Selcouth Chronicles Week 6
Hello family and friends! Welcome to week 6 of the Selcouth Chronicles.
Week 6: February 11th - February 17th
🚗Feb. 14 Kaikōura->Picton
🚢Feb. 15 Picton->Wellington🚗->Taupo
NEW ZEALAND
Highlights: Ziplining, accidentally finding the Mt. Fyffe Forest walk, whale bones at Fyffe House, Kaikoura Peninsula Track, star-gazing in Kaikoura, Aviation Heritage Museum, Huka Falls, Spa Thermal Park, Taupo Maori rock carvings
Abby:
This week we started wrapping up New Zealand with Kaikōura, Picton, and Lake Taupo. It was another relaxing (compared to the rest of the trip) week full of snuggling up in comfortable Airbnbs watching Lord of the Rings, but also packed with various exciting activities.
The first activity we did this week was ziplining in Kaikōura. I had been eagerly looking forward to this, but I certainly didn’t anticipate that it would be so cool! Although I was a bit frightened to head down the first one, after that it was fantastic. There were many mesmerizing views of Kaikōura and its stunning blue water as we zoomed down the cord, especially the last one. Another cool visit in Kaikōura that we made was to the Fyffe House, a whale hunter’s bright pink house built from whale bones that was turned into a mini museum. Unfortunately, it was closed, so we played a game of Horseshoe that was in the front lawn of the house and talked to a friendly couple. Luckily, a nice woman who worked there let us come into the garden and showed us the different whale bones and where they go on a whale. It was fascinating!
After the Fyffe House, we took a lovely walk on a cliff overlooking the beach and set up a picnic of meat pies in an opening of the tall grass. Afterwards, we headed to the library where James and I chilled for a while reading. The next day, we headed out of Kaikōura (Fun Fact, Kaikōura is known for its Crayfish, so in Maori kai means eat and Koura means Crayfish - Eatcrayfish!) and onto a night in Picton. On the way we stopped at the Aviation Heritage Centre, with very detailed fighter plane stories from WWI and WWII. There were even full sized plane models and wax figurines! After the night in Picton, we had an early 3.5 hour ferry to Wellington, NZ’s capital. We unfortunately only had time to drive through Wellington to get to Lake Taupo. We had another road stop that included a wonderful bird sanctuary that gave us duck food. That was very entertaining! Speaking of food, we also stopped for lunch at a delicious restaurant/tavern across from a beach.
Our stop in Taupo was wonderful. Our first day there we went to a store called the Huka Honey Hive that hosted a large colony of Honey Bees and many, many honey and bee related things including a Bee Simulator video game that James and I got to play. Later in the day, we did a walk to the mesmerizing Huka Falls, where a large river is squished into a tiny gap and all this water comes blasting out the other side. After that, we headed down to Spa Thermal Park and bathed in one of the thermal springs, where Mom thoroughly enjoyed relaxing in a little private pool she found.
On Saturday we went on a cruise tour of Lake Taupo that brought us to some Maori rock carvings. These carvings can only be seen by water, and they are very big and very interesting.
Next week is a bittersweet farewell to New Zealand with Auckland and a plane ride to the Land of Aussies. . .
The one and only(drumroll) AUSTRALIA!! (Enthusiastic clapping)
James:
One of the things I have been most looking forward to here is ziplines, and specifically the EcoZip Kaikōura ones, which are the highest and longest in New Zealand. You go all the way up to the top of a mountain and zoom down five separate ziplines, covering over 2 kilometers on the way to the bottom.
After you get your gear on, you get to the top using a mixture of mostly Unimog (basically a very versatile off-road truck) and a little bit of walking. While you’re on the Unimog, you cross a good number of rivers and streams that make wonderful splashes as you drive over them, but the best part of the ride is on the mountain. Whenever there’s a break in the shrubbery, you’re dazzled by the beauty of New Zealand from on high. With its sparkling water, snowcapped and/or forest-covered mountains, and picturesque towns, it’s a moment you will never forget, and it just gets better as you keep going up. When you get out, the two guides lead the group to the first zipline. It’s almost literally all downhill from there! Each one is different, with some short and some long, but they all offer incredible views. The Unimog ride was nice, but it can’t hold a candle to the zipline experience.
As you glide across the wire, you can literally sit back, relax, and enjoy the scenery from the best vantage point ever - you have a bird’s-eye view of Kaikōura and unlike in the Unimog, you can look in every direction, including down (yikes!). The only downside was the wind, which constantly turned me backwards when I was least expecting it. It was quite disappointing to finish the final zipline, as I would have loved to do it all day. But I guess all good things must come to an end!
