20/11–Moving on, Greymouth, Franz Josef and Milford Sound

We’ve been moving along at a fair old pace in the South Island. After the long march at Abel Tasman, we left Nelson and did an overnight at Greymouth. Little did we know that in little more than a week after our stay there, tragedy would strike the when 29 miners died in an underground explosion.

 

The next stop was Franz Josef, where we stayed another night. Just long enough to do the obligatory walk of the Franz Josef Glacier.

The drive up to Franz Josef was something of an event in its own right as we were greeted by some stunning scenery and winding alpine roads. For its size, New Zealand has some quite startling changes in climate and vegetation between regions, and the regions around Franz Josef were covered in rainforest, in stark contrast to the more temperate North and North East coast.

The Glacier itself in a magnificent thing. Its terminal end has been retreating over the past 15 years or so due to the earth’s warming, leaving behind a barren moonscape of broken rocks in its wake.

Having approached the glacier from this rubble strewn end, we were able put on our crampon’s and walk up on to the old boy, which gave us some more great views of the valley below. However, Si Phong seemed to be more interested in the great views of our guide’s behind. According to her and the other females on on the Magic Bus, “Callum” was a proper piece of eye candy. I guess the glacier probably retreated an extra couple of meters that day on account of all of extra heat coming from those ladies.

At this point, we’d been travelling for about a week through New Zealand with barely a day off the coach. We’d made a couple of friends on the way, such as Sao Mai from Quebec, who we were to spend plenty more time with down the line. Despite the good company and the beautiful scenery, it was starting to feel like a bit of a grind, so it was with much relief that we hit Queenstown, where we fully intended to slow things down a bit by staying seven nights before a more relaxed itinerary back up to Christchurch.

Queenstown is set in some fantastic scenery of its own, but most people will travel from there for a day trip in to the Fiordland National Park area in order to visit Milford Sound. This is not a short drive by any means. In fact, the Milford Sound excursion sounds positively insane at first glance…a ten hour return coach journey just to spend 2 hours on a cruise boat at Milford Sound. Say what?!?

However, we figured that the only way that such a ridiculous excursion could be so popular was if the 2 hours on the boat was absolutely knock out. And spectacular it was!

Things weren’t looking too hopeful on the way out from Queenstown to Te Anau, as the drive was shrouded in mist and freezing rain, prompting everyone to stop up on extra fleeces at the cafe stop. But as we progressed in to Milford, the clouds miraculously cleared. According to the driver, It was the first clear day in over a week.

Milford Sound is best viewed by boat, as it highlights the way that the mountains rise straight up from the sea. This was some proper Land that Time Forgot stuff right here, and the only thing missing was a flock of Pterodactyls plucking the odd unfortunate tourist in to the air.

Despite this, it was a slightly frustrating experience for me to be viewing Milford Sound from the top of a tour boat. I was fully aware that one of the reputed Finest Walks on Earth, the four day Milford Track, starts from lake Te Anau and crosses the mountains in to Milford Sound. This would have been a far more satisfactory way to get to and see Milford Sound, though our particular itinerary could never had accommodated this. Hmm…maybe there’s some unfinished business with this southern isle.

Navigation error leads to 35km death march in Abel Tasman

Having spent a couple of nights in Nelson, we used it as a springboard for a day trip to Abel Tasman. Abel Tasman…Abel Tasman...even the name has a slightly sinister ring to it, like a curse, or the unutterable name of a murderous pirate or evil shaman of olde.

In reality, Abel Tasman is a national park that is famed for its 51km coastal track, which skirts along fabulous unspoilt beaches and sandy coves. Abel Tasman has no road access, so visitors must either hike the coastal track or use the sea taxi service to get further in to the park.

Our plan for the day was to take the sea taxi 30kms along the coast and get dropped off at Tonga beach. We’d then backtrack, walking 16km along the coastal track to Anchorage beach, where we’d get the 5pm sea taxi back to the park entrance.

On the coach from Nelson, the bus driver had warned that parts of the track were tidal. This point was completely lost on us, as we are land lubbers and hell, we had 5 hours to walk a paltry 16kms, right?!?

We had an enjoyable stroll, reaching the estuary before Anchorage with a good hour to spare. However, one barrier lay between us and the last 1.5 km  to the pick up point. The tide had come up, meaning that we would have to wade across 100 odd meters of sea water to get to the other side. A quick look at the map (which later turned out not to be to scale) revealed that a soaking could be avoided by taking the non-tidal route around the banks of the estuary.

