Trio NZ Trip: South Island

It’s been three days since I got back from NZ and as promised, I will update on the details of my 13 days of holiday. Bear with me as this is going to be a very long post.

16/11

We were supposed to be on the plane to Christchurch at 7.45 am but arrived at the airport an hour on the dot. The check in counter was still open but since they had trouble looking for Ciktie's visa, they didn't allow us board the plane as they said it was only a few more mins for the check in counter to close. Too bad, so I and ciktie had to reschedule our flight for the next day and had to pay $100 for the new tickets.

17/11

Board the flight to Christchurch in the afternoon. Luckily everything went well and we arrived at Christchurch at 11 at night. The flight doesn’t take that long it’s just the time difference between Australia and New Zealand that made us arrived so late. Actually the flight only took 3 and a half hour. Haizum picked us up from the airport and we called it a day.

Brisbane Airport: outbound to Christchurch

18/11

We were supposed to get out at 8.30am but we ended up waking at 8.30am. So we settled the car renting and all and we head out to the city. We walked around Christchurch city, Cathedral Square and Garden city (I think that’s what the place was called as it was a garden in the middle of the city). Nothing much to see except for the architecture of the building which Diana enjoyed (well, being an architecture student she would enjoyed it). Then we head to Rick mall. It’s just like normal shopping mall with nothing new. Nobody feels like walking as everybody seems dreadfully sleepy. We thought of going back to Haizum’s place but decided to stop at the Botanical Garden on the way back. There was this beautiful rose garden at the botanical garden. It’s nearly the end of spring but the flowers are still blooming. After what seems ages, we head home and doze off..hehe..We woke up at 6.30pm and pick up our rental car and jln2 kat area around Uni of Canterburry as it was our last day in Christchurch. Took some photos, went back home, cook dinner and off the bed for we want an early start tomorrow.

The chalice at Cathedral Square

Christchurch City Hall

Christchurch Cathedral

Avon River

Christchurch Tram

Botanical Garden

Uni of Canterbury

19/11

Today is the first day of our road trip around NZ. We drove to Lake Takepo which was breathtakingly beautiful. Subhanallah..indahnya ciptaan Tuhan. Even though the sun was shining brightly, it was still cold due to the wind. Unfortunately, I didn’t expect the cold weather so I only brought my thin sweater which did me little good. We headed south to Queenstown today but there was a couple of pit stop on the way. After Lake Takepo, we stopped at Lake Pukaki which was similar to Lake Takepo but we took photos still. After a couple of hours drive, we stopped at Wanaka and went to the Puzzling world which gives me dizziness and slight headache in the illusion room. Before really heading to Queenstown, we had another stop which was the cute ‘pekan’ of Arrowtown. The shops were soo cute but not cute enough to make us stay for the night. It was already 6.30pm when we reached Queenstown but the sky was still bright and there was still daylight. So, as our backpacker was close to the city, we walked to the city and check out the city.

The view on our way south

Lake Takepo

Lake Pukaki

Puzzling World, Wanaka

Part of Puzzling World

 

Optic Illusion

Cute town of Arrowtown

The scenery towards Queenstown

Queenstown Street Mall

Queenstown

20/11

Nothing much was on the schedule today but everybody woke up late and we went out at noon and check out the activities they offered here at the information centre. We booked for the rafting and jetboat for tomorrow and went to the skyline gondola. The gondola was like the one in Langkawi except that it was lower and has a luge on the top. So, we got on the gondola and we can see the whole Queenstown from up here and Lake Wakatipu (seriously, they have a lot of lakes down here). The scenery again was breathtaking. Well, New Zealand is all about the scenery besides the xtreme activities. Then all of us had two rides down the luge and took more photos. After all that, we had nothing to do so we took the car and drove up to Glenorchy. There’s nothing much here except again for the scenery which was basically mountains and water. After that, we went to Shotover River, the place where we will be doing the shotover jetboat the next day.

The gondola behind us

The view from the gondola

The view after we got of the top gondola station

Chairlift ride to the luge area

Weee...going downhill on the luge

Lugers (is there even such a word)

Glenorchy

Walking track at Glenorchy

The view at Glenorchy

Shotover River

21/11

We booked the noon session for the jetboat and rafting so ended going out around 11.30am or so. The jetboat was a 60kmph ride between the canyons on the Shotover River. The famous thing about this jetboat ride was the 360 degree turn that all of us enjoyed so much. Later on, I and Ciktie got change for rafting while Diana went back to city for shopping. The journey to the starting point for rafting was gruesome, a very narrow road with high cliffs on the side. Seriously scary, I don’t think anybody will survive that fall. Once the arrived at the starting point we got into groups of 8 and the journey starts. We had to follow orders from our guide and there was this rapid called mother section that we had to lookout for as there were 6 rapids in a row. When we were at the mother section, the raft nearly flipped upside down on the 4^th rapid called ‘the toilet’. Luckily, everybody acted as fast as lightning and it didn’t happen and everything after that went smoothly until we reached the end of the journey. That night my hand ached so much due to all of the rowing.

Shotover Jetboat

All set for rafting

Our group

Action in the water

22/11

Today is the last day in Queenstown, and again we woke up late. (We always seemed to wake up late here and I don’t know why). Diana and I are doing the canyon swing today. It’s like bungee except that after the free fall we will swing across the canyon. On the way to the place we were watching videos of people that did the swing and there is this one girl that keeps on laughing at the people on the vids. Well, that girl went on first and I came second after her. I actually wanted Diana to do first but she insisted that she wants to do after me, so I ended up doing it first. My jump was buruk hell, you guys can watch it on the video. Takut?? I was scared but then I think this is once in a lifetime experience so I just went on with it. Then, back to Queenstown for some shopping!!!hehehehe..

The place that I'll be jumping down

All geared up with our safety harness

A pose before the jump

AAAAAAaaaaaaa....of I go

Here's the video of my jump. Please don't laugh, I know it's horrible. 

23/11

We are heading the west coast today to Franz Joseph. The weather was fine on the way but it started to rain as we were approaching Franz Joseph. We booked the 3pm slot for Glacier hiking but due to the heavy rain and the conditions were dangerous they had to cancel it which left us stuck in this small town with nothing to do. In the end, we just went around the place and went back to our backpacker and watch DVD there.

We can only take photo as the weather does not permit us to go hiking

Indoor glacier hike

24/11

Today was another early morning as we had to drive up all the way to Picton to catch the ferry to Wellingon. We were supposed to stop at an old city but due to the heavy rain we just keep on with the journey. Nothing done today just a travelling day as nearly the whole day we were in the car. We arrived at Picton at 4pm and waited to get on the ferry which departed at 7pm. Arrived in Welly at 11pm, had dinner and another day gone.

Pitstop on our way to Picton

Picton town

These animals traveled with is on the boat

Half of the journey done, another half to go on the North Island

To be continued..