The power of ice

Travelling north from Queenstown we came across the ninety foot falls, the water appears to flow from solid rock and falls completely free to the river below. The Haast river runs through a valley originally cut by a glacier that has since retreated up the mountains, leaving huge rocks and other debris strewn around the valley floor.

Our target for today was another glacier, the Fox. Glacier, whose ice sheets grew and receded in a series of ice ages over the last two million years, and at it’s last peak 20,000 years ago ice covered the whole region to a depth of hundreds of metres.

Over the past two centuries the ice has continued to recede, it is not some two kilometers further up the valley than it was then. We took the car as far as we could, then walked about a mile up a steep hill of rocks and fine dust alongside a river of glacial melt, almost white in colour with the fine dust ground from the rock by the glacier, and carrying huge chunks of ice down with it.

As we reached the face of the ice it appeared black with the dust and debris, with chunks of ice sticking out of the face. These move at a rate of around 5cms (2inches) a day, and some of the ice now reaching the face was laid down hundreds of years ago. Topped up each winter, at places the ice can by a couple of hundred metres thick.At any time blocks of ice of many tons can break off, in fact we heard some go as we were there, so we were glad that we were some distance above the face in safety.

Moving on we passed close to the Franz Josef glacier, another of the eight ice sheets still in the region. We could see right up the glacier for quite a few miles, huge crevasses were showing on the top of the ice many metres deep.

It is difficult to imagine the power of this natural phenomena, rock faces laid bare and sheer, huge slabs of rock dumped and massive moraines formed as the glacier recedes.There is a great deal of power in this ice.

Water,water.......

The Shotover river runs for many miles down from the mountains in the centre of South Island, and drops a long way down to Lake Wakatipu, and Queenstown. Much of it is in gorges, making it quite steep, and it is there that many of the adventure sports take place.
As Anne was unfit, I had to do my sports alone, although the company I was with made sure I was not lonely.
Firstly I went on the Shotover Jet boat, along with a dozen others, speeding at up to 80kph through narrow gorges and over very shallow water in places.



 We did a number of 360 deg turns on the way, showing off, but it was certainly a thrilling ride. I can be seen in the top left of this picture, gritted teeth and all!
Later I was taken by bus for twenty kms on one of the worst roads I have ever seen, a mountain track one vehicle wide, with no barriers, and on gravel. I have to say I had my eyes shut part of the time, there were hairpin bends with overhanging rocks scraping the side of the bus, and one bend where one of the wheels almost went over the edge. And the drop below was around 200ft!
All this was to get to the put-in point for rafting on the river.There were eight boats, each with 7 people and a  guide in, and after a good briefing we set off down the river. The first mile or so was a continuation of the briefing, forward paddle, back paddle, left forward, right back, etc etc, even "Hold on"! or "Get Down"!
eventually we got it right, and had an easy 30 minutes to the first real rapid.
Now rapids are measured in grades one to six, and we had four grade fours in quick succession. I have rafted before, but I think what Andrew and I had in the Himalayas were only about grade three. Its one thing having a grade four, but four one after another?
We followed another boat closely, and as they went through another grade four in front of us they stuck in the outflow. The water goes down, and then up, and if the boat is not moving faster than the water it can get stuck. Two of the rafters were thrown out, and we saw the boat almost turn turtle, with another guy just hanging on. We had been briefed what to do in those circumstances, and all the rafters made it out, but the boat was stuck until our guide ran down river and threw a rope to pull them through.
We ourselves got through OK, a bit hairy on that one, and eventually after another couple more lesser drops we made it to the tunnel, a fast flowing stream through solid rock, but with enough headroom to see our way through.
But as we left the tunnel we had the big one just 30mtrs in front of us - a grade five! It was a five foot drop with a huge lift afterwards, every one of us was cowering in the bottom of the boat for this one, hanging on for our lives, and as we hit the lift the boat roared upwards almost throwing us out. But we had survived it, and it was just a short paddle out from there.
The pics on here are not of my boat, my camera is not waterproof so I had to leave it behind, so you'll have to take my word for it - I woz there!

Later we took the Gondola, a cable car, up to the top of the mountain behind Queenstown. I had a go on the Luge, a sort of bogie like we used to run down the roads on when we were kids, not terribly exciting particularly as I had a couple of slowcoaches in front of me I couldn't pass easily.

All in all though, a busy exciting day, I shall leave you with a couple of views from the top of the mountain.

A little bit of nostalgia....

Another day on the road, north from Te Anau to Queenstown, not too far only about 220kms. As the crow flies however it would have been around 40, but mountains round here dictate the route.
There used to be a railway from Invercargill to Queenstown, built for the goldfields in 1878, but now there is just 14kms of line still operating, as a tourist attraction. This engine was built in 1923, and operates daily during the season, but unfortunately we were not in time to make the the journey with it.
C'est la vie!




We were pleasantly surprised when we booked into our hotel, we were upgraded to a lake view. And what a view, we are half way up a very high hill and overlook Queenstown one way, and the lake and mountains the other, a view to die for. We would pay a fortune for this in the Lake District at home, but this room works out at just £60 a night, and it's high season!





