Week 7 - West Coast + Wanaka

Greymouth, Hokitika, Franz Josef + Wanaka

Phew, long wild week! After the Abel Tasman walk I had to take the 7:15 a.m. bus straight to Greymouth the next day. These are the moments when you would rather cruise around in your own car. Well, so I strapped on my backpack and walked to the bus station for half an hour, it felt like day 6 of the hike😂 The plan was now a 1.5 day in Greymouth, a mini town that looked exactly like it sounds🌧️ and from there start the next 3-day hike in Paparoa National Park. Despite the worst rain forecast, I still set off in the morning with my backpack repacked and in full rain gear. The car park and start of the hike were deserted, which even surprised the shuttle driver. But then a few older kiwis came along, which calmed me down a bit. So I set off highly motivated, intending to travel 8 hours to the first hut, the first 5 of which were uphill. Despite the rain, the path through the forest was beautiful and I was still happy about all the little waterfalls that were created by the rain. Until I suddenly found myself standing there stupidly in front of a waterfall that was a little too big and unfortunately couldn't get past it. After thinking about it for a moment, I actually turned around and stopped my (expensive) hike and now had to walk 2.5 hours through the rain back to the (deserted) parking lot. When I got there pretty exhausted, I was able to google how far the nearest town was: 2.5 hours on foot. Oh nooooo. Then I ate lunch and changed my completely soaked clothes. But then I was chased away relatively quickly by the stinging sandflies and so I set off. Quite large chunks often fell from the slopes left and right, so I had to walk in the middle of the gravel road. LUCKILY two Australians came along and they just unloaded their friends in the parking lot and so they drove back. They picked me up and even drove me back to my hostel in Greymouth. Very nice, this saved me a lot of effort, time and money! I was able to easily rebook my night at the hostel and was really excited for a warm shower and my bed😂 So I walk up to the new room and ZACK I meet the next person I already knew from Nelson. It turns out that she (Becca from England) is driving and, like me, wants to drive further down the west coast to Franz Josef. So I immediately decided on a road trip and planned Hokitika as a stopover, where I otherwise wouldn't have been able to stop. In the evening I was offered homemade burritos in the hostel kitchen (good timing on my part) and then we watched a crazy film together that I didn't even know. So somehow still a great day! In the evening I dried all my things on the smallest heater in the world, which then ran all night long🔥🔥

We set off the next day at 10 a.m. in Becca's little red, faded Toyota:

Hokitika then turned out to be an ultra cute city, something I hadn't really imagined before. The place is known for its gorge with an extremely blue/turquoise river in between. The gorge also completely exceeded my expectations, with a small path and a bridge along the bank and a small swimming area:

The drive to Franz Josef was super nice and the landscape was a bit reminiscent of Switzerland or Austria. Franz Josef is known for his glacier of the same name. During my previous research, I realized that I wasn't really interested in glaciers, which is why I only booked one night there and the bus at 8 a.m. the next day. Nevertheless, we were immediately impressed by the mini town and its ski town atmosphere. In the hostel there was free soup and popcorn for everyone and a hot tub, which really added to the wintry feeling there. Of course we took full advantage of all the offers and had a lovely evening. The next day I woke up and the clouds that had hung over the mountains yesterday were completely gone and the glacier was shining in the morning sun:

So after I even saw the glacier, I happily got on my bus to chug six hours down to Wanaka. It only lasts six hours because a lot of emphasis is placed on lots of long breaks 😃 But the ride was really beautiful and we stopped every now and then for photos. The first step out of the bus in Wanaka gave me complete excitement. The city lies on the lake and is surrounded by mountains all around. The Wanaka Tree, which stands in the water and offers a great photo spot, is well known:

My absolute highlight and perhaps of the entire trip was the hike up Roy's Peak for sunrise. Becca was in town shortly after me and we got together a relatively large group with whom we drove to the car park at 2 a.m. and started the 2-4 hour hike up the mountain. Since everyone has a different pace, the reports about the duration of the climb were very different and you definitely don't want to miss the sunrise. The hike is actually more popular than I knew but it was actually quite funny because in the complete darkness you could see the flashlights everywhere along the way. The starry sky was also amazing and you could see shooting stars and even the Milky Way! In the end it only took us two hours to get up and then we had to freeze our asses off for another hour at the top, but we were also able to see the entire sunrise. The special thing up there was that you have a 360 degree view, where one side is more beautiful than the other:

Since we were back at the hostel at 8:30 in the morning, the rest of the day was all about eating, sleeping and chilling, which was great in the relaxed garden of our hostel. I somehow got stuck on the idea of making egg tarts with Nutella, but unfortunately Becca didn't want to 🥲 It's too expensive on its own and then you end up with a stupid pack of flour on your cheek:( In the evening the one from the hike said ( Ananda from France) that she really wanted crepes again, so I took my opportunity straight away🥞:

And today we continue to Queenstown, the most popular city for tourists in NZ. I am curious!