Australia and New Zealand Trip

Staying on Top - Down Under Even though I spent two months in New Zealand and Australia, it was not nearly enough. This expedition was a little different as none of the brothers could join me and after trying to talk people in to coming for a year a friend finally decided to join me. Kim quit work and became scuba certified a couple weeks before we left ready to embark on her first big trip. We planned the general route this time since we did not want to miss anything in these large countries.
We began the trip in Auckland on New Zealand's North island. However, we quickly left the large city by ferry to the little island of Waiheke to recover from the long flight down under. We soon realized that New Zealand was a lot like Northwest coast of the States. Since it was their fall it was cool (40 - 65 degrees), yet with all the moisture it was beautifully green. The forests were lush and dense like the temperate rain forests on Vancouver Island. The water was pretty cold down here as well. To give you an idea, the country stretches through the equivalent latitudes from San Francisco to Portland. In fact the strait between New Zealand's north and south island is at 40 degrees south the same distance as Denver is north.

	After we recovered from the flight we popped back into Auckland and caught the Kiwi Bus to start our tour of the country. This tour company geared toward young adults was very neat since it took back roads to see the out of the way sights. We traveled around 3 - 5 hours a day stopping often for hiking and other activities. The other neat thing was that this company had a bus driving the same route every day allowing us to jump off and on any time and we would just grab the next bus. With so many people doing the same tour of the country on the busses and staying in hostels every night we met many fun and interesting people and traveled with some for as long as a couple weeks.

As we started our journey we toured the city a bit and then headed along the northeast coast. It was amazing spotted with islands and coves so we decided to take a closer look and went sea kayaking. The next day we went to Rotorua to check out the thermal hot springs. It was as if a town was built in Yellowstone. There were bubbling mud pots in people's yards, a park with geysers a mile from homes, and of course, there was the ever present lingering sulfur smell. We did a lot of cultural exploring here as well that day and night, learning about the native Maori people. Next, we went to the town of Wiatomo for some caving. We did an awesome tour of an under ground cave system that was setup just as I would have it. First, we repelled 100 ft down into the caves then, with our head lamps off, we took a zip line through darkness. Next, we jumped a 15 ft cliff into water which we rafted down for a while in inner tubes. Here we could see glowworms hanging to the cave ceiling making it look like a starry night sky. We also crawled through tight spaces through streams and finally climbed up under ground
waterfalls back to the surface! It was pretty chilly even with the wet suites, but not to worry though, the guide brought along hot tea and biscuits and we warmed up afterwards in a hot tub! In fact, it seemed that whatever we did people were there with the tea and biscuits . . . a tradition I could get used to. Later last night I caught my first rugby game, pretty wicked!
We then headed down to the town of Taupo for some fly fishing. I hired a local Maori (native) guide and he took me on some of their land with a river that feeds into Lake Taupo. There was no one else and we fished for most the day. Caught one good size one ~4 lbs early so I threw it back thinking I would bring in another to cook up at the hostel, unfortunately I did not bring any others in. I did hook a big one but after pulling him out of some snags he made a run down the river and popped off. It was great to have a day to talk to the guide as well, he had a lot of insight to his people and their interactions with the rest of the population in New Zealand.
	Next on the list was River Valley for rafting. A long the way we stopped in Tongariro National Park, but it was too rainy to hike and we could not see the tops of the big volcanoes there, still pretty though. River Valley is a nice lodge nestled in deep rolling hills with lush forests and waterfalls. The waterfalls were coming down all over due to the continuous rain. The place was next to a river and I could not resist the 9 foot cliff dive from shore into the chilly water. Since it was so beautiful
and laid back here we decided to stay another day. Kim went horseback riding, while I joined others for some white water rafting! It was a blast. They said it was class 5 rapids, but they weren't as big as Gore Canyon, still a good challenge though. We also stopped along the river for more cliff diving this time 35 feet! The canyon we went down was very pretty with more waterfalls, lush forest, ferns, and moss. Later that day we hiked around in the forest and around a waterfall. Woke up to find it still raining . . . and looking at the river I found it to nearly flooding its banks and trees floating down. The ledge from which I took the 9 foot jump only two days before was now was covered with water!! I caught a raft guide and got the low down. They had not had rain for a long time until now and the river, up until the day before was unraftable because it was too low (8 - 10 m^3/sec). Then the day we ran the river it was at the maximum safe flow at 50 m^3/sec and then this day it was up to 350 m^3/sec!! After another hike we left River Valley for Wellington, the capital of NZ. Being party animals we headed to Te Papa, the countries largest museum to get a better understanding of the culture there.

