TRIP INFO BOX

Around 105Km north of Manaus on the BR174, we visit Presidente Figueiredo.

The initial impression is a tranquilo town , though with rather terrible hostels. Almost ready to leave the town for somewhere else, we finally find Pousada Das Pedras (50BRL/dbl + fridge, kitchen, parking, breakfast) – a price which we negotiate for a number of days stay with the owner Fernando.

Das Pedras is excellent. Fernando has set up the place like a jungle lodge, all with local heavy wood furniture and scattered all over are his collected antiques, which he is locally well known for. And then there’s his dog, named Fidel – lol!

A heart-breaking incident at 80Km/h…

As this moth flew by we had to duck not to get clipped for fear of concussion…

We spend a number of days exploring the area by moto and it’s truly amazing! Waterfalls, rivers, caves, crystal clear and pure as nature. Most of these locations are waylaid and off the main tourist path, so we often find we have the entire attraction all to ourselves. Fantastic!

There are even a large dam and hydro plant, which we get a little tour of, thanks to a lovely young lady named Maria, an employee there who showed us around. (They do have tours at certain times during the week but we weren’t there during any of these, so we were lucky.)

Das Pedras has an amazing kitchen, which we’re permitted to use, so every other evening we cook up a storm like we’re chefs in a classy hotel. The other evenings we spend lazing in plastic garden furniture, eating char-grilled chicken or beef skewers at the street-side restaurants in the village centre, while watching the nation-gripping soap opera Salve Jorge (which we were introduced to during our BR319 stint).

Refreshments on the way home….

Breakfasts are included at Pousada Das Pedras and always an experience. Every morning, besides the strong, sweet Brazilian coffee and maize cake, is an assortment of Amazonian fruits we’ve never seen before – interesting, healthy and delicious!

The Argentinians we met in Manaus meet us in PF a few days later.

We spend a few more days in the area with Max and Erica, swimming in waterfalls, exploring the area and getting to know each other a bit better. Erica and Max made some money building properties down Patagonia way and decided to do something adventurous: so now they’ve rode all the way up the Brazilian coast line to get here, and they will continue on all the way to Alaska. Seeing we’re going the same direction we decide to ride on together, at least to the Brazilian-Venezuelan border.

One day, riding out to one of the waterfalls, it starts to rain so heavily that we park up under a little shelter by the road side, where I get introduced to a cashew nut tree. Now of course I’d eaten cashew nuts before but never had I imagined the fruit (edible) to be so odd-looking! Also, I learn the hard way that the bean beneath, which contains the cashew nut, is filled with a strong chemical best not touched, because the resulting burns will leave you with a scar.

It must be said that the area surrounding Presidente Figueiredo is some of the most beautiful we’ve ever seen! There are literally dozens of waterfalls, one more beautiful than the other, secluded in lush jungle, pure amazonian water flowing through – magical! (But beware, some of them are hard to find and hard to get to!)

One of the waterfalls we visit is very close to the pousada but lost beyond a series of mud tracks in tall jungle. It’s such a slush through the clay to get there we get flash-backs of the BR319 – really traumatizing. I drop the bike about three times, blistering my legs up on the hot exhaust… (don’t ride there in your swimming cozzie next time!)

Max and I spend some time chatting with the owner Fernando. He’s an interesting character. Descendant of a wealthy Italian family in the textile business, his passion for motorbikes landed him testing motorbikes for the Honda factory. He tells of his adventures, spending six months at a time, riding the new motorcycle models thousands of kilometres down the Brazilian coast, getting up to all sorts of mischief. Until he unfortunately had too much fun racing down a road, looking backward, and ended up stopping very hard and breaking a whole lot of bones…

On one of our outings I manage to reel in a beautiful Amazonian river fish which went into a good meal that night…. very exciting at the time, but when nothing else took my bait thereafter I was left with a guilty conscience, wondering about whether I’d terminated the only Amazonian river fish living in these parts. I wish I had thrown him back. But then how could I know he didn’t have loads of friends?

On the evening before we plan to depart I try to withdraw money from one of the two banks in town. The ATMs fail to dispense any money, first giving the message “communication failure…”, however the third time I try I get the message “insufficient funds…”. I rush back to the Pousada and spend a hour on their useless USB-key-WiFi system to connect to our Kalixa online banking system, to find that our cash card account has been overdrawn (by my recent failed transactions) by about 600GBP! Something that should not even be possible!!!

What’s more: my cash card provider doesn’t see this as their problem and tells me I need to top up the account balance before I can continue using it! The last time we had a problem like this was in Santiago, Chile, with Kalixa cancelling Ebru’s card due to a suspected “security compromise” – nonsense!

Luckily Erica worked in a bank before and together we go to the branch the next morning. Her Spanish and Portuguese work a lot better than mine and she manages to convince the Banco Brazil staff – first reluctant to do anything – to give us print-out confirmation of the failed transactions from the ATMs, as well as time-stamped photo snapshots of me doing the transactions the previous night.

With these documents – though it still takes a painstaking email process with my card provider – we manage to get my provider to reverse the transactions and refund all incorrect charges. Thanks a lot Erica!!

Did I mention that we planted trees for our Brazilian Planting Around the World mission here? Click here for details…

Have you ever heard the story of the international flight which was recalled to gate and held for about half an hour because a passenger thought there was a screw loose on the port side wing? Well that’ll have been our flight out of Auckland.

Sitting in the plane, Ebru at the window seat as usual, the plane slowly taxiing towards the runway, I look out of the window and notice something unusual… surely not! That couldn’t possibly be a screw sticking out of the wing?? The hostesses are going through the safety brief (ironic, come to think of it). I am loathe to interrupt them on account of this, since it may well be a sensor on the wing or something I haven’t seen before. Besides, how likely that it’s a loose screw? And the consequences…

We’re getting close to take off and the safety brief is still running, so I decide it’s time to get the stewardess’s attention. I show her a blown-up image on my camera and point out of the window. She disappears, the chief hostess appears, borrows my camera and returns a minute later with a guy in a white collar and shoulder emblems. He disappears, the plane stops. We wait.

