South Island NZ Countdown

Day 16 - Everyone must be getting tired of this step by step holiday. We are just about ready to go home too. Yes there are lots of things that we haven't seen; it's just time to get back to normal again. Sorry for the inundation of blog updates, internet is scarce and what we do get, Glen uses for business - making sure we still have a home to go back too. As you can tell, we did manage to crawl out of bed today and surprisingly we both feel pretty good, at least we can move! All of NZ South Island is beautiful; I would recommend this country as a holiday destination to anybody. Today we road trip it from Marahau through Nelson, along the Queen Charlotte Drive, Picton and finish in Blenheim, the heart of Marlborough Country (Wine, not cigarettes). Today we've seen lots more hills, windy roads, glistening rivers and probably the best ocean bays for anchoring a boat in, that we have seen since Canada. We stopped in Havelock for a lunch of NZ's famous green lipped mussels at the Mussel Pot (yummy!). Havelock is the birth place of this lucrative aquatic culture. Our camp site is Blenheim, under a bridge, by a river - the bridge is highway #1! This will be just like sleeping in the truck stops during our racing days.

 

Day 17 - When in wine country, do as the winos do! So many wineries, so little time. Taste testing is FREE (every wino's dream). Needless to say, our camper van is now weighted down with 4 more cases of wonderful NZ wine. Typically, Glen and I don't drink white wine, but the taste test ladies are always so disappointed when you say no to it that we finally started to say O.K. to testing some white wine. Wow! Big surprise! This area is world re-known for it's Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Gris - they are truly fantastic. One of the trendy new tourist activities here is to rent bicycles and ride from cellar door to cellar door - easy enough to do. This gets you out of the crush of a tour group in a bus or van and keeps you off of the hook for drinking and driving. Maybe next time!

 

Day 18 - It's 8:00am and we are sitting in the line up to catch the Inter Islander Ferry from Picton on the South Island to Wellington on the North Island. It is another nice sunny day. Where were all of these kind of days when we on the West Coast?  On board the ferry, we take our final photos of the receding South Island. It has truly been grand. One thing we have noticed and liked about the S.I. is that ALL of the towns/cities have a Main Street, and that is "down town", everything that place has to offer is right there. Old fashioned, but endearing. So now we have three hours on the ferry to figure out where we are going to go in the three days we have left, before we have to have the camper delivered in Auckland. We change our minds three times as to whether we will go up the east coast through more wine country or the west coast and more wilderness (semi wilderness - as the North Island holds 3/4 of the NZ population - so there are more people everywhere). Believe it or not, we have had enough wine for now and head up the west coast. It is a little bit of a culture shock having to drive through all of the suburbs just to get out of Wellington and into the country. North Island is a great place too, lots to see and do. We stop in Wanganui for the night and will explore it more fully tomorrow. Four little sheep are our neighbors tonight as the camp site is by an acreage area and backs onto the Wanganui River ($6.00 extra for a river spot).

Happy Valentine's Day

Day 13 - It poured rain all night, it is still pouring this morning and we are off with our little backpack of snacks to do a guided 1/2 day walk on Fox Glacier. Good old New Zealand is prepared for this type of weather even if we "flat land prairie people" aren't. The guide service outfits us in proper hiking boots, wool socks, rain pants, rain jackets and woolen mitts (optional - I took those). A short bus ride, a nice brisk hike up the face or rubble part of the glacier, tip-toeing through a couple of rivers and there we are standing on the ice with rain falling by the bucket load out of the sky. It could have been stunning if it was a sunny day, but we had to settle for just, awesome. In order for this glacier to be where it is and how it is, only 300 ft above rainforest, there has to be a lot of precipitation, be it rain or snow, it gets upwards of 55 m of snow each season (they didn't give rain stats - my guess is 55 m of rain - kidding!). This is a very fast moving glacier; it flows 1 m per day. It was also advancing until 2005 and is now retracting, but there is no concern over this condition (yet) as over history this is a typical behavior for this glacier - move forward for a few years and back for a few years. There is also another glacier, Franz Josef, only 20 km away, same deal as this one, only bigger. Our time on the ice got cut a little short because of the rain; conditions were becoming a little un-stable.  As it was, the rivers we walked on step stones to cross in the beginning were now running about a foot over the rocks, quite strongly and we had to be held on to as we crossed to make sure that we (the stupid tourists) didn't get washed away. We would have ended up in the Tasman Sea in short order if we had. Hiking boots are not waterproof when the water is over the tops! Well we are happy we sucked it up and did the trip, it was worth every drop of rain. We are done by 1:00 pm all dried up and back in the camper, headed north. We have 1/4 of the south island left to discover and only a short time to do it in. Each town we come to we drive through the centre to see what there is, stopping if we find something we can't resist. We are driving alone the coast and it is gorgeous. Our stop for the evening is a tiny town called Rapatoe (5 houses and a camp ground). The camp ground is right on the beach and we pick a site that has our back window hanging over the pounding surf, truly interesting. The beach is covered with the most perfectly rounded rocks, beaten into submission by the relentless rolling and slamming of the waves. Oh, to have a few truck loads of these at home.

