Wanaka and Te Anau

Friday, January 16 7:37 pm

I love New Zealand. We're in Te Anau, a touristy but nice town on the edge of Fiordland. We drove here yesterday from Wanaka, where we were staying for the two nights before. It was wonderful there, and although we only got to stay there two nights instead of three we still had fun. The first day there we didn't have much time to do anything after the six hour drive from Christchurch except grocery shopping and walking around town, but the next day was eventful. We took a long but beautiful hike through sunny mountains near town, then later went swimming in the freezing lake in front of our house and the town (Lake Wanaka). I was amazingly out of shape for the hike (we haven't really hiked since September, and since I'm not playing volleyball anymore I don't have the same cardiovascular strength I did a year ago), so the five miles round trip and 1000 feet of elevation gain that would normally be relatively easy was near torture for my weak muscles and pounding heart. It was gorgeous though, because we got so high we could see the town and much of the lake. It was hot though, and sunny, so after the hike swimming sounded even more refreshing. Swimming was amazingly fun, because although it was freezing at first after about 20 minutes of creeping into the water it was actually bearable (well, everybody else in my family wimped out before then, but not I, the strong and valiant Sasha.).

The next day, we drove southwest to Te Anau. Our house here is bizarre-- it's the only house on a gravel road that runs closely parallel to the town's main (and only real) street that is filled with cafes, pharmacies, and outdoor clothing stores (my favorite kind:)). I think the only point of this street was so people who work at the businesses can park and access work. That means our street has a park on one side and the back of stores on the other (the supermarket has amazing orange milk crates, the same kind that M stole from the back of stores when she was in grad school and we still use for camping). It's also bizarre because there are beds for 10 plus two more couches that turn into double beds, and everything is arranged strangely arranged. One of the rooms with a bed in it also has a pool table, and it's part of a triangle of bedrooms where one of them can only be accessed through one of the others. It's fun to play pool, though. Anyways, today we took a very nice hike that was the fist three or four miles of one of the Great Walks, about 8 or 9 three to six day amazing hikes around the Fjords. We walked about 3 miles in on the Kepler Track to a spot with two picnic tables where we could eat. The tramp (in NZ instead of hiking on trails, people tramp on tracks) was gorgeous, hiking along the Te Anau Lake through lush, green forrest. The forrest was like Oregon coast forrest, but even greener-- hard to believe, I know. There were these amazing fern trees-- ferns that were on top of tall trunk like things, some getting to about 20 feet tall.

Tomorrow we're driving two hours up to Milford Sound, then getting on a tour boat. Tours are not a normal desired activity by the J-Fs, but Milford Sound is supposed to be one of the most beautiful spots in NZ. It started raining today, and although I was still sick of water falling from the sky and landing in big puddles on the ground from Fiji, the rain was refreshing. It was much more like Oregon rain-- I don't know what it is about it, but Oregon (and apparently NZ) has amazing rain that is different from other places. Or maybe it's Fiji that has the different rain. Anyways, it was nice.

I'm going to go sort through photos that I just uploaded. I have about 500 of the last week and a half. I'll try to post this post and some photos either tonight or tomorrow.