The sign for Anchorage indicated that the path would only take 30mins and so we cracked on. But as we progressed, we seemed to be walking further and further away from where we needed to be. The path went ever more inland with no sign of a bridge to the other side.Time was ticking down and we found ourselves anxious and walking ever faster until we were both flushed and dripping with sweat. Then, without warning the next sign for Anchorage jumped up to a 1 hr 30 mins walk time! Oh no!!! It dawned on us that the previous 30 min sign must have been for the tidal crossing and that we were now committed a much longer route which meant that we had no chance of making 5pm for the last sea taxi of the day!!!

When we eventually reached Anchorage beach, it was 5.30pm and the last boat had well and truly gone. I knew that this was not a good thing…there were no roads in to the park and the place was virtually deserted now. There was a good chance that we were stranded for the night. We had a frantic 30 minutes running up and down the length of the beach looking for help. Finding a ranger’s lodge gave us a brief moment of hope, but only confirmed that there would be no more sea taxi’s. We did find boat, but the skipper wasn’t up for taking a fare, though he did seem to take great pleasure in pointing out that it was a four hour walk and we’d finish in darkness.

So it boiled down to two options, an overnight stay in a beach hut or soldiering on and walking the remaining 13km out of the park, with no mobile reception and no guaranteed means of finding a ride back to Nelson. Staying overnight was not an option as we had a coach to catch at 8am the next day from Nelson. We resigned ourselves to walking, hopefully beating the 9pm sunset in the process. Si Phong had accepted her fate by now and had gone from being slightly tearful to silently determined…good girl.

So we trudged on, fuelled by our solitary remaining packet of chocolate digestives. We were making good progress under the still sweltering afternoon sun. About 5kms in, we began to hear strange noises from the jungle. “Its nothing, just bird calls”, I assured Si Phong. But the calls got louder and more regular until a human voice could be distinctly heard. Suddenly, a tall, muscular man emerged from the jungle behind us, he was running bare foot and his long, sun bleached hair rustled in the air. He looked magnificent.

TARZAN!!! YES!!! IT WAS TARZAN!!!

Not quite knowing what to make of it, I asked “Hello? Can I help you?”. Which was a silly thing to say, as it turned out that he wasn’t, in fact, Tarzan and had been summoned from quite some distance away to help us. We waited hopefully to see what assistance was on offer as he radio’d back to base. As far as Si Phong was concerned, she was now deeply embroiled in the Worse Crisis Ever and was fully expecting to be air lifted out of the park. Or at the very least, carried out by Tarzan. Unfortunately, this is New Zealand and the locals are a built bit tougher than that. Tarzan gave us a quick look over and politely suggested that we’d be good to finish the walk out of the park. I blame Si Phong and her sturdy looking legs for his assessment.

So, assured of our ability to finish, Tarzan disappeared just as rapidly as he’d appeared, leaving us to complete our death march . We thankfully got out at 8.30, just as dusk settled in. At this point, our escape from Abel Tasman was not yet in the bag, as we were still an hours drive from Nelson and a brief chat with the park ranger suggested that we’d be unlikely to find any transportation until the next day.

At this point, we were willing to pay any sum to get us back to a hot shower and our nice warm bed at our room in Nelson. We found a nearby cafe where the staff were great, and helped us to book a private minibus. The £100 fare hurt me far more than the 35kms of walking. How come all of my mistakes on holiday have been expensive ones?!?

While we waited, it seemed that the locals were taking an interest in our long march...the local crazy, a scruffy looking man with wild grey hair, undeterminable foreign accent and BO that could kill a possum from 50 yards, took great pleasure in castigating us loudly to the rest of the bar for our foolishness. As he blabbered on it became clear that he had an axe to grind with all the evil day trippers who were nowadays descending upon Abel Tasman by sea taxi.

It had been quite a taxing afternoon, but I restrained myself from chinning the crazy guy. It was a wise move, as he turned out to be the owner of the Cafe! Once he’d stopped foaming at the mouth, we were able to strike up some civilised conversation and his reasons became a little more clear. He was Czech, a traveller in a previous life, who’d settled in Abel Tasman over 20 years ago to start his Cafe. His beef was that back in the old days, backpackers would come from all around and spend several nights walking, camping and enjoying Abel Tasman. The advent of the boat tours had brought about a change, people were no longer willing to take their time getting in to Abel Tasman via the walking tracks, instead dropping in and out by in a single day via the boats.

Anyways, after the local Police popped in to check up on us (very embarrassing) the taxi arrived and we were finally on our way home.

In hindsight, things could have been much worse. Truth be told, we’re not really beach people and there’s something evil about these isolated beachy coves that drives people to madness and unspeakable acts of savagery…just read Lord of the Flies or The Beach if you don’t believe me!!! So we can consider ourselves lucky that the madness did not take us, though Si Phong probably did consider bashing my brains out with a rock when we first realised that we were going to miss the boat.