 

Day 14 - Making tracks again. We have to make it right up to the very north of the south island today. No big deal, we've only got 5 hours of windy, twisty, mountainous roads to do it on. Oh, but the views! An historic gold mine tweaks our interest and we pull over for a rest stop and wander through a bit of history - bits of rusty old iron and dingy tunnels through a sandy hill side. It got our imaginations going though. The highlight of today is a stop at Punakaiki, where the "pancake rocks" line the coastal shore. Perfectly layered rocks formed through forces only God can know and looking like they had been placed by a master craftsman (That describes God pretty well) creating walls for a lovely garden. There are caverns and blow holes and layer cakes, all with lush greenery sprouting from every crevice. Meanwhile the sea tries with all of it's might to smash this monument to itty bitty pieces. Our road takes us inland along the mighty Buller River. The highway clings to the edge of its rugged banks. NZ is famous for one laned bridges and the system works pretty well as the traffic volume isn't great. One of these bridges is virtually cut into the bank (rock) as a three sided tunnel. But if that isn't enough, it is an "S" curve, so each side of traffic has to stop at either end and wait a bit to make sure that nobody is in the hidden curve before starting across - scary! There are a lot of places we would love to stop today, but time is no longer on our side. There are just too many good things to explore here. Our stop tonight is in Marahau at the edge of the Able Tasman National Park on the very top of South Island.

 

Day 15 - It's day's end now and both Glen and I hurt. We did a biathlon today. We wore off a month of chocolate bars and beer in a single day. At 8:30am, we were at Kahu Kayak's office getting a briefing on our day of freedom kayaking (by ourselves) into the Able Tasman Park. Piece of cake, we've kayaked once before! Long story short, we didn't capsize, which would have been a major catastrophe and we did make it to our destination in spite of our screaming shoulders and arms. Oh, yes, I think there was scenery to see, ummm? Really there was. The most beautiful private beaches of golden sand spaced between outcroppings of rock and trees. The only way into the park is by water or walking, so these beaches are private. We managed a couple of landings to enjoy them while we had a rest and a bit of lunch. Now for normal people, who I thought we were, the kayaking would have been enough for one day, just catch the water taxi back to the start like everybody else. Oh, No. We are going to hike out. Again, we are experienced at this, we've done three hikes here (only about an hour each).  Off we go, hitting the path and the uphill incline, well one hour later and much more grumbly and did I mention that this is the hottest day we have seen in about the last two weeks? - we are back at the beach asking where the track to get home is. Directions are now clear and we head off again - the sign at the trail entrance says 12.7 km back to Marahau (I think we water logged our brains!).  Man, cold beer never tasted so good as when we finally reach our camper. Yes, yes, we were supposed to re-hydrate, but the water was hot, sitting in the camper all day. I hope we'll be able to get out of bed tomorrow.

 

 

Gorgeous Wilderness

Day 10 - We're on the road again early following the scenic route to get from Manapouri to Queenstown. What a contrast! Where Manapouri is quiet and natural, sleeping against it's beautiful lake, Queenstown is robust and packed with entertainment. It is the "activity capital" of New Zealand. Paragliding, jet boating, rock climbing, hiking, bungy jumping (first bungy - ever - was in Queenstown), kayaking, helicopter tours, horseback tours - you get the picture, Everything! There are shops, restaurants and bars and hordes of tourists. It is amazing! No camper food today, we have lunch out and dinner out and check out the night scene. Whew, full day.