Look again: close up image of the loose screw…

An announcement that we’re returning to the gate to check “some procedures” and the plane reverses. Parked at the gate, eventually a man in a glow-jacket shows up with a ladder. He sets it to the wing, mounts the engine, leans over and produces a huge screw driver…

Eventually the captain comes on the intercom system and explains that a passenger pointed out a loose screw on the wing, a problem which has been rectified and we’re now ready to take off. Some passengers start clapping and some in my vicinity congratulate me, saying I could have saved many lives and I should be put up in business class, etc. (I don’t think it’s really that serious but hey, you never know.)

The chief hostess took my details and I did eventually get an email from LAN in Spanish, saying something to the effect that a case has been opened. I review the case number on their online system – under investigation. I’m curious. A couple of weeks later I check the case again – case closed. Oh well, I guess it should suffice that I arrived at my destination in one piece!

……………..

We leave Australia with fond memories and are loaded with excitement and, to be honest, a measure of fear as we anticipate the beginning of a completely new adventure through South America. We have travelled long and hard, through some of the poorest places in the world, and so should be mentally prepared for any situation we may face. But of course, having heard some stories about places in South America and seen films like “City of God”, we’re not sure what to expect.

Given the unusual situation before take off and our departure from another piece of the globe, we decide to make the best of it, have a few drinks and get merry.

In the back galley we talk a bloke called Alan, a farmer from Australia. His story gives you a good example of how big business functions in this day and age:

He used to have hundreds of cattle and get a decent price for his meat, selling to butcheries across the country. Since the overwhelming domination of the main supermarkets, it has become more difficult for him to continue this business.

The main supermarkets in Australia, Coles and Woolworths (both American owned) lobbied the government to pass laws about whom farmers can sell their meat to and at what price. Now Alan can sell his beef for only a mere 89c/Kg of steak, namely to the big supermarkets. Woolworths and Coles buy the beef at this cheap price and export it to buyers in Asia. They then re-import it to so they can sell it for $17/Kg in the supermarkets. – Is it any wonder that most people on earth live in dire straits?

Alan has since given up cattle farming.  Morevoer, he tells us that, since the mining boom in Australia, his farmland could now be confiscated at any time if they decided it was a good mining prospect.

Beware the trojan horse called “Globalization”.

We stop at the Mangahuia camp (DOC) site which is right near the Whapapa village. In the village we go to the Tonariro Holiday park and book a shuttle bus to transport us to and from the start and end points of the spectacular “Tongariro Alpine Crossing” trek.

We’ve done a few treks on the South island, some quite challenging, but the distance on this one is about 19.4km – about double the distance we’ve walked so far. I’ve done a good few walks of this calibre before and I’m curious how Ebru will cope.

The day arrives and our weather forecast is fantastic. We take the 7AM shuttle and we’re quite pleased to see that not too many others are starting off at this time, which should give us more peace to enjoy the scenery.

The scenery is breathtaking – a barren wasteland of volcanic activity. There are at least 5 caldera in close proximity and the walk takes you right between a number of them. The view of Mount Ngaruhoe is incredible! It’s a free-standing cone of about 2300 metres; have I mentioned that this is still active? They have a couple of signs along the way telling you what to do in case of an eruption – you know, descend as quickly as possible, preferably along some of the safer ridges – HA! Given the distances involved I wouldn’t expect to be returning home in case of an eruption, period! That’s just an accepted risk as far as I’m concerned.

Further along you walk by the Yellow Crater (which is yellow) and the Red Crater (which is red and steaming).

And nearby there are some dazzling volcanic lakes; the Emerald lakes being emerald green and boiling with sulphuric gas, and the Blue Lake which is not as blue as we expect (could be the cloud cover at the moment) but it’s still beautiful.

Worth noting (for those going there, who fail to read the notes in their guide books) is that this is considered a holy site by some and eating by or swimming in the lake are considered disrespectful.

Much more disrespectful in my opinion are those imbeciles who go around dropping their used tissues all over the place – stay at home, you do not belong on a mountain! (And of course I could strangle certain parents who don’t supervise their little brats and let them kick big rocks down scree runs and cliffs with no consideration whether there’s anyone receiving the avalanche below.)

Those rants aside, we have a wonderful day and the views and tremendous. We reach the end of the trail exhausted. Ebru is in pain and promising never to attempt this again, but she’s made it almost blister free and she’s put up a splendid performance in her less-than-ideal walking boots. No doubt the hiking bug will return to her once she sees the Andes.

Further North we visit the Wai-O-Tapu Park and other geothermal features.

Hot water beach is especially fun, where you can shovel yourself a little thermal bath all for yourself (good luck).

As well as some impressive water features around Kaimanava Forest Park.

In Auckland we visit my Sensei Keith from back home, whom I haven’t seen in over 10 years. They generously put us up in a room and for a whole week we’re graced with excellent company and nice communal dinners, quite nice after eating alone for several weeks.

As an added bonus, Keith has set up a workshop in his garage and he introduces me to the basics of wood turning and knife making, which are his latest hobbies. It’s really interesting and fun and makes me long for the time I’ll set up my own base with a good little workshop to keep me out of trouble.

Whilst here, we also meet Gordon Pembridge, an artist of note. We go around to visit one day have the opportunity to see him progress one of his art works in his workshop. Gordon has a background in the more commonly known skills such as painting, but has since become a keen wood turner, and the work he produces requires a level of skill not many people have achieved.

Have a look at his web site to get an idea (http://www.timberly.co.nz/gordon_gallery.htm). The wooden bowls shown are turned FREE HAND down to about a milimetre thickness! He then grinds and carves them with such delicacy that the end product is about as fragile as an egg shell. No wonder they fetch astonishing amounts at galleries worldwide. We feel honoured to have seen this master at work.

We spend the final few days in Auckland doing our online chores, planting more trees for our Planting Around the World mission, and enjoying the company of the Fords. I’m pleased to say that we even took some time to do some training together for the first time in 11 years. After our time here among Keith and Company, we come away even more inspired to go out there put our hands and brains to use in a creative manner.