Finally, we took the jump from Wellington on the North island to Picton on the south island by ferry. Even though it was still rainy, it was a beautiful cruise through the little islands and bays for a few hours. Once on the south island we stopped in to a place for lunch which happened to be in the town that is the green lipped mussel capital of the world, yummy!

	The weather cleared as we got to Nelson so we drove up the coast a bit to Kaiteriteri and caught a small boat there to check out the coast line from the sea and then to be dropped off at the prettiest part of the Able Tasman National Park trek. Along the way we saw seals and neat sea birds diving for fish. After scoping the shore line for a while checking the dense rain forest from afar, we were dropped off on a secluded beach so we could dive into the forest and do a little bush whacking. We hiked
through the wet forest full of the usual dense underbrush, ferns, moss, and whatnot . . . in fact just assume when ever I talk about forests here in New Zealand that they are like this, beautifully green, wet, and dense. After a few hours of hiking we were picked back up and brought back to the bus. We then went down to Westport and caught the final game of the Super 12 rugby championships, the game really grew on me.
	I came to find, while traveling down the west coast of the south island, that it is much like HW1 on the California coast with rocky, dramatic bluffs and greenness. We stopped for hiking a several times to check out some especially dramatic locations and a seal colony of more than 100. Since we were in the middle of no where, everyone on the bus dressed up in costumes that we bought along the way that day and made a bar our own. We were told about the costume party just that day and that we
had to be something that started with the letter 'B'. So I went as a bush man with full war paint, fake leopard skin bandanna and wrist band, knife, and bow and arrows, all just for $3.00. As it happened, I won the prize for the best costume, which was a free video package of me bungy jumping in Queenstown when I get there . . . there was no way I could back out now!
	After a long night of costume funness, we headed to a bushman center the next morning. It had a lot of neat stuff about the crazy deer, possums, and other non-native animals that are taking over NZ. We then headed down to Frans Josef. This is one of the coolest places I have ever seen! The snow capped mountains tower over the rain forest, which is right by the ocean, and if that was not enough, there are glaciers flowing down from the mountains right into the rain forest! And what better way to take it all in than sky diving over it all!! It was quite amazing to free fall over this beautiful sight from 12,000 ft. I used a postcard here instead of my photo of the area since it was a little hazy the morning we climbed up to the glacier.

Surprisingly the next day was even better. No seriously. We got up early and hiked up through the forest, over the glacier melt off basin, and up the glacier. A friend from the bus and I got outfitted and picked up a guide for vertical ice climbing. After an hour of hiking around on the ice, over and through crevasses we came to the vertical ice walls. We got in about 5 climbs apiece, three of which had sweet over hangs, and were about 40 - 70 feet tall. It was a amazing feeling to just pick a line and go up where ever you like, kind of like spiderman (a bit different than rock climbing).

	Along the way I picked up a Southern hemisphere star guide. It is very strange to have an unfamiliar sky above. You can easily pick out Alpha Centauri (the closest star to ours), and after letting you eyes adjust for a while the two closest galaxies to ours (the Clouds of Magellan) could be seen. As we left the glaciers, we did more hiking and saw some more beautiful forests, waterfalls, and lakes with reflections of the snow capped Mt. Cook. We stopped off in Wanaka to try my luck one last time at fly fishing. I hit another run of rainbow trout in a small river that had some massive fish. I had two on, but as I was bringing both in, the line snapped and they got away, oh well.

	We then headed into Queenstown the adventure capital of NZ. In this spirit, I thought it would not do NZ justice if I did not jump off the world's first bungy site. It is an old bridge (the Kawarau Bridge) 142 feet above a raging river. I tried to dunk my head in the river, but unfortunately I was short by a couple of feet, bummer. The jump was like a shot of adrenaline strait to the heart, obviously it was not enough! I decided to get a package of three jumps, you know to add some diversity to the jump video. The next was on a mountain overlooking Queenstown later that night! This one had a waist harness setup so you could run off the Ledge and do whatever fancies you. I went for a double gainer (you run forward, throw your feet up, and spin into a back flip falling 154 feet into blackness! Yah!

