A Big Mystery

After today we are both agreed - our little hostel is actually a haven of peace and tranquility in Bangkok. No more comments on the volume of music played at midnight or anything. Its heaven here, really quiet, no street noise at all.

I would very much appreciate it if someone could explain to the Thai the it is perfectly acceptable for them to not really want pedestrians on the roads. I would much prefer not to be there either. I can cope with pedestrian crossings being ignored and I have learnt to just close my eyes, hang on to Martyn and blindly put one foot in front of the other. I also understand that they need to fill the pavements with stalls and markets so I may have to occassionally walk on the road. It is a bit much however when I survive the roads only to be nearly mown down by the mopeds and scooters on the one bit of pavement I've managed to find that I can walk on. It was bad enough in Japan being mown down by bicycles on the pavement but these scooters are a nightmare. I understand why they do it though - no room on the roads, 6 lane highways jam packed. The noise, the fumes.........where oh where is my rainforest gone?

Today we ventured further afield. Don't want to overdo the temples in the first week so headed off to find modern Bangkok. Walked for two hours along river, skirting Chinatown and Riverside. Must have managed to find every Bangkok equivalent of Edgeware and Tottenham Court Road combined along with those backstreet dens that look more like an untidy garage than a shop. They had every radio controlled toy imaginable, serial connectors, transformers, PCBs and lots of men at the side of the road with soldering irons. Eventually came across central train station. Decided had done enough walking being as we were still only half way there on map so got on subway train to LumpyKnee park. It is obviously not spelt like that, actually it is Lumpini Park but if you emphasise the 'knee' and make the 'y' short then Lumpyknee is how you say it. See my Thai is improving! Managed to be understood with my 'hello' today as well - things are looking up!

Three stops on train saw us at park, went up top to discover beautiful park had been turned into pile of rubble. Turned around and found park was opposite the building site we were staring at! Walked through park and found one of those fitness areas we last came across in Japan so had to have a play on the machines....and then up road a bit further to Skytrain station. Took Skytrain weaving through skyscrapers to Siam Paragon - largest shopping mall in SE Asia apparently, has a posh car dealership on the 2nd floor along with numerous other very posh hi-fi shops etc which Martyn enjoyed looking at.

Down to foodcourt for lunch. You have to buy a sort of credit card which you load up with money and then take to the food stalls to pay with - saves the chefs handling money and dealing with change and actually meant there were not any queues to pay - all very efficient. Martyn had chicken curry which I think had maybe had been waved over a curry plant at some point. I had thai red curry and am still trying to find my head after it was blown off.......very nice though. Although possibly a little too spicy for my usual tastes. It is customary here to leave a little rice on your plate to indicate satiation. Well I apologise profusely but every grain of rice not coated in sauce was needed to attempt to calm my shrieking taste buds.

The rice sort of worked but I still needed some help so we headed for the ice cream parlour - which was not Thai and therefore disappointing but was cheap and chocolatey and came with a wafer and considerably improved the oral situation I was experiencing. Much relief. Martyn is I think still laughing at me.

Back on Skytrain after lunch to go to the much less exclusive MBK mall at which Martyn enjoyed floor 3 (I think) well, until I experienced a 'divide by ten error' and worked out a mobile phone was 3000 pounds. This was an honest mistake and not a tactic to get him to leave earlier - honest!

Left MBK and wandered along to Jim Thompsons house. Good ol' Jim was in the American OSS around the time of 2nd World War. In 1945 he was due to parachute in to an area of Thailand but on flight was told war was over so turned around. Ended up in Bangkok at some point, decided he liked it, stayed and was instrumental in re-developing and commercialising the Thai silk industry. He also rescued and renovated 6 traditional Thai style teak houses and filled them with Burmese, Chinese and Thai art work so that was all interesting to see. Then he went on holiday to Malaysia when he was 61, left his friend asleep in hut, went for walk and was never seen again. No trace of him was ever found. Big Mystery!

Walked back along canal for a bit and then through more busy highways and expressways and traffic to nice, quiet, peaceful sanctuary of hostel!

Oh and so far have discovered 5 names for Bangkok: Bangkok (obviously); the Big Mango (no idea on that one); Venice of the East (which after today I fully get, so many little bridges and canals etc); the Thai name for Bangkok (which is very long) and City of Angles (which is what the shortened version of the Thai name means - personally I think its just because there must be a crowd of Angles looking over anyone who tries to cross a road here!)

Wat no hassle

Okay - big day planned......off we go.

Breakfast inc - hurrah. Toast yum (but am now back into traveller mode and was slightly disappointed not to get Thai omelette and rice) but hey, free breakfast so who's to argue. It came with butter and jam too - double yummy. Also even better, we got double rations as we didn't want tea or coffee - 'speci dea jus fo u coz u no wan t oh coffee' was the message. I can't even manage 'please' and 'thank you' in Thai and be understood yet - its all a bit embarassing really but I'm working on it!

Then off to the Grand Palace and Wat Phra Kaew, walked down there and arrived at about 9am, just in front of the multitude of tour buses. Decided on audio tour having practiced 'no thank you' to all the touts along the way in - feeling very proud! Really good little tour. Much better than the one for Windsor Castle which has so many entries you are brain dead and stand no chance of ever finishing them all. This had 34 little stations and was just enough in 2.5 hours (although we did realise at the end that we had missed out one museum). Highlight of this part is apparently the Emerald Buddha. Its not emerald, its made of Jade and is 66cms high and 46cms wide and sat on top of quite a tall pedestal. I spent a good 10 minutes wondering where it was until I looked up (how embarassing!)

