Sunday, April 14, 2019

New Zealand Road Trip 2018 ✈ Mt. Cook & Lake Tekapo

Our 5th anniversary adventure brought us through 4 seasons and 2 new countries within 2 weeks. Started our trip hanging out with friends in San Francisco, followed by a relaxing getaway in Fiji, and ended the trip with a 10-day road trip across New Zealand. I'll share more about our adventures in the next few posts. Follow along!

New Zealand 10D9N Road Trip:
Day 1: Hokitika
Day 3: Milford Sound
Day 4: Glenorchy
Day 5: Queenstown
Day 7: Christchurch
Day 8: Wellington
Day 10: Auckland




Dec 2 (Sun): Queenstown - Hooker Valley Track - Lake Pukaki - Lake Tekapo - Church of the Good Sheppard - Christchurch (600kms)

After 4 nights in Queenstown, it was finally time to bid goodbye to this scenic city and continue our journey back to Christchurch and complete our anti-clockwise drive around the South Island, before flying to the North Island. This was one of the longest driving days during our trip with lots of grounds to cover. Fortunately, we were both well rested and ready to rock and roll after two relaxing days.

Knowing that we had a long day ahead, we checked out of the hotel and left Queenstown at 5.40am and was greeted by this magnificent sunrise.

Quick photo stop at Kawarau Gorge. I mentioned in my previous post that New Zealand road signs are very clear and helpful, including the signs for scenic spots, which explains a lot of the random unplanned photo stops we had during the road trip.

Vineyards at the town of Cromwell.

Rolling hills (and loud sheep) along the Lindis Pass-Tarras Road.

Lindis Pass in Waitaki district is one of the most scenic roads in New Zealand.


Scenic drives like this make the long drive much more pleasant and enjoyable.

Colorful Lupin near Omarama town. Our trip was at the end of Nov - early Dec, which was the peak lupin blooming season. The purples and pinks flowers make the already-stunning views even more incredible. Here's a helpful post if you're interested in Lupin-spotting.

Lake Pukaki with perfection reflection of the clouds.

The famous Mount Cook road with Aoraki / Mt Cook peeking through the clouds.

Made it to Aoraki/Mt Cook National Park at 9.15am. We're both not big hikers so this was the only hike we planned for this trip. The Hooker Valley Track is 10km round-trip and takes approximately 3 hours (took us 2.5 hours). It's a fairly easy and flat hike/walk. 

Excited to begin our hike...or maybe not? 

Glad that the clouds cleared a lil' during our hike, giving us a better view of Mt. Sefton.

View of the Mueller glacier lake from the Mueller Lookout.

There are a total of 3 swingbridges along the hike which makes for good photo stops. 


If you don't want other people in your pictures (like us), go to the 2nd or 3rd bridge. =P


Another viewpoint of Mueller glacier lake.

Gorgeous scenery the entire way...snow-capped mountains, flowing rivers, lush valley meadows, and glacial lakes. Too bad Mt. Cook was hiding behind the clouds.

Finally...made it to the Hooker Glacier Lake lookout point after one hour! Took a break to enjoy the view and had some drinks and snacks before making our way back.

Some 'action' shots on our way back.

Goodbye Mt. Cook!

Drove by the beautiful turquoise Lake Pukaki, with colorful lupins on both sides of the roads. Stopped by NZ Alpine Lavender farm but it's not lavender season yet.

One of the most photographed lake in New Zealand....turquoise Lake Tekapo.

More lupin flowers!!

Church of the Good Sheppard with impressive backdrop of Lake Tekapo.

Last few photos before we big goodbye to this beautiful region and continue our 3-hour drive towards Christchurch.

Made it to Christchurch at 5.30pm and stopped by Pakn'Save to grab some food for dinner before checking into our hotel - Chateau on the Park DoubleTree Christchurch. More photos of the hotel in the next post.

That's all for day 6 of our road trip in New Zealand. Stay tuned for the next post! As a token of appreciation for scrolling through this long post, here's our map and itinerary to help you plan for your New Zealand adventure! Click on the top right 'square' to open in Google Maps.



New Zealand Road Trip 2018 ✈ Queenstown & Glenorchy

Our 5th anniversary adventure brought us through 4 seasons and 2 new countries within 2 weeks. Started our trip hanging out with friends in San Francisco, followed by a relaxing getaway in Fiji, and ended the trip with a 10-day road trip across New Zealand. I'll share more about our adventures in the next few posts. Follow along!

New Zealand 10D9N Road Trip:
Day 1: Hokitika
Day 3: Milford Sound
Day 4: Glenorchy
Day 5: Queenstown
Day 7: Christchurch
Day 8: Wellington
Day 10: Auckland



Nov 30 (Fri): Queenstown - Glenorchy - Queenstown (106kms)

After driving more than 500km/day for the last two days, it was time to slow down our pace and rest up. The only sightseeing we planned for the day was to visit Glenorchy, which is a small scenic town about an hour away from Queenstown.

