Last night's trip to the observatory was such a great experience! It is jointly run by the University of Canterbury and Nagoya University in Japan, and is up on Mt John at 1031m (about 300m above Lake Tekapo). I checked in at the Earth and Sky Centre in the village at 11.45pm and we were given big warm coats and driven 4km up the hill in a shuttle bus. About half way up the hill, the driver had to turn off the headlights so as not to interfere with the telescope...

Hello from Mount Cook YHA! It was very cold and grey in Queenstown this morning and the Remarkables had a fresh layer of snow on top, but I soon left the bad weather behind and headed for Mount Cook. The Kiwi bus dropped me in Twizel where I picked up a shuttle to Mount Cook. On the way, we passed Lake Pukaki. The lake is an absolutely beautiful light blue colour! This is because the water in it comes from a glacier further up the valley, so although the rock fl...

What a day! I am absolutely exhausted, but would definitely say that I made the most of 24 hours in Mount Cook! I got up at 7am, thankfully to totally clear, blue skies - perfect for a good walk in the mountains. I had a list of all of the possible tracks from the village, of which I'd already done red tarns last night. This morning, I decided to head towards Kea Point further up the valley, and turned off towards Sealy Tarns - supposedly a very steep climb, but ...

My luck with the weather finally ran out today. I could hear rain pouring down on the hostel roof all night and sure enough, it was still going when my alarm went off at 7am. I had booked a water taxi for 8.30am to take me across Lake Te Anau to join the most interesting part of the Kepler track - another one of New Zealand's 'Great Walks'. It is possible to get there along a lakeside track from the town, but it's a long and boring route and I only really wanted ...

Another 7.30 departure this morning, when will I ever catch up on sleep? Still, I was quite excited to get up this morning as today was the Milford Explorer trip! We met up with the big green bus in Te Anau and drove along State Highway 94, one of the most scenic drives in world, to see one of the great wonders of the world: The Milford Sound (technically a fjord, not a sound, as it was formed by glacial activity...) Milford is part of a huge national park and w...