20 Nov to 5 Dec
It was a trip that made us stepped out of our comfort zones. There were many firsts experiences, from fishing in the deep sea to driving and living in a camper van.
Kaikoura
A seaside town where we feasted on seafood. Mention crayfish to any Singaporean and their mind would conjure up the striking red freshwater crustaceans but the ones we were having were saltwater crayfish that are as big and tasty as rock lobsters, just minus the pincers. Instead of doing the customary whale watching, we went out for deep sea fishing instead where we caught perch, crays and octopuses. The sea perch though small, were abundant and easy to catch and most of the time were spent reeling rather than waiting.
Lake Tekapo
One of the best places in the world for star gazing. and rightly so. We went on a tour accompanied by nerdy tour guides with geeky PHD level of astronomy narration to get our minds blown and butts frozen. We even caught sight of a shooting star.
Mt Cook
We did one and only hike as a family here at the Hooker Valley trek. We also spent night at a campsite overlooking the glaciers. It was so windy that our campervan shook throughout the night. We stopped over for lunch at a place that sold the best tasting (king) salmon sashimi we had ever eaten which we paired it with our Singapore bought cup noodles. We spent close to a hundred bucks on the sashimi alone, it was that awesome.
Wanaka
Overcrowded city by New Zealand standards. We did a pretty challenging maze at Puzzling World and picked overpriced strawberries at a farm. We also caught our own salmon fishes for lunch at a “farm to table” restaurant. The salmons were very expensive at $48 per kg (whole fish) and only yielded lean meat and were underwhelming taste wise.
Queenstown
Zipline activity was booked out and so instead we went for Skyline Luge. The weather wasn’t kind of us for the 2 days we were there. We tried the famous Fergburgers which turned out to be very disappointing.
Arrowtown
We rented shovels to pan for gold in the nearby river, where we got cold and wet from our self induced gold fever.
Milford Sound
A long & challenging drive to get to Milford Sound and it did not help that it rained cats and dogs, though the rain made the fiord even more tranquil. The highlight for this part of the trip for me was actually an off the beaten hike to a waterfall which required crossing a chasm using a fallen log.
Oamaru
Hometown for the world's smallest penguins. Penguins spotting are done after dusk as adults return back to the shore after a long day of hunting out at sea to feed their shore-based chicks. As their nests are behind a paid conservatory, we resorted to searching for lost penguins that did not find their way back to their nest which I feel added to the trill of hunt. It was rather a sad sight to see dumbfounded penguins looking lost and surrounded by humans shoving their camera phones in their face. We managed to spot a total of 48 lost penguins according to Bob.
Timaru
A stopover before we get back to Christchurch city where we spent the day playing around the holiday park. KFC tastes much better in New Zealand as only fresh chickens are used. We stopped at a raspberry farm where we picked our own raspberries and paid $5 what would normally cost $20 back in Singapore.