Wandered along to the river for a break after that, headed to the wrong pier and had to walk a bit further so bought pineapple in a bag for 50p to sustain us along the way. Got to right pier, bought two tickets for the grand total of 15p and scooted across to Wat Arun. Climbed some VERY steep steps, took some piccies, looked at the smog layer lying across Bangkok, decided Thailand must suffer serious issues with keeping their crockery and mirrors in one piece - all the temples are decorated with broken bowls and mirrored mosaic. Very clever shaping etc and they use bowls to get the curved bits they need.

Back across river to Wat Pho where we finally found a bit of space. Oh and a giant 46m Buddha as well - much more easy to find than the Emerald Buddha!!! Had read that this temple was the favourite for a lot of people and I have to say it was very nice to find a bit of a temple where you could wander and only come across maybe two other people, and a cat. Nice chance to breath a bit from the 'fast like instant noodle' chaos that is the Big Mango.

Am already really looking forward to China (not that we weren't in the first place). The Chinese influences here I hadn't expected for some reason. I'd got the India influences but hadn't realised the Chinese had impacted this far over - was kind of expecting that a bit more in Vietnam. There were some great Chinese statues with big beards and the like today.

Left Wat Pho and headed back to hostel for lunch - felt the need to use discount voucher. Tom Yum Koong soup, very nice - definately getting into the swing of local food etc again now and banana fritters for pudding. Am planning more adventuresome street food meals from now on though as we are nicely back in the swing of asian travel again.

Martyn has mastered crossing the roads. I just cling on blindly and occassionally close my eyes - being a pedestrian out here is clearly not the done thing. Even market stalls on wheels take precedence over pedestrians and thats on the pavement! Did breath a sigh of relief though as we found Th Kao San today - and it was pedestrianised (well as pedestrianised as roads probably get here - they'd blocked off one end of it!!!)

Anyway, after dinner wandered around Soi Rambuttri and along to a fort, view of the river from a park and then on to the Democracy Monument which bought us back to Th Kao San.

Back to hostel suitably exhausted and ready to sit down with guide book and review the history bits that I really should have read by now!

Feeling proud - wat no hassle from 'wily gentlemen' as we were warned against by a sign outside Wat Phra Kaew! Although the woman selling food for the pigeons was quite tenacious and followed Martyn down the street for a good few paces!

Last Night

Yes well, budget hostel has budget soundproofing - gotta laugh.

So we both sat here at 8pm and thought 'this is alright' bit of noise from street and other rooms but fine. I did mention to Martyn that we are in the 'party' area. He said 'well I didn't see any nightclubs down there so we'll be fine'. Oh the naivety of a pair of people that don't drink and don't really do the nightclub thing.

A little voice at the back of my head did whisper things about bars not needing to be nightclubs and how I was sure I'd read about bits of Bangkok being quite nocturnal so they probably weren't even awake yet. In the face of Martyns nightclubbing innocence I kept quiet. The street didn't.

At midnight the Karaoke John Denver woke me up. Oh dear it was awful. Very quickly found ear plugs. The relief was immense. Unfortunately another bar must have got going. Earplugs blocked out the John Denver but didn't stop my ribs vibrating due to the bass from the other bar. Eventually I think some sort of destructive interference between my heart beat and the bass thumping rib oscillation must have occured as after a while the effect seemed to lessen. Drifted off to sleep again and awoke at 6am which wasn't bad really.

Its 7pm now, I wonder what time things get going on Tuesday nights round here.........

Oh and it's cold here

What has happened? Had to wear jumper all day and it's supposed to be colder tomorrow - the locals say the weather is all wrong. I can't agree more, no blue sky all day.

Humph.

Mango is scary!

Yes well it's a very good job we had a week in Sydney before we came here. They weren't kidding about 'fast like instant noodle'!

Got bus into town this morning and located considerably more budget place to stay - am currently holed up there trying to pluck up courage to go out again later... may need to dig out sleeping bags - cotton sheet but interesting nylon bed cover that has me seriously concerned about static shocks.

Went for walk this afternoon and then confused right and left and was blowed if could find hostel again but managed in the end. Admittedly we only made it back because we ducked into a travel agent to book some day trips and when we filled in the form to say where we were staying she said 'ahh yes, down that way'. We nodded knowledgeably but with some relief as we now knew which way to go!

Day trips booked and back to hostel for discount price lunch but we'd forgotten voucher. Stayed for lunch anyway as it was only two quid and we were bit relieved to have found the place again to be honest :)

Felt more confident after food so decided to try another wander. Scared ourselves witless again as some bloke hassled us into a tuk tuk for a boat trip along the canal. Not really any idea where we were going but we went there quite quickly in amongst stops in the middle of various junction where one or other of us was hear to mutter 'I'm going to die' as the traffic hurtled toward us!!

Some other tourist were equally suckered but unlike us didn't seem to realise they had been had but hey they managed to haggle much better price and we figured if there were four of us we were far less likely to encounter dark alleys and nightmare scenarios so we went along. Although I confess some of this was due to a slight feeling of responsibility to make sure they were okay - the woman was dressed entirely in pristine White with pastel green pashmina and they were both flashing cameras and videos all over the place. Still no harm done - hope they are ok tomorrow though - I'd read the guide book about the canal water so we ducked and covered mouths everytime there was spray and a wake. They obviously had not read guidebook!

Good fun on longboat in the end - interesting to get another view of Bangkok.

