on a paved road. The Zulu dancers were incredible acrobats but it put me off that they all arrived to the hostel in the back of a pick up truck and their spokesman wore levis jeans and wore an expensive leather jacket. After meeting many other backpackers, we got the feeling that what we were looking for lay further north in Kenya, Zambia, Botswana, and Mozambique.

With this new found knowledge we were now able to wipe the slate clean and take South Africa at face value not allowing the African stereotype to interfere with the rest of our trip.

Johannesberg gets the bum wrap as being the crime capital and not safe for anyone. This is partialy due to the proximity of Soweto the largest township in the world on its dorrstep. As I now understand it, Johannesberg is fairly safe during the day but has pockets of dodgy areas within the city that could be easy for a tourist to accidently wander into. Everyone therfore suggests a guide but with a little bit of sense and a well labeled map marked out by a local you could navigate it on your own.

Soweto once the largest, poorest, and most dangerous township has come a long way. Part of the cost of a tour to Soweto goes back into the community and it now seems to be thriving. There is still sections preserved for the tourists as they describe it, a “Shanty town”, but for the most part looks very much like a poor neighbourhood in the USA.

The worst section in the city is an area called Hillborough, which South Africans say has been taken over by the Nigerian Crime Syndicate where they pump drugs and prostitutes into the street. While we were there some police were shot in that area and this contributes to the difficulty in policing Hillborough. This is only a small section of the city, where the heart of it is its business district. Here you will see skyscrapers and men and women in business suits walking to work. Johannesberg is thought to be by South African’s, the most prospourus city in Africa and the financial centre of Africa.

South African women are breaking down barriers as well. Currently there are politcal problems but one positive seems to be the deputy president being appointed recently who happens to be a woman. There is some resistance to her appointment not due to her being a woman but due to her political credentials. Some of the locals thought that if they were to have a woman president that they would prefer someone older and experienced such as Nelson Mandella’s ex wife. In the poorer areas we still saw some backward thinking as women were made to ride in the back of pick up trucks while men occupied the front seats and on some occasions the passenger seat was empty! Still a way to go…

Pretoria, the capital city was nice. You could see that some of the federal money was spent on the appearance of the city which is the same feeling I get when I go to Ottawa. Pretoria is where all the Embassies are and is home to a university that hosts more than 250,000 students. No I didn’t typo on the zeros there it really is a mini city within the capital. With all the embassadors, diplomats, and foreign students it makes sense why police have made a concentrated effort to clean up Pretoria and make it a safe place to walk around at night. The downside of this is it isn’t really geared up for tourism. There are some really nice museums but if you wanted to do an organized tour they will always point you to Johannesberg or a nearby game reserve. It is still a pretty city with tree lined streets that bloom purple in the spring, and huge mansions for the wealthy diplomats. I have to say with the mansions came the most extensive security systems on the market and if any sector was profitable in northern SA it’s the security sector!

Kruger National Park is where we trucked off to next. South African’s claim it’s one of the largest National Parks in the world but I happen to know of some in Canada and Austrailia that are bigger. However this is not the time to be competitive, it is immense and once we discovered this fact I became extremely skeptical on seeing anything except open plains and bush. I pictured the day spent searching out high ground, parking up and waiting, scanning the terrain with binoculars. On entering the park my worries disapeared as we saw elephants, giraffe, kudu, zebra, and wild boar just on the way to our camp and some within 20 min inside the park. This good news also contributed to the evaporation of “The African Experience” as there is something to be said about making it a challenge to spot wild animals. Take the challenge out of it, stick it on a plate infront of you and give you what you want…it was just too easy for me (but at the same time I was thrilled to see it all (cant have your cake and eat it too!)). The following days produced sightings of Lions, hippos, crocs, and many other strange looking creatures. We were happy with our decision to rent a car and “Self Safari” as all we did for sightings was follow the big safari trucks around and stop when they stopped. The occupants of the trucks will have paid a small fortune for a safari package and they didn’t have the flexability to drive off when they had seen enough. I would highly recommend our way as it was so cheap!

Leaving Kruger we needed to head to the coast but found no easy way to do this. We could have gone through Swaziland but we were unsure on the insurance regualtions on our rental would allow it so we chose the safe option and went around. To do this you need to travel through an area called the Traneski aka the wild coast. This is one of the sparsest areas in South Africa and very rural. As much headway as politicans have made moving the country forward, the change happens the slowest in these areas and our white faces were not welcome. This was not a place we wanted to break down, unfortunately being poor and rural even the main roads were in dire need of repair and if we were to puncture a tire this would have been the place.