 

Day 11 - Enough "over civilization", we are off to catch more of the back country beauty. First we stop in the little gold mining town of Arrowtown. There is a restored Chinese community from the gold strike days of the late 1800's. The town is purely a tourist attraction now and has fashioned all of it's new buildings along an old streetscape style, with a few "real" oldies tucked in between. Now we are back in the central part of the south island, only 40 km west of Cromwell and since we don't want to travel any road twice, we choose to go up over the Crown Range on our way to Lake Wanaka. What a splendid choice this proved to be. Initially, the road climbs steeply uphill and begins very sharp, steep, switchbacks to gain the rapid ascent required to get onto the top of the range. The views back over our trail are jaw dropping as we can see as far away as Queenstown and Lake Wakatipu that it sits beside. The pass tops out at 1076 m above sea level, which I know is not Rocky Mountain standards, but still very impressive because it is straight up and over. This track used to be a sheep herding trail. Speaking of sheep herding, on our descent, what do we run into but about 4000 sheep being herded along the highway to their next grazing ground. They have the right of way and there don't seem to be any people around, they just keep running up the road, bordered by the guard rail on one side (a sharp drop into the river below) and the rock cliff on the other.  The traffic squeezes along the road in between gobs of sheep. Finally bringing up the absolute end is a single guy and a dog! Crazy! We are entering some of NZ's best snow skiing country now - no snow right now of course - they do have some very lovely hills/mountains though. Lake Wanaka and the same named town are our stopping point tonight. After a quick buzz around the town and a beer at a local pub, we head further up the road to a quiet bay on the lake where we find a spot backing onto the lake to park up. Real nice. The sun has come out, the wind has calmed and it feels like a day at the lake should.

 

Day 12 - Today we are headed right out to the west coast. Our road takes us beside beautiful lakes, over another mountain pass, by blue rivers (glacier fed), more regal mountains and inviting rolling hills, out to the wild wind swept west coast and the Tasman Sea. We stop at a couple of natural sites of interest - blue pools and some view locations. The best stop was a hike through the rain forest out to Monro Beach, about 1.5 km. Just a pebbled beach surrounded by steep rocky cliffs with a creek mouth empting into the ocean. But it is wild and beautiful. The sea is actually very calm (as far as seas go). There is a colony of crested penguins that breed and nest here, but now is not the season, so we don't see any. We imagine that the small moving things we see on the jutting rocks further out to sea are penguins, but its probably just seals. Our rest time is spent picking up round, smooth, stones off of the beach. We are like a couple of crows giving each other the beautiful stones we have picked to admire. New Zealand is a walker's/hiker's/mountain biker's paradise. They have trails for public access, everywhere. I mean everywhere! Short distances (which we like) and long distances - many day treks. They've invested a lot of money into making their beautiful country visible and accessible to everyone by installing gravel paths, board walks and hanging bridges. It really makes us wish we had more time to spend here. So many walks, so little time. Fox Glacier is our stopping town tonight and we choose a Top Ten Motor Park to stay in. It has no scenery, but it does have brand new shower blocks and it's time for a little luxury.

 

Doubtful Sound and More

Day 8 - Manapouri is mountainous and there is a big lake here that is prime for fishing, boating and if you are brave - swimming (cold!). It is also the entrance point for tours out to Doubtful Sound. So we are here for three nights. Exploring the town takes all of an hour as it is a couple of streets with predominantly accommodation buildings of all sorts. This is a big tourist area. There are a couple of restaurants and that's it. So we head up the road to Te Anau, which is the entrance point for tours of Milford Sound, and an even bigger tourist area. More accommodation places and lots of restaurants. This is first class New Zealand wilderness. The mountains are great ski areas in the winter and the lakes and rivers and forests are great draws in the summer months. International tourists from everywhere come here by the bus load to soak up NZ's beauty. I think I'm getting visual overload. It is getting pretty hard to describe everything as the same adjectives keep coming to the forefront - stunning, awesome, beautiful, etc. - repeat, repeat, repeat. It is also my opinion that if you squashed all of the good things about Canada into a place 1/2 the size of Alberta you would create New Zealand. Glen disagrees, saying that they don't have prairies here - I say they do… they are only very small! So now we have buzzed around both towns and on our way back to Manapouri we wing off the main road and arrive shortly at a staging area for a portion of the famed "Kepler Track". This is a much traveled, rugged, 5 day hike, over hill and through dale fording rivers and scaling mountains. But since we have started mid way, it turns out to be an easy part and we have a great afternoon tromping through the forest, over a couple of swinging bridges, around a swamp, up to Lake Manapouri and back to the camper again. 8 K in not time flat! Our camp site is probably the nicest to date and we enjoy the evening cooking outdoors and chatting with our neighbor (because we are too "walked out" to walk into town - a couple of blocks - for dinner).

