April Adventures in N-Zed
It has almost been a month since I have been home from New Zealand. The farther away it becomes, the more dreamlike it seems. July has absolutely flown by with readjusting back to my full-time job and my sister’s (wonderful) wedding. But I am back to blogging because I must tell you all about the rest of my April break!! Let’s recap: University of Canterbury has an amazing 3-week break in the middle of the semester, which makes our spring break look like nothing.The first week we spent up at the top of the South Island in Abel Tasman National Park seeing a lot of beautiful coastlines. From here on out I remember it being a bit difficult to coordinate everyone’s trip. Some people had field trips for their Biology classes. Some people didn’t want to go to the North Island, etc. etc. But it all worked out in the end, as things really always do!
After a day of recovering from our first week of travels, Emily, Jon, Geoff, and I took the boys’ beloved blue car to Arthur’s Pass to hike to Otehake Hot Springs. To be honest, this was a frustrating trip. Of course looking back, it’s just funny! But a combination of disorganization, not leaving on time, and me-having-an-attitude-problem equaled me being a flustered tramper. So due to some miscommunication, we left late and did not arrive to Arthur’s Pass till one or two oclock (and Arthur’s pass is not far away, only a couple hours…). It’s a 5-hour hike to the Hot Springs and the sun was starting to go down at 6 or 7 at that time so this meant we were cutting it pretty close. We actually parked the car in a farmer’s backyard because the people at the visitor center said the car park gets vandalized a lot. We had to pass some smelly cows to get on our way (it’s pretty amusing seeing cows roam through these rocky streams with a gorgeous scenic backdrop behind them… don’t know why, but it is!) and we came to the first stream able to go through it pretty well by just stepping on some rocks. Next stream was a bit deeper… so you have to make the decision whether or not to take off your shoes so they don’t get wet hoping there are not any more crossings… I think we took them off once (which wastes a lot of time if you do it every time) and then by the next stream realized we might as well get wet! I think at the next crossing the water was maybe up to mid-calf range. I thought this was cold. Boy was I in for a treat the next day haha. So a couple hours into our hike… to make it short, we basically realized we are sorta kinda lost. We all missed an obvious 90-degree turn that was marked with a sign. We all saw the sign. and we all thought it did not apply to us. Oh man lol. So we lost about an hour and a half of our precious time back-tracking to this sign. Despite our push to go faster, it was starting to become apparent we would not make it to the campsite in time. It was pretty dark when we got to a lake that on the map looked to be about an hour away from where we wanted to be. All the time before we got to the lake, we were already trying to find a clearing we could set up our tents in, but the forest was pretty dense and there was just nowhere. Thankfully, there was a little clearing off the trail right next to the lake. We noted this spot, and actually tried to go on a bit farther in the dark but as soon as we lost sight of the orange path markers in the dark, we went back. So we weren’t able to spend the night at an actual camp site with nature’s built-in hot tubs right beside us… but it made for an adventure. And look what we got to wake up to…
There was a mist rising over the lake in the morning. It was very pretty. I will also always remember camping that night at the lake as Geoff was trying to freak out Emily by telling her the farmer was really a serial killer and scaring her with loud noises. I think I was a bit annoyed since I wanted to sleep but I also secretly thought it was pretty funny. Oddly enough, we heard the noise of a helicopter going over head… of course Geoff told Emily this was the NZ police searching for the fugitive. Okay, that finally freaked me out a little. Why would there be a helicopter out in the middle of nowhere late at night? Anyyyyway, I think Emily really did have trouble sleeping that night lol.
The next day back on our way to the Hot Springs! With how the path was, I think it was very wise that we decided not to hike in the dark! Once we got to the river that the Hot Springs was next to, we ran into another hiker who told us they were about another 30 minutes down the river. He was wearing waders for good reason. We had to go back and forth through the river a couple times and it was coooolllddddd. I’ll admit it, I’m pretty much a wimp when it comes to cold water. One of the crossings was all the way up to our waists… and I was freaking out the whole time I was in the water lol. Geoff pretended to freak out to, but of course he was just being funny lol. Although the cold water was a beautiful blue color… I have named it the pool of death.
So we kept going down the river and I was a little worried as to why definitely more than 30 minutes had passed and no hot springs… there is no sign or anything you just know they are there when you smell the sulfur! Oh why oh why do we worry so much as humans (I know it’s not justtt me). We almost turned back. But thank goodness we didn’t. They were only 5 minutes away! There were three different pools all clustered together in an area that was to the left of the river, each with different temperatures but all HOT!!! Jon, being the Montana river guide that he is (okay, sorry, that’s actually an inside joke about him being a river guide but he is from Montana!), had experienced hot pools before but this was a completely new experience for me. and they were AWESOME. I mean I’m already a huge hot bath/spa/hot tub fan. I get excited about going in those. So put a naturally heated pool of water surrounded by rocks and mountains in the middle of the most beautiful country in the world and my excitement level goes up a bit! The pools were so relaxing and felt especially great after having been in that cold river water. Poor Geoff had been hiking on a bum knee the whole time so we were hoping the pools would also have healing powers haha.
Unfortunately, we could only spend about an hour in there since we had to leave time to hike back, but it sure was a wonderful hour. We had some nice views on the way back too…
So this particular trip didn’t go exactly as planned. That’s life. And in the end, all I have are good, fun memories of it.
You know, I wouldn’t mind getting lost in New Zealand right about now…
More April Adventures to come!
Being late always raises my temperature but it is really all self imposed and if we could learn to take what where we are as it is we wake up beside a nice lake with mist wafting over the still waters!
Great camp to the springs and oh would love to hot tub in NZ baby!
Sometimes I still think of you as being gone since I’m gone now. You still blogging about this makes me wonder if you actually are back in the states or only a few hours flight away!