	The next day we took a day trip down to Milford Sound. Both the drive and the cruse in the Sound was amazing. This area may be the most beautiful I have ever seen. It was shear, black rock, jagged peaks gouged by glaciers with rain forests all around. The best part is that they get rain 2 out of every 3 days, including the day we were there. This produced thousands upon thousands of waterfalls spilling down the rock faces, it was gorgeous. The next day we continued our exploration of Queenstown and finished the last jump in the bungy package. This one was a full on free fall for 10 seconds as it was 440 feet down into a canyon above a river you could hardly see! Embrace your fear!

We left Queenstown for Christchurch where we would fly to Australia from. But intent on making our last day in New Zealand the best we took a day trip up to Kaikora to swim with dolphins! You get decked out in a full wet suit and snorkel equipment motor out into the sea and get dropped into a pot of wild dolphins. The dolphins are always there waiting to play with visitors not because they are tame or fed, but because they are curious! When we first got there we thought, as you probably do now, that you are swimming
with 3 to 10 dolphins . . . try 400!! They were swarming all around us swimmers, swirling, streaking past, shooting strait for you and then turning at the last minute, and jumping every imaginable way! You would find yourself surrounded by 2 - 30 at a time and they wanted to play - swimming in circles at arms length away, making noises, and diving. Simply amazing! I think I burned 3 rolls of film there, one underwater camera and two above water trying to catch the perfect jump.
The next day was far less exciting. We stopped off at the Antarctica Center the next day on the way to the airport. There was a neat explanation and photos of the icy Continent, it's history, wildlife, and research performed there. We then flew up to Sydney, Australia. It was getting into their winter by this time and to give you an idea of what it was like, the temperature ranged from 65 to 85 degrees where we traveled. The next two days were spent exploring this very cool city, which is a lot like San Francisco. Some of the activities included
hiking through the Royal Botanical Gardens, taking a tour of Sydney's Opera House, checking out the Sydney Observatory and doing a night sky tour there, catching live music, touring Sydney's aquarium, walking around the harbors and bridge, and experiencing a symphony performance at Sydney's Opera House. As a side note, the picture of Sydney's Opera House is a postcard.
We then flew into the heart of Australia, Alice Springs. We did a two day camping trip out to Ularu (Ayer's Rock), the Olgas, and King's Canyon. This place is in the middle of the desert and it reminded me a lot of Moab and Canyon Lands. We did a bunch of hiking through the bush checking the rock formations, oasis's, wild kangaroos, and wild camels. We also learned a lot about the Aboriginal culture. Much fun was had by all.

