...I note that license plates in NZ are not associated with the locality where a car is registered, like in Belgium...I notice a particular local flavor of ice cream, chocolate and cakes: hokey pokey! It's basically honeycomb toffee. And in the case of ice cream it's vanilla with chunks of such toffee!...I'm still puzzled as to what my how my AA card works. It's a like regular customer/discount card which I use at gas stations and supermarkets. Th...

...I decide I won't do the last trek after all - I'm tired and deserve some rest. No more hiking from now....I drive to Dunedin through very scenic areas, as always. And I pass what must be the fruit supply center for the whole country because signs advertising cherries for sale pop up literally every 100 m. Expensive though....in Dunedin I visit Baldwin Street, the world's steepest street. My feeble car barely makes it up there, especially that's...

...I wake up and conclude it's good I still have some dry clothes for the last day....I run out of gas because I had thought mistakenly huts were equipped with cookers (other national parks sometimes do have cookers in huts) so only lukewarm tea and no warm breakfast...I set out, trying to use my ziplock bags to protect everything fragile inside my pack as I have no rain cover anymore...weather is not too bad and drizzle is light while the wind is not very st...

...I wake up in the empty hut as Mark&Kelly slowly clamber from their tent into my humble abode to make some tea and breakfast...I set out with them towards the Gillespie Pass and after an hour our ways part as they turn towards Lake Crucible and I soldier on...weather becomes wetter and wetter as I climb the relentless pass. Visibility is ok-ish but foggy and merciless drizzle combined with brutal wind makes me completely wet. Despite everything gore Tex and ski...

...I learn that the river I'm supposed to ford to start my trail in the Mt Aspiring National Park is high due to heavy rains so I opt for the swanky option of taking a helicopter to take me to the first hut...the 25m scenic flight over glaciers, valleys, rainforests and lakes leaves me speechless - I don't have the best seat but it is still superb...I leave my stuff at the hut and try to do a day hike to a nearby lake but the first big stream I meet seems...