 

Day 9 - Our first paid tour! We get up early, pack our new backpack with food, bug spray (sand flies are ferocious here), sun screen (incase the sun decides to shine) and umbrellas (because it will most definitely rain). The boat ramp is a short jaunt through the woods from our camp site and we are away. The tour is a full day, first exploring Lake Manapouri by boat, then hoping a bus to the big power station - here we travel 2 km into the mountain, 200 m below the surface - then on to another bigger boat for the trip down Doubtful sound and out into the Tasman Sea (the body of water between NZ and Australia) and then everything in reverse to get back to the start. The scenery is gorgeous, it is windy and very cold though, but luckily the boats are all covered in. The lake is surrounded by mountains covered in an evergreen forest and the sound is banked with even bigger mountains with multitudes of waterfalls cascading down, fed by the continuous rain. This is "Fiordland" and it is truly majestic. One arm of the sound has recorded rainfall of 16 m (55 ft) in a single year, no wonder the place is covered in rainforest and waterfalls. Deer are an introduced species to NZ and particularly this area. Initially for sporting purposes, but there are no natural predators here so of course they multiplied like rabbits (rabbits were introduced here too! Duh!). So there was an open cull on the deer until somebody discovered a market in Europe for the meat, now they are captured and farmed for this. The "cowboys" that did first the hunting and then the capturing overcame the rough terrain by using helicopters and it is a long but interesting story.

Catlins of NZ - Wonderful Suprise!

Day 6 - This area is called the Catlins Coast and a good portion of it is scenic reserves. When Europeans first came to NZ, they cut down every tree in site, so all of the forest reserves are replanted and now protected as it seems the bent of even modern day NZers is to clear everything and raise dairy cows or sheep. The Catlins had/now has a lot of rain forest and it is lovely to drive through. Today, we catch every tourist site we can along our road. We start with a walk on the estuary beach to see the sea lions. It is a lovely hard sand beach stretching for a mile between steep rocky cliffs. We are not disappointed, there are two bulls sunning themselves (and not paying any attention to us) and further down the beach we find a female, her pup and a younger female. These guys are playing just at the edge of the surf, the little guy antagonizing his mother. Our next stop is a blow hole, but it is unique in that it is inland from the beach/cliffs by about 200 meters. You walk along a path that meanders along the beach, then up the rugged coastal cliffs to a stunning lookout and then out into the middle of a flat grassy sheep pasture.  "Poof" there it is, this great big hole in the ground, roughly 2000 sq.ft. in area and probably 50 feet deep.  The ocean surf is pounding in the bottom and the sheer rocky sides warn you to stand back as escape would be impossible. The tide was low when we visited so now big plumes, but when the tide is high and the surge is strong the waters will crash up and out of the hole. That would be an awe inspiring site. It is raining again by mid day, which is fitting for our hike into a "rain forest" to view the MacLean water falls. It is a nice walk and the falls are worth the effort. We also want to see the Cathedral caves, but the tide is too high by the time we get there and they are submerged. Oh well, we will imagine them from our guide book pictures. Our stopping point tonight is Curios Bay. The camp site is on a cliff, jutting out into the ocean, quite exposed to all of the elements. Each camper spot is surrounded by huge spikey leafed plants (6 ft tall) that are call "flax". They look like giant aloe vera plants. This is a neat change in itself. It is 5:30pm now and pouring rain, with a sideways wind, not nice. This is the time of day that the little yellow eyed penguins come home from fishing all day to feed their young that are hidden in the trees and rocks along the shore. So off we go umbrellas in hand and we are rewarded for our touristiness by witnessing these little guys in their wild environment, up close and personal. Trudging in from the open ocean like someone coming home from an exhausting day at work. This is also the site of a Jurassic age petrified forest that you can see at low tide and the specimens are truly well preserved. It makes you feel pretty young to line up against one of those ancient specimens. This has been a great day. The Catlins are a superbly different and unique piece of the world. This is also the southern most part of NZ's South Island. The south winds that blow here are from the Antarctic!

