December 31, 2022 – January 14, 2023
Welcome to Part II of our travels in New Zealand! For Part I, check out my post on New Zealand’s North Island. After spending the first half of our trip on a small portion of the North Island, we made our way to the South Island for the final half of our trip. While there are many routes to take to get to the South Island, including driving and ferries, we opted to fly from Auckland to Christchurch since we had limited time. Plus the cost of the plane ticket on JetStar was reasonable. Similarly to the North Island, we rented a car from Ezi Rentals so that we could make our way around a portion of the South Island. Our route went as: Christchurch –> Akaroa (side trip) –> Lake Tekapo and Mount Cook National Park –> Queenstown (lunch time visit) –> Te Anau –> Milford Sound (day trip) –> Queenstown –> Franz Josef -> Christchurch. Everywhere we visited on the South Island was spectacular. Yet, if we ever went back, we would spend much more time in Queenstown, since both E and I loved Queenstown.
Christchurch, Akaroa, Lake Tekapo, and Mount Cook National Park
Christchurch and Akaroa
We flew to Christchurch from Auckland; however, we did not spend a lot of the time in this city. I particularly wanted to see Christchurch, since I had a good friend that I met in South Korea that was from this city. Luckily enough, he was visiting Christchurch for the first time in over three years (pre-pandemic) when we were in town! Unfortunately, he was not able to meet up with us on this first night, but E and I did catch up with him at the end of the trip. However, based on my friend’s advice, we decided to take a side trip to Akaroa and check out this coastal town.
Although Akaroa is slightly out of the way from our drive of Christchurch to Lake Tekapo, we found this side trip to be quite enjoyable. As a historical French settlement, French culture definitely shone threw in Akaroa with lots of seafood restaurants and French cuisine. I only wish we had a bit more time to do a tour visiting dolphins or a tour visiting penguins. Before leaving Christchurch, we picked up lunch at a common sushi chain, St. Pierre’s Sushi, which we ate along Akaroa Beach. Afterwards, we walked along the coast to visit the lighthouse, but then headed out since we had a long drive ahead of us to get to our next destination, Lake Tekapo.
Lake Tekapo and Mount Cook National Park
As we made our way to Lake Tekapo, we drove through rolling hills and farmlands that, once again, reminded me of Italy’s Tuscan region. However, unlike what I expected, the landscape of the South Island was pretty consistent. While New Zealand has wonderful and breath-taking vistas; the country has more of a gradual build-up to those vistas in comparison the stunning landscapes of Iceland at every turn. Makes sense since New Zealand is much bigger than Iceland and in a completely different part of the world, but still it is interesting reflecting comparisons like these with countries around the world.
We arrived at Lake Tekapo in the afternoon with thunderclouds threatening our time in this region. Oddly enough, this area was the only area where we were unlucky in that the stormy weather forced us to change some of our plans, but that is life when traveling. Even though the skies were not fully clear and at times we couldn’t see the mountains across Lake Tekapo, the storm clouds did provide unique views of the lake. That first night, we had clear enough skies to catch a near full moon. I had hoped to catch starry skies of Lake Tekapo with the moon behind me; however, it seems whenever I plan for an astrophotography night, it just never goes as plan. Yet, whenever I don’t plan the night, I get the best pictures of the stars (see Lake Te Anau below as an example). I regret a little bit that I didn’t plan for a full moon (or near full moon) photo along the horizon. Still, we did watch the moon rise over the Church of Good Shepherd and Lake Tekapo.
We originally planned to do a helicopter ride at Aoraki Mount Cook National Park for our full day at Lake Tekapo. However, the helicopter company had to cancel the rides for the day (and the next) due to poor weather. While we were unlucky here, we found another helicopter company that held rides on the other side at Franz Josef that was a little more expensive, but still reasonable. Therefore, we delayed the helicopter ride and hoped for the best. Instead, we took a hike in the rainy weather to see several glaciers, including Hooker Glacier and Mueller Glacier that feeds into their corresponding lakes along the Hooker Valley Lake Track. Although rainy during this hike, it could have been significantly worse and overall, we enjoyed the hike. It proved to be a wonderful alternative to changes in our plans for the day.
Te Anau, Milford Sound, and Queenstown
Te Anau and Milford Sound
After we had our fill of Lake Tekapo and Aoraki Mount Cook (not really, but we had to leave), we made our way to Te Anau with a brief lunchtime stop in Queenstown. On our way, we stopped by Kawarau Bridge to watch the budgy jumpers dive into the waters below. In Queenstown, we picked up lunch and ice cream at the ever so popular Fergburger. Since it was so crowded around Fergburger, we took our lunch to a Earnslaw Park next to the wharf, where we watched passer-bys enjoying the weekend outdoor market. We did not spend much time in Queenstown at this time since we also intended to return. After lunch and walking around the wharf, we returned to our car to finish our drive to Te Anau.
I loved Te Anau! Although most areas in New Zealand were not horribly crowded, Te Anau was even less crowded than many of the areas we visited. It would be a wonderful place to have a vacation home for sure! Lake Te Anau was beautiful and easily accessible at all different hours. I particularly enjoyed visiting Lake Te Anau to capture some wonderful evening and starry sky photos, including one of my favorites (see the featured image). The sun would set quite late in New Zealand; it did not get dark until around 10PM or so at the time. Although the sky was too cloudy on the full moon night in Te Anau, the second night had completely clear skies. This photo captured the glow of a near full moon over the small town to the right of the lake and gradates into the midnight blue skies dotted with stars. I love taking night photos and astrophotography photos that approaches the sky with Earthly elements and differing approaches!
