Time to catch up on my blog after being "off the Internet" on the wild, west coast of New Zealand.
Its Friday pm here and we are back in Christchurch at the Chateau on the Park..

By last Sunday night, Liz right foot had swollen up to about twice normal size, as a result of her many sandfly bites after our mountain hike last week, and a whole day of caving and rafting. We went into Westport and found a "chemist". I was able to buy some dexchlorpheniramine maleate antihistamines for her, and some elastic wrap, sorta like Coban. I have not seen any ACE bandages here. The groceries and chemists are very interesting; they do not have nearly the amount or number of OTC meds we would expect in the States. No Benadryl. Only cough drops, and few cough and cold remedies. Two of the nonsedating antihistamines are OTC here- and its funny to see it spelled "Clarytin". I wrapped Liz foot and we decided to help her elevate it and not tramp on it for the next couple of days.
So Monday, we went out to Cape Foulwind to see the seal colony. There is a wonderful bay on the tip of this peninsula, and a great restaurant, the Bay House Restaurant overlooking it. After a short (<100 meters) walk out to see the seals, we went back and had breakfast on the porch. The "nested eggs" and muesli were great with hot tea. After that we drove down the wild and rocky coast to the "pancake rocks" at Punakaiki. These are wonderful formations, where the seal pounds through many arches and spouts up in blowholes. We arrived just before the rain, and Liz managed to hobble around the path, being a good sport. We then continued down the coast to Hokitika, an artists colony. We took a quick walk across the street to look at the glowworm dell (nice, but nothing like the cave rafting) before hitting the sack.
The next morning, Liz's foot was still pretty swollen, so we decided to just hang around Hoki for the day. We had read about a class where she could make her own greenstone jewelry- and she was pretty interested in that. So we left her in the hands of the Mad Kiwi at the Just Jade Experience for the day. Vicki and I walked the shops and drove out thought the beautiful Hoki valley to the Hokitika Gorge. When we came back, we took Liz through a few shops and also visited the Kiwi Centre. This is an eclectic menagerie that is obviously someone's aquarium hobby that got away from them. I could do without the giant eels. However, the kiwi exhibit was great. They are in a nocturnal room, so they were awake and feeding, and they come up to just a few feet away from you, so you can really see them well. Before we left Hokitika, we had a great meal of Indian food. We each had a lamb dish. Because the sun sets so late here, we were able to leave Hoki at 6:30 pm and drive down to Franz Josef , reaching that town at the foot of the glaciers while it was still light out at 8:30 pm. The weather was great, for the wet West Coast, and we could see the mountains marching down to the sea the whole way.
Wednesday morning, I got up and made arrangements to do a glacier hike. Liz and Vicki checked out the town, and walked up the valley to the glacier foot. However, to go up onto the glacier, you need to take a guided tour. So at 10:30 I reported to Franz Josef Glacier Guides. Here they give you a set of special leather boots with hobnails in them, a pair of "talonz" (which are just special ice crampons for the boots) and a Goretex parka. About 40 of us hopped on the bus to the carpark up the valley, and then we hiked in to the foot of the glacier, about 2 km. over very rough country. Once at the foot of the glacier, we split into 12 man teams, then started climbing- straight up the ice. After going up just a little ways, we stopped and put on our talonz. Then keep climbing, up and up over ice that graduallly cleared of rock and became the most beautiful turquoise blue color. We crossed over two crevasses on ladders, climbed up many pitches with ropes and finally at the "top" walked next to an 800 meter tall huge waterfall cascading down the valley wall onto the side of the glacier. We traversed down into a few crevasses,and walked through an ice cave- something I've always wanted to do. Overall we spent about 2 hours on the ice. We walked about 8km total, and climbed about 200 meters in altitude- although it seemed a lot more because it was such rough climbing. The glacier was awesome, and as we came back down, the sun came out and I could see, looking back, that for all our effort, we had only climbed up a very small portion of the glacier in our half-day trip. The mountains here are marvelous- they rise right out of the sea straight up to tens of thousands of feet. You really get a feel for how small you are on the face of the Earth in this landscape. When I got back down, I had the world's best tasiting peanut-butter and jelly sandwich, and we took off back north to the Hokitik area again. We stopped in town and grabbed "takeaway" fish & chips for supper. This time, instead of staying in a campgroung, we "free camped" out in a DOC campground on Lake Kaniere. This beautiful lake is tucked a way at the foot of the mountains. I took a swim in the lake, and fell into bed.