 

Day 7 - We pass through Niagara (NZ) on our travels today and believe it or not, they even have Niagara Falls there too! Sadly we didn't have time for a photo op. We head for Invercargill, the home of Burt Munro - the world's fastest Indian (motorcycle). Burt (now deceased) still holds the land record for speed, in his motorcycle class, on the salt flats of Utah. We even get to see "the" motorcycle. Invercargill has the widest streets of any city we have ever been in; more cities should pattern themselves after this place. It has managed to maintain a whole downtown of heritage (150 yrs old) buildings. We have lunch here and walk around the city centre then head on our way. We travel the southern scenic route so we are always touching the ocean on our left and grazing lands or forest to our right. A stop along the way at a souvenir shop is always a must as it gives us an excuse to stretch our legs and a chance to yak with somebody local which allows for rapid intake of area history/news. The trees along this coast grow sideways, like they have been blown on for every moment of their growth, but in reality it because of the salt spray that they occasionally get that causes them to grow crooked. Humm…who knew? Again we find our travel distance is shorter than we estimated and we stop for the day at Manapouri, in the heart of Fiordland, a day ahead of ourselves.

 

South Island NZ continued

Day 3 - Peel Forest to Cromwell - Today we see rolling hills and valleys with rivers and a canal that joins one lake to another.  There are dams on every piece of moving water in this region.  In the canal they have salmon farms setup - ingenious! So the feature today was to be Lake Tekapo - very much hyped to us by many people. It is set in the mountains here, fed by the Tasman Glacier. Mt. Cook, the tallest mountain in NZ is near here (3754 m).  Well, it was nice, but it wasn't the highlight of the day (maybe because it was overcast and dull out). Cromwell was the surprise! And nobody talks about it. It is a town in a semi mountainous area, desert like and rocky, but with grass, a major river running through it, large valleys with acres and acres of vineyards. This is the Central Otago Region, producer of wines the rest of the world will soon be asking for. It is raining tonight so we fry our steaks on the stove in the camper.

 

Day 4 - We are exploring Cromwell and area today, most notably the wineries. The doors open at 10:00am and we are not late. The day proves to be a lot of fun.  We stop at 5 vintner's doors and accumulate 4 cases of yummy Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris and a shockingly excellent White Port. Lunch is at a boutique winery called Mr. Difficulty and it is the most interesting combination of tastes and textures as they are show casing their wines with the food. The day is sunny and warm; the scenery is unusual and stunning. This would be a place, we both agree, that we could happily live.  Kamloops x Okanagan x Phoenix. Our little caravan happily rumbles down the road to Clyde for the night.

 

Day 5 - Clyde is a cute place, on a hydro lake, but is tiny and only a stop over. Our destination is back to the east coast from the center, to a place called Owaka. We traverse the most remarkable country side today, hills like our foothills covered with massive boulders, strewn about like a herd of grazing elephants, rugged rivers and blue lakes, forest and rolling pasture land. Tiny towns tucked in all the right places with a fruit stand here and a "petrol" station there. Honey is a big item in NZ so I have begun a collection of little pots of honey. My favorite so far is Manuka. When we get to Owaka, the camp grounds are actually out on the coast at a place called Pounawea, which is right on the beach of an estuary. But it is raining again tonight, so we just get a short wander around the resort cottages. It sure rains a lot in this country!

Adventures of the Mystery "Campervan"

The South Island Exploration Begins

 

Bright and early on the morning of Feb 1/11, you find Glen and I waiting at the top of the dock for our taxi to take us to the Auckland airport where we will be whisked off, by Jet Star Air, down to Christchurch on the south island of New Zealand, about 1/3 of the way down the east coast. We are met by the Tui Camper Rental people (we rented our camper from them) and after a briefing on the operation of our new mode of transportation/accommodation, we are on our way. Groceries are the first order, then finding our first camp site. Happily the GPS unit Glen received for Christmas works like magic and we don't even get lost a little bit! The camp site is "right on the beach" (20 min walk) and pretty devoid of trees (think open sports field), but the grass is green and we are there early in the day so a walk to the beach is a good use of time. We've rented a four person sleeper, with toilet/shower, kitchen/dinette so it is pretty spacious, but the bathroom is going to be more trouble than good, so we use the public facilities - toilets and showers - and will continue to do so for the balance of our trip. One thing NZ camp grounds have is very nice facilities as camping is "the" thing to do here. We've also splurged and rented a BBQ for our time out and it is quite the contraption - basically a frying pan screwed on to the top of a propane bottle. So "fried" steak is our first meal on the road and it is not too bad!