To Keith and Family: we extend our gratitude to you for taking us into your home and making us feel welcome. I look forward to our next encounter and hope that it won’t be another 11 years before we meet again! Travis, thanks for your bed, take care, keep your head on straight and good luck with Oz. Samantha, good luck with graduation and work life, and remember, people aren’t all as mad as you may think

Location: Hunua Falls Reserve, Auckland, North Island, New Zealand.

This magical spot in the Hunua Reserve is now home to three more indigenous trees, planted on our Planting Around the World mission. Naturally, we had to plant a tree in New Zealand as part of our visit, but not to forget, we still owe one to Vanuatu.

Actually we decided to plant three trees. One for Vanuatu, one for New Zealand and another just in case we end up in a situation in South America where we don’t manage to plant one. (Or if this doesn’t occur then we’ve planted one extra.)

Since Mother’s Day this month, we also named after and dedicated these three trees to our mothers (one of them of course being our GRAND mother).

On the East side of the river, sits Zuhal (Alectryon Excelsus / commonly known as Tītoki):

On the West, Jennifer (Alectryon Excelsus):

And on the East side at the base of the waterfall, Esme (Beilschmiedia Tarairi / Taraire):

Happy Mother’s Day to you!!!

And thank you New Zealand, for showing us another beautiful piece of our planet. Your nature conservation efforts are outstanding. We hope that our small contribution is appropriate.

We’ve landed in Christchurch airport, it’s midday. The air con temperature in the plane was turned quite low and it seems this is no different in the terminal, where we go through the friendly immigration and quarantine procedures. We spend an hour or two looking for camper van deals with the agents directly at the air port, as well as online, using the 60 minute access scratchcard we bought (bought!) here. We have some problems contacting the hire companies: some aren’t in the position to deal with me as it’s Sunday and there’s no staff on hand; others only offer an 0800 contact number and for some reason my newly purchased Vodafone connection tells me I’m “unable to connect to” some of these “from your current location”. Whatever that means… Either way I can’t wait to get out of this terminal because it’s bloody freezing in here!

If we want to get going today we’re forced to go with the best deal we can find, which is with ExploreMore, one of the air port agents. The price is very reasonable (NZ$43.5/day) and there will be no $200 fee for returning the van in Auckland. The part we’re not happy with though, is that (unless you pay the additional daily excess waiver fee) they will debit the insurance excess ($3500) directly from my account, so be refunded once the car is returned in good order. Hmmm. I wonder whether this is a smart ploy to make interest on customers’ hard earned money while they’re exploring the country (and paying additional interest in the $3500 hole in their credit card account)? They do say they do this because they’re not able to do a card verification – one of those that hold a potential for them to debit the fee if needed but don’t actually take it until then – apparently not possible in NZ, but I find out that for some the competitors here this doesn’t seem to be a problem at all. Strange, don’t you think?

Anyway, we head off to their depot to look at the van and so on – it turns out the same company owns ExploreMore, Maui, Britz, Backpackers; the difference is that once a car/van reaches a certain age it’s transferred to a different sub-company and rented at a lower price (ExploreMore being the most budget of the lot).

A low price camper with a few hundred thousand on the clock is not a problem for us if it’ll get us around cheap, but the ensuing conversation with the staff member on hand is rather off-putting: he doesn’t seem to have a clue about anything. (These people don’t even read their own T&C document?) For any question we put to him he has no clear answer – sometimes you can see he’s making assumptions.

“So if I’m liable for a burst tyre, how do you proceed if I break a tyre? What’ll that cost me?”
“I’m not sure about that..”
“More or less?”
“Other companies I spoke to will get a quote from two companies and provide me that information when they charge me for the damages.”
“Oh we have a list for all standard items covering replacement costs.”
“Can I see that list?”
“Oh sure, just a wait here moment….” [returns] “It’s about $200.”
“Could I have a look at this list?”
“Well, we don’t really have a list…”

The last nails in the coffin for this deal is in the contract fine print regarding vehicle damage: “customer liable for all damages up to excess limit …. liable for cost of repairs to the damages as well as the daily rental fee for the time the car is out of service during repairs…”

Needless to say we walk out, and a few minutes later we’re waiting at a bus stop to head into town and find a hostel. As we stand there in shorts and flip flops with the wind blowing over us, the reality sinks in: it’s actually bloody cold out here! Worse than in the airport terminal! Out come the longs and socks and jackets, and as we wait the 20 minutes or so for the bus to arrive, dull memories of English winters surface. After 8 months in 30-plus degrees, we are not physically, nay, nor mentally equipped to deal with this climate. We both get rather melancholy and talk about perhaps curtailing our stay in NZ and either making a bee line for Chile or heading back to Southeast Asia.

We get a Thai takeaway and spend a night sniffling and shivering in “At The Right Place” hostel on Bealy Ave, quite central. The place is quite pleasant really, as are the staff, but we’re just not used to this temperature anymore. (How did we ever…?)

The next day we manage to contact a few more companies and find a great deal with Happy Campers (same company as Kiwi Campers). For $48/day we have a well equipped vehicle, there’s no alternate location drop-off fee, the insurance excess is lower and they won’t take it off my card unless there’s a claim. Aside from that all the details look very reasonable and flexible enough, and the owner, Kevin, seems like a good chap to deal with. The bonus is that because the last camper of the type he quoted us for has just been hired he gives us an upgraded (Kiwi Camper) one at the same rate! And so the New Zealand adventure begins!

We first head SouthWest to Highway 72 to get on the Inland Scenic Route.

This is a good decision as it takes us through some spectacular scenery of mountain ranges and endless flat planes.

In the evenings we generally stop at rest stations or camp sites which are free of charge, or Department Of Conservation (DOC) camp sites, which usually cost about $6/pp and have running water. Every now and again, generally when our camera or laptop batteries are empty, we fork out more for a night on a holiday park camp site with electrical hookups, hot showers and laundry facilities.