Thursday morning, after breakfast, we drove around the lake to Dorothy Falls. This is a beatiful waterfall out in the middle of nowhere. It had rained the night before, and we could hear the waterfall from the lakefront, over 100 meters away. After coming back into Hoki to do a few errands, we drove over the Arthurs' Pass. This is a wonderful feat of engineering. and one of the steepest mountain passes I've ever been over. The high country of New Zealand is dry and beautiful and the rivers really are turquoise in color due to the glacial snowmelt and powder in them.

Coming down into Canterbury, we stayed the night at Ashley Gorge at a wonderful campsite filled with families with little children on holiday. The kids here are really cute, and Vicki and I both have the impression that they are really allowed and encouraged to be children, and are less media-influenced than U.S. kids. All of them were wearing sun hats and sunscreen also, and a sundress here for a little girl means long sleeves,a nd long skirt with ruffles! We enjoyed watching them play in the dirt, river, swings, etc.

This morning we came back into Christchurch, said a sad goodbye to our campervan. In one week we put on 1400+ km, and did SO many activities. It will be a relief to stay back here in the hotel with soft beds and our own shower. Tomorrow we start down to the deep South of the country, and Monday I start orientation in Winton. Its been a great holiday, but we are anxious to "light" and stay in one place for awhile.

Today is Monday, we are in Graymouth on the West coast headed south. Lots to tell about, but since I have a fast internet connection, I'm going to just post pictures for now. they are in random order- see if you can figure out where they are from reading below!

Westport
Today is Sunday.. This will be a late post as I have to type this offline and hope I can find someplace to upload these blogs soon. The internet access we have had has been disappointing to say the least. At last nights attempt, I could read email, but not Reply because java-script was disabled, apparently by some virus checker on the rental machine!

Friday morning dawned in Kaikoura with a double rainbow over our caravan, in the mist between us and the mountains. This quickly gave way to another absolutely blue day, with intense sunshine on the bay. The mountains were in stark relief and the wind was gentla and cool off the Pacific. We packed up and drove our campervan out to the end of the peninsula to explore the rocks and tide pools before leaving this magical place. As we drove into the "carpark", we pulled up and saw a sea lion basking in the sun right in front of us. We walked down and watched him (or her) back-scratching with a hind flipper. He let us take a few pictures, then waddled off into the bay, rolling over and waving flippers, doing somersaults on the way out into the sea. We explored tidal pools for awhile, then climbed into the campervan and headed off into the center of the South Island.
I drove the first stretch up along the outer Kaikoura range. This started as a pleasant drive through the valley floor, studded with wooly sheep as far as one could see. Then the road began to climb up into the hills and mountains. This became more of a challenge, as the road twists and turns quite a bit. Just as you top a rise of a hill, you suddenly dive back down into the next canyon, going around hairpin turns and switchbacks, with Kiwi drivers and trucks barreling around the turns at 100 kph in the opposite direction, just to make it interesting. Then, at the bottom of the ravines, you come to the famous New Zealand "one lane bridge". Almost all the backcountry bridges are of this variety. As you approach the bridge, a sign with up and down arrows tells you whether you or the opposite driver has the right of way. If your arrow is bolded, you can run right across- assuming there is no one already on the bridge. If not, you must slow down and wait till the other side is all across. Vicki surmises that these bridges are one lane to keep costs down. New Zealands geology is such that flash floods and bridge washouts must be very common. Many of these bridges looked fairly new.
Once we climbed up onto the plateau, we came into "tussock country" with large basins and ranges covered with sheep farms. It has been do dry here that all this land was golden-brown colored; dotted here and there with trees and flowers in bloom.

