Adventures in Queenstown

After we finished our shortened version of the Routeburn Track, we headed straight to the airport to pick up Erik's sister, Carlie, who would be joining us for our last week in New Zealand. Unfortunately Carlie's bag did not make it with her, so we altered our plans for the next 24 hours in order to wait for her luggage to arrive. That night we had dinner at Fergburger, a place that Aussies and Kiwis rave about. Our burgers were good, but maybe a bit overrated considering we grew up in a country that knows how to do burgers! We stayed at Adventure Queenstown Hostel, where we spent the evening hanging out on the deck enjoying views of The Remarkables, a mountain range near Queenstown.

Carlie really wanted to bungy jump in Queenstown (home of the original bungy jump...which Erik did back in 2002 when he spent 6 weeks traveling around NZ), but due to recent weather (the crazy rain that caused us to modify our Routeburn Track hike), bungy jumping was not running. The Shotover Jet, a jet boat that is another popular "adventure" activity in Queenstown (the home of adventure activities!), was not running due to high water level, but they were hoping to start running the boats at 11am. We decided to give it a go even though there were warnings for people with head, neck, and back injuries due to the rough conditions. Our driver, Quinn, did a great job of making sure that we had fun on the Shotover. It helped that we had seats towards the front/side, so that when we went flying through the narrow canyon we felt like we were going to hit the rock walls while speeding by in the jet boat. My favorite part was the 540 degree turns that soaked us with water, of which Quinn did quite a few!

We spent the afternoon enjoying Queenstown before heading to the airport to pick up Carlie's bag, which arrived on the same flight she did, just a day later! At that point, we started our drive towards Milford Sound. The drive towards Milford provided us with breathtaking mountain views! Once we got close to Milford Sound, we started looking for a DOC campsite with available sites. There were a few along the way, but unfortuately we were finding that many were closed, again due to the recent heavy rains. Finally we found a site, Cascade Creek, that was a bit busy but certainly got the job done.

Gorgeous views of mountains and Lake Wakatipu!

Views approaching the Milford Sound area.

I had a slight obsession with these flowers at our campsite.

Time for some sibling bonding!

Ironically we ended up running into the two American guys who we met during our night of camping on the Routeburn Track. Small world! That night it rained A LOT. Thunderstorms, lightning, and heavy rain plagued our night of camping. Erik and I woke up to lots of rain in our tent. Carlie, fortunately, stayed dry. Despite the rain, we charged on to Milford, where a day of kayaking on Milford Sound awaited us!

Christmas at "the Prom"

Merry Christmas! Technically Christmas is over here, as we are well into the 26th, known as Boxing Day in Australia. Boxing Day is similar to Black Friday in that most stores have massive sales, and Boxing Day is also known for a big cricket match held in Melbourne every year at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG). This year we woke up in a tent on Christmas morning, the last of three nights spent backcountry camping in Wilsons Promontory National Park, affectionately known as "the Prom" to Australians (in case you were wondering, Australian secondary schools do not have "proms" like we have in the States, so no confusion there). We have been wanting to check out the Prom for a while, but it is a good three hour drive from Melbourne, so I thought it would be good to dedicate more than a weekend to exploring the area.

We did not get a very early start on Saturday morning, as it had been a busy week of finishing up work before a long holiday for Erik on top of lots of Christmas parties to attend for both of us (the Aussies do not mess around when it comes to Christmas parties!). Originally we had planned on a 7am departure, but we missed that by a few hours! At any rate, we arrived at the Prom in the early afternoon hours to be greeted with lush green forests and beautiful beaches.

This is the first time I have ever seen an emu on a sign. The bottom animal is a wombat, which we were hoping to see on this trip but we were not so lucky. We did see a few "sleeping" wombats on the side of the road, but those don't count!

Upon arrival, we ate lunch and took the free park shuttle up to the top of Telegraph Saddle, where we would begin a "short" hike to our accommodation for the night. Our hike that day was about 12 kilometers, or 7.5 miles, mostly downhill with a little bit of climbing towards the end. We camped at a backcountry site called Roaring Meg, conveniently located next to a freshwater stream. On Sunday, we got an early start, as we had 24 kms (15 miles) to hike that day. I have to take the blame on setting such ambitious distance goals for each day, because the way that I generally convert kms to miles is to cut them in half. Clearly that is NOT a good way to calculate, because three extra miles is a lot when you've already walked 12! The tracks that day were filled with lots of ups and downs, a visit to a lighthouse, some nice coastal scenery, much-needed rest stops, walks through towering forests, and numerous wildlife encounters.

Our first view of the lighthouse

You can actually stay in cottages on the lighthouse grounds instead of camping, but you still have to hike to the lighthouse to get there, as there are no roads within the park in this area.

Look how well this blue-tongued lizard blends into the walkway!

The lighthouse from the "other" side 

Stepping foot onto Waterloo Bay beach...still a few more hours of hiking to go at this point!

