Hello all, it's me again. Apologies for the lateness of this entry, I've been essaying. Here is a precis of my time on the Kiwi Bus. Those are some photos of my time of the Kiwi bus, plus my birthday cake. One of my birthday cakes.
So I left Welly on the morning of April 15th and we did the short drive over to the InterIslander terminal before clearing everything of the bus (buses stay on either the north or south island, they don't go between because it'd cost Kiwi Ex about $1000 a day to do that.) I spent most of the crossing watching The King's Speech for a second time as there's apparently nothing to see for the first two hours. The last hour of the crossing is supposed to be amazing and you're supposed to be able to see the Marlborough Sounds. We did the crossing in a storm, so not only could we see fuck all, we were an hour late getting into Picton :( On the bus I was sat next to Andri who is from Brazil. When we got to the accommodation that night in Nelson, she invited me to hang out with her and her friends. We did beer tasting and took advantage of the $15 two course meal deal. You should also know that raspberry cordial and coke is nice. Through Andri I met Aya (Japanese), Elena (Spanish), David (Austrian, and will be referred to as Tripod from here on in), Per and Fredrick (Swedish) and Randi and Derek (Canadian.) I had a very strange bunk bed that was on wonky angle and had no ladder :|
The next day we went to Westport and it was still pissing it down, so the scenic stops we'd normally make didn't really happen. I signed up to go jetboating but nobody else did so I couldn't go so I said I'd go horseriding instead with Daniella (German) but my horse kept bucking and trying to throw me off so I stayed in and had some tea and read some magazines whilst we waited for Daniella so we could get to the hostel. When I got back, I caught my middle finger on something in my bag, presumably a zip, and there was blood everywhere. Even I was weirded out by the manky-ness of it and it's still scabby now. In the evening we went to the pub, where I became acquainted with Jax, Double D, and Henry who all work at Base in Queenstown, as well as Dylan, our driver. Nobody is entirely sure how it started but my name started getting put into song titles. By the end of the trip, I was the bus celebrity and we even had our tour guides joining in with it.
The next morning we began our drive to Lake Mahinapua where we stayed at the 'Poo pub' owned by 85 year old Les, the world's oldest publican. On the way there we stopped at Greymouth (terminus of the TranzAlpine train) to pick up supplies for the fancy dress party that night, the theme being Bad Taste. Tripod wasn't listening, didn't make any effort and then threw a hissy over Hitler and the Fritzl family. Dude, it was BAD TASTE, c'mon! I decided just go with a very peculiar outfit. On the way from Greymouth to Mahinapua, we picked up Hana (Canadian) in Hokitika and we played speed dating on the bus. Except I met people O already knew. At the 'Poo Pub' we were served food and we had the place to ourselves. The police came to visit us (fairly standard) and good times were had. Randi got really drunk and locked herself in her room with her key and escaped by breaking the window :|
From here we went to Franz Josef, stopping at various places on the way, including the Bushman centre (a deer-hunting museum) and I was the last back on the bus because I was waiting for my hot blackcurrant to be a bit less scalding. In Franz it was a really nice day and I wanted to go kayaking but nobody else wanted to, so again I couldn't go. So I went to a kiwi sanctuary instead. We had fun times in the bar, including me getting ID'd and struggling to get my passport out so they let me off with my drivers license. Played some Killerpool which Charlie (Jersey) won. He then gave his prize to someone else because he wouldn't be in Queenie long enough to do it. Damn. As Henry was skipping forward a day and leaving us, Double D made him do a ski run, albeit a less lethal version than the one they gave me (more on that later.) Our second day in Franz Josef involved actually hiking up the glacier itself. Double D, Jax, Jodie, Sophie, Elena, Per, Fredrick, Tripod, Aya, Katie and I formed group 5 with our guide Rebecca AKA the slow group. On the way up we managed to overtake two groups but coming back down we were so slow that they had the send an extra bus back for us. It wasn't that we were walking slow it was just that Tripod was insisting on taking photos everywhere and not listening to Rebecca when she asked us not to/walking off the path she was taking us on. Urgh. In the evening, I went to the glacier hot pools with Double D, Jax and Katie before having dinner in the bar.
