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Going Down Under

January - March 2020
A 52-day adventure by Michael Read more
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  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 17

    Brookfields and Askerne Wineries

    February 13, 2020 in New Zealand ⋅ ☁️ 27 °C

    Another nice day... The morning was quiet, but at noon I got picked up for the winery tour. We were a group of ten, me being the only one younger than 60 as well as the only Non-British🙃Nevertheless, it was a great tour.The first winery to visit was Brookfields, probably already my favourite of the day. We tasted six different wines and they were all good. The owner explained a lot about the wines and the tasting took place in a nice room like alike a wine cellar. The second winery was Askerne, again six wines to be tasted, but here the tasting took place directly in a kind of sterile shop what was not so nice. In general, the wines were good, too, but did not convince me as much as Brookfields. Very interesting was the Dessert Cabernet, which we had with a piece of dark chocolate and tasted very different before and after having eaten the chocolate (afterwards it had a taste of cherry whereas before it had different fruity notes).Read more

  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 17

    Ash Ridge and Oak Estate Wineries

    February 13, 2020 in New Zealand ⋅ ☁️ 27 °C

    The third winery we visited was Ash Ridge. Here the tasting took place in a modern restaurant-like room. Once more, six wines. In general, I liked the Pinot Gris' at every place very much, also here. Furthermore, Ash Ridge was the only of the four wineries to have a Riesling, which I liked very much. I even bought a bottle of it, but that will probably not see Europe😉 However, it has to be the "right" moment to open it. Last, but not least, we went to Oak Estate, a winery owned by a German-Swiss couple. Oak Estate is a very beautiful place and the tasting took place in the garden behind of the building - very nice on this sunny afternoon. Chicks were also moving around. At Oak Estate we also got a really good cold platter (almost all of it home made) to eat. After the amount of wine we already had had, that was also kind of necessary😀 Unfortunately, over eating the wines we tasted lost a bit of prominence. The reds, Cabernet and Syrah, were very good though.Read more

  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 17

    Napier

    February 13, 2020 in New Zealand ⋅ ☁️ 23 °C

    Finally, I even made it to Napier, which had not been planned at all. Since the rest of the group all stayed in Napier, I spontaneously asked Denise, our tour guide and driver, if she could also take me to Napier instead of back to Hastings and booked a seat on the last Intercity Bus from Napier to Hastings at 7:35 p.m.. So, I could at least explore Napier for 1.5 hours. What a good decision! Napier is way nicer than Hastings! Other than Hastings it is located directly at the Pacific coast which gives the town a completely different atmosphere. Furthermore, Napier that had been completely destroyed by an earthquake in the 1930s is famous for its art deco-buildings. The mayor at that time even had brought foreign architects to Napier to rebuild the city in art deco style. I enjoyed the short time in Napier😊Read more

  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 18

    Te Papa (Wellington)

    February 14, 2020 in New Zealand ⋅ ⛅ 20 °C

    After a long busride (5.5 hours) I arrived to Wellington. What a great city, I really like it, even though Ihave not seen so much of it yet. After checking in, I went to the Waterfront (there is a flair in the city that I really like!) and visited the Te Papa Museum, the National Museum of New Zealand. It is a really good and interesting museum dealing with several topics about New Zealand. I only had 2.5 hours until closure which was way too few time. I think, you could easily spend a whole day in the museum. In the evening, I enjoyed the beautiful lights of the Wellington Lantern Festival which also took place at the Waterfront.Read more

  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 19

    Wonderful Wellington

    February 15, 2020 in New Zealand ⋅ ☁️ 20 °C

    Wellington is so great! It is so much more beautiful than Auckland. This city somehow caught me - the buildings, the waterfront, the hills, the atmosphere... After breakfast I was wandering around in the Te Aro quarter. The Cuba Street is so nice with many bars, cafés and shops. On Saturdays there is an underground market close to the waterfront with handcraft and art products. Well, I left some money there, although that was definetely not planned🙃 Afterwards I made my way to Wellington's cable car up to the quarter of Kelburn. What a view from up there. Anyway, I was on the way to Zealandia, a fenced eco-sanctuary where they try to re-create the original nature and eco-system of the New Zealand without foreign flora and fauna.Read more

  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 19

    Zealandia (by day and night)

    February 15, 2020 in New Zealand ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

