Hellllooooooo.....

Sorry for the lack of blogging yesterday. In a nut shell we were cream crackered - more on that later.

So, we ended up going to the Olsen Hot Pools on Tuesday evening - complete and utter BLISS especially after the hard day of sun bathing, eating ice creams and gentle relaxation in the beautiful Queenstown. Its funny how a hot tub, in a garage (look at the photos - there were 6 garages lined up with pools in!) with some hot water in (glacial of course) can be sooooo expensive but worth every penny :-)

We left Queenstown early on Wednesday on a coach destined for the infamous Milford Sound, driven by a very nice lady called Tracy http://www.realjourneys.co.nz/Main/MilfordSoundNatureCruises/. The coach was slightly strange looking, and the seats were all angled towards the windows in a very unique fashion. It took flipping ages to get there (about 4 hours in total) - the scenery was stunning but after a while you kinda get used to seeing mountains and rivers. We were basically both asleep until Nathan spotted a wild parrot (think it was a Kea?) but then we went in a very long scary unlit tunnel and both got bored again.

We boarded a boat at Milford and cruised on the Fiord for about 2 hours. Honestly - it was OK, scenery was nothng new as we'd seen it all on LOTR BUT we did see some very rare penguins :-D and the not so common fur seal. They were worth the long journey there and back alone. Milford is a great place to see but I think we were both a bit saturated with hills/mountains/rivers/lakes/fiords and didn't appreciate the beauty before our eyes. Maybe would have been better if we'd not seen so many films?

We get back on the freaky coach, and the lovely Tracy (driving) decided it was a good idea to keep a brick on the accelerator all the way home. Now as you can imagine, a mountain road isnt the straightest, or smoothest of rides. Added to that a high altitude, air conditioning that wasn't brilliant, a dodgy "picnic" lunch aboard the boat, the freaky seating arrangements on the coach, and Nat's rare opportuntistic travel sickness... you get the picture. However - Natalie is so fantastic and considerate to her fellow travellors, she managed to prevent spewing until we were only 100m (yep - 100 METRES!) from our B&B. So close even Tracy had taken the brick off the accelerator to chuck us out.

We were given a very warm welcome from the owners of the B&B http://www.dunluce-fiordland.co.nz/, beautiful accomodation, fantastic setting, very friendly people. We both hope they didn't notice Natalie carrying a bag of puke when they were showing us around their exquisite home (if they did, they didn't say anything!). We barely had time to dump our (now 5!) bags before being dropped into to centre of Te Anau to grab some grub and depart on another boat http://www.realjourneys.co.nz/Main/TeAnau/ to see some insects with shiny bottoms. They (the glow-worms) were magical - we had to go into a very low ceilinged cave, take a short walk past underground waterfalls and rivers, and then we had a boat ride in COMPLETE darkness to see the little critters. Very eerie as all you could see were the glowing bottoms of hundreds of worms (they looked like stars in the night sky) and for the majority of the time, all you could hear was the rushing waters of the river (Except for when the previous group of a certain nationality got excited about a free hot drink. Then they were all we could hear. Even from the other end of the cave. Grrrrr!) Today (whatever day it is - we couldn't decide on the coach and seem to have lost all sense of time) we have travelled via coach from Te Anau to Dunedin. Very cloudy today, but warm! Staying in a reasonably small hotel http://www.brothershotel.co.nz/index.htm - nice but not as nice as the previous places (we have been spoilt rotten). Natalie got a bit scared not long after arriving - we have to use the internet in a lounge and a terrifying german lady (who sat behind us on the couch...!) came in demanding to know where the owners were. Nat said she didn't know - and she went slightly insane saying she had guests outside and couldn't find the owners... I said to try reception, so she went and found Nathan! Think he had a grilling too as he obviously is not on holiday and is a member of lowly staff. Anyhow, at 4pm today (60 minutes Whoop Whoop!) we're going for a good old piss up at the Speights (www.speights.co.nz) brewery less than a minutes walk down the road. 90 minute tour with free samples of lagers.... Could be a fun way to spend an hour or three! Later (if we're still standing) we're hoping to meet up with Nathan's parents. They love Natalie so much they had to schedule in a stop in the same city to meet her. Think that will do for todays entry. Gotta go limber up for some beer drinking!

May have something interesting to say tomorrow!

Loads of love x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x