Ebru proudly presents Turkish Campervan Kofte in New Zealand 

One night we meet a young German couple on a rest stop, Anja and Andreas. There’s nobody else around in this deserted park and we invite them over for a couple of drinks. It’s a fun night and we consume more beer than intended. They’ve been travelling here for a few weeks already and give us some tips on where to go on the North Island later on.

A beautiful sunrise the next morning

Highlights on this leg are camping at the great lakes Tekapo and Pukaki en route to the Mount Cook National Park. These lakes are spectacular, with clear blue water and majestic mountains on the horizon.

Next morning we decide to take a dip in lake Tekapo, since we’re in dear need of a shower. The water is painfully cold, but it’s so nice to get a wash after a few days that it’s actually refreshing, and it becomes a regular practice for us.
Taking a dip in the freezing mountain lakes and streams turns out to be our recurring theme here…

Mount Cook is the highest peak in NZ and it’s beautiful. Unfortunately, on the afternoon when we arrive in the village at its base, the weather is overcast and after doing an hour of the walking track to the glacier we turn back and decide to move on the next morning. However, the next morning while I’m preparing some coffee I notice some commotion outside as people are scrambling to get their cell phones out and point them towards the mountains.

When I look outside I see the clouds have lifted and the peaks are brightly visible on a perfectly clear morning. We can’t miss this opportunity so we delay our departure and go trekking up to the glacier.

It’s a beautiful walk and we get some fantastic views of Mt Cook and the glacier lake. (We plan to take a dip in it but our courage deserts us this time.)

From here we hear back out coastwards via the 83 past Oamaru, on to the number 1 to Moeraki where we spend 2 nights on a beautiful fully serviced camp site (Moeraki Holiday Park), doing our laundry, doing our Internet stuff and spoiling ourselves with daily showers and ample power, we can even run our little in-car heater to keep us warm.

Continuing South past Dunedin, the Southern Scenic Route begins and takes us all the way by Kaka Point, Nugget Point, Curio Bay and Slope Point, the Southernmost point of NZ.

We see some of the most beautiful coastline along the way, as well as some wildlife you don’t see in may places, such as seals, sea lions and penguins. At Curio Bay there’s a fossilized forest which has been uncovered by sea erosion and you can actually see huge petrified tree stumps from about 150mil years ago laying there in the rock.

The coast was nice, but the trekking fever has got us now and it’s time to head back into the mountains. We’re now in the SouthWest Fjordlands of NZ which offers some unbelievably beautiful natural scenery. We decide to drive up along the beautiful lake Te Anau and up to Milford Sound, one of the well known fjords in these parts.

Just in time, we realize we’re going the Wong Way…

Knowing that camping facilities in Milford Sound are limited and expensive, we camp about 130km before Milford Sound at the DOC site Cascade Creek, a beautiful site right at a river bank. It’s paradise here! The mountains surround us, the mountain stream is right there for refreshing dips – especially important after a long day’s walk – and in the evenings we light up a fire and braai some succulent NZ meat – and it is damn fine here I assure you.

Loving the humour in a Milford Sound pub toilet

We also do the challenging Gertrude Valley trek up to the Gertrude Saddle. It takes about 3 hours each way and vertical ascent is only about 1km, but the terrain is rough, steep and rocky. We are lucky to have a clear day and the view from the top is superb! The fjord valley stretches out below you with steep, jagged  peaks either side, and in the distance you can see the waters of the Tasman Sea coming into Milford Sound.

Queenstown is the next stop. Based at lake Wakatipu, New Zealand’s longest lake, the approach is a beautiful winding road along the side of the lake, with mountains on the horizon in every direction. Queenstown is a nice little town, rather reminiscent of ski areas alpine Europe, but of course quite busy and crowded compared to the places we’ve been hanging out. Also it’s correspondingly expensive and since we’re not here to fork out hundreds of NZ-dollars for adrenaline sports, we satisfy ourselves with a night on a powered camp site, a good steep walk up Queenstown Hill and a good evening of Guinness (brewed in Christchurch but still good) and Irish music in Pog Mahone’s Irish pub.

If you drive along the banks of the lake out past Queenstown you get to Glenorchy (did I mention a lot of place names down here sound very Scottish?). It’s a treacherous road, narrow and full of bends next to steep drop-offs into the lake, but spectacularly beautiful.

We camp out at the Kinloch DOC camp site which is wonderful. 8km down a gravel road, it’s right where the Dart River flows into Wakatobi, and the scenery here is stunning! The river is great for refreshing dips, sure to provide a teeth-chattering experience. Our night is once again spent at a bonfire with marinated chicken drumsticks and ember-baked potatoes and brussel sprouts and a good mixed for dinner.

Kendalf, Lord of the Spoon, casting fire spell upon dry wood…

We could get used to this kind of life. In fact, I would say we have become used to it.

The next day we follow the dirt track up toward a place called Paradise for a few kilometres. This is supposed to be some of the most stunning scenery in the country and has been used as the backdrop for many a film. However with the condition of the road and the number of streams we have to ford along the way in a rental van we decide to pass on this affair – we do get a few good photos though. Funnily, nearly all of the few cars that we come across on this track seem to have one thing in common: two young, well groomed, male passengers. We look at each other thinking, “Hmmm… Brokeback Mountain”?

We do stop at Lake Diamond, which is supposed to be very beautiful but I don’t find noteworthy at all. We head back past Queenstown and Wanaka, stopping at Arrowtown to look at the historical Chinese mining village there. Very interesting to see the conditions under which these people lived here so many years ago. And one great thing about New Zealand, I must say, is that in all of the national parks and sites that we’re visited they’ve got a good amount of information displayed to give you some background about what you’re looking at.

That night, we camp at the Pleasant Flat camp site several kilometres further North. It’s a long drive and we only park up there at about 8PM. It’s pretty small and it’s already almost full, but it’s lush and green and well maintained. And most importantly, it’s got fire places, so it’s marinated NZ rump steak on the braai tonight and that is something you just can’t beat!