    Zealandia is such a wonderful natural valley - unbelievable that it is located not even three km away from downtown Wellington. Once more, I enjoyed the forest with the only noises coming from birds and insects. I tried to spot some birds (even had my binoculars with me) and, every now and then, was succesful. I could observe some tuis, saw some whiteheads, as well as some kakas, but that was at a place where they get additional food. Furthermore, walking around in this peaceful nature was so nice. For dinner I went shortly back in the city before I had to be back at Zealandia at a quarter to eight at Zealandia because I had booked a night tour, mainly in the hope of spotting a kiwi. The night tour was gorgeous. We started in dusk, so we could still see pretty much. The guide showed us a shack colony, as well as something very special, two Takahe. Takahe are very threatened. Only 418 birds are known to be still living in New Zealand, so the takahe is much more threatened than the kiwi. It got darker every minute, but we were equipped with torches. We saw several tuataras, reptiles similar to lizzards, but in fact tuataras date back to the time of the dinosaurs. We passed by the kaka feeding station and our guide explained to us, that the reason of feeding them is to bind them to the area and to make them more visible for the visitors. They would find way enough food all around Wellington without the additional feeding and they do live all around the capital again - a success of Zealandia. We made our way through the forest, but had no kiwi spotted yet. In a creek we saw two huge eels. Their size was quite impressive. In some part of the forest we could see glowworms on both sides of the trail, almost more formidable than in the cave in Waitomo. And then, it happened. A kiwi on its search for food appeared😁 We could observe it for some minutes. What an amazing moment. Some minutes later we passed by a second one, but that one dissappeared again quite qickly. What an experience, this night tour in Zealandia, but after 2.5 hours it came to an end. I could have stayed much longer. Since the cable car does not operate after 10 p.m. I walked the three km down to the city. I passed by the university with some beautiful buildings. Actually, I had planned to check out the bars in Cuba Street, but I simply was too tired.Read more

  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 20

    Cook Strait

    February 16, 2020, Tasman Sea ⋅ ⛅ 19 °C

    Goodbye Wellington! 1.5 days have been way too few for this amazing city, but I think I gonna come back for some days in March. Not only goodbye Wellington, also goodbye North Island. On the Interislander Ferry I went from Wellington to Picton on the South Island, a trip of about 3.5 hours. On the Cook Strait itself it was very windy. When arriving to the South Island, we passed through a beautiful fjord-like landscape before arriving to Picton.Read more

  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 20

    Picton

    February 16, 2020 in New Zealand ⋅ ☁️ 21 °C

    I like Picton. It is a small town with a relatively large harbor, including a pretty large marina. However, I needed a quiet day today, so after arriving at the hostel I first slept about two hours (last night at the hostel in Wellington had been horrible - noisy and hot) and then I only went for a short walk to the marina and had my dinner in an Irish Pub. Well, that was pretty much it from today...Read more

  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 21

    Queen Charlotte Track

    February 17, 2020 in New Zealand ⋅ ☁️ 19 °C

    First full day on the South Island, first rainy day of my travel🤔 But that did not matter that much, it was not raining the whole day either. At 8:00 am I took a boat to Ship Cove, a place in the Queen Charlotte Sound where James Cook once landed and where nowadays the Queen Charlotte Track starts. The whole track takes about four to five days, I only did the first 18 km to Furneaux Lodge. Nathalie, a German historian, was on the same boat as I was, and we found out that we had the same plan for the day, so, wie did the hike together. Just, when we arrived at Ship Cove it started raining. Since the track begins in the forest, that was anyway not too bad. In the forest we saw quite a few Weekas(?), another kind of flightless New Zealand birds. The forest is a little different from those I had been on North Island, but also beautiful. I think, what makes the New Zealand forests so special to me are the ferns. From time to time we had nice views on the Queen Charlotte Sound; well, in the beginning not so nice because of the rain and the clouds. However, after an hour or so the rain stopped and we had a mix of sun and clouds. We had a break in a bay, and then, we had too speed up a bit because both of us had thought that it would be only 14 km too Furneaux Lodge, not 18. Anyway, the trail was not so difficult, so it was not a problem. The mix of forest and the views on the sound make the Queen Charlotte Track pretty nice, but I am not sure if I wanted to do the entire trail. However, this one day was definitely worth it😊At 3 pm the boat picked us up at Furneaux lodge. It had some other pickups, so we had a nice boat trip through the Sound as well. And then, shortly before Picton there was a big school of dolphins. It was so amazing to watch them😁 The skipper even turned and slowed the boat down to see them better. I think, I have never seen so many dolphins at once (maybe in Florida, when I was ten or so). What a great end of the trip and the highlight of the day!Read more

  • TravelerGoing Down Under
    Day 22

    An average town, great landscape & seals

    February 18, 2020 in New Zealand ⋅ ⛅ 21 °C

    Another fantastic, but also a bit exhausting day! At 6:45 am I boarded the 7:00 am-bus from Picton to Kaikoura, about two hours south at the Pacific coast and famous for its whale watching. The bus ride was a mix of agricultural estates and beautiful coastal views. After I had seen quite a few sheep, I thought, that they had overtaken the cows by now, but then a few bunches of cows again😁 Kaikoura itself is not very beautiful or special, but the surroundings are gorgeous. First of all, it is diretly at the Pacific coast, so, you have the "sea breeze" in the air😉, furthermore nice black beaches. I did a 15 km, not very demanding walk around the Kaikoura peninsula. The rock formations in the sea are kind of impressive and on the peninsula you have a seal colony. Those guys are pretty much chilling in the sun... From above the shore you have amazing views. Once, I could see the view towards the other side of the peninsula, I was just flashed. What a coastal and alpine panorama! Unfortunately, I was in a little because the next adventure was about to come...Read more

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