So what have I learnt from this experience? It’d be all to easy to blame it on my wanton disregard of tidal warnings or my route planning skills. But no, the real culprit is something much bigger. The fact is, we would NEVER have been stranded if this had happened in China. You can be your bottom dollar that we would have found an enterprising fisherman willing to moonlight as a boat taxi if the price was right. No, the real blame must lie with New Zealand and its people. Yes!!! Here is a country where people have gotten affluent that they actually believe they have the right stop working at 5.00pm and worse still, cannot be bribed in to action by our weakened British Pound. DISGRACEFUL!

14/11 - Touch down in NZ

We're now in NZ, its somewhat different to China, a bit like Scotland or Wales on steroids and without the rain (so far!).

 

We were looking forward to a more casual style of travelling, after the relentless march across China and SE Asia. Unfortunately it looks like this won't be the case as it turns out that New Zealand's South Island is the size of Great Britain and packed with things to see. The magic bus network goes in an anticlockwise loop, covering 3000km en route. We quickly realised that we'd need 3 weeks to do it justice and forked out for later flights.

 

Unfortunately NZ and OZ signal the start of UK like prices...a big shock to the system after China and even HK. This is great news for Si Phong as she will get to savour my gourmet like cooking as we cook our own meals in a bid to save money.

 

The hike in price means that we're also well and truly doing the backpacker thing now, staying in youth hostels and travelling on a tour bus. Based on Sheenie's tales from Lao, we were expecting to witness scenes of rampant debauchery as our fellow backpackers ran wild at night, but were rather suprised to find most folks tucked up in bed by 12. Tssk! The youth of today, no party in them!

 

More from NZ once we've figured out what the hell we're going to do here! It sure is purdy here though...missing China big time, but I think we're going to have a good time here.

10/11 - Goodbye China

So with a heavy heart and fond farewell, we bid goodbye to the People's Republic of China, flying out of Hong Kong on the 10th November. Or maybe we left 4 days earlier on the 7th of November, depending on how you view Hong Kong's level of independence from the PRC.

 

We almost didn't make it out at all, having had another dodgy moment at the check in counter where our booking did not show up. This time the mistake was ours, somehow we'd managed to get our dates mixed and should have flown the day before...doh!!! Fortunately Quantas were able to fix this for a painful-but-could-have-been-much-much-worse charge.

 

We both agreed that China's been an amazing experience, a dizzying kaleidescope of people, food & flavours and jaw dropping scenery. One of the biggest reveleations was the realisation that China is just not one nation of Han chinese, but a mix of many sub-cultures and ethnic groups, Xi'an had its Muslim Chinese and there was a strong Tibetan influence in parts of Sichuan and Yunnan. The diversity was certainly in evidence as I struggled to understand various local accents and dialects as we moved from province to province.

 

China remains one of the great untapped destinations for western travellers...it has so much going for it, delicious and varied cuisine, thousands of years of culture and history and some of the most unique and epic scenery imaginable. Best of all, even with China's growing economy, its still ridiculously affordable to live and travel out there. If it were not for one significant catch, I'd be urging everyone I know to get out there right now and experience China's wonders.

 

The catch is, of course, the language barrier. There are very few English speakers in China and unlike SE Asia, the tourism industry in China does not depend on foreign visitors as the chinese middle classes largely holiday within their own country. I grew up in a mandarin speaking household, which was about as usful as a chocolate teapot in the UK, where the BBC's are all cantonese speakers, it was therefore an extremely gratifying experience to have finally been able to make use of the language to unlock the treasure box that is China.

 

Things may change in the future, as the younger generation of classroom-educated Chinese take over maybe the proportion of English speakers shall increase, but so will the prices. So if you already know or have half a mind to learn mandarin, I'd urge you to get over there and experience China while its still relatively cheap and unvisited.

10/11 - Living in a Box in Hong Kong

I'm something of a freak among BBC's (British Born Chinese) having never visited Hong Kong before. I finally got to break the duck when we spent 3 nights visiting our friend Alison and transferring for our flight to New Zealand.

 

Highly developed and with a pace of life that rivals any of the world's great cities, Hong Kong was always going to be a rude shock to the system after our relaxing time in Yangshuo. What was an even bigger shock, however, was the quality/price of the accomodation!!! In china we'd been spoilt, staying in accomodation with hostel prices, but hotel quality.

 

Bolstered by our experiences in China, we felt confident going for the hostel option in HK. What a mistake! We arrived at Chung King mansions and were greeted by the sleazy looking manager, who proudly announced that he'd upgrade us to one of the big rooms for the first night. Bonus! However, far from being the palatial suite of our dreams, the big room turned out to be a shoebox, literally two single beds, four walls and a 3 foot gap between them and nothing else to spare. It was obviously a false promise to get us to sign up for three nights, as this was certainly not a "Big Room" and we couldn't imagine there could be anything smaller.

