West Coast

Able Tasman, Westport, Greymouth, Franz Josef, those were our stops at the West Coast on the South Island. We had the full range from beautiful beaches to icy glaciers, from heavy rainfall to perfect sunshine.

The ferry ride from Wellington to Picton was three and a half hours long and we had some nice seats at the front of the ferry with a good view … and yes, I got pretty seasick, lucky I was able to sleep most of the time I felt bad.

We did not do much at our short Picton and Nelson stops, because we both got a cold. Getting sick itself is always bad, but it is specially inconvenient and uncomfortable if you are not at home.

In Able Tasman we already felt much better and were able to enjoy the beauty of the Able Tasman National Park. We did a nice boat tour and a five hour hike through the park and were quite lucky with the weather. We even visited a small seal colony and saw some young seals. To be honest, this was not planned at all. We signed up for a boat trip, not for a 12km hike, because we were not completly well and fit after all. That the hike belongs to the boat tour was told to us right before entering the boat. We learned to really make sure what we sign up for and that hiking is incredible exhausting if you can not breath well. After two nights we left again, traveling to Westport.

Westport is a small town located at the West Coast of the South Island. The best thing about it was the old villa, which was our lovely hostel. Besides this, there was not too much to see there except the typical features of a small Kiwi town. Westport had a lot in common with Greymouth, our next stop, except that Greymouth was a bit larger and had a nice cinema. If you have less time at your journey through New Zealand, I would recommend skipping those places.

On our way to the next destination we made a stop at the well-known Pancake Rocks, took a nice and short walk there and had the best muffins of our hole trip so far!

After those smaller towns we came to the Franz Josef Glacier village and we visited the glacier itself. We both enjoyed the walk to the glacier and we had wonderful sunshine for the time we were walking, the next day was full of heavy rain.

On the way to Wanaka we stoped at the Fox Glacier and had another nice bush walk. Then we finally arrived in Wanaka, our accommodation for Christmas. We celebrated the holidays the best way possible in a hostel . We baked Christmas cookies, made a nice Christmas meal and had very relaxing days. We also saw the famous Wanaka tree and climbed Mount Iron, which was much higher than expected.