Wandered back to hostel braving the roads yet again. Some of them have pelican crossings not that it makes any difference - mad dashes all around! Getting back into the swing of SE Asian travel now. Sensible heads back on and ability to say 'no thank you' much improved!

Oh dear - may now be motivated to go out again - budget hostel was going well but heinous fan noise has just started up from somewhere - now where did I put those ear plugs???

the Big Mango

Well that was weird.

Got on plane to Bangkok only to discover it went all the way through to London heathrow - don't panic, we remembered to get off but it did feel a bit odd being on a plane that was going home!

Landed at 11pm which was 3 in the morning to us so headed straight to airport hotel and crashed into bed (after spending 10 mins gazing in awe at the lavishness of reception - this is kind of 5* luxury at Premier Inn prices - hurrah!).

Of course getting in to bed was delayed a little by Martyn discovering that the hotel room was kitted out with home automation plug sockets like we get at home (or something like that anyway). 'Look' he said from the bathroom 'I can turn the radio on in the bedroom from here'. He promptly turned out all the lights.

Aha I thought - Home away from home!

Even Martyn commented that it was a bit like the 'Nothing in my house works.com' T Shirt he got me for Christmas only this one should read 'Nothinginmyhotelworks.com' which I thought was a bit harsh really given that most of the time he tells me its just user error. I managed to keep quiet at this point.

and then slleeeeppp......

and breakfast - ouch. Must still have been a bit tired or something. Headed down to restaurant to order cereal A La Carte having worked out what our breakfast budget was......got waved into seat and told to enjoy buffet. Completely forgot about cereal. Have just spent 3 nights room budget on two breakfasts and one hours internet. Ha Ha Ha Ha. Very budget place booked for next three nights. Decided we better make the most of our breakfast bodge and am now sat completely stuffed and unable to move in hotel room. Needless to say Martyn enjoyed cooked breakfast!

Ah well, off we go to find bus and head into chaos of Bangkok also known as the Big Mango for some as yet not understood reason

Bags too heavy

I just dont understand it. Bags seem to be defying laws of the known universe!

Just checked them in and they weigh to same, if not more, as they did when we left. But we've posted home all souvenir and our tent and sleeping bags.

I just don't get it ...........

Must be a stowaway somewhere!

Aussie Days Out

SO, been a bit busy since the last posting - sorry about that!

(sunrise over Sydney, viewed from Paramatta)

Have done the Grand Pacific Drive stopping at Wollongong and Kiama. Also went to Illawarra tree top walk which was very nice. It had two cantilevered lookouts which were fine and then a large tower which went up 30m from the 15m high platform. This was fine except it was a spiral metal staircase around a single pole with just the one bannister on the outside. I made it two spirals up no problem but then my brain kicked in and went 'what on earth are you doing you crazy woman'. Knees buckled. 'B****y H**l its higher than I thought' I mumbled to myself. Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on how you look at it) turning around on a narrow spiral staircase with very little protection when the wind has just started to pick up and the tower is swaying is not all that easy so I opted for carrying on up. Made it to the top. Martyn has funny photo of me gripping on to bannister on the outside of the viewing platform - quite why I didn't stay in the middle near the tower I'll never know but I figured I'd made it up that far so I might as well walk to the edge! Strangely I didn't stay up there all that long.

 

Thought of you when up there though Dad! :-)

The views were honestly stunning (when I managed to open my eyes!)

Next day went to Art Gallery of New South Wales as the weather had clouded over a bit and there was a landscape photography exhibit on. Photos from 1970s onwards. Most of which we didn't like. I kept saying 'but they were taken on film and there was no tweaking' but the boys still thought they could do better..........I quite liked one or two of the blurry ones - it made me think there was potential for some of my piccies, all I have to do is say 'I meant it to be like that'........Then off to the cinema to see The Adjustment Bureau which was quite good actually.

Grey and only 23 degrees here today - had to find my jeans which is a bit much really so we opted for the Powerhouse Museum of science and design which set Martyn reminiscing as it had a big 'Remember the 80s' exhibit on. He had a little play on the pacman machine and the Commodore 64 bought back some memories as well. I won however as I got the pop quiz question on who sang the theme tune to Neverending Story right - strike one for me. I'm making the most of this as I never get the pop quiz sections. I did however lose a race against a robot - but only because the counting was rigged.

Noticed yesterday that some of the leaves on the trees here are just starting to turn autumnal colours so its time for us to be moving on. Said goodbye to more friends, gosh that was hard. Off to Bangkok tomorrow. Read that Cambodia is 40 degrees and humid in April - excellent, not sure my planning worked well there but hey ho we'll survive. Might be no blogs for a view days as we get back into the swing of not knowing the language, ordering food from pictures and transporting our bags on foot. Oh it has been lovely to have an actual apartment with our own kitchen and a bath the size of a swimming pool (which I haven't even remembered to make time to use) Methinks our remaining rooms will probably be about the size of our current bathroom.

I think I have managed to run off some of my ice cream consumption calories in the gym this week. I'm hoping I can sweat the rest off in Asia.

Ho hum, have had a lovely time in Oz but as Martyn says everytime we move on....'Next bit....'

The saga continues.....

Ham cheese and pineapple sandwiches for lunch only I put ham pineapple and cheese so that the pineapple didn't make the bread go soggy. Apparently there is a big difference.

Martyn was quite gutted (linguistically speaking) to discover that he prefers ham pineapple and cheese - supposedly this sounds wrong......

I am maintaining my apple and then cheese as I prefer pineapple and then cheese. Martyn was to busy with the whole three variables in a sandwich conflict to consider the finer points of whether or not when making cheese and pineapple on sticks hedgehogs you should put the cheese on first or e pineapple.

