Putting the NZ back in GoNZo

« Return to New Zealand

And so it came to pass that I stood amidst a great glacier, as grand as time itself, my nuts frozen to my leg and an icicle stalactiting from the tip of my nose. Franz Josef Glacier is truly remarkable for all sorts of exciting geological reasons, but also because it has birthed a tourist center, where folks of all budgets can explore the beautiful deep blue canyons of compressed ice. Although it rains 260 days a year, only idiots with one day to spare do it in “heavy rain”. There is no shelter, and the gear provided by the guiding company keeps you damp and smelly, and once those socks are wet, well, that’s when little piggy cries all the way back to the frostbite hotel. Last time I strapped on crampons a volcano was toying with the idea of erupting underneath me. This time, given an overly civilized approach to litigation, the guide was carving steps on flat strips of ice in case we forgot how to walk, all the while imploring us to hang on to ropes instead of simply trudging forward. It took 5 hours when it should have taken two, and normally nobody minds much because you get to spend more time in a winter fairytale. Normally it doesn’t rain like frozen bullets falling on your head. But my pictures of ice-hiking on Franz Josef save the day, and how quickly we forget discomfort in the quest for pictures to make your friends jealous. It’s not every day you explore a glacier. Next time I’ll skip the excruciatingly slow step making, and hitch a helicopter straight to the top.

My adventures aboard the Stray Bus concluded, I hopped aboard the Atomic Shuttle to Queenstown, driving through the Southern Alps and along the turquoise waters of Lake Wanaka. This was true Lord of the Rings country, and if you’re a little Frodo-obsessive, special tours can take you to the locations. Queenstown is traditionally the activity capital of New Zealand, but seeing as Rotorua provided a more than able substitute, I was only going to spend a day in town, connecting with Gabi, a friend from Vancouver who I had last seen in Prague. It reminded me instantly of Whistler. Wooden shops selling candy in jars, clothing boutiques in faux-wood cabins, expensive restaurants. The glacier-fed lake was sparking, I hand-fed some gulls, looked across the Remarkables mountain range, and cursed Norway. As beautiful as Queenstown is, all I could see was Grouse Mountain, looming over Stanley Park. Is this a sign that after fifty weeks, I am finally homesick? I thought about flying-by-wire, but the idea of doing nothing for the first day in two weeks seemed a better choice. Beers, good Italian, more beers, good Indian, a spot of shopping for a future nephew/niece, more beers, play time with Cocco the Alaskan Malamute at the wonderful Last Resort backpackers, and it was time to fly back to Auckland and put the exhausted lid on New Zealand.

Country number twenty-two. A beautiful land of diverse landscape. Lush, fertile, friendly. When the Maori ancestors arrived in this isolated land 8th century on their canoes, they had arrived in the Garden of Eden. Sadly, only10% of indigenous bush remains today, and several fascinating species have fallen into a dark hole and are never coming back. But these islands, the last great undiscovered land to be brutally commercialized, is still a land of plenty, with more than enough to wealth and bounty for Maoris, Europeans, and snap-happy tourists. More activities than a kindergarten, more sheep than the dreams of a continent - New Zealand put the NZ back in Modern Gonzo. Now it’s time to chase the sun in the French Pacific, put some colour back in my skin, and prepare for the inevitable: the finish line of my 12 month round the world adventure.

Air New Zealand Flight 72
32,000ft over the Pacific

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