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Falling (off things) for New Zealand

Diarist: Mike Gough
Date: 5th May 2005

"I’ll go through the rest of our time in New Zealand in a bit, but as most of you know we got as far as Queenstown where I saw the mountains capped with a light dusting of snow and I started thinking, dangerous. I realised we arrived maybe five to seven weeks before the start of the winter season (I call it the snowboard season), we had time on our tickets, if we got jobs we could just about afford to stay here, if we didn’t stay now we would probably never get the chance again and it had seriously always been a dream of mine to go to New Zealand and do a season boarding.

I was hooked on the idea of staying and doing a season pretty much within 48 hours of arriving. All I had to do was persuade Elaine it was a good idea, which I did, very gently after my initial outburst of mad excitement. There was no bullying involved though.

Now it really is, just in the last few days, starting to take shape. Elaine is less worried and more excited which has meant my excitement has bubbled up again and I just can’t wait for more snow to fall (there's already been some!). The reason for our excitement is because we have sorted our CV’s have been getting some really positive responses. I have an interview on Sunday for a job in one of the hire places of NZ Ski (the people that run the slopes) which may not sound glamorous, but it's fairly flexible on the hours (meaning more boarding time), and I would also get a free ski pass and bus pass which is about £650 worth that wouldn’t go on my credit card! So I’d be happy about that.

I have also applied for an assistant managers job at the AJ Hackett bungy shop in town, which would be interesting if I got that! Elaine has also just got an interview for one of the Front Line information places, which is awesome. These places give info on and sell the many trips and tours around Queenstown and if you work in what is classed as 'Front Line' you get most of the stuff here for free! Like bungys, trips and discounts around the town!

We’ve nearly completed the process of getting working holiday visas and we’re going to start looking for a place to stay today, so its all starting to take shape. I’m well excited, did I mention that?

So that’s where we are, we just need to re-arrange our flights, which isn’t a problem as we’ve already checked the availability. All we need to do is decide on a date and do it. So there it is, we came to Queenstown for three days and have ended up staying for six months! Beats working in the UK for six months I reckon!

So, we were here for a week and a half before that all happened. What on Earth did we get up to I hear you ask! Well, let me start at the beginning...

We touched down in Christchurch on a really nice sunny day and started exploring. This place was really nice, there was a relaxed and uncrowded feel about the place and they had a cool big chessboard in the park which I played on and lost, it was fun though. We spent three nights in Christchurch planning our route round the country and deciding we wanted to buy a van. We spent an hour and a half looking for a van, and we found Jemima!

It really was a stroke of luck, we were meant to find her. And she’s done us proud. OK, so first and third gear don’t work quite as they should and if you don’t warm her up in the morning she gets very grumpy, but generally we’ve been very happy with her. After this we headed to Arthur’s Pass and did some hiking up mountains and looking at waterfalls, it was actually quite high!

Then on to Punikaiki and saw the Pancake Rocks, I had no idea what these were before we got there, someone just said they were cool! They were fairly cool, and there were some good blow holes there.

Then it was onto the Franz Joseph Glacier through Greymouth and Hokitika (or something like that), a really nice drive down the coast and through the mountains actually. Here we did a Heli Hike, you get a helipcopter up to the top of the glacier and walk about for a few hours.

From there it was onto Wanaka, there were some amazing sunset views on the way into Wanaka. And we had some lovely Bluff Oysters, Bluff is the most southerly point of NZ (not counting Stuart Island) and home to lots of fishing. Wanaka was a really nice place, but we fancied some extreme activities so only stayed there a night.

So then we went to Queenstown. Firstly, upon arrival we booked a bungy, not just any bungy, the biggest one in the country, the Nevis. It's 134 metres high! It is really high! The experience is incredible, the biggest adrenalin rush eve,r but you can't begin to explain what its like beyond that, and I can't wait to do it again. We also did a fly by wire, where you're strapped into a little plane and fly around on a bit of wire for 10 minutes. It was a bit tame after the bungy, to be honest.

Then to get away for a bit and chill out rather than stress over whether or not to stay we decided to visit Milford Sound for a couple of days. It's really nice, its not actually a sound, let me explain: A sound is a valley or series of valleys caused by erosion by rivers which are then filled with water, mostly. A fjord is a series of valleys caused by a glacier and then mostly filled with water. See the difference, small but significant I feel. Anyway, we went there and it was very nice.

A lot of people say Doubtful Sound is better these days, as Milford is too touristy. Well we went in the quiet season so it wasn’t packed with tourists. We weren’t that interested in spending a whole day getting there, also weren’t that bothered about seeing the underground power station on the way. Besides, Milford cost us $50 and Doubtful was $180, so we went to Milford.

And that, as they say, is that! Another rather long post I admit but hey, once again a lot has happened! Hope it wasn’t too boring, I felt like I was really telling a story this time, an emotional roller coaster, well maybe not. Anyway, I’m hoping my next post will be to say that Elaine and I have both found jobs, we’ve got somewhere to live and are all set for the start of the season with all our boarding gear. Roll on July 10th! Fingers crossed..."



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