New Zealand - South Island tour cont'd

(Lewis Pass)





From viewing the Fox and Franz Joseph Glaciers, we headed further north (on the east coast) through Hokitika and Greymouth and headed inland over the Lewis pass (as the famous Arthurs Pass was impassible that day) where we literally drove through a winter wonderland...... the mountain roads were covered in light sprinklings of snow and it snowed for over an hour as we went up one side and down the other side of the pass. Once we dropped to the lower valleys, all signs of any snow disappeared (other than the snow capped peaks behind us) and we continued our journey stopping overnight at Hamner Springs - a place made famous by its hot springs and thermal baths.
(Enjoying the balmy conditions in Christchurch)


We spent one day touring around the Banks Peninsula - east of Christchuch and spent the coldest night of our trip so far in a Christchurch hostel called "Boulevard Backpackers" where it was warmer in the corridors than in the bedrooms. That night we got dressed for bed by layering up (*3) - locking overselves into the sleeping bag under the duvet.
Needless to say we left the next morning and headed north for Kaikoura where we headed out on a boat to do some whale-watching - and we did spot some pretty big whales, dolphins and seals. The sea was pretty rough with swells of 1.5metres but the sun was shining, blue skies so we got some pretty cool photos and the ginger tablets also helped ease the queese !

Moving north again, we passed through Blenheim and Picton before hitting Nelson where we were to spend a few days. Outside Nelson (a very nice town) is the Abel Tasman National Park where you can trek / tramp (NZ trekking), camp etc. In the last week, we also have picked up a Lonely Planet for South America as we will heading for Chile on 9 Sept and need to do a little planning to maximise our time.

Next stop - Ferry from Picton to Wellington in the North Island.

(Abel Tasman National Park - northwest of Nelson)

New Zealand - Queenstown and beyond

Our first port of call in New Zealand was Queenstown. Queenstown airport must be the most well appointed airport in the world as we flew in on a clear day over snow capped peaks and crystal blue lakes. Its a small town/ ski resort in a valley surrounded by Coronet Peak, Cardona and of course the Remarkables (other wise known as "Mordor" to Lord of the Rings fans). Michelle did a ski course for 3 days on Coronet Peak and had great fun while Sanch checked out all the local amenities in town. Local temperatures in Queenstown hit highs of 5 degrees during the day - you can imagine how cold it got at night in a hostel with a plug-in rad !! (Queenstown, Bob's Peak)



We have hired a car for this leg of the trip and are currently to be found spinning around the South Island in a white Toyota Corolla with a dodgy radio and a strange rattle ! (Coronet Peak Ski Resort)


From Queenstown, we travelled south to Te Anau and spent a day out on Doubtful Sound - gorgeous scenery again, a little overcast and very cold of course. We also took a trip from Te Anau to see some Glowworms ! we were taken into a set of caves (only 12000 yrs old), from there we got into a boat and in darkness (not to freak out the glowworms) we moved around the cave and saw all the worms light up on the ceilings and walls of the caves.

The following day we drove out to Milford (2.5 hrs drive over a mtn pass) where we boarded a catamaran to cruise around Milford Sound. Unfortunately the rain continued all day as did the mist and fog but it was still very impressive place - just a lot nicer in the sunshine ! (Milford Sound)

Our latest location is at Franz Joseph - location of a very impressive glacier, we also checked out its neighbour Fox glacier (20 kms down the road). Our plan was to head off this morning moving north again but yesterday afternoon we watched the Australia v New Zealand rugby match in the pub, met up with some fellow travellers and locals and basically made a night of it ! (Fox Glacier)

Australia - Sydney

Sydney & The Blue Mountains – 30 July to 9 August.

Plenty to keep us occupied in Sydney – from the opera to bridge climbing; spotting kangaroos in the Blue Mountains; stocking up on warm clothes; soaking up the lifestyle in the stylish suburbs and beaches – we could have stayed another week!

