After a hearty breakfast, we met a young Wallaby called Sally before leaving the sheep station and wait for it... I actually held her! I wasn't too keen on it but there you have it, perhaps this trip will make an animal lover of me yet...! We then headed off to Cromwell - the home of Aussie country music and the annual international country music festival. The festival apparently starts in two weeks with many famous artists due to travel over for it. We were tak...

I went to mass at St Mary's Cathedral next to Hyde Park yesterday morning. It was solemn mass led by the cathedral choir, who sounded magnificent. The choir was made up of boys attending the cathedral school as well as professional men - a great, free concert! I also took a walk across the harbour bridge, having decided that the bridge climb was too pricey. Annoyingly, I had to check out of the nice YHA on The Rocks and move to Base Hostel for the night, as that...

Hello from a very lively Sydney! I arrived at the YHA 'On The Rocks' last night - a perfectly positioned hostel, with an terrace overlooking the harbour. Having dumped my bags, I walked straight on down to Circular Quay, where a huge cruise ship was just leaving. It was a pretty cool view, with the impressive Harbour Bridge on one side and the iconic Sydney Opera House on the other. Bit of a change from the wilderness of South Island to say the least! It was Fri...

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...