After Pleasant Flat we drive up to visit the Fox and Franz Joseph glaciers. We’re now on the same latitude we were when we visited Mt Cook, but we’re on the other (Western) side of the range. At Fox we check out the guided glacier walks. They’re quite expensive ($109/pp half day; $159/pp full day) and for safety reasons there are no public tracks that you can walk independently. The weather forecast predicts overcast skies tomorrow and rain the day after, so we’re not so sure about forking out the cash. We take one of the short walks around the area and then set off to find a camp site Ebru has read about. It’s a DOC site and we’re not sure whether they allow camper vans there, but they apparently allow camp fires which is what we require for that other piece of rump. Although the approach road warns of gravel and fords, we see an old school bus enter and we follow, and get there without issues.

The camp site is behind the beach and you can hear roaring explosions and feel the tremors as the waves hit the shore. After dinner we go for a walk to check it out and it’s breathtaking! This is pebble beach but the pebbles are no smaller than fists and heads, and as the furious waves come crashing in on the steep embankment of the shore and dump tons of rock on rock, the sound is fearsome! I wouldn’t even dare dip my toes in this water for fear of getting minced. Some kids up the beach have made a huge bonfire with some of the driftwood. The driftwood itself is magnificent: it’s all over the beach and in form is large logs and roots heaved up here by the powerful tides.

Over all, the west coast on South Island is a marvel. I don’t recall seeing such a brutal onslaught of water on land. And in the grey, overcast, windy weather it’s all the more spectacular. As we’re touring along this part of the country we’re following a news story of a number of Chinese refugees docked in Australia in a fishing vessel, intent on sailing on to New Zealand (not keen on the prospect of staying in Australia and being banged up in an immigration camp for a few years). Allegedly they’re being urged to reconsider. After seeing this water I have to agree. (They did in fact reconsider in the end and make their asylum requests in Oz. Good luck to you.)

The next morning we do an independent walk up to the face of the Franz Joseph glacier. Fortuna smiles upon us and the weather turns out very pleasant, so we manage to get some good photos as well. This area receives the highest precipitation in NZ and therefore a mass of fresh snow feeds the glacier from the top constantly. But still, the glacier has receded many hundreds of metres up the valley over the last century, which is quite astounding to see as you walk through.

After the West coast of south island, unfortunately, the rest of the scenery Northwards becomes less and less noteworthy. And what’s worse, the wildfire risks here mean that it’s just about impossible to find a campsite with a fireplace – i.e. no BBQ

I think the highlight up here is Nelson, where we do some wine tasting at the Rock Ferry winery, and collect edible wild mushrooms near a pine forest.

And with that, we take leave of the South Island via ferry. There are two ferry operators (Bluebridge and Interislander) operating from Picton to Wellington, both of which operate a similar schedule and price list, but Bluebridge seems to be slightly cheaper. The journey costs us about NZ$235 (2 x 51 + 133 for the van).

We want to find a nice place by the sea, not too costly, and stay there a few days just to relax, snorkel, maybe do some scuba diving. We only have a couple of weeks so I don’t really want to be rushing around from one place to another. We do some research on the Internet and pick an outlying island that seems not too touristical.

We arrive at Nandi airport and take the public bus system straight to the nearest town, four hours drive, and super cheap.

Then there’s a drive by taxi, followed by a half hour boat ride to arrive at the island.

We have to stay in town one night as it’s not possible to get a boat today and besides that we have to do some food shopping for the next few days. We check out the accommodation in the centre – there seems only to be a single motel. I check it out – Ebru understands the look on my face when I exit, but she really has no idea of the things I saw in there…. makes me shudder to think of it.

A local taxi driver of Indian descent makes us aware of a better option and takes us there. It’s reasonably priced and we like it a lot. Its rooms are preserved as from the 1970s or 1980s – the carpet, the bed spread, the little FM radio integrated into the bedside table. It also seems to be a place where many local Fijians come to stay or dine (food’s really good), so there’s a really happy, smiley Fijian atmosphere going on here. We drink beer and swim at the swimming pool outside and converse with a couple (Fijian and an Aussie) here for a wedding. Awesome place.

There are many people here of Indian descent. It’s a bit like being back in India, except there’s so many Fijians around. Fiji, being a British colonial territory, was determined to be a suitable place for sugar cane cultivation. Indians were lured over to build the rain infrastructure (which they of course had plenty of experience in) and many remained here. It’s another thing that adds to the flavour of this country: the Fijians are cool, the Indians are cool, the country is cool…. perfect!

The next day we go grocery shopping and the taxi driver, whom we befriend the day before, takes us to the pier. A boat meets us, piloted by the trusty caretaker of the property Pravesh, who is, by the way, an expert fisherman! (Thanks for all the tips and bait mate!)

On the other side we arrive on one of the most heavenly little pieces of land ever created on this earth.

We stay in a lovely bungalow, called “Bure” locally, with kitchen and bathroom, a stone throw from the beach. Perfect for two.

There are no shops here, so our supplies we need to bring along from main land. Electricity (generator) only works from afternoon to about 10PM, and the drinking water is rain water collected in a large tank behind the Bure.

Our two weeks here represent our most vivid memories of tranquility, isolation, relaxation, just pure existence surrounded by beautiful nature alone.

We find a small resort on the other side of the island with an excellent diving instructor named Steve, a South African. With him we accomplish our PADI Advanced certifications, and, in the water, we see the most dramatic displays of sea-life yet – sharks, fish, coral caverns…. Impossible to give a just description.

And the underwater beauty is not only accessible from a diving boat. Almost daily we’re out for hours, snorkelling in the vast coral gardens accessible just 50 metres out from the beach. Literally like an expansive garden of flowers in every shape and tone, with all colours of sea-life hovering around. It doesn’t get more magnificent than this.

Of course I dedicate a lot of my time to my main addiction: fishing. And contrary to the results in other places to date, I actually catch a fair bit, and of an edible size!

And believe it or not, Ebru joins me!

So we have some lovely fish BBQs out in front of the Bure.

Thanks again Graeme!

In fact, probably the most impressive catch was off the back of the diving boat, trawling a line. Within 15 minutes I landed a 1 metre barracuda!

