Saturday 8th December

Today we leave for home. We've stayed in hotels, apartments, lodges, villas and private houses and one penthouse. We caught up with old friends and met interesting, friendly and enthusiastic people wherever we went. We've eaten wonderful local produce and drunk world class wine, and seen the vines from which one special bottle was produced. We've taken 18 flights in aircraft from the largest passenger plane flying, a twin turboprop, a single engined plane and a helicopter. We've been on trams and trains, buses and 4 wheel drive vehicles. We've taken chain link ferries, an electric eco boat, a jet boat, monohulls and catamarans, big and small, slow and fast. We spent 10 days on our charter sailing catamaran. We had 4 hire cars, went on 18 walks, 20 excursions, 3 theatre trips, 2 cinema visits, went through 5 time zones and sat in one hot tub watching the sunset. We've gone from cool to hot, to very hot and back to cool and wet. We've seen crocs and kangaroos and wallabies and wombats and lots of dead possums, birds who can fly and some that can't, shy and curious, brown, green, white, red and black. We've sailed tropical coral strewn waters, sampled the power of the Southern Ocean, cruised lakes and rivers and sounds and inlets and fiords. We've been to cities, to lush forests full of strange creatures, along seashores that were tranquil and manicured and others that were jagged and windswept and rough hewn. We've climbed mountains, stood on a glacier and walked deserts and forests and sheep filled pastures. Now we need a holiday.

Friday 7th December

Today's trip took us north to Glenorchy at the head of Lake Wakatipu. This area is the location for lots of adverts as well as films including Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit. The water jet marine engine was invented in1957 by a Kiwi, CWF Hamilton. Jetboats are fast, highly manoeuvrable and can operate in very shallow water. Our boat shot up the Dart River to Paradise, a place named after a duck. We weaved through rocks, missed boulders by millimetres, slid over barely covered gravel and bounced over rapids. Along the way the pilot performed several 360s, spinning the boat in a complete circle. It was exhilarating although cold. The scenery was astonishing with snow tipped mountains and lush wooded foothills as we skimmed along this multi channel braided river. Once back on land we walked through an ubiquitous beech forest. We learned that the NZ beech is nothing like the northern hemisphere beech; in fact the Latin name for it translates as "not a beech". After that it was a short 4 wheel drive coach ride back to Glenorchy and, after lunch, an hour's drive back to the hotel.

Thursday 6th December

The south west region of South Island is called Fiordland. We were due to take an all day trip to the most northerly fiord, Milford Sound. However, the road was impassable. Luckily we were able to transfer to a tour visiting a different fiord, Doubtful Sound. This is more or less in the centre of the 14 fiords. Captain Cook passed the entrance in1770 but never entered as he was 'doubtful' whether he would be able to manoeuvre his ship out once it had entered. Our journey involved a two hour coach trip and then a 45 minute fast boat ride along Lake Manapouri. The Lake is high above sea level and a tunnel dropping 173 metres down to Doubtful Sound provides the head of pressure for an underground power station generating 14% of New Zealand's electricity. A road through the dense rainforest over Wilmot Pass to Deep Cove was constructed to get equipment to the power station and that was our route to the Sound. Our three hour cruise took us through a spectacular steep sided gorge. The cloud lay low and water boiled off the mountain sides in living, twisting, leaping, foaming ribbons pulsating with energy. The hills could have been populated with trolls, dwarfs and hobbits. The cruise was notable for the large number of Asian tourists, many of whom never seemed to look out at the scenery but stared at their phones, played games or simply slept. We retraced our route and arrived back damp and tired. Our clothes were laid out to dry in front of our fire (yes our room did have one). After a shower and supper we were ready to go to bed.

Wednesday 5th December

We were collected from our hotel shortly after 7am for today's trip. We got to town but then decided to postpone the trip until Friday as the forecast was lousy. By the time we had got a bus back to the hotel the weather had improved. After lunch we went for a long walk and then into town to watch a movie. Lucinda spent most of the time with her hands over her eyes ducked down behind the seat. Killing me Softly is not to be recommended.

Tuesday 4th December

We thought we'd see what Puzzling World had for us. First there was a two level maze. Each of the four corners had a tower. We were thoroughly lost and after half an hour had only managed to get to one tower. Lucinda was becoming increasingly frustrated and we headed for the emergency exit. Other exhibits included masks that moved to look at us as we moved and rooms of optical illusions. We drove over the mountain pass towards Queenstown. On the way we stopped at Arrowtown. This was based on an old gold mining town but turned out to be a collection of designer shops and coffee bars. We got to our hotel on the lake a few kilometres outside of town. Having checked in we drove to town and dropped off our hire car. Twelve days with a Holden Epica was enough. The hill behind the town is accessed by gondola. We looked at the views while others were bungy jumping or riding on wheeled luges. It was all pretty ghastly. We then went to the cinema to see Skyfall. A taxi boat ride took us across the bay to the hotel.

Monday 3rd December

This morning we drove the short distance to Fox Glacier Township. On the way we walked round Lake Matheson. If there are no clouds and the water is still Mount Cook is reflected in its waters. No chance today. We had a distant view of Fox Glacier, in honour of which, allegedly, a mint has been named. From there it was some 230km to Wanaka. Along the way we passed through only two tiny hamlets, sneeze and we would have missed them. We left the mountains and descended through lush tropical rain forest to the sea at Haast. We stopped for lunch at a desolate, mist shrouded beach. The road then turned inland and we had Lake Wanaka to our right. The strong wind was whipping up white horses on this vast lake. We then cut through the mountains to our left to emerge above Lake Hawea. The lakes are separated by a narrow isthmus, bounded by snow capped mountains and are some 35km long. In Wanaka they upgraded our serviced apartment. We have a three bedroom apartment with laundry room, jacuzzi bath, huge living area and massive terrace with BBQ, sun loungers and hot tub, all overlooking the lake (see photo). It's great on the terrace so we stayed in, sat in the hot tub and threw some steaks on the BBQ.

Sunday 2nd December

We were booked for a walk on the glacier. The weather was forecast to be rain and high winds so we thought the trip was unlikely to take place. We were lucky. The cloud stayed away and the trip went ahead. A short helicopter ride dropped us on the ice. We put on crampons before our guides led us off. We spent more than 3 hours clambering through crevasses and over ice boulders before being lifted back to base. Then the clouds came in and all other trips were cancelled. We took a short drive to the ocean at Okarito to walk along the deserted beach. The low cloud merged with the ocean and the waves rolled in. Twisted driftwood tumbled smooth by wind and surf littered the foreshore. It was then back to the room for a rest before a take away pizza.