We arrived off our longest overnight bus trip yet – from Brisbane – on a gorgeous, sunny Sunday morning. North of Sydney are lovely lakes, mountains and inlets. The drive over the Harbour Bridge was a scene-setting way to enter the city on the Greyhound bus!











We stayed in two places during our week and a bit, both just off Hyde Park on Wentworth Avenue – very handy city centre spot for those contemplating a visit/return visit! So we were within walking distance of all the major sight-seeing and shopping spots including the Opera House, Oxford Street, Central Business District and Darling Harbour.

We did the sight-seeing, to name but a few: Opera House, Blue Mountains, bus from Bondi to Watson’s Bay to city centre, Circular Quay, Lilyfield (! end of the lightrail line !), The Rocks, Sky Tower.

We indulged in some culture and activity: “Turandot” at the Opera House, Pearl Exhibition at the Natural History Museum, Harbour Bridge Climb.

We shopped.

We sported our cool sunnies at Manly – one of the many minted easterly suburbs.

We ate Doyle’s fish and chips as per tradition at Watson’s Bay.













We walked Pitt and George Streets about 50 times.

We found odd pubs: O’Malleys, Orient Hotel, Scruffy Murphys (complete with karaoke singing 88 year man on a Sunday night), Establishment (actually v posery joint full of suits, where Sancha felt compelled to complain about ‘tude from the barmaid).

We ate well: Korean, Italian, Moreton Bay Bugs, Moroccan; and at some fab locations: Darling Harbour, “Aqua” at Milson’s Point (amazing view of Harbour Bridge, Luna Funfair Park and Opera House!), Manly Beach.

Our Aus travel partner, Catherine, left for warmer (can you believe it eh?!) climes back in Ireland a few days before we headed onwards to New Zealand. All in all, we had a great time in Sydney and highly recommend the city as a place to burn your well-earned / borrowed cash!

Australia - Fraser Island & Brisbane

Count how many times the word “sand” features in this article!

As if three days sailing around the Whitsundays and getting little sleep isn't enough for one! We are traveling further than the east coast of the USA in less than 3 weeks and trying to fit in as many highlights as possible. We should really re-name our trip in "Australia" to exploring "Queensland & Sydney". So the next stop for us was a little place called Hervey Bay. Found the place a tad quiet to say the least - it's a jumping point for Fraser Island and home to an usually high number of retired aussies (the town has therefore earned the nickname "Gateway to Heaven"....).

(pic: Lake Wabby on Fraser Island)
For those of you who know nothing about Fraser Island, here's some info! It's the largest sand island in the world, experts claim it could contain more sand than the Sahara Desert. Now, we're not entirely sure about that one, but we can tell you there is a LOT of sand :o) So much so, most of the roads are sand, the lay-bys are sand, the main "highway" is sand (it is also a 100km long beach on the east coast!) – you get the picture.

We arrived on another overnighter from Airlie Beach. Sleep experiences were somewhat better than the previous time; we may be getting the hang of it? That doesn’t mean we got a good night’s sleep now!

We had to get up at 5.30am the following morning to report for our Fraser Island 4WD & trip safety video and talk. This consisted: the talk; video; form filling; assignment to teams; little demos on how to drive a big four wheel drive (which seated the 9 in our group); how to pack our 4wd with essential items such as tents; eskeys (ice boxes); shovels (for environmentally friendly loo visits!); sleeping mats and so on and so forth. This was important practice, as we would be packing and repacking several times over the course of our 3 day stint on the island. We were also warned in a number of different ways about the dangers of having / encouraging dingoes near your camp – so we paid attention to that section! Anyway, next task was the shopping trip. Shopping for 9 people from Ireland, Denmark, Germany and France was interesting – it seemed the food of the Italy and the outdoors won out in the end as we shopped for sandwiches, BBQ and pasta dishes…. The Irish (ie the three of us) were pretty flexible, however another nationality (not the obvious!) chose the cheapest of everything – Woolworths branded cornflakes, jam, bread. They also price-compared everything by the 100g - we kid you not!! Good thing we had safety stashes of some decent items including chocolate and tea (Barrys: brought all the way from home by Catherine). By the time all of this was done and we were on the ferry over to the island, it was about 11.00; our stock of ham / lettuce / cucumber / tomato for sandwiches over three days in tow….