Oh, worth mentioning (if you find this place) that there is a food menu available here in the evenings, by pre-order, and dishes are prepared by Filo, the lovely Fijian lady who manages the place day to day. She makes a mean pizza, and other guests had nothing but praise for her cooking.

We meet a few interesting people as well. Jan pilots big freight ships through a major canal around Kiel in Germany – “Helmsman”, I think it is called – and he’s is here spending some quality with his special lady, who is a nurse and thus they lack this quality time back at home. He’s a awesome chap, full of life and humour, and he comes well prepared with a stock of the local 50% rum.

We spend some nights together, drinking beer and Cuba Libres and exchanging experiences from our travels. He has plenty of fascinating stories from his ship voyages around the world, during his time in the navy and working on research vessels. The best one of which must be the crazy story of when he and a few navy mates, stationed in the Caribbean, happened by chance upon an long-lost Spanish Galleon sunken 30 metres off the island coast, hundreds of years ago!

One weekend an Irish Priest and his accomplice, a Fijian missionary, come to visit. We spend a night in interesting discussion about biblical history, whilst taking part in a Cava ceremony – an intoxicating brew made with the powdered root of the pepper tree.

Talking of trees, we finally made some progress here with our Planting Around the World *L mission!

During our time – or time-out – on Fiji, the removal from work, routine and urban life really hits home in a big way. The experience is not that of a mere vacation any more. It’s becomes a state of meditation. If there was ever a specific state of mind I was looking for out here on the journey, I think this is it.

What better place for a tree to be, than in the heavenly sunshine of this precious little island of Fiji?

No nurseries around here, but that won’t stop us continuing on our mission. Tropical islands tend to go hand-in-hand with an abundance of coconuts. And coconuts come from the coconut Palm Tree!

Countries we still need to plant for are: Singapore, Vanuatu and here, Fiji.

Scattered on the beaches here it’s possible to find coconuts that have been moistened enough to germinate, but they lack a stable bed where they will not be swept up into the sea. We pick up a couple of these and find them a new home.

The first, for Singapore, we planted on land-edge of the beach directly opposite Dolphin Island, on the South-East tip.

The second (for Fiji) was planted in the Zen garden in the South-West.

This tree is named after and dedicated to Ebru’s brother Savaş. Savaş, of course you now have a duty to visit this point, but don’t worry that’ll be the easy bit. The difficult part will be having the will to leave.

What to say about Vanuatu?

In our case there’s not so much. We stay here for less than a week and spend the time on the island of Port Vila. This is not those main attractions elsewhere in the archipelago, and we do not visit them due to limited time, costly transport to get there, and forewarning of the high expense of being there. Port Vila it has to be, then.

Not cheap, this little place in the pacific. The cheapest accommodation we find is on a small hotel  in the centre (City Lodge), which gives us the double for 48VVU/night. It’s no great shakes but at least it’s reasonably clean and they have WiFi which works in the reception area. And the ladies as reception are really sweet, by the way.

Coconut Crab

Moving around the area is done in taxis or collective minibuses, which are not too costly. But beware the driver who will let you get in, having agreed a rate with you, and then stop at a petrol out of town, telling you a much higher rate for that destination because he’s not going there! – Kick him in the teeth, the bastard!

Three days we spend at a new resort – since it’s Ebru’s birthday I decide to do something special. It’s called Aquana Hotel, I find it on tripadvisor. The folks there are friendly and professional (as you’d expect for US$100/night). Though there’s not much choice on the pricey menu, the food is good. The atmosphere is quiet and relaxed. The bungalow is comfortable, modern and spacious and – just as we wanted – right at the beach.

Though this is where the problems begin: the beach is a recent manufacture (literally), thus not soft powder but more of a hard sand mound which extends into the sea. The sea is a channel between the beach and the island opposite, which (though pretty) obscures any view of the horizon. The resort offers swimming, snorkelling and kayaking, but this is possible only technically: the water is shallow and murky; the coral is dead; to avoid injury on submerged rock swimming is best restricted to the swimming pool; to kayak to the other side of the island (where you see the sea) takes tremendous effort due to the channel current and even there, in the clearer water, you have to snorkel out about 100 metres to see coral that looks a bit alive.

On the picture (i.e. tripadvisor) it looks nice, but…

Though we enjoy the comfortable accommodation immensely and the staff are amiable – sorry guys – this place is a disappointment! Once you’re there you’re stuck  – with nothing else in vicinity! Won’t be coming back for our anniversary.

We visit one little beach cerca the main town (Mele Bay), but we are not particularly impressed.

Thus we decide for rental of a scooter (approx US$40/day) from a local Frenchman, who has a shop just about a kilometre East up the main strip. The guy is cool and has no problems with us dropping off the bike at night after his shop has shut.

This is the best thing we do here. We do a trip right around the island and visit a few well known attractions which are pointed out in many tourist maps.

From the road you can see lush jungle and tantalizing stretches of pristine, virgin beaches beyond.

The highlight without doubt is the Blue Lagoon (yes Vanuatu has one too)!

This place is a piece of heaven. Crystal clear sweet water – so sweet you can actually taste it – laces its way through the jungle towards the sea, whilst well below the surface lies the level of salt water (heavier), creating a visual blur, until you actually poke your goggles into it. There are huge trees lining the shores with swinging ropes to launch yourself in with.

As you follow the channel out to sea you become surrounded by blue-grey volcanic rock, sharp and jagged, forming deep chasms and tunnels filled with fish and coral. It’s like diving through a beautiful piece of Emmenthaler cheese filled with clear water; from bubble to bubble, watching the sea life bloom around you. Magnificent!

BE WARNED: DO NOT GO WITHOUT YOUR DIVING MASK!

Another amazing thing to see around the island is the Banyan trees. Some of these are as wide as buildings – fat bunches of vine stretching down from the foliage with corridors winding between them. Very impressive!

And a good lunch – definitely the best meal we found on the island – to be had at Sara Beach.

With traditional musical accompaniment.

Other than that, Port Vila is nothing much to write home about (with all due respect). There’s not much going on, the night life is pretty dead, and good food seems not that easy to come by.