I think cheese closest to the end of the stick going into the potato with the pineapple on the far end so the cheese catches the pineapple juice. Only problem is I want pineapple in mouth first so have to turn cocktail stick over.

I shall ponder the culinary engineering required further as i sit at Manly Beach - shall have to go and find ice cream

Yellow Eyed Penguins - From Dunedin, NZ

Finally, got a chance to upload this. Enjoy.

Fast - Like instant noodle.

Well we are in Sydney. Last time we were here couldn't afford Opera so just walked around outside of Opera House and took photos. This time, pennies saved, opera it is!

Carmen - set in Spain, sung in French (of course it was by Bizet) with a not very literal translation on the subtitles. Kept reading the subtitles and even with my limited French managed to work out that it wasn't quite what they were singing!

Amazing depth of stage, and they had a horse bring the toreador on stage. Horse took a bow at the end - very clever but did feel that the horse might rather be somewhere else.

Carmen and Micaela were brilliant. Great voices and great acting. Set was stunning - real fires burning, not so much gadgetry but really well set.

Have been frantically trying to remember some of the tunes from Carmen and then of course the minute the overture was played I was like oh yes that one, and that one and that one! Managed to not to join in though.

In some ways it is reassuring that even the Sydney Opera House suffers from the same issue as all other theatres etc I've been in - not enough toilets! Queue at the interval was beyond massive! As usual I made it to the front of the queue just as the bell for the end of the interval went.

A truly great first introduction to opera.

Oh dear, LOL, sorry - I have to go now, we put the laundry on and Martyn has just found the hanging drier which we thought we would try and use on our balcony. His tongue is sticking out as he tries to assemble it, currently he looks like he is putting up one of those folding deck chairs. I'm trying to tell him its a drying gadget so he should be able to make it work - what do you think chances are? He says the tumble drier is looking more enticing. Oh dear, now its leaning on his legs, balanced on his feet and he has an arm through one bit. Oooooh - impressed, its up. Will it hold up under the weight of the laundry????

Sun is out today - may tootle off to beach - didn't get ice cream yesterday!

PS - sorry about lack of photos recently - we are taking them but we don't seem to have the time to sort them out at the moment.

PPS - spent some time yesterday researching Bangkok bits n pieces - most useful info gleaned from one website:

 'Bangkok is fast - like instant noodle'

Hic

Excellent - at the ripe old age of ......... yes well ahem, lets start that again shall we.......

Excellent - after many years have finally discovered a wine that we both quite like and actually felt we could drink half a glass of with dinner. Of course there is a catch - its from a nice little vineyard in Australia and you can't get it in the UK!!!

Ha Ha.

Very nice man there helped us find one that didn't make me shudder. Finally discovered the cause of my inability to like wine - won't tell you the cost of the wine that he found that I could actually drink. Needless to say even if we could have got it at home we'd have needed a bank loan.

Still, am now fully conversant in tannin, legs, aging, plum, raspberry tones, pepper, oak barrels, size of bubbles (in a sparkling Shriaz of all things...) etc. I think the man took pity on us as he gave us a cool free tour of the winery as well.

Got back to apartment and had steak, blue cheese and red wine for dinner. Wow - how our taste buds are maturing. Don't panic though - we topped it off with a nice glass of vintage Ribena :)

We had plans to go to ANSTA today - nuclear medical facility south of Sydney, it was raining again, it was fully booked though and is until two weeks time so never mind. Instead headed off to Hunter Valley. Went round Hunter Valley Gardens and then found very nice chocolate shop and very nice cheese shop which also sold Gelato - oooops, double scoop rum n raisin for Martyn and single scoop chocolate for Kay.

Completely mucked up taste buds with ice cream and then off to wineries (although some would say given our palates the ice cream might have helped). Tried three wines in first place. Revolting. Had to hide behind Martyn as I was in fear of grossly offending the people who worked there with my shivers and gurning impressions. On to next winery. Not so sure about the first three there either but now knew enough to honestly be able to say they were much nicer than the previous three. Actually asked about shipping some of the one we liked home - yes it was that nice. Not as nice as the shipping price required though.

So we shall continue on and remember our one taste of wine we actually liked. Anyone for a quick tipple of vintage Ribena?

G'day G'day, and how' ya doin'?

As the song goes - not that you know the song but we remember it from the last two times we were here!

Landed safely - to rain, cheek of it! Still it's warmer here than the last few days in NZ and a but more humid too so we are breaking ourselves in gently ready for the humidity of SE Asia!

Lovely to meet up with even more friends as well.

So far have driven out to Lake Macquirie in time for picnic in sun and walk along beach. Kookaburra count = 2, cockatoo count = 4!

Into Sydney today - more rain so shopping and Chinese gardens for the girls and Maritime museum with torpedoes and submarines for the boys! Italian for dinner with Lindt chocolate blackforest ice-cream for pud (Kay actually found some self control and only had a lick of Martyns!)

Funny to have patchy memories of things we have done here. We both swear Darling harbour has got bigger and we dont remember the monorail but never mind.

Exhausted now - not used to having to look up past skyscrapers to see the sky and there are so many people and cars etc here - quite scary really.......having lovely time but can we go back to temperate rainforest and places with permanent population of 7? Ah well, all good preparation for Bangkok!

Farewell land of the long White cloud

Crumbs chief - fourth day and no blog - I am such a slacker.

Okay here they come .....