In the morning we went to Lake Matheson which is a mirror lake and was very foggy. We crossed through the southern Alps through the Haast pass and between Haast and Wanaka we did a quiz in the teams of two we were sitting with on the coach. I was paired with Laura (German.) When we got to Wanaka, I had a shower and went down by the lake. As I was walking past a bar, I heard a familiar voice. Double D and Jax had gotten some of the other girls together and had been looking for me two and were having some drinks with their colleagues from Base Wanaka, including Shane or Happy Feet as he's known. In the evening we had a few drinks in Mint Bar where Happy Feet abused his staff discount for us all.
The next morning we went to puzzling world where Hana and I tried to do the maze together but she gave up and I eventually managed it. Also went through some illusion rooms and bought myself Quiddler. It's a word card game and we're not too sure yet how you play it. Back on the coach and it was time to announce who'd won the quiz...it was me and Laura! Only Laura didn't want any of the prizes as I'd answered all but one of the questions, so I had Dylan throwing a ridiculous amount of stuff and me. There's a picture of that, if Vic. House net wasn't so crappy, I'd upload it for you. He then said that we should find him at AJ Hackett (home of the original bungy) and he'd buy us both a t-shirt, which he did. I have an I <3 NZ one. From AJ Hackett we went to Queenstown where we picked up a cardboard cut out of Henry and went to have our bus photo taken. After checking in, Hana and I went to Noodle Canteen and got a ridiculous amount of noodles for $10 each. In the evening, people got wasted and it was interesting.
The next morning I stumbled out onto the Bottom Bus. We were being driven by Mike and my fellow passengers were Darren and Claire (a couple from Ipshit), Charlie, Tom (NY) and a girl whose name is escaping me...my bad. We drove to Dunedin and saw Baldwin Street, the steepest street in the world. We then drove out to the peninsula and sat on a beach watching yellow-eyed penguins come into shore.
The next day things were a bit different as the driver who was supposed to take us had been in a motorbike crash so Mike was trying to get us where we needed to be without going over the number of days he's allowed to work. We went down the coast through the Catlins and were joined by Kat (German.) I got off in Invercargill with Darren, Claire and Cat and Mike drove the rest to Te Anau.
The next day we went to Stewart Island. Not a lot happened on Stewart Island due to the fact that it has Vancouver style downpours most of the day but we managed to walk about a bit and do a trip to Ulva island and I ran into Jax and Double D and we had a couple of pints together.
On the Tuesday (26th) we went back to Invercargill and went to Dominos and got $6 large pizzas. Mine had a bbq base and had onions, jalapenos, spinach and feta on. It was good.
The next morning was my birthday - ! - and we had to get up stupidly early to catch the bus. This time our driver was Don and he drove us to somewhere in the middle of nowhere where we caught the Milford Explorer with Jamie at the wheel. We made a fair few stops, including in Te Anau, before we got to Milford Sound and our cruise. Kiwi passengers had the buffet lunch included in our ticket and we went nuts whilst enjoying the view. Milford Sound is the 2nd wettest place on earth after the Amazon rainforest and 2/3 days have rain so we were very lucky to get blazing sunshine! Milford Sound is also currently in the running to be named one of the 7 natural wonders of the world. One the way home we stopped in Te Anau again and Jamie put on the film Dodgeball as it was getting dark. I'd forgotten how funny that film is. Also got a pretty view of the stars. When we got to Queenie I dumped my stuff, got changed and went to Altitude Bar where Darren and Claire presented me with birthday cake, Jax bought me a bottle of champagne, many other drinks were bought and I did my ski run. One red shot (vodka and raspberry,) one green shot (it was supposed to be chartreuse but those bastards game me tequila), one black shot (JD and Jager) followed by a Jagerbomb. People were impressed by my effort as I now have the privilege of being one of the few people who's done a ski run and not thrown up. The other guys whose birthday it was didn't do so well. Afterwards Double D got me into World Bar and the bouncer, Johnny, carried me out because I was drinking water.
The next day was pretty chilled, went to the endangered birdlife place.
Friday I took the gondola up and did the luge, that was pretty fun.
My last day in QT was spent on a funyaking trip. We took a jetboat (complete with 360 spins) up the river then came back down in an inflatable kayak, with lunch on the way. Good times. I went out with some English people from Kiwi but lost them in Buffalo Bar so I found Jax who was at Revolver and some drinks with her and said goodbye. The next morning I hung around Base for a while yarning to Henry before flying back to WGTN.
I've lost the will to type any more except to say that the birthday cake Michelle had made for me was awesome. It was a mudcake duck and they put relighting candles on it. Good times!
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