By and large people seem to be poor. Ladies at the central market (where you can get reasonably good food at reasonable prices) attend their fruit & veg stalls all day and all night, sleeping on the floor, often with their little children. Their husbands – as in the case of one of the ladies we spoke to – not employed or meagerly paid, unable to make ends meet to feed or send their kids to school. It’s rough! I think if the family don’t own a plot of land with enough to subsist they’re in a precarious position. Don’t know what it’s like on the other islands…

And driving around the island it seems quite clear what lies ahead: acres and acres of shoreline are neatly plotted out and up for sale – good holiday nests up for grabs for well-off Australians and New Zealanders. Why the hell not? – Though I’m not too sure how the locals will feel one day when they find out they’re now land-locked and still don’t have food to eat.

Just my perception.

One the up-side, if you’re looking for strong rum, you need look no further than here. I recommend any hard core traveller to carry a bottle of this with you as it’s not only good for drinking, but also disinfection and lighting fires!

Our point of entry in Australia is Sydney airport, where (after some flight delay) we are met by my good friend Andy.

We spend a week in this city, visiting attractions like Bondi Beach, Manly (very), the Maritime Museum, Sydney Harbour and other such.

It’s a city like any other in many respects, but there’s definitely a strong hint of London in the flavour, minus a good measure of hecticness, plus a healthy dose of beach-bum-sportiness.

People are indeed very sporty: everywhere people are jogging and cycling, but most predominantly, SURFING. Everybody’s surfing here! Kids line up for surf school in their blue wetsuits while teenagers and grown ups paddle their boards into the waves.

This seems to be the lifestyle here and I must admit I could get used to it. People are very friendly too. Everywhere we go people greet and are helpful. (But I have to say that for people that spend so much time in this beautiful outdoors there’s indeed worryingly little tan going around.)

Also, this place is expensive! Brace yourselves, even London can seem reasonable compared to here at times.

From Sydney we take a train trip up to the Blue Mountains, a beautiful nature reserve.

We spend the day trekking through the jungle and visiting impressive waterfalls.

We spend a lovely week with Andy and Tash in Paddington – no he does not live at the train station. We’re out during the day taking lots of photos, and back at their home for dinner in the evenings. I’m so glad to get to spend some time with my old buddy again.

Many thanks to both of you for putting us up so hospitably! About darned time we met again Andy and we cannot wait to greet you two at our place some day. I hope everything is working out and going well!

Australia: what a beautiful countrynent!

After Sydney we spend two weeks month in this place travelling around in a camper van, which I would recommend without doubt as the best way to travel here. The folks at Travellers Autobarn have very competitive rates and have a really good attitude.

There’s a few bits of good advice for this kind of trip:
1. Get your camper from a decent company like Travellers Autobarn
2. Avoid driving at night because you’re likely to collide with the abundant wildlife that heads for the streets after sunset
3. Take the CAMPER map book with you (they might have one at the camper hire to lend you): it locates most camp- and rest-sites in the country with all relevant info like charges, facilities, etc.

We cover 4000Km of road in this country and we hardly even see a fraction of it! It is MASSIVE!

We leave Sydney and travel North along the coast line.

Up here there’s many beautiful beaches, but without doubt, the most beautiful one for us must be the one at Seals Rock. Pure natural beauty!

The sand on this coastline is so fine it squeaks under your feet as you step.

The roads here seem to be leading us in constant circles: by now we’ve passed by Refuge Island a hundred times at least!

A few hundred Km further North I get tired of inching along the coast line and decide it’s time to see the desert! I remember seeing a map of Australia in the past – a big lump of brown with a few hints of green on the coastal fringes. On the map I see the Great Dividing Range extending straight up North, just a couple of hundred kilometres inland, and I know what we have to do: cross over these mountains which clearly divide the wet from the dry and meet the desert beyond!

The drive across the range is interesting. Lots of fog and S-bends and regular oncoming sections of the Moscow State Circus.

On the other side we’re greeted by flat bushland as far as the eye can see. No desert?? Clearly I must have miscalculated…

I must say that I feel at home here. The terrain reminds me a lot of the bushland in South Africa. And what’s more, it’s miles and miles of straight roads and hardly any traffic.

But of course that can be a bit dangerous as well. We pull over in the middle of nowhere, where some guy has run his car up the roadside-barrier – he fell asleep. Lucky bugger was alright, but his car was neatly teetering across the top of the barrier, not a soul in sight, the last house we saw about 10Km behind and it’s started to rain…

We spend one night at a lovely camp site at Tia Falls. It’s out of the way, right in the bush and just a short walk from a spectacular waterfall. Sadly no steak on the braai due to rain. But we’re well stocked with alternatives. It’s beautiful!

We do most of our camping at rest stops and free camp sites, except when we need an electric hookup to charge the laptop or phone.

Australia is awesome for this kind of travelling because most of these stops have fire places and out here the steak is some of the best that money can buy! Believe me!

By the way, here I have to say a big THANK YOU to my good buddy Graeme in England for giving me the ingenious gift of a portable BBQ!

It weighs about 2 kilos and I have been dragging it around the world in my backpack for six months waiting for an occasion to use it, and Australia has provided plentiful occasions! To  be honest I didn’t think it would last very long but his little device is genius! Easy to use, easy to clean, and always ready to perform whenever you need a braai out on the road somewhere.

Graeme you’re a legend!

We meet a guy named Chris and his dog Tess at one of the stops near a small river. He’s a retired construction engineer and spends several months a year travelling the country with his dog and his camper van. We sit at the fire and dine together one night and exchange some stories – a really nice night. He laughs when I tell him my surprise at not finding the desert here. Apparently we’d need to go another 7 hours West just to reach it!

We return to the coast and head to Brisbane to meet Karl and Yvonne, some old friends from back in Africa – and Austria.

It’s been more than 15 years since they left SA and it’s really nice to catch up with them. They kindly put us up in their home and we almost get used to having a nice bed, shower, a kitchen and a swimming pool at your disposal.

