Tēnā koutou New Zealand

After nearly 5000 km of humidity and soaring temperatures it was time to finish my Asian adventures and catch a flight further south to New Zealand.  What I wasn’t expecting to see was snow on the ground when I arrived.

After a fantastic week of ‘poshness’, relaxation and a bit of an adventure into a sulphur volcano it was time to say a sad goodbye to my wife as she headed back to work in Vietnam.  As Deirbhle’s flight left at lunchtime and mine was not due to depart until 10.30pm this gave me the chance to catch up with Fraser and Trinh who had set off from Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam with me 3 months ago.  They had now made it to Bali and had set up home there for the next few months.

Sanur where they now lived was only about 15km from the airport and so we met up for a late lunch before Fraser dropped me back to the airport on his motorbike.

I had left my bike and luggage in storage when I flew into Bali to meet Deirbhle the previous week.  It was cheaper to get a company to collect it from me when I landed than leave it with left luggage at the airport.  I had arranged for it to be dropped back to me at 6.30pm and when I walked to the prearranged rendezvous point at the airport my bike and panniers were already there waiting for me.

Once I had checked in I headed through to passport control and on my way I bumped into Wayne who I had cycled with in Flores.

We had met when we both got stranded by a cancelled ferry from the island of Sumbawa to Flores and had then hiked to see the Komodo Dragons together.  The last time I had seen Wayne was when his chain snapped as we were cycling up a very steep mountain on our way out of Lubuan Bajo, and he had had to thumb a lift on the back of a truck.

My flight left on time and to get to New Zealand I had to change planes in Sydney.  As my luggage was booked all the way through to Queenstown it meant that I could just transit when I arrived in Australia rather than having to go through immigration which was a good thing as I did not have an entry visa.

A fellow teacher called Natalya who works in Frankfurt Germany had read about my cycle trip and had been in touch to say that her parents, Brian and Marion, lived in Queenstown and would be happy to put me up when I arrived.  I had emailed them and it was all arranged for me to stay when I landed and they had sent me directions of how to cycle to their house.

I had a seven hour layover in Sydney and when I was sat having a coffee and checked my boarding card for the flight to Queenstown I realised that I was in fact arriving a day earlier than I had told Brian and Marion. I had told them that I was arriving on Tuesday evening when I was in fact arriving on Monday evening.  I emailed both Natalya and her parents from Sydney to say that I would be landing a day early but had received no reply by the time I boarded the plane.  As my plane departed I wasn’t sure whether my first night in New Zealand may yet be in a tent rather than a comfy bed.

The flight was only 3 hours and it was early evening in New Zealand as the plane descended to land.  Once we were through the blanket of cloud that covered the land below I caught my first site of the size of mountains that I knew we waiting for me below.

The first two things that struck me as we descended was not the size of the mountains but the sheer remoteness of the areas that I would be cycling through and that there was snow on the ground below.  The first was a slight surprise but the second was totally unexpected.  October is spring time in the southern hemisphere and although I was not expecting endless sunshine I was not expecting snow.  As I would find out later the southern part of the island had been hit by a late winter snow storm the week before and as we were so close to Antarctica these could apparently happen at any time up until mid December.

As the plane descended lower the sheer size of the glacial valleys below were stunning, and as the plane came into land the valley sides looked awfully close as the plane rocked from side to side as we followed the contours of the land.

As we disembarked from the plane we had to walk across the tarmac to the terminal building and it was bloody freezing. I would definitely need more layers than the shorts, t-shirt and flip flops that I was currently wearing. Everybody around me was wearing padded jackets and long pants – maybe I should have checked the weather forecast before arriving.

Thankfully the arrivals hall was toasty with the heating cranked up to high, and my routine when I arrive at an airport is to rebuild the bike where I collect it off the conveyor belt as once I pass through customs finding a quiet space where I don’t get the way of other people can often be a problem.  Putting my bike together normally takes about 20 minutes and when I was halfway though one of the security guards came across and asked if I was Stewart.  When I said yes he walked away without another word.  I thought it a bit strange but continued building my bike.

Now that my fellow passengers had collected their luggage there was only me left in the arrivals hall and that was when the bio security team came across to inspect my bike.  New Zealand, like Australia, have very strict laws to protect their wildlife and environment.  One of the bio security team ran a gloved hand along the inside of my mudguard and came out with dirty fingers.  They stood over me whilst I finished building the bike and once completed told me that they would need to take my bike away to be inspected. They wheeled my bike off whilst I sorted out the rest of my panniers and headed after the bike hoping that they would give it back to me and not impound it.

As I also had camping gear with me when I passed through customs they also took my tent and cooking gear away to be inspected.  All I could do was sit and wait.

After 20 minutes they returned with my camping gear and told me that my bike had been decontaminated and it could be collected on landside.  Once I had repacked my panniers and headed out into the arrivals hall my bike was sat there gleaming as they had steam cleaned it to remove any trace of dirt from it.

