I left off with us getting in at 1am, and crashing. The morning was … hectic. I woke up having planned for 45 minutes to get ready and eat. I got out of the shower and got dressed with seemingly 25 minutes to spare, only to find out the bus was arriving to pick us up in 5 minutes. WHAT?! A bus is picking us up? WHAT?! Today’s event was the Milford Sound cruise. I thought we were driving there. Nope. A bus was picking us up and I now had 4 minutes to eat and pack. Needless to say, it was a little rushed – at least my shower was leisurely :) I hustled onto the bus having prepared a pb+h sandwich for breakfast and thrown my stuff into the van. I had a raincoat (it was drizzling again) and my clothes – that’s all. I forgot my wallet and camera, but that was ok. Though I don’t have pictures yet – I’ll get them from Allison, since I borrowed her camera (the really nice one).
The bus ride was great! We got 2 hours of guided tour through NZ as we drove to Milford Sound. We learned about the countryside, and the animals, and the plants, and the history, and all that kind of stuff. When we got to the Sound, we boarded a ferry-like boat and began our cruise. IT was a little drizzly all day, but everything looked beautiful. As we left the wharf, some dolphins swam alongside our boat! They were so close! We saw sheer cliffs plunging into the sea, tall waterfalls, seals, dolphins, lots of beauty! South, South Island is my favorite landscape in NZ, in the world so far! Rolling plains of green, with dense forests, crystal clear lakes, and distant mountain peaks covered in snow - it’s gorgeous! Milford Sound was beautiful. After the cruise was over, we took the bus back to our hostel and then started our drive towards Christchurch. We stopped in Queenstown, which is a lovely town. We ate magnificent burgers at this burger joint. I got a spicy Cajun chicken sandwich which was amazing. Then we left and finished our drive to our hostel (a little over halfway between our last hostel and Christchurch). We arrived at midnight at a small farm in the middle of nowhere. That was our hostel. They had a few small buildings with a few bedrooms each set up for us to sleep in. We really did not expect it to be so far from everything – I mean it was just a single house along a long stretch of road. But it was such a blessing! One of the things I really wanted to do while in NZ was see the stars without all the city lights and light pollution – just to see how many there were. When we arrived, one of the fist things we noticed were how very many stars there were! The drizzle from earlier that day had blown over and the sky was completely clear! So we grabbed our comforters and laid out in the field for at least an hour just watching the stars and chatting. I saw Orion, the Sevens Sisters, Southern Cross, and the W (Cassiopeia). There were so many stars out – impossible to count! We went to bed sometime after 1am.
The next day was simply getting back to Wellington. Those of us in Bio1520 (3 of us), caught a plane at noon and made it back in time for lab at 2:15pm. God worked out everything so that the plane was on time and smooth. We had no problems. Everyone else arrived back in Wellington around 5pm. It was a very full weekend, and an adventure I will never forget! My favorite part was ice climbing and then stargazing. I have now journeyed through just about all of New Zealand! I feel very accomplished and satisfied with what I did in New Zealand. I really squeezed the seconds to make every minute count!
No comments:
Post a Comment