This is adventure capital of New Zealand, white water rafting, jet boating, paragliding, bungee jumping, every type of adrenalin rush that you could think of. Some I wouldn't do, some I would like to do. We'll see in the next day or so.

There is a delightful little steam boat that plies it's way along the lake around each hour, we may take a trip on it tomorrow if the weather remains as it has today. We really have been so lucky that way, the sun has shone for us each day since we arrived. Unusual I believe, as they get rain some 200 days a year this side of the island.

I'll leave you with a group photo, couldn't miss the opportunity of showing you that scenery again!

The wonders of nature.

We traversed the whole island yesterday, east to west, took about four hours with stops, on the way after stopping for coffee we came across a Taxidermist who invited us in to see his work. He has dozens of local animals on show, including this one of deer. There are a lot of domestic deer round here, we saw fields of them on the way up.
This is a very mountainous area, they call it Fiordland as this whole coast is just like Norway, fourteen large fiords puncture this west coast for many miles inland. And further inland there are many large lakes, Te Anau is the second largest in New Zealand, and is surrounded by high mountains, some snow covered all year round.

We arrived at Te Anau early enough to take a boat trip across the lake of the same name to visit caves. Across the water from the town is a very long cave with glow-worms on the roof, a spectacular sight which is impossible to photograph as it is rather dark in there, and in any case they will not allow it.
The caves themselves are full of rushing water, many small waterfalls, and have been formed by the water comparatively recently, just 12000 years ago.
We were taken across a cave lake in a small boat, completely dark apart from the mirriad tiny lights in the roof- the glow-worms. Worth a visit!

That was good, but today has certainly capped it. An early start saw us driving some 20kms to Lake Manapouri, where we boarded a boat to take us across the lake to a jetty. There are no roads across to here, but there is a road going from here to Doubtful Sound, built to service a power station and it's 15km tailrace some fifty years ago.




Doubtful Sound is a fiord sculpted by a glacier during the ice ages, it bites some 40kms into the coastline and is the second largest of the fiords, opening into the Tasman Sea.It was named by Captain Cook when he circumnavigated New Zealand in 1770, he would not enter it as he was doubtful he could get out again against the prevailing wind.
The scenery here is spectacular, as we travelled over the pass we caught our first glimpse of the Sound some 2000ft below us, and it was breathtaking. That was only the start of a day full of  wonderful views, again I shall publish some of them at the end of this script, but none of them do justice to the beauty of these surroundings.

It so happened that we had chosen a beautiful day, over 200 days a year are wet here, and when it is we understand the water falling down the mountains is  something to behold, but we still saw some great falls, and with the good weather we enjoyed unusually good clear views of the mountains too.
There are few places on earth to match this, it is a true untouched wilderness just as Cook saw it all those years ago, with wildlife just as pristine.

As we left the fiord and entered the Tasman Sea for a while we found an island with New Zealand fur seals, almost hunted to extinction in the early part of last century, but recovering nicely now. There was one very big bull just peeping over the rocks, surrounded by a couple of dozen females and their pups. We were quite close to them and they were completely unfazed.

I also managed to get a good photo of an albatross in flight, which delighted me as they really are majestic birds, effortlessly flying back and and forth across the ocean in front of the boat.

We were also fortunate to see Little Blue Penguins, not close enough to photograph as they were playing in the water. A Yellow Crested Penguin showed itself a few times also, a very rare creature, but they are very quick, we didn't have the chance to focus the camera before they disappeared under the water again. As there was a model on the boat we took a photo of that instead- cheating again!

I could show you a hundred pictures tonight, none would do justice to the scenes we have seen, so please be content with some of the better ones, and perhaps one day you can come here yourself to witness the wilderness as it should be.

Taieri and Toroa

The Taieri Gorge Railway runs from the lovely Edwardian station in Dunedin for 58 kms inland to Pukerangi, rising all the way. Built over 42 years, the line originally ran up to Cromwell, in the heart of the Central Otago region.

By the late 1870's the gold rushes in Otago were well past, and attention was being focussed on the agricultural potential on Dunedin's hinterland, roads being notoriously bad, railways were seen to offer the best means of improving transport and communications.
While the first section of the line opened in 1889, economic depression and wars delayed the finishing of the line until 1921, but despite it's late arrival the line played a major part in the development of the region.
Many tons of farm produce and hundreds of thousands of head of livestock were moved annually down to Dunedin for onward carriage to other parts of NZ and export.
The scenery along the way is spectacular,, with many of the views being totally inaccessible in any other way. We took over 100 photos as we travelled, each bend in the line gave us fresh lovely views of the gorge.

After making it's way south to Wingatui, the train leaves the main north south coastal line and starts to winds it's way up to the gorge, following the Taieri river all the way. Through no less than twelve tunnels, one almost a mile long, the train struggles at times to pull us up the steep gradients, as we rise over 250mtrs. There are numerous viaducts on the way, mainly wrought iron, the Wingatui viaduct is almost 200mtrs long and 50mtrs high spanning the Mullocky stream.