As we drove up into the mountains, we crossed a divide and came into a river valley where the river was obviously in full flood stage. It was chocolate brown, roaring down the canyon, and full of tree trunks and logs. A bit farther up the road, and we came around the corner to find a long line of cars ahead of us. The drivers and passengers were all out in the road, talking and partying. In fact, the 3 or 4 cars ahead of us were having a group picture! One of the drivers came back and told us "Bridge is washed out up ahead by the flood, eh? Might be 2 or 2 and 1/2 hours they tell us. Might as well take it easy." Although we had planned to drive through the mountains to Westport, we decided at that point to double back to Hamner Springs, since we had just passed the turnoff.
Hamner Springs is a mountain spa or retreat popular with people from Christchurch. It is well known for its mineral springs and hot baths. We drove through the town, and found a wonderful campsite a few kilometers out of town. It was a former forestry camp, converted into a retreat center for the physcially and mentally handicapped. Since school is out now, they welcome campers. After making arrangements, we went back into town and took a baths in the hot springs. These were 39 to 42 degrees Centigrade, and very nice. Vicki and I even spent a few minutes in the sulfur pools. The baths were nicely remodeled, witth rock pools, little bridges and wonderful landscaping. We really felt clean after soaking for an hour. We found Liz some Internet access for awhile, and got some fish and chips for dinner. We returned to the campsite and listened to the birds singing in the trees overhead. It was a lovely site, very quiet (we were 1 of 2 families there).
About 4 AM I got up to use the facilities, and was just "gobsmacked" at the stars overhead. It was really the first time I'd seen them well- it was too humid and lighted in Kaikoura. Up in the mountains, the stars were spectacular, although I will have to work a bit to find my way around this Southern Hemisphere sky. Orion is prominent, but the constellation appears to be standing on his head, with Betelgeuse towards the horizon and Sirius well overhead. I could identify the Southern Cross, and the Milky Way. Otherwise, the constellations are completely unfamiliar.

Saturday we had a little muesli and coffee or tea, and then went hiking. It seems every little town in this country has some "walks" nearby. We had seen some labeled as "nature trail" and "waterfall trail" just down the road from our campsite. So we drove to the trailhead, put on our hiking boots and set out. Liz was game for the Waterfall Trail, so we started up. And up. And UP. This trail rose along a mountain stream that was pure waterfall surrounded by ferns. We climbed at a steep pace for 1 and 1/2 hours up through the forest. I figure we went up about 1500 feet vertical elevation, and around several twists and turns in the canyon. In several places there were stairs to climb. However, it was a pleasant climb. The forest was Mountain Beech with many other trees mixed in, and it was full of birds. The birdsongs here are amazing- they sing extremely loudly, especially in the morning and evening. In the forest, we could never see the little bird singing however, sometimes they seemed only a few feet away, they were so loud. There are few insects, and no small animals. The stream is clear, and I could not see any minnows or fish in it. When we came out to the top, we had a grand view of the valley to the south. The trail then wound back into the canyon to a high waterfall coming down from Mount Isobel, that I estimated to be about 75 to 80 feet tall. It was in a grotto full of moss, ferns, and lichens. Quite beautiful and worth the climb. Once back down to the trailhead, we had a quick lunch, and drove on over Lewis Pass. We stopped in the little town of Reefton for ice cream, then drove through a beatiful valley in front of the Victoria Range. Vicki drove down the Buller RIver canyon, which features not only many one-lane bridges, but one section of "one-laned" highway, where the road literally hangs off the rock over the gorge, with nothing but wall to wall river below. To decide who goes first, one looks into the parabolic mirrors to see if any traffic is coming.

