Kayak and Back
We’ve been offline for a few days – way offline. After the rafting trip, we continued to make our way back to Auckland doing what I’m now calling our Week of Adventure. The next stop was Queen Charlotte Sound at the top of the South Island, which is a pretty combination of hills and inlets. We spent a day on guided kayak trip from Picton cruising around many coves, stopping for lunch on a deserted beach, and being followed by seals playing under our kayak. At the end of the day, we left the group to paddle up to our lodge for the night in Lochmara Bay. I’ve never arrived at a hotel this way before, but it seemed appropriate in the setting.
In the morning we hiked out from the lodge on the final section of the Queen Charlotte Track. It’s a nice 20k walk, but the highlight of the day might have been on the water taxi back to town. A group of 3 dolphins surfed, jumped, and played in the wake of the boat and it was a fantastic sight that we didn’t want to end.
We took a day off from the activities and caught the ferry back to the North Island. It’s bittersweet because it’s good to have a break from the campervan, but it also means that our time in NZ is getting shorter. However, we still had more things to do and we returned to Tongariro. When we stopped there on the way south, we passed up the Tongariro Crossing. It’s a 20k trail that is considered the “best one day walk in NZ” in the guidebooks and is always rated highly in those top-hikes-of-the-world-type lists. At that time, the weather didn’t cooperate and I just didn’t feel up to it. We vowed to do it on the way back and this time everything fell into place. The views include volcanic mountains, craters, alpine lakes, and even smoking geothermal vents. It’s an incredible track with Mt. Doom (Ngauruhoe) as the backdrop, and I’m thrilled that we did it. I’m also a little tired and looking forward to a few days in an apartment in Auckland to recuperate.
View from the Crossing:
On the Queen Charlotte Sound:
halftime
March 28th, 2009 at 11:01 pm
I noticed a photo on Smugmug that shows the caravan company taking away the motorhome because Eric thought that Ellyse ruined the clutch. I think that it might be the other way around. Ellyse learned to drive a standard shift car when she was 16.
March 29th, 2009 at 5:59 pm
Hey, thanks for defending me! The engine started making a terrible knocking noise, so we had to swap campers. The company was great – took only about 16 hours (overnight) to get us a new one. They thought it might be something in the gearbox, but couldn’t tell until it was opened back at their shop.
Anyway, it’s been a long time since I drove stick, and it was especially tricky shifting with the left hand. I will admit to quite a few stalls coming out of first, but I’m positive it had nothing to do with the engine troubles!