(Sancha & Catherine at Lake Mackenzie, FI)

Pretty much all 9 of us wanted to have a go at driving the 4wd in the various conditions over the three days. It was cool to experience the moving of the sand beneath, driving on the beach etc. It was sometimes tough, not in the driving sense but rather in the shouting of directions / warnings / instructions / squeals of “please slow down” when doing 15km per hour - all from the back row: a certain group of unmentionables (as they are now called; it brings back too many bad memories to talk in specifics… this same group measure by the 100g and at one stage told SM how to peel an onion). It didn't matter who drove, this was the case every time, except when it came to themselves of course. Anyway, rather than dwell, let us happily digress…

So Fraser Island really is something: miles of sandy beaches that you can drive on; huge surf that you can’t swim in; plenty of lakes that you can swim in; rainforests you can walk in; dingo encounters; pitching a tent; BBQ-ing the meat and waiting 2 hours to eat it – that kind of thing. The southern skies at night looked incredible, the sound of the ocean as you fell asleep after several glasses of chardonnay (out of a carton) and local aussie brew. Sleeping on the rock hard ground and being a tad chilly in the tent was something as well –we won’t be signing up for that kind of thing again too soon! Four teams set out at the same time so we would meet up at the various viewpoints and camping sites. One of them, being a naughty team, left their eskeys out one night and woke up to the gentle scolding strains of the local ranger’s voice, who subsequently fined them. The dingoes had arrived during the night and pretty much took all their food. After the other teams headed off on day two, we caught sight of one of the dingoes who decided to come back and see if there were any other titbits to be had ;o)
(The dingo who showed up on morning two; FI dingoes are the purest breed in Aus)

Next stop, Brisbane! We spent two nights in Brisbane, mostly recovering from Fraser Island. We contributed to the local GDP by shopping, dining at nice restaurants and cafes - lots of good fish here. We also visited the largest Koala sanctuary in the world, where we got to cuddle Koalas, say hello to Skippy and watch "one man and his dog"! Soooo cute. Many obligatory photos taken and souvenirs purchased.

Michelle with Skippy, collie Riley and Sancha holds a Lorikeet on head

Australia – Whitsunday Islands

So we left Cairns on Sunday evening to catch the overnight bus to a spot called Airlie Beach, jumping point for the Whitsunday Islands. There were mixed experiences in terms of sleep and sleep deprivation – an 11 hour bus journey with 2.5 hours worth of stops - grrrr. Still, we have a lot of ground to cover so overnight buses help keep our daytime Aussie experiences at a max.


Airlie Beach is a busy little place eh darls. The one main street is jammed with hostels, holiday apartments, tour operators, cafes and even a beauty salon or two where we indulged in a little TLC! I (SM) also allowed the tresses to be chopped (just a trim please… whoa, whoa. whoa, just a trim please! But of course, a bit more than a trim was taken….you know how it goes girls….). Apart from wanting to pamper ourselves after a few days in the rainforest and overnighter bus, it was also as misty as Dingle on a day in June so we kinda had nothing else to do mate! Our accommodation at “Koalas” was basic to say the least, so we were happy to spend little time there. Plenty of good cafes and touristy shops to take our cash anyway…

Up at the dawn on Wednesday for our three day sailing trip around the Whitsunday Islands. We thought we had lucked out in Cairns when the boat we wanted was booked up. When we first saw our Tall-Ship “Defender”, we thought it didn’t look so ‘tall” but did we change our minds once we were out at sea, watching the sails go up over the cobalt sea. It was fab. The ship is the oldest commercial sailing boat in the southern hemisphere and can sleep 24 people on board . They allow 12 people to camp on one of the island: we weren’t exactly volunteering for that opportunity knowing that (a) there is sand and dubious ablution facilities involved and (b) we have to do the beach camp thing on Fraser Island, so why max it?!