Our full day in Te Anau consisted of a drive to Milford Sound and an accompanying boat ride. We stopped at all of the usual places during the scenic drive, including Mirror Lakes (underwhelming with poor timing), Pop’s View (wonderful panoramic view), and Monkey Creek (my favorite scenic spot). While Milford Sound was for sure gorgeous, I found Milford Sound to be a bit over-hyped. I blame my high hopes and over-planning to have this impression. However, I do think that if we approached Milford Sound differently, such as if we chose to do a kayaking tour rather than a boat tour, Milford Sound would have been significantly more impressive. Still, I would go back to Milford Sound, but just maybe in a different way.
Queenstown
E and I would both say that if we ever retire, we would retire in Queenstown. Not only is there so much to do in the surrounding areas, but Queenstown itself is remarkable. We both loved the all of the people meandering around at night along the Main Town Pier. Although Queenstown did not have as quite a diverse food culture as Auckland, we still could access foods from different parts of the world. Just the overall vibe of Queenstown align with some of my favorite parts of traveling. We both wished we had more time to spend in Queenstown. Eh, next time!
While we spent only one night in Queenstown, we took advantage of it for sure. The drive along Lake Wakatipu had so many remarkable views — from the southern point on the way to Te Anau, up to the northern point at Glenorchy. As a LOTR fan, E wanted to hit some of the scenery spots that could be seen in the movies. Even with all of the guidance online, the exact LOTR spots seemed to be a bit more difficult to identify, especially up near Glenorchy and Paradise. Still we can say we visited LOTR sites. With little hiking at this point, E and I began to feel trapped in our car too long after our stop in Glenorchy. Therefore, we decided to get a little movement at the Routeburn Nature Walk. The Routeburn Track actually would have been really cool to hike. It would require at least one overnight stay and a reservation, so I didn’t plan for it. The Routeburn track is now on my list for a return visit. While walking the nature trail, I mis-read the sign and made a wrong turn, thus ending up on part of the Routeburn Track. We hiked to Forge Flats to cool ourselves off before hiking back to our car, taking us about three hours.
After the mis-directed Routeburn hike, we returned back to Queenstown and took a cable car up to Skyline Queenstown. We grabbed a quick drink and took in the vast landscape of Queenstown from a birds-eye view. By this point, E and I were looking forward to some delicious food, followed by ice cream and watching the sun set over Lake Wakatipu.
The West Coast and Arthur’s Pass National Park
West Coast
After Queenstown, we made our way along the West Coast, ending at Okarito near Franz Josef Glacier. Our drive took us to several key spots along the West Coast. First, we stopped at Wanaka and saw the often-photographed tree in Lake Wanaka. We made our way to Blue Pools, where we ate our lunch (St. Pierre Sushi again from Queenstown), waded in the chilly waters, and watch water jumpers from the bridge above. Our next stops on the scenic drive were Fantail Falls and Thunder Creek Falls. We did not spend much time at both of these waterfalls, only enough to get a quick photo and make our way on. Lake Matheson near Fox Glacier was the last stop on our scenic drive. It was too late in the day for the mirroring of the mountains nearby (also too cloudy), but we still enjoyed the hike around the lake and viewing the mountains over the lake.
Our full day near Franz Josef Glacier consisted of the highlight of our trip–a helicopter ride over Franz Josef Glacier and Fox Glacier with stunning views of Aoraki Mount Cook and Mount Tasman! We booked our helicopter ride with Glacier Country Helicopters through Bookme, a New Zealand activity booking site. E, in particular, enjoyed the helicopter ride. It was his idea, so makes sense that he lit up looking out the windows at the scenery. I’m just always happy to get some good photos in, especially since we could not see Aoraki Mount Cook from Lake Tekapo. After the helicopter ride, E and I went on another hike to Franz Josef Glacier via Robert’s Point Track! I learned that I really need to plan enough water on this trip, because for the third time, we ran out of water. Then again, AllTrails indicated that the hike would take 3.5 hours (and I planned water for that amount of time), but in reality, it took us 5 hours (the suggested time on the entrance sign). Plus I had gotten E’s cold when we were in Queenstown, slowing us down significantly and requiring more water. Overall though, it was an invigorating hike with a bit too much sun exposure and mostly uphill one way and downhill the reverse.
After the hike, E and I (mostly me) were too tired to do much else. I had wanted to go to a hot spring, but the one I found online happened to be closed and the other hot spring was fully booked. Instead, we walked around the beach in Okarito, ate some home-cooked lamb for dinner, took some astrophotography photos from our AirBnB, and then went to bed.
Arthur’s Pass National Park
Unfortunately, it was now time for the final leg of our trip. The last bit of our drive was not as pleasant as the rest of the trip since my cold had been making me feel completely miserable. I was ready to get home and just rest and recover. Yet, we still did our best to make the last leg as enjoyable as possible. Although we did not do anymore hiking trips, we made some stops along the scenic drive from Franz Josef to Christchurch through Arthur’s Pass National Park. We first took a detour to visit Hokitika Gorge and I am glad E convinced me to do so. Hokitika Gorge had stunning milky blue waters and it would have been nice to have more time to spend there. Our next stop was at Arthur’s Pass Village and views overlooking the Otira Viaduct. Arthur’s Pass Village was much smaller than I expected, but we needed a short break to stretch our legs. Our last stop on the scenic drive was Castle Hill. I could have done with skipping Castle Hill due to my cold, but we stopped since E wanted to walk around and stretch his legs (he was the primary driver and all).
At the end of all of this traveling, we made it back to Christchurch and enjoyed a lovely dinner with my friend. The next day took us back to Auckland, with another lovely dinner at Lucky 8 in Ponsonby (well not so lovely, since I was coughing up a storm). Then we flew out and back home to our lovely dog who missed us so much!
Until next time,
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