From The Catlins to Christchurch (June 30 – July 5)

Once we made the journey back across the Foveaux Strait and crossed Stewart Island off of our ‘Official List Of Things To Do In New Zealand’ checklist, we were off to the Catlins, as Alex and Marie were keen to visit the area. Becky thinks that probably has much to do with their appreciation of remote and untouristed areas. To wit, the guidebooks’ description of the Catlins largely consists of calling it “enigmatic" and leaving it at that.

Look at the smile on this man's face, he couldn't be happier to be in the Catlins. Maybe you should visit us, too.

Driving through the Catlins for a few days, our lucky streak for weather continued and we got some relatively balmy, sunny weather, which was fantastic considering that it was essentially the middle of winter, and it had snowed the week previous in the Catlins. The weather in the area this time around was actually much better than our previous WWOOFing stint in early April, when we stayed through nine days of nearly unceasingly cold, grey, rainy unpleasantness.

He's just sleeping, right?

In our experience, the Catlins really is best when you consider it to be a natural zoo area, where wildlife can be seen (pretty regularly) in its natural habitat. This jaunt through the area definitely had that in spades. We saw heaps of seals and sea lions and even managed to spot two yellow-eyed penguins making their exit from the sea at Nugget Point. With beautiful weather and only two days to spend there, even Andrew and I found ourselves enjoying the Catlins this trip through.

A pair of yellow-eyed penguins - unfortunately our camera battery died just before they started tap-dancing, truly an amazing thing to witness

Making our way further north, we stopped to see the Moeraki Boulders again, and took Alex and Marie, our inveterate nature-loving co-travelers, to see the blue penguins at Oamaru. Unfortunately, with breeding season set to begin very soon, the penguins weren’t very active outside of their nests, so they only saw one lone penguin as they walked home from the penguin center. We had hoped to at least catch the penguins that nested in the garage near our backpackers, but the lady at the desk told us that a few weeks ago a backpacker had accidentally run over one of the little penguins, squishing it. The rest of the penguins then left for safer nesting areas; a tragedy as well as a bummer.

Marie and Becky want to know what the big deal about Moeraki Boulders is

Our last major stop with Alex and Marie was to go to Akaroa on the Banks Peninsula near Christchurch. We tried to stop in Waimate for a wallaby pie, as recommended by Lonely Planet, but the guy at the counter seemed surprised that we were looking for one, as they only make them at a few special occasions throughout the year. Bad info: yet another reason to ditch your guidebooks as soon as you’re able to. We stayed in Akaroa for a few days, doing a little hiking and kayaking, and taking in the scenery once more. As a volcanic crater filled in by the sea, it’s unlike any other place I’ve ever been. The place really is magic and we were glad to get back there again.

An unseasonably warm and nice day on the Banks Peninsula

Leaving Akaroa, we made our way to Amberley on July 4, where Kieran and Belinda graciously put us all up for the night and even made us a turkey dinner. It was a delicious corruption of the typical American celebration that was certainly appropriate for the cold Canterbury winter night. We taxied Marie and Alex to the Chch airport the next day for their flight back home (they had about a full day of flying ahead before they got to Connecticut, then they were heading on another flight the very next day to Belgium!), and if you know Becky then you know she was a-blubberin’ as we dropped them off at the terminal. After ~2500 km of driving over to weeks, heaps of great experiences, and thousands (literally) of pictures taken, our whirlwind trip around the South Island came to a close. Whew, I think we need a couple days off now…

Well Dunedin (Mar. 31 – Apr. 2)

From Akaroa we drove southward to Dunedin, stopping for a night at a campground near Oamaru. The campground was nothing special, but we were excited to see that it had a hot tub. Excited, that is, until we saw that they were charging $5 to hop in for a half hour! Properly offended, we declined, as it felt like a serious breach of our backpacking principles. As Becky can’t resist warm water, one could consider it quite a principled stand on her part. Not exactly a Gandhi or MLK-level stand on our part, but we felt good about it.

The moeraki boulders are surprisingly spherical!