 

Now we probably should have taken a spin around down town Christchurch, but the rental gals said it was still quite a mess from the earth quake/s and not being "demolition gawkers" we decided to give it a pass. So that puts us two days ahead of schedule already. As we head out the next day we find that the distances are not really so vast as we were imagining (Canadian Prairies type!) and by days end, we are actually another day ahead of ourselves. But that's O.K. there will probably be somewhere down here that we are going to really appreciate the fact that we have a time buffer as we will want to stay longer. Now the question becomes…..How much info do I bore you all with, the details (that I will need in order to remember our wonderful time) or the summary (so you don't fall off your chairs - asleep - and hurt yourselves)? Compromise!

 

Day 2 - Christchurch to Peel Forest - Man it is windy along the coast, has to be blowing 40 kts (glad we aren't on the boat), Glen has a fun time keeping the house on the road. Oh yeah, they drive on the left side of the road here and this unit is a standard! Take a moment and imagine having to learn how to shift gears and work the clutch left footed!!!!! Glen is a pro - I need not say more. Anyway, lots of lovely flat farm land filled with either sheep or dairy cows and fenced by these lovely tall rows of trees ('cause it's so flippin' windy the cows would blow off the field if it was barbed wire!). Peel Forest is inland and kind of their foothills. Our camp site is lovely, with nice trees and posh facilities and a couple of nature walks. We chose a walk of 30 min (our kind of exercise) and head off to enjoy the forest. No nasty creatures in NZ, no snakes, bears, poison ivy - nothing scary at all (unless you have a bunny phobia!). We fry chicken on the BBQ - life is good.

Boat Work and People Play

 

I can't believe how quickly time goes by when you are busy (and having fun). Here we are at the end of January and I have only written our adventures down once. Guess I'm just getting lazy, but also, how exciting can it be for anyone else to read about polishing a boat's hull, having the teak re-done and so on? But we have been taking weekends off. We contacted Mike and Karen our "big" boat friends and were invited out to Gulf Harbor where they are tied up for an over-nighter (a chance to live like the rich and famous). This is about an hour away from our marina, so we hopped into our tiny (super tiny) "Marsh" by Nissan (should be Marshmallow, but the name would be too long to fit on the tail gate and for $29.00 NZ a day - who's complaining?) and scooted off. Karen being a certified Chef fed us in fine style and Mike entertained us with his outback stories from South Africa. He also plied us heavily with good wine. We were joined by David and Marian off of Kilkea (a sail boat out of Vancouver). So there was lots of sail boat - power boat rivalry going on. David owns a 48' power boat back in Canada, so the jousting was all symbolic. The next weekend just happened to be the annual Sea Food Festival at the Viaduct Harbor in downtown Auckland (where we are tied up) in honor of Auckland's Anniversary.  Being berth holders, we were issued weekend passes which allowed us to enjoy the scores of sea food kiosks - prawns, oysters, green lip muscles, whitebait etc. done any way you can think of and a 100 ways you don't know of yet. We also got to sample (all of this is on a purchase basis of course - this is New Zealand!) wines from a multitude of the fine wineries that they have in NZ and likewise, from a gazillion micro breweries - the finest brews. All of these are scattered about entertainment pavilions with blues, rock, pop, classical, anything you wish - they play it, music. It was a fun (expensive) but very fun weekend. In between all of this, (guess we take more than weekends off) sailboat Jackster, with David and Jackie on board tied up in the slip beside us and we spent a couple of nights carousing with them. So much visiting to do when you only meet up every two months. And No, the boat work still isn't done, but the guys doing it will still have a few more days, before we have to depart, to get it done.

 

Now for those of you who pay attention to the international news/weather. Yes, New Zealand has been hit by a couple of cyclones.  Yes, on the north island where we are. No, we were not impacted. There were high winds and flooding reported in and around Auckland, but we were very sheltered where we are docked, so other than a bit of "rope strain", Mystery Ship suffered no ill effects.  The weather down here has been less than great for what is the height of their summer - rainy, cool, overcast and always, always windy. This may be a blessing as the sunshine down here is reportedly the worst thing in the whole world for you as there is "NO" ozone! Anyway, we should all be praying for the people of Queensland in Australia as they just got smacked by Cyclone "Yasi", category 4, as if they didn't have enough mud on their plates already.

 

Our next adventure is the South Island of New Zealand. I'll send some news soon.