Wellington and the South Island

Last weekend. Ah, where to begin. I guess at the beginning. This was John"s "weekend" in NZ. All the kids will spend time here but get only one long weekend when we can get away. So we planned to head south. First stop, Wellington, capital of NZ. We got in Friday night and went straight to Joan Mirkin's house, our good friend who Lynda and I stayed with previously. She was once again unbelievable with her hospitality and John loved the house - views both ways over two parts of Wellington harbour. The next day started out rainy, so we hit the Weta Cave, the workshop for Peter Jackson, the movie director. We'll have to tell you about that in person, but it was amazingly cool for such a small place. I have not posted the picture of Mom lecturing the Uruk-Hai towering above her, but it is priceless. After that we walked around Wellington, went to the Te Papa museum, Mac's Brewery, and then back to Joan's to change for ... THE GAME. Yes, we went to the All Blacks vs. France at the Cake Tin (also known as Westpac Stadium). It was cold and rainy, but we bundled up well and were quite comfortable. And best of all, the All Blacks avenged their loss the week before with a good, albeit nail biting, win! Highlight was the red, blue, and white painted rooster getting loose on the field. Those French!
We headed home to Joan's picking up a pizza on the way. We rose early the next morning to catch the BIG ferry to Picton on the South Island. It is about a 3 1/2 hour ride across seas that are sometimes pretty rough. They were pretty rough this time and Mom had to get me some Dramamine, but we won't dwell on that. John and Mom were fine. On arriving in Picton we got to see their mid winter swimming event. They don't even call it a "Polar Bear" swim. It's just "everybody go in the water". We didn't, needless to say. Then it was on to our water taxi for the 10-15 minute ride across the sound to Portage. We were met their by a little van and transported over a saddle in the ridge to a really cool little lodge - better than we were expecting. A short walk followed by a chess game, then dinner, then sleep. The next morning we had breakfast and set out for a 7-8 hour hike on the Queen Charlotte track from Portage to Anakiwa. A boat would be waiting for us there at 4 pm. We planned to leave at 8 am, but actually hit the trail at 8:55 am.

Everything was covered in mist, but we figured with the hike starting out with a straight climb to 1300 feet, we might pop out of the clouds. We ran into little areas of residual snow/frost, but the track was in good shape.

And we did pop out into bright sunshine. Too many good pictures to post and too many good stories to tell of our journey, but it was right out of the Hobbit. Best might have been a fat Jack Russell terrier suddenly emerging from the woods followed by a grizzled mountain man looking guy. He was holding what turned out to be a dead possum (NZ version) in one hand. He then knelt down, showed us how much fur he had already gotten, and then proceeded to pick the fur off this possum. Interestingly, it came right off in big bunches. He said he gets $95/kilo. More details on that story and others later.

The scenery was nothing short of spectacular the whole way (did I mention the cloud/mist "waterfall" pouring over a saddle in the ridge! Wow!). Finally we got to the end 20 minutes early and the boat was there. A dad and his little 6-7 year old boy as first mate. On the way back to Picton we went through the middle of at least 50 dolphins (porpoises) feeding and got some spectacular pictures. It was right out of a National Geographic article. I won't go into the ferry home as it was even rougher and the captain announced he had to take a somewhat alternate route - at least that's what Lynda told me. I took my Dramamine ahead of time and stayed pretty quiet. And again I fared quite well. Then Wellington, into our car, and the drive home. Another amazing Selby long weekend in New Zealand.