 

Except that this was Hong Kong and the rooms could always get smaller! The next day, we got back at night to find that our luggage had been transferred to a regular room and the world had closed in around us just that little bit more. The feeling of claustrophobia was further compounded by the lack of windows and stiffling heat (the aircon was busted), though if things got too much, we felt that help was never too far away as the hole in the wall plugged with rolls of newspaper and selotape meant that we had a direct line in to the room next door.

 

So constricting was our accomodation, that we took to wandering the streets at night, like destitutes, unwilling to return to our prison cell until the last possible moment before bedtime.

 

It was great to catch up with some dear old friends in HK, but big cities and small bedrooms are leaving us a little cold at the moment...New Zealand is calling.

04/11 - A perfect end

As promised, our five week tour of China came to a rather dreamy end at Yangshuo.

 

I'd taken a slightly alternative choice of accomodation, eschewing the hustle and bustle of the main strip to stay in a converted farmhouse 5km out of town. It was a potentially risky manouver as S-Lo, our resident diva, might not have taken kindly if it'd been all about water wells, brick outhouses and cows wandering through the bedroom in tut morn.

 

However, it turned out to be a masterstroke, The Giggling Tree turned out to be a slick operation, run by a dutch couple and their excellent team of staff, who catered for our every whim. Furthermore, it allowed us to be truly in and amongst Yangshuo's star attraction...the lucious, slow moving, picture postcard countryside!

 

None of my pictures can really do Yanshuo any justice, it may not have the epic scenery of Huang Shan or Jiuzhaigou, but the really great thing about Yangshuo is that there is no kodak moment or beauty spot as such, because the whole county is one big patchwork of golden crop fields, limestone peaks and waterways.

 

One could easily spend a fortnight just relaxing in Yangshuo. We unfortunately had only 5 days, so we did our best to ensure that every day was filled with good things, we had unforgettable moments cycling around the countryside in the sunset and hiking along the banks of the Li River. This place casts such a tranquil aura that even after a full day of activity, one finished the day feeling relaxed and glowing.

 

It was a lovely way to finish our time in China and ensures that we leave the motherland with a fond memories and a definite wish to return again in the future.

 

 

 

01/11 - A short stop in Guilin

Lying on her sick bed in Lijiang, Si Phong almost felt that she'd had her fill of China and of travelling. Fortunately, I knew that the perfect antidote was around the corner, which would ensure we finished our journey through the motherland on a high. We were flying to Guilin and had seven days of relaxation to look forward to, no planes or coaches to catch and all at sea level under an equitable climate.

 

Guilin lies in Southern China in the Guangxi province and is famous for its karst limestone peaks; strange lollypop/finger shaped mountains which rise up from the flat rice and wheat fields around them, giving the landscape an almost surreal look, a little bit like Marioworld made real. Its the quintessential image of China, captured over the years in countless paintings and images, recently the TV advert from HSBC.

 

However, those looking to have a defining China moment in Guilin City will be somewhat dissapointed. Its a pleasant enough place, but serves more as a base to the surrounding areas, with the very best of the countryside and scenery actually being located some 40km down the road in and around the town of Yangshuo.

 

We spent a couple of days in Guilin, with a visit to Longsheng rice terraces at the top of the to-do list. In order to give our travelling companion Sheenie the opportunity to meet more backpackers, we broke with our usual independant travel thing and signed up with a tour group. The plan backfired when we realised that our "English Speaking Tour" was a sham, and we'd been thrown in to a massive Chinese tour group.

 

As a result, rather than the idylic trek amongst the rice terraces and villages that we had envisaged, we found ourselves among the masses, following a tannoy wielding guide like sheep while we were funnelled in to various tourist processing spots where the "quaint" villagers proved to be just as adept at milking us for our dollars as they were at milking the cows.

 

Our dud day on the terraces was soon forgotten as we took a lovely cruise along the Li river the next day to travel from Guilin to Yangshuo. Yangshuo will be our home for the next 5 nights and will offer us the opportunity to experience a little bit of rural life in china.

01/11 - Lijiang

We've just bid a fond farewell to Lijiang, where we spent 3 nights in the lovely old town, which is a maze of old naxi buildings, now all converted in to souvenir shops, bars and hostels. Our stay was made all the more enjoyable because of our host, Mr Wang, an old timer from Beijing who spends his days drinking tea and sipping the odd Bai Jiu (chinese white spirit) or ten while tending to his guests like a kindly old father.

 

Si Phong had been suffering from a bad case of food poisoning which she'd had since Tiger Leaping Gorge and hadn't been able to hold down any food. Mr Wang steadfastly refused to indulge her requests for noodle soup and instead prescribed her the time honoured meal of Congee (rice porridge, absolutely no oil or meat) and pickle, which got her right in no time.