There are so many wonderful views that it is difficult to choose the best, I shall include a few more at the end.

Later we drove some 30kms to Taiaroa head, a long peninsula which forms part of the harbour mouth for Dunedin. We had not seen any Albatross on our travels, and this was our opportunity to see these magnificent birds close to on the headland. Known as Toroa in Maori, the Royal Albatross is one of about eight different Albatross which circle the earth around Antarctica. With a wingspan of over 3mtrs, (ten feet) it uses the wind and thermals to travel up to 1500 kms each day, at up to 120kph (75mph). Spending two-thirds of their life at sea, they come ashore only to breed, and we were privileged to see a few of them, one with a chick, through a viewing window in the nature reserve.As we watched, a ranger came over the hill and approached the nearest nest, and gently took a day old chick from under the mother Albatross. He weighed the infant, and replaced the chick soon after checking it over. Despite many attempts, it was impossible to focus my camera on the birds in flight, they move so fast and were some way away. Hopefully we will get the opportunity again.

The headland has been used as a fort for many years, indeed from 1885. In 1889 an Armstrong Disappearing Gun was installed, made in Newcastle on Tyne, and of course Armstrong has a connection with the borders. It is a six inch, breech loading gun of a hydro-pneumatic carriage, and was aimed and loaded underground, before being lifted for firing. It returned for reloading by the recoil, and could be fired once a minute. It has been perfectly restored, and still works, although it has never been fired in anger it has been tested hundreds of times over the years.

Lakes and mountains

Although a very interesting city, we were glad to move on from Christchurch after the tremor, but our bad luck followed us on the road. (There may have been other good reasons for leaving too!!)

We had barely gone 20 miles when we realised that the car we had was crook, there was a terrible whine coming from the engine at 60+kph. So we had to turn round and return it, where it was exchanged for a better one, albeit the same model. It is not easy to go back to a car after driving a four wheel drive for so long!
But the day improved as we travelled into the mountains, the scenery was lovely. The roads here are a little better than the surfaces in Oz, so the driving is comfortable, and despite the distances we can make good time

The South Island is very mountainous, which affects the climate. In the east, where we are, it is mainly dry and reasonably warm, while in the west, where the weather comes from, it is much wetter and a bit cooler generally. And the latitude here is considerably south of even Hobart, our southern most travel on Oz.
An overnight near Lake Tekapo and we travelled on. In the distance we could see Mount Cook,  the highest in Australasia at 3755m (about 11,000ft), which is snow covered all the year round. We were lucky to see it without cloud cover, although a bit hazy at that distance across the lake.

Yesterday there was a very big avalanche on the mountain, fortunately without casualties.



They seem to enjoy redeeming their rogues in the antipodes, viz Ned Kelly. This is a guy called McKenzie, who gave his name to this region, but who was also a notorious sheep stealer. He took 1000 sheep from a big land owner and attempted todrive them through the mountains to a hidden valley. Unfortunately (for him) he was caught, and sentenced to seven years hard labour.

So now we are down at the coast again, in Dunedin, a lovely city only spoiled by it's one was system, which took us a bit of sorting out! (Nuff said!) David and I visited Rotary tonight, Dunedin East club, which has about 50 members. There we enjoyed a talk by a chap who is in charge of security at a brand new stadium here, and would like Rotary to provide some volunteer stewarding at major events. Looks like a good fundraiser!

It's bl**** cold out there.....

As I reported last evening, we had an earthquake as we were getting ready for bed. At a magnitude of 4.6, it was not a very big one, but we felt and heard it. It was about 10k away, and only about 10k deep I understand, which doesn't make it a very dangerous event.Just a bit worrying.
The city is so well shored up now that it is unlikely that much more damage could occur, as I said last evening they are trying to save the old buildings, even if it only the facades. This is one such, an art museum, but there are many examples of older buildings which have been closed until they can be properly repaired.

We had a message this morning when we woke up, to tell us that our trip to the mountains, the jetboat, the train ride etc, was off as the agent had messed up and booked yesterday. What a shower! So instead we took ourselves off to the Antarctic Centre, a sort of museum about the south pole. It was good, a few films including one in 4d ( that means they move the seats and squirt water at you!) and quite a few exhibits. Penguins of course, and we also had a ride in a Hagglund, which are the machines that they use to travel over the ice there. It was very like a roller coaster, up very steep hills, and even through water, it floats believe it or not.




We experienced what it was like out there in a cold room, where they simulated windchill down to - 18c, and I can tell you that it is very cold. We only had it for a few minutes, but one can imagine what it must be like to be there.

There is a buskers festival on here at the moment, and Anne and I spent an hour or so there watching a couple of acts. It goes on here for a couple of weeks, and they come from all over the world, and like Edinburgh festival, have quite a number of stages.We watched as a trio of acrobats performed, just sorry that we can't spend more time here at the festival , but we must move on tomorrow.