We crossed several gorgeous beaches during our four days of trekking.

Once we arrived at Refuge Cove, our campsite for the second night, we plopped down our bags and immediately headed into the ocean for a bit of relief from our long day of walking. This campsite was probably the nicest of our trip...lots of towering trees to sleep under, a minute or two walk to the beach, and only two other tents besides ours in the area.

Our campsite at Refuge Cove was just beyond the sand and into the trees.

We were slow to start on Monday morning given our big hike the day before, but we still had a good 16 kms (10 miles) to walk in order to get to our campsite for that night. The first two hours of hiking were backtracking along part of the walk we had done on Sunday, but the last few hours were mostly easy miles across flat, sandy tracks, bringing us to Oberon Bay, where we would spend Christmas Eve. Unfortunately the weather was not as nice on Monday, so it was a bit cool during the evening hours, but on Christmas morning we woke up to sunshine and warmer air, ensuring that we could get in a Christmas morning swim.

Little Waterloo Bay

On Christmas morning we had about 8 km (about 5 miles) to hike in order to get back to our car. The views on this hike were some of the best of our trip, so it was a pretty easy few hours of walking. Once we arrived back to where we started, we quickly changed into our swimwear and headed out into the ocean for a quick dip!

Oberon Bay. Our campsite was at the far end of the beach.

Brothers!

Hiking down to Little Oberon Bay

Little Oberon Bay

Blue water and blue sky!

The boys returning from their swim in the ocean at Norman Beach

Overall, we had a great trip to the Prom, as it is set up well for hike-in camping. The backcountry sites have water access (though you need to be able to filter/treat the water) and most have basic long drop toilets. Despite my full-on itinerary of hiking, I think everyone in our party had a good time. It was our first encounter with snakes in Australia (except for the one I saw running last year), and fortunately all of the snakes that we came across retreated quickly and were not interested in being close to us. We are not sure exactly what types of snakes they were, but we determined one was probably a tiger snake given its appearance and their presence in the Prom. No koalas, wallabies, or kangaroos in our campsites this time though, only possums trying to eat our food! We did see a few wallabies and kangaroos along our hikes, one particular exciting moment when we saw a joey who was a bit startled by us and then jumped head first into her mom's pouch. Pretty cool! This was my longest hike-in camping experience and while it certainly is easier to hike without carrying everything on your back, I think the chance to access places that take a bit more "work" to get to is a nice reward for a hard day of hiking!

Freycinet National Park

The drive from Tasman National Park to Freycinet National Park is filled with beautiful scenery. The road winds up into the hills and along a river before being exposed to the stunning coastline of the Tasman Sea.

Spiky Bridge, built by convicts in the mid 1800's

Beware of wildlife so strong that it can lift your car!

Once arriving in Freycinet National Park (pronounced Fray-sin-ay), we secured a campsite at Richardson's Beach. This site was actually closer to the beach than our site the night before, but there were fewer waves because the waters are more protected by land. Regardless, another sweet place to pitch a tent for $13!

A little after midday, we set out to hike the Mt Amos track. Mt Amos is part of the granite mountains (also known as the Hazards) which tower above the water, providing spectacular views. The hike required rock scrambling for much of the way up (for this reason it cannot be hiked in wet or rainy conditions...so fortunately for us it wasn't raining) and is very steep in portions, but the end result is extremely rewarding!

The large beach on the right is Richardson's Beach, where we camped.

Getting closer to the top...

...to be rewarded with this amazing view! Can you spot Erik in this picture?

Self-portrait thanks to the timer, because we were the only people at the top!

The way down was just as challenging if not harder than the way up!

After the Mt Amos hike, we decided to tackle the Wineglass Bay track so that we could actually put our feet in those waters we had seen from above. That hike is much less challenging, but still hilly, as it takes you up to a lookout point before descending to the water below. Our friend Andrew had told us that we must swim in Wineglass Bay despite the fact that it would be freezing cold. Only one of the Hansons was crazy enough to attempt that and it was NOT me!

I think that could be Mt Amos in the background

A quick dip in Wineglass Bay

Don't let the smile fool you...he was freezing!

Gorgeous stretch of beach!

Look who was waiting at our car when we returned from our hike!

At that point it was dinner time, so we drove a few minutes into the "town" of Coles Bay, where we found one restaurant open for dinner at 7pm. The place was called Tombolo, and they had a wood fired pizza oven, so we tried the night's special, a smoked salmon (Tasmanian salmon, of course!) pizza. The food was quite good and the employees were all very nice, and I would certainly go there again if we ever make it back to Coles Bay. We headed back to the campsite for the night, where we made friends with our neighbor, an Aussie from Melbourne who was just beginning a three week trip around Tassie. He generously shared beers with us (Iron Horse, a local Tasmanian Brewery) while we all enjoyed a gorgeous sunset.