Day one - post tent home - need rest if day to recover from the fact that we could have bought a new tent for what that cost - and despite what Martyn says it was all down to the tent and sleeping mats and nothing whatsoever to do with my bucket of cookies!
After that drove up to glacier land stopping at various points along the way for short, sandfly ridden, photos. As usual stunning scenery. Last NZ ice cream in Haast and then on to Fox glacier.

Day two - hike Fox Glacier - obviously not a local but have now picked up enough of the lingo to get by.......hike was sweet as and truly awesome! See picky for small sample of what we spent 5 hrs gazing at (well actually we have better views but the staircase to get up to the Glacier was the best one on the blog camera!

Slight delay on dinner as we discovered that the fridge Martyn had proudly put last nights leftover mince in was actually a freezer - quite appropriate given we'd spent the day on the glacier!

Day three - drive from Fox glacier to Arthurs pass - in the rain - lots of foggy mysterious views but still stunning. NZ must be so sorry to see us go that it was crying! Stopped for a picky at the top of Arthurs pass only to lose half an hour watching three Kea amuse themselves with various other tourists cars - wasn't quite so funny when the Kea also decide we needed to stay in NZ so started trying to eat Sherberts windscreen wipers! Wasnt quite sure how we would explain that to rental company!

Day four - rain stopped and we headed back to Christchurch having been woken by more Kea scrabbling on the corrugated iron roof of our chalet :)
Currently sat in airport waiting to go through to departures......please dont make me go.........

Ah well, from the land of the long White cloud to the land of kangaroos and wallabies we go. See you in Sydney!!!

Adrenalin laundry

Is our all new game, but more about that later.

Our steamboat trip last night was very cool (well warm actually being as i spent most of the journey in with the stoker!) You could walk on gangways in the engine room and they has schematics to show you how it all worked. Martyn called me a petrol head but then had to correct this as it was of course a steam boat (I mean der come on husband) in the end he decided to settle for me being truly my fathers daughter (which is reassuring!) - it was ace dad and we have video - much better than the diesel (pah) train we were supposed to go on a while ago!

And it came with a free sheep shearing demo as we arrived at the farm at Glenorchy in time for the end of the farm show and the boat crew said we could sneak down and watch - bargain!!

All this excitement resulted in a late night so it was quite hard to get up this morning - even with the very helpful and loud alarm that went off. Martyn lay in bed and mumbled 'wassat ?' I said 'earthquake alarm' got up, checked the corridor, decided earth was not moving and everyone else still in bed so went back to bed only to turn round to find Martyn trying to use iPhone to work out what he was supposed to do. Ah bless :)

Later on someone told us it was a firealarm which was a bit disappointing in a way.

This story is all the funnier for the fact that at least three other people have told us stories about being woken up by the alarm in Queenstown, none of which we remembered at the time of course!

So having had a small adrenalin rush start to the day we set of up the gondola which whilst very steep was quite a calm start. Of course once you've gone up you have to come down. We vetoed the luge as it didn't actually get you down and we'd done one already. Bungee jump was out too and it was quite breezy so I was saved from my mad paragliding fancy! What did that leave? Only the steepest zip line in the world!!!!!! Waaaaahhhaaaayyyy

Zip a de do dah, zip a de day, my oh my what a wonderful day!

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeee

6 zip lines, 2.5hrs, jazz hands, a cannonball and two upside downers later we were at the bottom (and Martyn has the video evidence I actually did those things - of course being in charge of camera he stayed upright and declared it good fun and not too painful - very important for blokes when in harness!!)

So off we zipped ('scuse the pun) to Fergburger for lunch - yummy but ate waaay too much. Then drove over mountains to Arrowtown which is a pretty little gold mining place. Wandered the shops very slowly attempting to let dinner settle but still had to sit in car and read paper before I felt better!

Pootled rest of way to Wanaka where we are staying tonight and where we have discovered 'adrenalin laundry'.

I swear everyone else staying here has chosen tonight to do laundry - the machines were all in use and we left our room and checked twice, just as we were about to check a third time two blokes wandered along with bags full of washing - I kept an eye out on one laundry, Martyn ran to the other, baggied a machine and waved me over, load one sorted, quick 300m dash to the other laundry and quick, machine free, load two underway.....seriously, if it's got to a two load situation this is drama - no washing = going commando from this point on and it's a bit nippy here now - very nice but there is definitely a little chill in the air sometimes.

Currently in phase two of adrenalin laundry - will the driers be free before the laundry closes for the night? Got one lot in so there is hope for clean and dry pants.......will we be drying the second lot in the car tomorrow I wonder ..... Oooooh the suspense....... 'Who needs White water rafting or skydiving?' that's all I can say!!!!

It's cookie time

Yes well, having got all sad about saying farewell to our little tent yesterday we got to the post office today only to discover that apparently it is Sunday so strangely post office not open. Needless to say tent is with us for a little while longer. Got some very odd looks from people as we stood outside post office wondering why it wasn't open before we saw sign saying 'closed on Sundays' and put two and two together - doh :)

Pondered walk around Te Anau and then decided we'd rather come back and do all of one of the great walks (but NOT Milford having experienced just a few sandflies whilst still miles away from the part of that track that is called 'Sandfly Point')

So off we went in Sherbert (who now has a clean bum as Martyn washed him yesterday) to Queenstown - the adrenalin capital of the world!