The experience really takes your breath away and lets you get a real appreciation for the work NZ puts into maintaining the natural beauty that they’re famous for. It’s truly unforgettable!
Sean:
“The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.” ― Carl Sagan
All of us find ourselves from time to time staring up at the stars. The wonder and magic of the tiny lights hanging in the sky is something hard to describe, as it touches something deep inside us that connects us to the universe. I knew New Zealand would give an opportunity to truly see the universe, and it delivered for us this week.
As we passed through different places in New Zealand, I noticed mentions of Dark Sky areas nearby. Upon further investigation, there is a group called Dark Sky International that works to designate areas where light pollution is essentially nothing, and one can see the night sky as it was seen hundreds of years ago. Though we weren’t in a Dark Sky area ourselves, New Zealand focuses on keeping nature pristine, and so there were some actual stargazing locations in Kaikōura specifically marked for this activity.
Our early morning trek to the dolphins last week was our first taste of what the sky could look like, so we tried sitting out on the porch one night to look at the stars. The number of stars we could see was much more than I could see from San Jose, and we were lucky to see some shooting stars as we sat on the porch, but again, this was just a preview of the show to come.
The Fyffe House in Kaikōura has a large lawn that is considered a great star gazing location, so we decided Tuesday night to head out after dark to try and see the stars. Due to how far south we are, it unfortunately wasn’t dark until 10 PM! A short drive brought us to our location, and after careful walking in the pitch black, found some picnic tables we could lie down on. James was with me, Abby with Caitlin. As our eyes adjusted, more and more stars came into view, until the sky was littered with them, and we could see the outlines of the Milky Way. We all had fun interpretations of what we were looking at, and it felt like a connection to the civilizations of old that gave us the constellations we know today.
We all could have sat out under the stars all night, but after an hour, we packed up and went to the Airbnb to get some sleep. It was a magical moment, captured with some photos that look unreal, and one of the types of bonding moments I’m hoping will continue through the trip.
Caitlin:
I’ve been loving all of the great walks in New Zealand. One of the great things about traveling is the chance to enjoy the novelty of new scenery. Sometimes all we have planned for the morning or afternoon is a walk, but it’s always a new walk, full of different things to see and do, and each one feels like a little adventure.
Early this week the kids and I picked up lunch and had a picnic lunch along a peninsula track in Kaikōura, and it was lovely! Sitting on the cliffs overlooking the ocean, eating meat pies… what could be better? Our only sadness was that Oreo can’t enjoy all the walks with us - he would love all the new smells! We are all missing him a lot.
Midweek was when we transitioned from the South Island to the North Island, and one of our favorite walks this week was up north in Taupo. Taupo is most famous for it’s large lake, which is actually the caldera of a volcano that exploded many centuries ago and was so large that places like Beijing and Rome noticed gray skies! Taupo also has another famous water feature, which is Huka Falls. The falls are formed where the Waikato River (the longest in New Zealand) is compressed through a canyon, and the normal 100 meters of riverbed is suddenly squeezed down to 15 meters across. The enormous pressure makes for incredibly fast-moving water, and we found it mesmerizing to watch the churning white and turquoise foam.
The walk to the falls is an hour each way and starts where the river is wide and smooth; it’s hard to imagine how turbulent it will become at the end! The stroll along the river is beautiful, but one of the best parts of the walk is right where it starts and ends. Spa Thermal Park is a little spot where you can soak in the thermally heated waters of the Otumuheke Stream as it flows into the Waikato. Thanks to the abundant geothermal activity in the area, the Otumuheke is naturally warm year-round. It’s one of many hot springs in the area, but this one was top on our list because it was a delightful way to relax after a nice walk! The stream creates pools of water and mini waterfalls to lay in as it makes its way down to the river, and you can choose your temperature; for warmer water go upstream, and for cooler water you can swim down where it joins the Waikato. I wouldn’t describe the water as hot, but it was pleasantly warm. At one point, I found myself soaking alone in a pool with my head on a rock, watching the clouds pass overhead and listening to the waterfalls around me. It was so peaceful. Not a bad way to end the day!
See you next week!
Sean, Caitlin, James and Abby
Catching up? Read week 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5.
And a quick correction! Last week I wrote that Kaikōura is on the West Coast of NZ - that was an editing oversight! It's on the East Coast of the South Island. :)