As it turns out we didn’t break down, something far worse happened. Our map claimed that the road we were on joined a major ‘N’ road that would take us around Swaziland to the coast, however it never connected but instead the pavement abruptly ended and turned into dirt. With no turnoff’s for about one hour behind us we pushed on hoping for the illusive connection to the ‘N’ road. This didn’t happen and soon the dirt became a road only fit for quad bikes and logging trucks. It took us up huge mountains through twists and turns with no signs or barriers keeping us from toppling over the side. We were so in the middle of nowhere I started to make a checklist in my head of the survival gear I would need to take with me and what I needed to leave behind. We eventually came accross a man in uniform asleep on the hillside and a crude barrier accross the road. It turns out we were in a remote border pass into Swaziland and by the look of things the last car admitted was from 1986. With very broken english the border guard gave us directions to salvation and we were able to take a deep breath knowing that there would be many more.

Once we hit the coast many things became apparent. As long as you stayed on the coast you were following in the path of tourism. The further south along the coast you went the more government influence there was to highlight that as a better place to be. It felt like you were going to view a house and the estate agent would keep steering you towards the highlights of the house and would try to keep you from seeing the unfinished parts of the house just in case you disaproved. Starting from St Lucia, the one street town geared towards fishing enthusiasts in the north; to Cape town at the southern most tip where serious redevelopment has taken place along the waterfront and table mountain towering over the the city being a serious wow factor!

For the rest of this message I would like to explain it using a top 10 format as there is a lot in between St Lucia and Cape Town and by picking out the highlights I won’t have to send you tooth pics to prop your eyes open. So here goes;

Top 10 Likes….

1. Kruger Self Safari
2. Wine Tasting in Stelenbosch
3. Walking throught the Drakensberg Mountains
4. Wlaking with Elepahnts
5. Surf Lessons in J Bay
6. Exploring Cape Point
7. dancing with Zulu Dancers
8. The Table Mountain experience
9. Durban watrfront and eating ‘Bunny Chow’
10. Driving through every small town

Top 10 Dislikes

1. Driving in SA
2. Poverty next to wealth in dramatic proportion
3. Our driving through Swaziland
4. The Quality of food on offer…MSG, poor meat, trans fats, etc.
5. Johannesburg Airport
6. Evident racism and tension in the air
7. Night spent in Mossel bay on a dirty train / hostel
8. Knocking the wing mirror off the car and having to pay for its repair
9. everyone drives white cars…it just looks odd
10. Seeing things I would like to buy but can’t carry

Top 10 scenic sights that were a must see…

1. The viey from /of Table Mountain – Cape Town
2. The view from a lookout deep in Kruger park
3. The view from the balcony of our beach house in J Bay
4. The view from our pool inInkosana looking at the Drakensberg Mountains
5. The view from the plane as we landed in J’Burg
6. The view from the N2 coastal road watching the African sunset over the hills
7. The Boschendal vinyards
8. The view from Cape Point
9. The view of Bloukrans gorge bungee jump
10. The view at dolphins point which was nice unough to make the cover of our rough guide

Top 10 suprises found on the roads of SA

Before you read this picture your busiest road in your country. It might be the M1 in England or the Trans Canada Highway in Canada. This is where all of the following took place not on some small out of the way place as you might expect!

1. A variety of livestock such as turtles, cows that look like camels, sheep, horses, and some form of badger-dog
2. Large quantity of poisonous gas spewig from every vehicle contributing to a countrywide mist of pollution
3. any vehicle able to carry an external load actually used to fit as many men, women, and children on the back
4. potholes the size of moon craters
5. Middle aged white women driving blue cars are the worst drivers there it was a weird coincedence but they are crazy
6. The longest stretch of roadwors ever where they close one lane and hold one side of traffic for 25min. dist – 3.7km long
7. Instead of signs or lights indicating roadworks there are people employed to wave big red flags and boy do they wave them!
8. Roads that suddenly have no lines and and tehn turn into a dirt track
9. People walking along the roadside with nothing for miles around. Sometimes 4-5 in a group in the middle of the road having a meeting and looking at you as you swerve around them as if you are an intrusion
10. The crazy driver of all award goes to the 12 seater mini cab drivers that make up to 40% of all vehicles in SA. They operate on their own set of rules and somehow cram 20+ in the 12 seater!

In summary I came for the “African Experience” but didn’t get it. Instead I got the “South African Experience” which did not disapoint! I was thrilled to go and see such a beautiful country and treasure my experiences there. It is by no means a small country and it was a lot of driving but well worth the effort. I would reccomend this way if travelling with other people but on your own use the Baz Bus as other travellers we met raved about it.

Patrick Riddell
October 2005