Not quite sure what we're doing here being two of the most risk averse people we know but hey - maybe the 'Queenstown' thing will happen and you'll get a blog update about us doing something crazy......although all the (much younger) people in the streets here are either covered in sticking plasters or bruises so maybe not. It definitely won't be skydiving given the bruises on the legs of one girl. Paragliding is out (I did quite fancy that for some reason) as I watched them come down and felt sick! The jetboats are a possible but Martyn has already mentioned a lack of head support. Which leaves....... Ah yes, perfect..... The TSS Earnslaw steam ship cruise across the lake. Much better. Apparently it has working engine room you can observe. Am currently sat waiting for our launch! Friends suggest 8pm sailing but we think it must have been summer when they were here as sun is rapidly fading!!!

This afternoon we strolled up one mile track to a power house and dam and then watched some completely insane mountain bikers go down the hill. Then we meandered through the shops and a DISASTER of epic proportions occured. You see Martyn drove me straight past the Cookie Time factory/shop near Christchurch and I had been doing really well with weening myself off them but then we came across the Queenstown Cookie Time shop. Oh dear!

Paddling along

Yes, probably our last kayaking for some time and we finally feel we've cracked it! Sum total of zero 'marital harmony moments' and at times we actually looked like we knew what we were doing! All that plus swell from boats making large splashes along the front of the boat - very exciting! The only slight confusion came when our guide asked us to head for the 'yellow boo-eee' - phonetically typed! We weren't sure what this was (neither was another couple with us). After a while paddling we realised he meant 'buoy'!

We were kayaking in Milford Sound for 5 hours and it was stunning but wet so no blog picture - sorry!

Left at 6:30 am which we felt was quite impressive. Journey there was interesting 2hr drive mostly in dark on very wiggly road. Now we've been on some roads in our travels and been on some roads in the dark on our travels but that is the closest either of us want to ever come to car sickness. So feeling slightly 'ughy' we promptly climbed aboard sea kayak (as you do) immediately felt much better.

Of course climbing aboard was after battling the sand flies which were AWFUL. Even Martyn thought they were so bad that he asked me to protect him as he changed into his thermals and kayaking gear. This resulted in me doing a hilarious 'wafty wafty' dance all around him as he changed (sandflies do not like breezes). Rest of group found this very funny, I was humiliated but Martyn was not bitten. Did he do the same for me? Did he heck as like. He was too busy applying DEET to the remaining uncovered bits of him which by this time was just his hands and face. All this while I did the quickest strip and redress ever achieved by a human being!!!

Scenery was stunning - just like the postcards but a strange thing happened at the end. Despite yesterday being on board a cruise ship with 100 other people we both agreed we preferred Doubtful Sound. There was always somewhere on the boat that no-one else was and, the stillness and quiet when they turned the engines off was indescribable. In contrast Milford, being more accessible had 3 cruise ships which went past at least three times each and numerous sea planes, scenic flights and helicopters over head!

Despite this we still viewed a pod of bottlenose dolphin (which is very cool from a kayak) and three fur seals!

Drive back was much better as we could a) see and b) stop off and take photos (which Martyn did with avengeance - I feel more keep delete approaching!) Seriously a beautiful drive and another picture perfect day!

Back to Te Anau in time for trip to pictures - very special cinema. This guy spent 5 yrs flying helicopters and made a film of the scenery. Couldnt find a cinema that would show it so built his own! Cynically Martyn and I decided if it took him 5yrs to film and he got 32 mins of film he either wasn't very good or he was not very efficient and lining up shots. It was a stunning piece of film though (but then it would be as the scenery is) it was nice to see it in the different seasons though! Biggest seats ever in the cinema.

Back to little cabin for dinner and a big re-pack of the bags. It is time for our little tent to go home. This makes us quite sad. He has protected us from thunder storms and mosquitos, kept us warm in the cold and and provided shade from the sun. We shall miss him and hope he makes it home safely.

Oh dear - have just realised I have assigned a gender to our tent. Definitely losing it.,......

Cruising along

Realised yesterday that we only have 7 days left in NZ. This led to two things
1) realisation that we will have to come back - not enough time in fiordland and we haven't touched Abel Tasman or done a great walk (but have done many other great things!)
2) frantic booking of things we thought we could fit in before we go to Oz.

That used up most if yesterday afternoon (well that and a small nap did anyway!)

Today we went on a wildlife cruise of Doubtful Sound which was very spooky as the cloud came down but it cleared in the afternoon so we could see how stunning it is. Made it out to the Tasman Sea and Martyn took loads more photos - thank goodness for digital cameras that's all I can say - we'd need to remortgage the house if we were doing this trip on film!

On the way back we took a trip down to see the Manapouri power station which is built underneath a mountain. Now you will remember that Martyn is not a fan of caving so I was a little surprised he suggested this but apparently being as a bus fitted down the long 1 in 10 entrance tunnel that was 2km long it was okay! Personally I think his desire to see large engineering type gadgets over ruled the whole 'deep underground' thing!

Just on way back across lake Manapouri now and then on to Te Anau.

What's that R2?

So many birds that sound like R2D2 and now we know what they are and have seen them too!

We left for Stewart island two days ago across the Foveaux Strait which is notoriously rough - only a 2m swell so not too bad. Arrived at 1030am and regained our land legs by walking from Halfmoon Bay up Fuschia walk, down Raroa walk to Golden Bay, around to Davis Bay for lunch (gentle breeze = no sandflies - bargain) and then back to Halfmoon Bay. Booked Ulva island trip but decided against spending money on Kiwi spotting trip. Afternoon nap an a wander around the two shops , oh and an ice cream of course!

Up early next day - caught ferry to Ulva island at 0830 and were bird spotting by 0845. Fantastic - weta, saddleback, cockariki, robin, kereru, bellbird, tui and kaka. Great time meandering through temperate rainforest with a really good guide who showed us all the trees and plants as well - umbrella moss, filmy fern, rimu, totara, lancewood, miri (with sap that i tasted - bit like vegemite but we had no cheese so Martyn didn't have any!), Easter orchids and anothe orchid, very cool.

