Saturday, March 10, 2007

South Island - New Zealand

The South Island of New Zealand was more beautiful than the north as far as scenery goes, but we didn’t enjoy it as much. This may have been because we saw some really great spots on the north island that were really low key and mellow, without the hustle and bustle of heavy tourism. Also, we are both famous for getting the most mosquito bites out of anyone in a group and it was no different with the pesky sand flies that are all over the South Island.

That said, our last 10 days in NZ were still great. We headed down from Picton to Nelson, then worked our way down the west coast stopping at the pancake rocks and the Franz Joseph Glacier. The glacier in NZ looked like glorified ice cube compared to Perito Moreno in Argentina (dirty too). The further south we got, the more extreme the scenery became. We found ourselves comparing the surroundings to another spot in Patagoina, Torres del Paine. There were steep granite mountains rising up out of sky-blue opaque lakes.

We pushed on south to Queenstown and were happy we did. Amie thought it was the most incredibly beautiful place she had ever been. I wouldn’t go that far, but definitely top 5. We’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.
As time was running out we headed up the east coast to Christchurch—another nice city with a very British feel to it. Three weeks was a good amount of time to get a feel for NZ, we could have used another week easy however… Next stop Tasmania!

Love birds on the ferry
Mike's favorite: Cafe Lambretta in Nelson
Assortment of meat pies
Rise and shine lazy bones
Vineyard in NZ
Lake front property in Queenstown
The lake
All time skipping record: 24! Amie's favorite spot so far

...and she is pretty happy about it!
Snow melt
Still impressive, but no comparison
Good times in NZ!
Amie with beer and tabloid

More natural beauty
More still
and more



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