As I wheeled it out I found out why the security guard had come in and asked if I was Stewart as sat there on a bench was a man with a sign with my name on it.  The man turned out to be Brian who I was going to be staying with and after receiving my email saying that I would be arriving a day early he had come to the airport to collect me.

If only I had checked my messages when I had landed he wouldn’t have had to wait for an hour for me to put my bike together etc.  I just hoped that he had a car big enough to take my bike as the delay at customs had meant that it was now dark and freezing cold outside and I didn’t fancy cycling it the 12km I knew that it was to his house.

Luckily, Brian had come prepared and he had a pickup with a bike rack hitched to the back so we were soon rolling along with the heater on full blast. When we arrived at his house we were met by a wave from the kitchen window as Marion was busy preparing dinner.

Marion is a former secondary school Art teacher and their home is testament to the many countries that they have lived and worked during their time working in international schools around the world. Having now retired and returned to their native New Zealand Marion has taken a studio at an art gallery in Queenstown where she still teaches privately.  To see her amazing art Click Here

They are a great couple and said that I could stay as long as I wanted.  As I only have seven weeks of cycling in New Zealand then I wanted to get on the road as soon as possible but given the temperatures that I had encountered when I arrived I would need to go shopping for some thermals in the morning otherwise I would freeze in my tent in the mountains.

It turned out that Brian worked with a Kiwi guy called Paul who had recently returned from his own cycle through Europe and had cycled extensively through the South Island of New Zealand.  He said that he would arrange for him to come over for dinner the next evening so that we could discuss my route.

The next morning I cycled the short distance back into Queenstown and armed with Brian’s hand drawn map I went around the places that I needed to – outdoor clothing shops for thermals and wet weather gear, the supermarket for a weeks supply of food, the petrol station for cooker fuel, the Department of Conservation office for a map of freedom campsites and a bike shop to get new brake pads.  My first few days of cycling in New Zealand would be completely off road and my final stop of the morning was the ferry boat office to buy a ticket  that would take me across Lake Wakatipu to the start point of the track that I would be following in the morning.

By the time that I had completed all of the shopping it was lunchtime so I headed to Subway as that seemed to be the cheapest option in town.   After lunch, I headed to the gallery where Marion’s studio was as I knew that she would be teaching a class in the afternoon.  After sayig hello, the next couple of hours were spent just chatting with random people around town as for the first time on this trip I was in a country where the main language is English ,and it was very nice to just sitting around and speaking to people about nothing in particular.

One of the people that I had talked to had said that in the park there was a frisbee golf course set up and so I headed across to watch people play.  It is a bit like playing a round of pitch and putt but with a frisbee and instead of getting the golf ball into a hole you have to get the frisbee into a basket.

It was now time to go and have a look at the size of the mountains that I would be cycling into when I left Queenstown and Brian had said that there was a cycle track around the lake shore.  Man, they certainly looked impressive from this side of the lake.

At 5pm I headed back out to where Brian and Marion lived and to get to their place I had a very steep ride in front of me as their house is perched on a hillside overlooking Queenstown.  This was my first taste of steep uphill cycling in New Zealand and without the heat and humidity of Asia it was not actually too bad.

As arranged that evening Paul joined us for dinner and Marion had cooked us a fantastic pork roast with full trimmings.

After dinner, over a glass of wine or two, Paul gave me some great tips about routes to take and places to camp along the way.

By the time we got to bed that night it was very late but I had a much firmer idea of where I would be heading when I left Queenstown the following morning.

On this trip I have learnt not to plan too far ahead as plans always change and when I landed in Queenstown I had no exact route plan rather just a general direction that I would be heading as I have found that advice from locals when I arrive is far better than research on the internet.  My time in Queenstown proved no different as Brian, Marion and Paul had all recommended that when I arrived in a town called Manapouri in a few days time I should take an overnight boat trip out to a place called Doubtful Sound.

So the next morning when I was waiting for the 11am ferry to take me across the lake I inquired about the boat trip and they did indeed have a spare berth for me in two days time.  This meant that my plan when I boarded the ferry would be to head into the mountains that night to camp at Mavora Lakes and then to head the next day to Manapouri where I would again camp before catching the overnight cruise to Doubtful Sound.

The boat that I was catching across Lake Wakatipu was more of a tour boat than an actual ferry but I had bought just a oneway ticket and they would drop me off at a sheep station on the other side of the lake.

Once the boat had finished refueling it pulled along side the jetty that I was stood on and I cycled onboard for the 45 minute journey that it would take us to cross the lake.

If the view from the boat was anything to go by I was going to have one heck of a stunning ride through New Zealand

The sheep farm lay on the small coastal plane that skirted the shoreline at the foot of the mountains on this side of the lake and the track that I needed to follow would take me over the mountains behind.

After a 45 minute commentary on the lake’s formation and current use the boat docked at the sheep station.  It was now time for me to get off and get on with the job of cycling my way across South Island New Zealand.

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