Back to Stewart Island for lunch and then a walk to Horseshoe Bay and back before a fish n chip supper (ooooops, did have meal planned but hey ho!)

Attempted self guided kiwi spotting at 9pm but didn't see any. Could hear them though so they were out there!

Ferry back to the south island this morning across a millpond - apparently there is a north westerly due this afternoon so it will be a bit rough - glad we came across when we did, it's only an hour but methinks that could be a very llloooonnngggg time across the strait if rough !

Anyway, now tootling up to Manapouri via Tuatapere - sausage capital (we'll be stopping there then!) ready for doubtful sound tomorrow!

11 days left in NZ

Crikey its going quickly , cant believe only 11 days left and so much still to do so we sped up a bit today and have booked in a few things towards the end so we dont miss anything....) today though was a bit of a travel day...

So, at the crack of dawn (7.30 - now Martyn is exaggerating as even I know this is not quite the crack of dawn!) we woke up at our friends house in Dunedin remembering that we had a ferry to catch tomorrow. The best laid plans went slightly to waste as we couldn't find the right key to lock their door with on the way out - never mind.

We zoomed off to Nugget Point - named so for when the light shines just right, the rock formations look like nuggets of gold - no gold today, but a cool see-through floor at the top by the light house - K held on tight as apparently it was scary.

We headed next to the Petrified Forest, which was actually a beach which used to be a forest but when the volcano blew and there was a flood the trees all became impregnated with silica and were hence fossilised. Had to get there within 4 hrs of low tide to see it though and we were slightly delayed due to a visit to the Lost Gypsy Gallery which is in a bus and is basically a guy fiddling around in a shed/workshop making things out of rubbish! Needless to say my scheduled 5min quick stop became 45mins at least and it was very cool. We both twiddled many handles and said 'oh wow look at this' quite a lot.

Anyway made it to curio bay and the petrified forest with about 10mins to spare so got to see cool trees. There was a moulting yellow eyed penguin on the beach which everyone else was focussing on so we had the rest of the beach to ourselves!

Car picnic for lunch and then on to Invercargill to shop for food and sleep.
Found yummy bread and two savoury swirls to have with our soup. Had to laugh - Martyn chose the savoury swirls. Took me a while to work out they were vegemite and cheese. Martyn does not like vegemite. Except apparently with cheese (he was quite surprised when I told him it was vegemite!) but hey he likes fish now as well apparently! Don't worry though I'm holding out as I still do not like sprouts!

Had to cook soup in bowls in microwave. Didn't realise microwave was 100W more powerful than the cooking instruction listing. Didn't read instruction to cover the bowl. Dinner delayed somewhat by needing to clean microwave. Exploding soup made cooking a bit more interesting though. As usual we were laughing too much to be efficient with our clean up. French people cooking dinner at same time did not seem overly amused!

Oh and campsite has unisex toilets and showers - thats quite interesting, but then so was the long drop toilet I had to use today - an unexpected breeze caused another burst of hilarity. I leave you to imagine the rest!

Rail trail day four (the end)

Brrrrrrr that was cold
Wind changed direction again - south now and very chilly but still a headwind so had to pedal all the way to Middlemarch. Only 29km though so not too bad (and we were crumble and ice cream powered from last night!)

Left at 9 as the sun was shining, colours lovely, views great. Past site of Hyde rail disaster, last two station stamps in little booklet, cake stop at Ngapuna and on to Middlemarch for 11.40ish where we had our own minor rail disaster!

Booked on 1pm train. Unfortunately two cruise ships had arrived in port and booked out every carriage on the train so we had been bumped off it. We could go on the 4pm train but as the cruise ship had arrived late it wasn't due in until 5.15 and it wasnt coming as far as Middlemarch so we would have to get shuttle bus and we might get to Dunedin by 7pm.

Middlemarch is pretty but not that much to do for 5hrs and we would have missed last afternoon with friends. Skip train, call friends, get collected, big lunch, walk to salt lake, walk dog, big (Turkish) dinner, big sleep.

Farewell Andy and Christy and Georgia and Brew (dog and cat) oh and chickens and on to the next bit!

Day 3 rail trail

Slightly wet and soggy start to the day - needed raincoats for the first part of the ride and then it was cold so needed coats to keep warm, and gloves and could have done with extra socks - very cold toes!

Made it to Ranfurly by 10 and spent some time looking around their little museum which was a pleasant chance to warm up a bit.

Then there was nowhere for about 32km so we had lunch in a Gangers shed as we were starving.

Oh, and just our luck - the wind had changed so we had to pedal - going downhill!

Lovely views even with the grey cloud !
One bridge, one tunnel and one viaduct later we made it to Hyde where we've just had yummy crumble and home made ice cream for pud!

Oh, and we've been doing a study of the ground surface on the rail trail (which is increasingly important now we have to stand up on the bridges which have planks going 90degrees to direction of travel!) Anyway there are big bits of grey/black stone which is quite bumpy, then there is medium sized grey which is okay but the best is the fine grey/brown stuff which is a bit like big sand. We had some mud and puddles today as well which Martyn tried to avoid - guess what I did - yup - straight through the middle kersplash!

Anyway, all down tomorrow so could we please have no headwind, fine grey/brown gravel and blue skies!

Day two rail trail (view)

Here is the view from our cabin this evening. There are ten cabins, one information stall and a pub here so guess where we're going for dinner!