Day one was spent getting out to Hook Island, snorkelling and diving around there – sailing past a few of the other islands. Day two was the rockiest wave wise, so most of the time was spent on deck trying to focus on the horizon and not on our queasy stomachs. The main aim of day two was to get to a beach called Whitehaven on Whitsunday Island proper. Whitehaven has the finest silica sand on the planet and is also one of the most photographed beaches anywhere. It was certainly stunning, but rather brisk and rainy at times (SM and MF are finding it hard to get used to 20C after all that SE Asia heat!!). Of course, the beach on the other island across the way had the sun on it the entire time, of course it did eh!! Day three started off lovely and sunny, perfect for our beach (coral beach, ouchee to walk on!) and snorkelling sojourn on an island called Hayman (also site of one of the top 10 resorts in the world apparently – 500 guests / 600 staff!!). The number of fish in the water was amazing; there is a resident called Elvis, a huge purple/green Wrasse fish – certainly the biggest fish we’ve seen so far, eh dolls!

We landed back at Airlie Beach around 3pm on Friday afternoon and pretty much headed straight to fight a laundry war with other likeminded people – it nearly broke into fisty cuffs around the dryers at one point! That evening, we met up with most of the people from Defender – each boat holds a table at one of the bigger bars. Strangely enough, it came down to the (mostly) large number of Irish Defender passengers to keep the party going until the wee small hours.

Saturday evening saw us take another overnighter to Hervey Beach – this time 13 hours. Again, mixed sleep quality experiences. Hervey Beach is the jumping point for Fraser Island which we head to at the crack of dawn tomorrow. Australia may well be the country where we get least sleep!!

Cairns and surrounding areas

We arrived in Cairns on Tuesday morning, Catherine (the new member of our touring party) arrived later that day and we slept for most of the day - didnt sleep at all on the flight from Singapore - did we mention that our original flight was with an airline that recently went bust (thats the second time that has happened to me [mf]) !!! so we were transferred to Qantas (fine) but that flight was via Darwin (2 hr stop over !! marvellous).

(Pic: Michelle and Catherine meet Kutie Koalas)

Hired a car the next day - did I mention that it has been rotating from drizzling rain to full downpours since we have arrived. I can see the tan fading as we speak and there was so much work went into that too - so depressing !!

So we headed north to Cape Tribulation, stopping off in Port Douglas for lunch but as it lashed rain all day we couldnt fully appreciate the town which would look stunning when the sun was shining. Sancha did contribute to the local economy though by purchasing several sets of earrings.

We carried on north and crossed the ferry (A$ 16 return for a 3 minute trip !!!) to get to the only road that leads to Cape Tribulation and about 20kms for our destination (through a rain forest) all the cars in front of us came to a stop. It was still lashing rain so we got out to see what the hold up was - the road was completely blocked - a local creek (Coopers Creek) had burst it banks crossing onto the road and was very fast flowing. Even the 4x4's and buses were backing up and turning around. So we had to do likewise but we had plans in Cape Tribulation so we didnt want to turn back. There was only that road into Cape Trib so after trying lots of B&B's etc in the local area - we ended up in a place called Daintree and got their last cabin for the night. All the local B&B's and motels did great business that night as the road was blocked with all the tourists stuck. (Pic: View from our Daintree Cabin)

The B&B lady rang the local ranger for us the next morning to check if the road was passable and it was ok - only 0.2m apparently (wasnt sure what that meant but she was confident a car could get through) - so we headed off on the road again. By the time we got to Coopers Creek - cars were crossing but it still looked a little deep - anyway we got through. We got to Cape Trib - which is nothing more than a village with a pharmacy(run by a yank), little supermarket and accomodation places. Its in the middle of a rain forest and we are staying in a cabin with a corrugated roof (noisy when it rains !!)

