canuckkiwi: Westcoast to Wanaka

Over course of last week, my travel companion Hannah and I slowly made our way down from lackluster Greymouth to action packed Queenstown.

New Zealand’s remote West Coast has much in the way of water (it gets some five metres of rain every year), trees, rocks and mountains, but little in the way of people, towns, roads and other comforts.

What a lucky girl I am that I have visited this gorgeous place three times in less than ten years.

We saw lakes, rivers, glaciers, forests, mountains, and rocky shores. We stayed in cozy hostels, and creepy deserted lodges. We drove in brilliant sunshine, and raging downpours. We ate far too much junk food and took too many pictures. Other than the sandflies, it was great.

This one section of the road between Greymouth and Hokitika had all these inukshuk-like rock piles that people had made. They were cool.

We took the only route available down the West Coast (I’m not exaggerating. There’s literally one road down). It took us through Greymouth (stopped for free library Internet, a McFlurry and KFC), Hokitika (took some photos at the beach),

The beach in Hokitika

Pukekura (spent the night in the emptiest and creepiest place I’ve ever stayed.

Our creepy accommodations in Puukekura.

Seriously, this “hamlet” consisted of approximately three buildings, one of which was adorned with a giant metal sandfly), Franz Josef Glacier (visited a glacier, natch), Fox Glacier (ditto), Haast (spent that night and thought we might go out to a pub or a bar there, until we arrived to the “town” and realized that the population is about 200), and finally, Wanaka.

How one spends an exciting Saturday night in Haast. Sadly, that look of glee is not staged. I was actually that stoked.

As I mentioned back in October when I was back here, Wanaka is one of my favourite places in NZ. This time of year, there’s not much to do there, but nevertheless, we stayed three nights. It’s still damn pretty, and we made the most of it.

We walked to my favourite winery (Rippon) to do a tasting. Unfortunately, it’s closed until July L

We took dozens of pictures of the lake.

Fall in Wanaka.

The lake. Again.

We saw a charming French rom com at Cinema Paradiso.

We visited Puzzling World, a museum celebrating all things that tease the brain: illusions, tromp d’oeils, puzzles, games and mazes. It was pretty cool.

Big Nadine and Little Hannah.

Pretending to puke in the fake bathroom.

The maze. We had to find our way to the four corners then navigate our way out again. Finding the corners was fairly easy and we were so proud and cocky. Then it took us nearly an hour to find the exit again. It was humbling.

Ouch!

We also spent two days in Queenstown, which was nice, though we didn't really get involved in the action there (Queenstown is known as a party and adventure town -- bars, bungy jumping, rafting, mountain biking, you name it, Queenstown's got it). On Friday, I headed out on the Routeburn track (more on that later) and Hannah hopped on the Stray Bus to head back up North to Bleinhem. It was hard saying goodbye.

I’m hoping to find work in Wanaka for the winter, unfortunately, things are very quiet at the moment, and no one is hiring. Things are meant to pick up in July, but in the meantime, I’ve got a rapidly-dwindling bank account and a car that’s in dire need of a new timing belt (which is not cheap).

I might have a place to work for accommodation for the next six weeks and I had an interview at a ski hill on Monday, plus I’ve applied at two newspapers and a holiday park, so I do have some prospects. It’ll all work out, just not sure how just yet J