Between Oamaru and Dunedin lies Moeraki Boulders, a group of round boulders on the beach that are, as the postcard puts it, “surprisingly spherical.” We have to say that they were pretty cool, though since you can’t see the bottom halves, half of them seems to be wasted. Also, there didn’t appear to be around 50 boulders as the guidebooks indicated. We wonder if perhaps people have trucked off the smaller ones, as at least one driveway in the area featured some surprisingly spherical decorations.

Becky stretches out on a boulder

In Dunedin, we Couchsurfed for the weekend with a woman named Anne, who lived just outside the city with her son, Andy. Anne is a lovely woman and was so hospitable and gracious to us during our stay, cooking dinner for us both nights we stayed there. Andy was also great, sharing music with us from his vast collection. Thanks to both of them for being so generous! Anne also treated Becky to a small gift for her birthday – the only present she unwrapped this year! – which was a much appreciated gesture.

Anne and Becky - another great couchsurfing host!

While at Anne’s, I was able to catch a bunch more rugby, and figure out the differences between Rugby Union, League, and Sevens. They’re all quite different versions of the same game, and Sevens in particular is a blast. Sevens games are very short (only 14 minutes), so they’re necessarily fast-paced and action-filled affairs featuring end-to-end runs. Sevens tournaments also look like a great party, with stadiums packed with revelers from many countries dressed in ridiculous costumes, boozily swaying, singing, and occasionally watching some rugby action.

The weather in Dunedin wasn’t quite brilliant while we were there, but we did make it out to the Otago Peninsula to try to see some wildlife. We didn’t see any of the advertised penguins or albatrosses, but the drive out there is quite scenic, winding along the harbor to Taiaroa Head. We also went to Baldwin Street in Dunedin, billed as the world’s steepest street. To be honest, it was a bit of a letdown since the street didn’t seem any steeper than half the streets in San Francisco, in my opinion. We learned later that we really should’ve had a box of Jaffas (a round candy-covered chocolate popular in NZ) to roll down the street. We’ll have to remember that if we’re ever back in town.

The steepest street in the world - Baldwin Street in Dunedin

Given that the weather was a bit dodgy, on one of the days we went to see Black Sheep, a NZ film about sheep that turn bloodthirsty as a result of genetic engineering gone wrong. As we haven’t been to a movie in months and we were having crappy weather in a big city, it seemed like the right time to take in a movie, especially since it was a NZ flick. Between the sheep and the fears of GE food, we’d say the film manages to hit two pretty big NZ touchstones right off the bat.

More views of Baldwin Street

Black Sheep is basically a lesser, NZ-centric version of Shaun of the Dead, in the horror-comedy genre, so gory-but-funny scenes and bad jokes abound. And it almost certainly sets the record for most scenes of a sheep leaping from offscreen and disemboweling someone. Overall, we enjoyed Black Sheep, and would recommend it as a good popcorn flick, especially if you’re a Kiwiphile at all. After seeing the killer sheep in the film, though, it did make us do a double-take as we were driving through the countryside the next day.

The view of the lighthouse from Otago Peninsula

We found Dunedin to be a nice, relatively quiet little city in southern NZ. Due to the big university here, Otago, it’s a student-dominated town, but that isn’t bad as there are heaps of cafes in town, especially around the center square, the Octagon. As a city square it’s certainly unique, but as a traffic pattern it seems a bit silly. When you drive on the street around the square you’re just constantly making 45 degree turns.

There are also a few breweries in Dunedin, and you can bet that we stopped by, but we didn’t see anything too interesting going on there. We figured we could skip the Speight’s brewery tour as it was $17 a head! You’d better get a lot of samples at the end for that kind of coin. We’re constantly shocked by the prices they charge here for brewery tours, especially when it’s a beer as uninteresting as Speight’s. Apologies to any Southern Men reading who that may have offended, but people count on this blog for the cold, hard truth. Next, we’re off to wwoof at a backpackers even further south in the Catlins region. It promises penguins and surfing lessons, wish us luck!

On the road to Otago Peninsula