(Pic: Coopers Creek @ 0.2m )

We partook of the local craze and did some "jungle surfing" - up on platforms 22 metres above the ground in the trees, with harnesses and helmets and slid from tree to tree on steel cables (the guys running it had pulleys too to yank us along... the views were great but some of it was a little nerve wrecking especially when they stopped you in the middle of a big gorge and you were left hanging !! they got a good laugh out of that.

We took also took a trip out to the Great Barrier Reef - 45 minutes to get out to the reef where we went snorkelling, swimming and diving (SM) for the day and saw lots of coral and loads of different coloured fish ... it was very cool. The sun came out while we were on the reef but the minute we headed back inland the rain and mist came down again.

(Pic: Sancha on the boat back from Mackay Reef off Cape Tribulation)

The plan is at midnight tonight we get an overnight bus down to Airlie beach from where we will head out to the Whitsunday islands - did I mention that its an 11hr trip !!!! (well that still doesnt come close to the 18hr bus trip (from hell) from Laos to Cambodia - 11 hrs is just a walk in the park !)

Where we are now: en route to Chile, somewhere over the Pacific (crossing the international dateline!)

Read up on our next destination here!
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/worldguide/destinations/south-america/chile-and-easter-island?a=facts






Ireland - Hong Kong - Thailand - Laos - Cambodia - Vietnam - Thailand - Malaysia - Singapore - Australia - New Zealand - Chile - Bolivia - Peru - Argentina - Brazil - Ireland

Singapore

July 6th - July 10th

Thursday 6th July saw us on an express bus from KL to Singapore. The journey took approx 5 hours with a short stop at the border where we had to disembark with all our luggage - go through an arrivals hall - through passport control - have all our bags and ourselves scanned before being allowed to reboard the bus to Singapore. I'm not sure what they were checking for but the soldiers with the machine guns didnt look like the easygoing type.

(Ladies enjoying afternoon tea at Raffles Hotel)



Singapore is a lovely city: great shopping areas (Orchard Road), transport links are so straightforward (using the Ezlink card). We were quite busy taking in the Night Safari, doing a city tour and having afternoon tea at Raffles Hotel ( www.raffleshotel.com) and having the Singapore Sling in the bar where it was originally invented.

There is also a bar/club on the 71st floor of the Swissotel where you can great city views, watch a sunset and enjoy an apple martini or gin rikky at half price during happy hour (5pm-9pm).

Brian acted as our local guide in Singapore taking us to local eateries such as the Banana Leaf Apollo, the Rendez Vous and areas including Little India, Arab street and Clarke Quay - he and his friends were wonderful hosts.

Malaysia - Kuala Lumpur

July 1st - July 6th

Kuala Lumpur is a very impressive city - lots of shopping of all kinds can be done here. We also managed to fit in a small amount of sight-seeing.... as well a night out or two !!!

Pic: Malaysia loves Man Utd - Air Asia plane; hope Ronaldo and Rooney kiss and make up ;o)

The Gods were against us however as the two days we attempted to go up to the Skybridge on the Petronas Towers they were closed - the first day we tried was a Monday (closed on Mondays !). We tried again on Tuesday (4th July) and again it was closed all day "due to technical difficulties" (?) so we gave in at that stage and went off and got manicures and pedicures for the afternoon !!


Pic: the rather impressive Petronas Towers

We sampled much of the local cuisine here in KL, lots of chinese influences with plenty of chilli. Also in KL is an O'Briens sandwich bar !!!! it was quite a surprise to see it there and full of locals having lunch too !! We ordered sandwiches with everything in them..... :oP

We stayed with Sammi in KL who was a superb guide and hostess and who was kind enough to allow us the use of her car for our stay. The kamikaze style of KL drivers is one we won't forget too easily though; we will be cornering and cutting-in like women possessed on our return.