We rolled into Westport around 6 pm, and everything was closed. Westport is a port on the Tasman Sea, and looks like the south pacific towns in movies like "Mr. Roberts". The sidewalks are all covered with corrugated awnings, the single story cinderblock buildings are brightly painted in pastels, and there is one lane to the town, ending in the harbor full of fishing boats and the cement-loading port facility. We found a nice campground after having supper in a combination "Chinese restaurant/fish and chips takeaway" (which was really quite good). We had a nice walk on the beach whick featured roaring surf and dinner plate sized jellyfish washed up on the sand. Liz was bitten by sand flies at the end of our mountain hike, and she was having a lot of swelling and itching despite her Alavert, but she was being a good sport about it.

Upon signing in at Westport, the campground manager talked us into signing up for the Underworld Rafting tour in Charleston, just south of here. So this morning we got up at 0715 for shuttle pickup. Our guide, Sandy, who looked to be about 20 met us and took us to the "base camp". There we collected our wet suits, helmets and gear, and took a further shuttle down into the valley of the Nile river. This is a beautiful temperate rain forest, full of tree ferns and tall rata trees covered in red flowers. Several people told us the valley was used as an outdoor set for BBC series, "The Lost World". The river runs through a canyon of tall limestone cliffs, at least 200 feet tall. It certainly looked like a dinosaur could appear at any minute. The journey continued with a 2km train ride up the valley, through the rainforest. Once at the end, we were warned that this was "the last toilet break for 3 hours" and directed into the bushes. Then we put on our wet suits, grabbed our inner tubes, and then tramped about 1/4 km through the jungle and across the river. Next, we climbed 111 steps up to the cave entrance. This is the largest cave in New Zealand, and it was only discovered in the 60's. Its now part of a local National Park. Its still very wild, and very little changed from its discovered state. We started on the top level of the cave, and progessively walked down and deeper into the earth. The cave formations were exquisite; pure white flowstons in draperies, thousands of staws, and columns. I have never seen such beautiful draperies, and I've been in many caves, (including Mammoth Cave in Kentucky). We progressed down through 4 distinct levels, and took a break once to sit on our tubes and experience complete darkness, and complete silence except for the drip of the water in the cave. It was cold in there- 11 degress C. and we could see our breath. I was glad for the wet suit, as we tromped through mud and fell on our bottoms more than once. As we reached the lower levels, we came into a glowworm chamber. These insects are unique to the Southerrn hemisphere. The larva live on the roofs of caves or rock grottos, and spin sticky threads. They then attract flying insects by glowing, like a firefly, but with a steady light. In the dark, they shine like the stars in the Milky Way. In the dark cave passage, they were very special and beautiful. But the best was yet to come. The inner tubes we'd hauled all through the cave were now put to good use. As we came into the bottom level of the cave, after walking about 3 km through it, we entered a rivering passage. It was clear that the recent flooding here had washed stuff up into the tubes- there were leaves and branches, and a few logs. We then reached a dark underground lake. Here we plopped our bottoms into the inner tubes and set sail in an "inner tube" train through the passages leading out of the black pool. We turned off our lights, and as we floated backwards through the darkness, tens of thousands of glowworms became visible on the roof of the passages. Words do not describe the sensation of lying in the cool water and floating down this river of night. Finallly we rounded a bend and faint light of day began to appear. As we floated out of the gloworm's domain, gaps appeared in the roof overhead and sunlight streamed down, along with long lianas, ferns and the roots of trees precariosly perched on the edges of these skylights. Rounding a couple of more bends, we came out into an a small recess in the cliff face above with the river in front of us. To complete our trip, we plopped back into our tubes, and rafted down the river, over several fun rapids back to our starting point. A quick change, a train trip back to the shuttle, and a short ride up the hill took us back to the daylit world and a cup of delicious hot chocolate, tasting wonderful after a long mornings walk and rafting. Home again, a shower and the rest of day spent doing camp chores, making dinner, talking over our adventure and giving Liz's swollen foot a rest and wrap. Another wonderful day in New Zealand.