	Shaking off the dry desert dust, we flew into to Cairns on the Northeast coast of Australia. The humid and lush tropical forests and warm ocean beckoned for us to come play, and did we ever. We began with a day trip up to Cape Tribulation in the Daintree Rain forest. We took mountain bikes all through the forest and along the beach on hard packed sand. We also stopped at water holes for a dip to cool off. Along the way we saw the rare cassowary bird (like an emu), wild boars, golden orb spiders,
and Cockatoos. The short taste of mountain biking was not enough for me so the next day I left Kim to a hiking trek and I did a more technical mountain bike trip. It was single track through the rain forest where it rained off and on all day. We followed the 1996 UCI World Mountain Bike Downhill Championship course up some tough hills, down sick drop offs, and through streams. All the while we were racing down a single track that was sometimes fully overgrown so that you would have to push the plants away as you shoot past. It was pretty wet so you would have to watch out for slippery roots and rock, as well as Wait-a-while. This is a plant that hangs down vines with sharp barbs that could rip into you and pull you off the bike. We also avoided another plant that has small silicon hairs full of poison that can kill or at least cause intense pain for several months. So, due to these challenging plants and all the poisonous animals, there was a bit of extra incentive to stay on the bike and stick the moves!
The next four days we spent out at sea diving the Great Barrier Reef. Over 3 days of diving I had 9 day dives, 2 night dives, and 2 snorkeling sessions. One of the dives and the snorkeling was the highlight as we dove with Dwarf Minke Whales! These huge creatures would swim by, up to 7 at a time, as close as 3 meters away. It was truly amazing. The rest of the reef diving was amazing and we did not see anyone else while we were out there. Among thousands of amazing corals and fish we saw lion fish, rays,
cuttle fish, eels, shrimp, a sea snake, a swimming flat worm, sea turtles, huge cod, and sharks. That's right, we saw sharks (white tip reef sharks) both at night and during the day. At night it was pretty spooky as you first see two green eyes in the darkness, then as they turn, you see their silhouette. When we were not doing incredible diving, we were eating incredible food. Gourmet food was constantly being cooked up throughout the day. We finished the dive trip up at Lizard Island where we caught a small prop plane and flew, low level over the reef, back to Cairns.
We then started the last leg of the journey, a bus trip down the East coast of Australia back down to Sydney. We went with the same bus company as we used in New Zealand to keep the flexibility of jumping on and off when ever we choose. Our first leg of the trip was very short. We headed up into the rain forest above Cairns to a town called Kuranda. We staid here two days to hike around and check out some neat markets. We visited an incredible bird aviary that had hundreds of beautiful
Australian birds flying all around you in a lush enclosed jungle. There were a couple of cockatoos that flew down to us as soon as we walked in and chilled on our shoulders for the duration of our stay! We also visited a butterfly sanctuary, which had hundreds of Australian butterflies inside a beautiful enclosed jungle. On one of our hikes we saw this wild cucaberra chillin'.
Leaving Kuranda we hiked around some more in the lush forest around waterfalls and in a neat forest sanctuary and then headed down back to the coast to Mission Beach. The next few weeks were very chill. We spent them soaking up the sun and playing a lot of beach frizbee as we headed south along the coast. I really dedicated myself to the teaching of ultimate frizbee and spread its lovin' around the world! From Mission Beach we went down to Arlie beach. I did not have time to sail around the Whitsunday
Islands so I did the next best thing I did a day trip on an ocean raft around them seeing in one day what the sailing vessels see in three. It was a lot of fun but I'm sure it was not as relaxing. We stopped twice for snorkeling where some people threw some food pellets in the water next to us drawing a plethora of fish swarming inches around us! We also enjoyed the beautiful Whitehaven Beach and did some hiking to the top of the island to look below and see all the rays and sharks below in the water.
We then headed in land to Dingo to see what the country is like away from the ocean. It was quite dry but that did not keep the beautiful birds away (the blue, red and green ones shown above). We had a bit of fun on a 45,000 acre cattle farm. There we had fun playing with whips, boomerangs, and taking tours to see wild kangaroos and emus.

From there we headed back out to the coast and played frizbee down to Bargara and then on to Hervey Bay. This was our staging point for a great 3 day/2 night camping trip on Frasier Island. This is a big sand island with pristine fresh water lakes, rain forest, 4WD tracks, and miles and miles of beaches. Nine of us piled into a Land Cruiser and off roaded around for three days through some gnarly sand 4WD trails and down the beach riddled with washouts! All along
the way we stopped to take dips in the lakes and ocean, play frizbee on the beaches, and hike through the forests. At night we gathered around the camp fire to sing songs with a friend who brought a guitar. The sky was amazingly dark here making stargazing wonderful except for fending off the occasional wild dingo. And of course we had to spread the word about S'mores! Much fun was had by all.
	The rest of the trip back to Sydney was pretty chill, no dramas. There was more hiking, beach time, frizbee, and relaxing. We stopped at a wild life park one day to see all the animals that we missed, including koalas. We also saw a bunch of nocturnal animals that we missed a couple nights before night kayaking on a calm river in the forest. While we heard a bunch of animals, but we were unable to spot anything except for some possums. Arriving back in Sydney, we hit all the things we missed the first time through. This included the Australian Museum and the Australia IMAX to catch any culture we may have missed and see what part of the country to visit the next time we get down under. Finally, the last day was spent in the Hunter Valley wine region tasting the few wines we missed along the way . . . If you would like to see any other pictures of specific parts of the experience, or want higher resolution copies of what are on the web site, just let me know. Also, don't hesitate to ask if you have any questions. jon.pineau@colorado.edu
Check out some pictures from other trips here

Staying on Top - Down Under