Malaysia - Sabah (Island of Borneo)

(Pic: Orang-Utan "Man of the Forest")

We landed in Sandakan, Sabah, Malaysia on Tuesday last. Sarawak and Sabah are the two Malaysian provinces on the island of Borneo. It's a big place, so we decided to concentrate on the Sabah side and even then, we are doing a whistle stop tour of the area!


We stayed with a friend's family (the Liau family), who looked after us very well for the few days we were in Sandakan, including treating us to some proper home cooked chinese food! During our time there, we went to the Sepilok Orang-utan (which means man of the forest) to see these endangered animals. Truly a privilege that they came out at feeding time: we saw two adults and one baby. The rehabilitation centre takes in orphaned babies and rears them until they can fend for themselves in the wild (all depends on the individual, some of them take 6 years, some take 10) so the work being done there is amazing. You can support this centre through Orang-Utan Appeal UK if you are interested!

(Pic: Mt Kinabalu - when it's not raining...)

From Sandakan we made our way by bus - it's been a while ;o) - to Kota Kinabalu further west. This journey took us over the mountain range and past Sabah's number 1 tourist attraction, Mount Kinabalu, which is the highest in South East Asia. Unfortunately, as we neared the mountain it got really misty and then we hit major downpours so we couldn't see it at all. Good thing we caught a glimpse of it on the flight into Sandakan! An hour into the journey, the bus started to heat us and we all started to drip - the AC had gone on the blink - so we eventually ended up pulling in to a truck stop and waited for an hour or so before another bus arrived. This truck stop was interesting and we were obviously VERY interesting to the locals - I'm sure two ladies of the paler variety are not frequent visitors to that cafe. Anyway, after an hour of not trying to make eye contact with everyone there, we left again and reached KK about about 17.00. KK is located in a very scenic spot - even more scenic if you could see the mountain ;o) - right next to the sea, with some lovely islands off the coast. Sadly the rain means we are seeing more of the local shops and restaurants than the islands! The shopping experience is somewhat painful - how does a girl walk past the Marc Jacobs sunglasses without at least trying them on!!

Malaysia - Perhentian Islands

On Monday last (19 June), we left Thailand to head for Malaysia. Once again ( ahem, taking the road less travelled by backpackers), we availed of the services of an airline and flew to Kota Bahru on the northeastern side of peninsular Malaysia (see map in "Where we are now"). From here, we made our way by boat to the smaller of the Perhentian islands, where we basked in the sunshine and blue, blue waters. It's high season on this side of the peninsula as it's not really their rainy season (though it doesn't stop the rain coming down in buckets!).



(Pic left: Long Beach)












Anyway, we hopped off the little speedboat, straight into the water, backpacks in tow and set off on the beach to find suitable accomodation. Now you can imagine our standards following our stint at 5 star level! Sufficit to say "chalet" usually conjures up images of some sophistication, or at least decent loo facilities. But not really the case in this instance for us. A chalet, a bed and a mosquito net is what you get for a steep 65 ringits per night (high season! some people end up sleeping on the beach on night one!!). So we landed ourselves in Panorama Chalets right in the middle of Long Beach on Pulau Kecil. Over the coming days, we snorkelled, tanned and I (Sancha) decided to sign up for a diving course. Kind of scarey at first getting used to breathing only through your mouth, taking your mask off underwater and then having to clear it - you know - that kind of thing! Anyway, it was all worth it in the end cos I got to see lots of Nemos and some other cool aquatic life such as Hawksbill turtles, stingray, small sharks, zillions of very colourful fish, brightly coloured corals etc . (Pic: Sancha found Nemo!)

So while I was off scaring, testing but ultimately feeling very proud of myself, Michelle was keeping the local sun-umbrella-supplier in business. Roles will reverse when we get to New Zealand: Michelle will be skiing while I'll be nursing a hot toddy "apres ski". Those of you who know Sancha well will know of my terrible state of balance and history of accidents resulting from same ;o) so it's safe to assume Michelle will be whizzing down the slopes without me!

Oh yeah. The mozzies got really acquainted...sigh.....