Skip to main content

Day 13 - Saturday 3/26

Image
By
We knew, when planning out our trip, that this would be a long travel day - we were going from Wellington on the North Island to Franz Josef, which is almost halfway down the west coast of the South Island. What we didn't take into account was how long the ferry from the North to South Island would take! We were up early on Saturday to get in line for the ferry at 7:15am. We got a video of us getting on the ferry: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZ3vl6ttsiI

Once on the ferry we staked out seats in the cafeteria and hunkered down for the 3 hour trip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WeerdRSYjM

Here's a map view of our journey:
It was foggy and overcast leaving Wellington:


Partway through the trip we did see a rainbow:


Ryan braved the wind and weather to go up on the deck and get some pictures:


And video:




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggP0IsVrIo0

As I mentioned, it was a loooong driving day ... over 500km. We continued with our routine of taking turns driving, stopping for pictures, and checking out some cool sights along the way, we just took a little less leisurely pace since we had to be at our hotel in Franz Josef by 8pm.




Imagine our surprise at seeing more sheep :)


We drove through wine country for a while and the sun came out! The countryside down here was absolutely gorgeous as well:


Marquette was playing UNC in the Sweet 16 game that day (Friday night, in the States), so I was proudly sporting my MU sweatshirt and Ryan captured his thoughts about the game: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UruR3GWJ6uU




Also on our drive we got our first experience with the one lane bridges that are so prevalent on the South Island. Most of them did not have lights (like in this picture), but a sign indicating whether you had the right of way or not, then it was up to you to make sure no one was coming at you on the bridge. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3M9tuwKSJDw


And then, after about 250km of driving through the mountains and across the country, we got to the ocean!





The pictures are a little blurry because we took them from the car as we were driving since we didn't really have time to stop. Ryan got a video (might want to mute your speakers - there's lots of wind noise!) too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIZWmhX4k4g




We did make a stop near Punakaiki, about 25 km after we got to the west coast, to see the famous Pancake Rocks:


There was a nice trail in from the parking lot through the forest:











Ryan got some videos that help capture it a bit better too:








We were nearing Franz Josef around sunset:







Franz Josef is a cute, tiny little town. After checking into 10 Cottages (see our cute little cottage, below?), we walked to the grocery store for a few provisions - anything we could microwave for dinner, and lunch and snacks for the glacier hike the next day.





Day 14: http://kellytmiller.blogspot.com/2011/07/day-14-sunday-327.html

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Travel day

By
Monday.  We really lucked out on weather the first 6 days. The last 3 were definitely not great for the pools. Today was sunny again and it’s amazing how much warmer it felt while we were walking around.  We got up and packed and headed out before 9 to try to catch a feeding. Never saw a feeding but wandered through the aquariums again. Breakfast at Shake Shack. Up over the rope bridge again.  Got our luggage and checked out at 11 and caught our shuttle to the airport. The ride to the hotel seemed to be on major roads, but the ride back to the airport seemed to take us through a ton of small rundown streets. We did go past the US Embassy and a few hospitals as well.  The line for TSA was long but went pretty fast and we cleared customs quickly. I got a Starbucks (coffee for me, pastries for the girls) and the girls colored in the gate area. Flight was easy and the girls discovered they could play tic tac toe against each other on the screens in the seats. We made it ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Lauterbrunnen and Mürren, updated

By
Lauren and I are reading books, Jeff's at the laundromat. Really good day today. 21,000 steps! We're pooped! Walked thru the Lauterbrunnen valley, so beautiful. Wonderful day for it, too. Then up a cable car to Murren. I will post more later, but my phone battery is low and I'm going to try to get Lo to sleep. Update:  Yesterday was awesome. Jeff said it was his favorite hike, I still think Mannlichen too Kleine Scheidegg is my fave, but this was a very close second.  Started with breakfast again. L ate more pancakes, I got a fried egg and a roll with Nutella. Yum! Ooh, and the coffee, so good.  Then a nap for L and we got packed for the day. Caught the noon train to Lauterbrunnen. It was our first time leaving the station there; we've changed trains there a ton, but never left the platform. Town was really nice, and we had a gorgeous sunny day. The first waterfall is just outside of the main drag and then we got on what a blog I read called "a ...
7 comments
Read more

Mannlichen

By
So last night we went to an Italian steakhouse/ pizza place for dinner called Sina's. We kept Lauren entertained with several of those really long skinny hard breadsticks (Mom, remember when you used to buy those for us?) and then when our anti pasta plate arrived (ham, salami, cheese, pickles (they seem to love pickles here!) and really tasty) the waiter (I think he was the owner) looked right at her sitting in Jeff's lap, said "this is for you" and set it right in front of her...a split second later she had both hands smack in the middle of the plate. Pretty funny, wish I'd gotten a picture. Jeff had pizza for dinner, I had spaghetti alla carbonara (good, but not as good as yours, Mom). Lauren sat in our laps until our main course came and then sat pretty happily in her stroller next to me, as long as I kept putting pasta in her mouth! Dinner was really good, probably amplified by the fact it was only our second real meal of the trip and neither of us had lunch....
4 comments
Read more