Day two rail trail (a bit more)

Here is proof we made it to the top. Oh the dizzy heights!

Day two rail trail

Martyn moaned that his bum hurt this morning. I kept quiet about mine which does not yet seem to be as bad as I had thought it might be - at least I am still glad I did not pay out for the gel set cover! (I can hear mother now - where there's no sense there's no feeling!)

Had lovely breakfast and natter with owner of the Black Hotel in Ophir and set off. Vert surprised by how fast we went without the headwind of yesterday!

One curving bridge, two tunnels and a 37m high viaduct (which I had to cycle in the middle of so as not to look over the edge or down the gaps between the planks!) and we made it to Hayes Engineering - home of the famous wire strainer ! Which made a very good ice cream stop. A bit further on to lunch pursue Gilchrists store in Oterahua. Then the big climb over 45 degrees south latitude to the summit of our cycle ride at 618m (Claire and Ian are in fits if laughter again - I know they are!) and weeeeee someone fitted rockets to our bikes - downhill all the way to Wedderburn - very nice!

Here is my wire sieve (strainer!) I will post proof of making it to the top in a mo!

Day one rail trail

Just how stupid am I? Actually the reason for asking this has nothing to do with the cycling part of the rail trail I have just had another mental issue that Martyn says I have to tell you about. Oh the humiliation of what I am about to reveal.

But first - left Andy and Christys at about 7.45 am (ugh) but only had to wait at bottom of drive for bus to pick us up. After a 4hr ish drive which basically followed the route we are cycling (yes we did wonder whether or not we needed to bother with cycling back) we made it to Clyde and the start of the trail. Sorted bikes and decided not to pay 35bucks for gel seat cover (may regret this tomorrow but ok so far)

Averages 17km/hr from Clyde to Alexandra and then hit the headwind and the crosswinds on the Galloway plains. Even the Kiwi bloke we met (who cycles this bit twice a week as part of his training programme said it was diabolical so I didn't feel so bad then). And there was a big long haul up a 1 in 50 to the top of Tiger Hill as well. Combination of wind and hill slowed me from 17 to 7 ish km/hr. Bummer.

Still plenty of places to stop and admire the views (which we forgot to take blog piccies of - will rectify tomorrow) so it wasn't too bad. 36km and about 4.5 hrs of cycling later we made it to Omekau, another 2km got us to Ophir, stretch, wash, groan, stretch, dinner, 3km walk to bridge and bed!

At dinner we reviewed the things we will see tomorrow, one of which is the Hayes Engineering Works (oh joy but apparently a bit of a farming gadgetry legend). In particular they are famous for the Hayes wire strainer which is still in use in most farms throughout NZ apparently. I had a lightbulb moment at dinner. I had been trying to work out why / how you strain (as in sieve) wire. I really must have left my Physics brain somewhere! Martyn was in fits! I get it now. Strain = tension. Just how stupid am I?

Staying with Friends

Just realised I haven't blogged for two days. Crikey. I think I have withdrawal symptoms!

Now, where were we when I last did this?

Oh yes, sitting in car in rain. Rain stopped (just a little sprinkle) and we went in to visitors centre at Benmore Dam which was very interesting indeed and it had some cool things for kids (ahem, us) to play with! Bit of history about the building of the dam and some interesting electic / hydroelectric facts. All this along with a very nice man who we had a natter with and who was very impressed by our puzzling out of how it all worked!

Tootled along side of Aviemore (ha ha, thought we'd gone wrong somewhere) and down to Oumaru to a penguin reserve but we decided the penguins were the same ones as we had seen in Australia so we weren't going to pay to see them here. Instead used their car park to have lunch in! Then drove from Oumaru down to Dunedin stopping at very intriguing Moeraki Boulders and also at Shag Point to search for yellow eyed penguins instead of little blue penguins but we didn't see any there either (but then yellow eyed penguins are quite rare and very shy!)

Found friends house in Dunedin with no sat nav and no argument - crumbs :-)

Slept in bed in a house which was a very novel concept and very nice.

Went out on Otago Peninsula and to only mainland nesting colony of Albatross and saw a baby one - wow! Then went out to the Penguin Place and saw my yellow-eyed penguins. Really weird because they nest under trees. You do not expect to see penguins under trees! AND, they had a little penguin hospital where they had one of those little rock hopper penguins (the ones with the crests that look like punk rockers) sad he was poorly but very cute!

Very nice Turkish meal for dinner having discovered that where we were going to go was closed for some reason. This was after we walked dog on beach and rescued a juvenile Shag which had two fishing barbs in its feet. Good team effort - 1 person to get dog off bird and then entertain dog, one person to supply jumper to cover bird up for carrying, 2 people to use multitude of phones to try to get signal and contact DOC for more permanent rescue of bird! Met DOC lady at hotel somewhere, barbs removed, bird released. Hurrah!

Currently having domestic day - washing on, emails done, got to play 'Keep Delete' our all new travelling game with our photos next. We are waiting for cycle hire lady to ring us back as we may be attempting the Otago Rail Trail in the next 4 days. This could be interesting. 160km in 4 days. There is a training programme and everything on their website. Martyn says we can do it no problem. I've put the ice in the freezer for when we finish and I need to sit on it! Apparently the biggest hill is a 1:50 you can buy cycle shorts and gel seat covers. Martyn is currently refusing these offers. Claire and Ian please stop laughing.............

Anyway, there is very little phone signal on this bike ride so there may be no blogs for a few days. After that I may well be blogging whilst standing up :-)