Francesca and Henk-Jan's Backpacking Trip!

Franz Josef turned out to be a neat little place for us to stay a few extra days, and more importantly, to save a few bucks. However, we were quite happy to leave the Austrian emperor behind. There was one minor problem though... We couldn't find the Stray bus. The bus should have gotten to FJ a few days before, but there was no sign of it. Thinking we might have to call the office to make sure the bus would come pick us up we checked outside early in the morning. There was a Ritchies bus there, but no Stray in sight! I walked up to one of the passengers and asked if this was perhaps an undercover bus. And indeed, it appeared we had found our "waka."

I chucked our bags in the back and we found two comfortable seats. This bus was much bigger than the buses we had been on until then, so my legs finally got some space. Our driver, Ricky, was to take us to Makarora, a small town in the middle of beautiful mountainranges. Our drive for the day was supposed to be the most scenic one in the world. Quite promising! We took off and Ricky showed us the second glacier in the region: the Fox Glacier. Fox Glacier was called after one of the earlier Prime Ministers of New Zealand. We got a few nice shots from the distance and drove off again.





Our next stop was Lake Matheson. Lake Matheson is fairly famous, because it's an extremely dark and still lake. The leaves from the surrounding trees made it a perfect mirror. What's there to mirror you ask? The two tallest mountains of New Zealand: Mt Cook and Mt Tasman. Just look at the picture to see what awesome effects that creates! After the lake we chilled out in the local cafe for a hot chocolate and a sandwich. Francesca demanded I took a picture of said hot coco, because it looked royal.





Next stop: Makarora Wilderness Resort. The drive proved to be quite enjoyable, with some great photo opportunities along the way. We stopped at a beach, where I skipped some stones, and Francesca got some great shots. We also climbed a tiny watchtower, but could not spot any dolphins. We had booked into our own double, with a hot meal on top of it. Francesca loved the unusual shape of our housing, which was perfectly triangular. The driver had warned us that there was not much to do in Maka, so that it would get pretty dark. Our only option was to check out the resort's bar, where we could get our food. Francesca opted for the Fish and Chips and I chose the Lamb Chops. We shared both meals and were more than full after finishing them both. I challenged Francesca to a game of pool and I'm sorry to share that she kicked my ass. :(











We decided we were pretty tired at this point and wanted to get some sleep. However, a couple off the bus challenged us to a pool-duel, so we accepted. The two games we played with them were close, but we still squeaked out wins in both cases. We ended up talking to that couple throughout the night. The best part of the night was still to come though: a karaoke-competition! Woo! At first, we sat back and watched people pull off some amazing, and some not-so-amazing performances. We were more or less forced to do our share, and ended up singing Bryan Adams' "18 Til I Die (Everything I Do)." However, this was not enough, as the four of us ended up singing James Blunt's "You're Beautiful." Woohoo! Leaving everyone behind completely stunned, we decided that after well over four hours of karaoke (!!!) the superstars needed some sleep.



Francesca and I had enjoyed our stay in the little town of Makarora, and loved the amazing surroundings. However, the bus left the next morning to take us to Wanaka. Francesca had looked the town up in the Lonely Planet and had found some cool things for us to do, so we had decided to stay for a few days. The road to Wanaka was again littered with views of snowtop mountain ridges, enormous lakes and amazing waterfalls. Not a bad way to spend the morning! We got to Wanaka around noon and Ricky dropped us off at Holly's Backpackers, where we would spend two nights.







After dropping our bags off we headed for our first stop in Wanaka: Cinema Paradiso. Francesca had found this place and decided that we were going to watch a movie here. The place didn't look like much from the outside, but we wanted to see "The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas" so we made a reservation for later that afternoon. Next was our fun for the day: Puzzle World! This place has the biggest maze in the world, a leaning building, some cool optical illusions and a great selection of wooden puzzles. Obviously, Francesca and I headed for the maze first. Our challenge was as follows:















It took us well over an hour to get through the whole thing, having to backtrack quite a few times. It was really good fun though, being helped quite a bit by the great weather. The finish brought us to a little courtyard, with some cool toilets. The entrance had a Roman-style drawing on the wall, which created a neat optical illusion. These were not the ones we were supposed to use though! The actual toilet seats were also a nice treat, being made with original stuff like jellybeans, pokercards/chips and money, and shells and sand in them.







We headed back inside to check out the illusion rooms. Our first stop was a room that made me even taller, and Francesca even smaller. After walking around in the room, we walked outside to watch the illusion in action on the delayed TV recording. Pretty funny to see how your mind can play tricks on you like that! The connected room started with an incline of about 15 degrees, whilst the objects in it were actually level or around level. We saw a pooltable on which the balls roll upwards, water runs upwards and a person standing on a ledge looked like they were leaning forward whilst standing straight. Weird!











Having finished with the Puzzles we sat down for a bit, playing with some of the wooden puzzles and enjoying a sandwich. We had a bit of time to kill, so we took it easy. When we got bored of puzzling walking towards the cinema sounded much better. It took us about half an hour to get there and we were still a bit early. The Paradiso offered us meals during us intermission (cool for a cinema!) and Francesca and I opted for the steak sandwich and pumpkin & coconut soup. When the doors opened we saw why the Lonely Planet had raved about this place: the seats were random couches! But that was not all; the best seats in the house were for us! Francesca's showing you all we had an indoor drive-in. Awesome!



The movie was also a good pick. A really impressive drama about a German boy whose father is a high-ranking officer in the German army during WWII, and in charge of a concentration camp. His son 'finds' the camp during his explorations and develops a friendship with a young Jew. Devastating consequences portrayed with powerful images made the movie a perfect pick.

So was the food! The steak sandwich was pretty much a collection of her favorite foods: steak, garlic bread, sauteed onions and mushrooms, and a salad with balsamic vinegar dressing. Whilst she enjoyed her sandwich I ate the soup, which also tasted fantastic. Dessert was equally fantastic: two freshly baked chocolate cookies! Yum! And we got to eat the meals in our car! The evening had us relaxing in our hostel, looking ahead at the next days and thinking of our plans. The second day in Wanaka was really quiet: we slept in and walked around in town. Since town was so small we were done pretty quickly. Francesca did enjoy a "super cookie" from the local bakery, which she loved thoroughly.



This morning we were picked up by Nana, a driver we had seen before. Nana was quite happy to have us join his bus, seeing there were only 6 people on it (including us). Our drive today was to take us to Queenstown, the adventure capital of New Zealand. Francesca had dreaded thinking about it, as this is the place for bungy jumping. Our first notable stop of the day was the 45th parallel. The 45th parallel is the line in the middle of the equator and the southpole. Nana also told us of some of the history of the region. A few decades back Otago had been pestered by a rabbit-plague, which had made the land completely useless. Prices were as low as $1 per acre. About 80 million of the little buggers had to be killed to make the place worthwhile again. The government decided to release a virus, killing off 95% of the rabbits. The remaining 5% are now controlled by the local farmers with guns and traps. The price of the land has gone up to $10,000 per acre, being great for fruit-farming.

Just before Queenstown, Nana drove up to Makarau bridge. This bridge is very famous, but I won't tell you the reason until the next post! Stay tuned!