But we have much distance to cover, so after a couple of days we must move on.

We head North along the coast to Noosa Heads, where Ebru’s friend Kimberly lives. We haven’t got her number nor is she responding to emails. Also we know that around about now she should have given birth to a baby. Ebru did get her address but we’re not sure what to do – we don’t want to just rock up and intrude at this time.

In the end we decide to bite the bullet – we’ve come all this way to visit and we’re in the area now and might not be again, so we have to go and say hello. With a box of Pampers in hand Ebru rings the door bell and makes a nappy delivery. The proud new parents are at home and Kim recognizes Ebru immediately. We end up spending the night in their spare room and Ebru and Kim have a few hours to catch up, which we’re really happy about. Another bonus is that after 4 months, I am finally reunited with my Amazon Kindle, which I had to send back because it broke in Thailand and I had the replacement sent to this address.

Our gratitude to Kimberly and Tim for having us over at your place. We know it was a busy time for you. And lovely to meet you again!

Sadly the Kindle doesn’t last longer than 2 weeks before the screen breaks again and is now consigned to an address in New Zealand for replacement.

Some new friends we made along the way…

As you may have heard, Ozies love to party, but when they drink too much they tend to go overboard…

The plan is originally to head North along the coast and all the way to Cairns if possible, to meet another old friend of Ebru’s but it is far and we’re not sure that goal is realistic. As we leave Noosa there’s a lot of flooding ahead and all the coastal roads to the North are closed. I’m quite happy about it as this gives us a good reason to head inland again and experience more of the fantastic isolation this continent has to offer.

The rest of the way from here is marked by hour-long stretches of straight roads, yellow-brown bushland and huge trucks transporting massive loads around the country. We stop at a lot of road works and while we wait we chat to some of the workers. They’re earning good money alright! And word is that they cannot find enough people to do the job in Oz.

Oh yes, another thing I remember: Australia definitely seems to have a beard thing going on. Everywhere we go men have long ragged mats of facial hair hanging on or sticking out. At the road works it looks like the Hell’s Angels driving steam rollers and operating STOP/GO lollipops.

We meet an interesting guy at a camp site in the middle of nowhere. He’s fishing in the lagoon. He’s got a big tough caravan, an even tougher 4×4 with a boat on the roof rack. We get chatting. Turns out he was a postman and his wife an interior decorator, no kids. They decided that they were “just consumers” and would like to have more to their lives than working the same job so they can stay in the same place and buy stuff. So they resigned, sold up, bought the caravan and set off across Australia, working wherever they find work available and staying until they’ve saved up enough to continue their journey for a few months. Awesome! And you’ll find quite a few people out here that are doing a similar thing.

Many fires and delicious rump steaks later we eventually reach a town called Emerald. It’s about 4-500Km inland and about the same North of Brisbane. There’s nothing much around here except some mines. But that’s the point. From here you can head out to places called Ruby Vale and Sapphire to dig and fossick for gem stones – how cool!

We enroll in a short introduction and learn how to use a sieve and water to separate out gems from soil. The soil they have there is from a Sapphire mine and we find a few fragments. It’s all very exciting!

Then we rent a pick and shovel, a large water container and a couple of sieves and off we go to the gem fields, where we camp for a couple of nights and spend our days digging and sieving at the riverside.

We don’t find a thing of course. I actually think we threw whatever gems we may have had overboard because we didn’t recognise what they were. But nevertheless, it’s good fun and I recommend anyone to give this a try.

Our last few days in Australia are spent back at Karl and Yvonne’s, which is wonderful. We see a bit of Brisbane and spend some more time enjoying the company of our hosts. We take the time here to plant two trees for our Planting Around the World mission.

Hey Ritti’s we thank you again for having us! It was lovely to see you again. We hope to see you again when the time comes, either in Oz or maybe you’ll pay us a visit wherever we are! Keep well and take care of yourselves.

To conclude this chapter I thought it would be interesting to give you an idea of the things you find crawling around on Australia’s highways. Enjoy….

None the less we go and I am very pleasantly surprised!

The speed boat transfer we hired on Gili Trawangan for 250KRp/pp includes onward transport from Padangbai harbour, so we get to Denpasar without issues.

We stay in a place listed in the Lonely Planet, which I booked ahead of arrival. It’s fine.

Most impressive of all, wherever we go, no one hassles us to buy things.

Even when we visit the larger markets, people surely advertise their wares, but people glance at you with a smile and nobody’s pushy. It’s really pleasant!

Had I known this I’d surely have spent some more time in Bali exploring the place and trying to find food that I like. (Nope, unfortunately we still don’t find any food we can go crazy about here, but we had a couple of dishes that were OK.)

We navigate the town itself by scooter, which we hire at the hotel for 60KRp/day.

(A reminder that scooting around in Asia is very different to scooting around in Europe. – It’s AWESOME!!)

And there are plenty of interesting things to see.

We arrived smack-bang in the middle of the 6-monthly Dhamma ceremony, which is a Hindu festival celebrating something to do with enlightenment, forgive me for not being able to be more specific. But for those interested here are some Wikipedia translations:

Dhamma (Pali: धम्म) or Dharma (Sanskrit: धर्म) in Buddhism can have the following meanings:

The state of Nature as it is (yathā bhūta)[1]
The Laws of Nature considered collectively.
The teaching of the Buddha as an exposition of the Natural Law applied to the problem of human suffering.
A phenomenon and/or its properties.[2]

The roads are lines with tall bamboo poles, carrying intricate patchwork of pleated leaf decorations.

People are out in their Dhamma-best (to coin a phrase).

Everyone is making a rainbow of offerings, carefully prepared at home,

in temples and at shrines in forecourts and aside the streets.

The nice ladies at our hotel are kind enough to give us some background information on the even, recommend some temples to visit, and clad us in the suitable dress, so that we may visit respectfully.

Our flight out of Denpasar air port concludes our Asian adventure. Six months have flown by and it’s hard to believe that it’s over. Of course we’re looking forward to seeing Australia and that side of the world but we’ve had such a wonderful time in Asia we just know we’re going to miss it!