First task on our agenda was to return our RAV4 at Queenstown airport. Our hotel was only 10 minutes away from Queenstown airport so it was very convenient. We picked this car up from Christchurch airport and drove a total of 1344kms over the last 3 days. We spent a total of NZD85 ($58) for the 3-day one-way rental and NZD223 ($153) on gas. 

After returning the Toyota RAV4, the staff from Discount Car Rentals picked us up from the airport and brought us to their off-airport location to collect our SUV for the next 4 days...a SsangYong Korando. Honestly, I've never heard or seen this car model before but I ain't gonna be picky for a FREE car. =P


Yes our rental car was FREEE...4 days one-way rental from Queenstown to Christchuch. =) All thanks to this awesome company - Transfercar. It's a car-relocation website that helps rental car companies transfer cars between their branches by letting people drive for free. Such a brilliant and awesome idea! I've been looking on the website for various routes that could work with our itinerary and as soon as they opened up the booking for this posting at 10pm, I submitted my booking request almost immediately (first come first serve). Apparently, I must have been the first to book it because I saw 4 more requests shortly after I booked, but my booking request was the one that was accepted. =) We had a great experience using Transfercar so we can confidently say that this is totally legit!

After picking up our rental car, we started our drive towards Glenorchy. First unplanned stop was the Seven Mile Point Track car park with great panaromic view of Lake Wakatipu.

Bennetss Bluff Lookout. A scenic view point along the Glenorchy-Queenstown road. 

Made it to Glenorchy at noon. Gotta get a picture of this famous Glenorchy red barn.

Glenorchy wharf with scenic views of the snow-capped mountains and Lake Wakatipu.

The Glenorchy-Queenstown road is definitely one of the most scenic drives in New Zealand. Be prepared to make multiple photo stops!

Another unplanned stop on our way back to Queenstown...Wilson Bay Reserve. This is such a cool lil' by you can park right next to the waters and enjoy the views. There was only one other car when we were there so this is definitely a hidden gem.

Last quick photo stop at One Mile Car Park before heading back to our hotel. We originally thought about hiking up the Tiki Trail to get a panoramic view of Queenstown from above but chose to be lazy and avoid the crowded town center.

Dec 1 (Sat): Holiday Inn Frankton Road

We did nothing at all on our last day in Queenstown. We spent the day chilling and resting in the hotel. Hubby wasn't feeling well so it was good that we had one extra day to rest, relax, and recover before continuing our journey northbound. 

The only time we left the hotel was to get some dinner from the supermarket. 

That's all for day 4 and 5 of our road trip in New Zealand. Stay tuned for the next post! As a token of appreciation for scrolling through this long post, here's our map and itinerary to help you plan for your New Zealand adventure! Click on the top right 'square' to open in Google Maps.



Saturday, April 13, 2019

New Zealand Road Trip 2018 ✈ Milford Sound

Our 5th anniversary adventure brought us through 4 seasons and 2 new countries within 2 weeks. Started our trip hanging out with friends in San Francisco, followed by a relaxing getaway in Fiji, and ended the trip with a 10-day road trip across New Zealand. I'll share more about our adventures in the next few posts. Follow along!

New Zealand 10D9N Road Trip:
Day 1: Hokitika
Day 3: Milford Sound
Day 4: Glenorchy
Day 5: Queenstown
Day 7: Christchurch
Day 8: Wellington
Day 10: Auckland



Nov 29 (Thurs): Queenstown - Milford Sound - Queenstown (566kms)

After a long day of driving the day before, our original plan was to have a more relaxing sightseeing day around Queenstown and do the long drive back and forth Milford Sound the day after. However, as we were going to swap rental car the next day, we decided to change our schedule and do the long drive while we have the RAV4. Most people spend the night at Te Anau (midway between Queenstown and Milford Sound) if they plan to visit MIlford Sound early, but because our hotel in Queenstown was already paid for with points, we decided to just wake up earlier to do the drive.

It takes approximately 4 hours to drive one-way from Queenstown to Milford Sound and since we've already bought our tickets for the 9am Milford Sound cruise, we departed Queenstown at 4.40am to make sure we make it in time for the cruise. First hour of the drive was pretty much dark and foggy.

Best part about driving so early...having the roads to ourselves!

Drove through majestic mountains at Fiordland National Park and the Hommer tunnel.

Finally made it to Milford Sound at 8.30am! It took 10min to walk from the car park to the Wharf Terminal Building, so make sure to give yourself some extra time. We checked-in at the Jucy Cruise counter and received our 'boarding pass' and a card each for light refreshments on board. 


As you can see from the dock, there are a number of cruises to choose from and we picked Jucy because they had a 50% discount for Jucy driver (we had a 3-day car relocation booking with Jucy). Besides, the 8.55am cruise was also the cheapest one for the day and less crowded, so it was an easy decision. We paid a total of NZD 67.50 ($46) for 2 person. =) They requested to see our Jucy car key when we picked up our tickets but we told them that we haven't collected our car so we showed them the booking email instead.



Boarding the boat was smooth and easy. We claimed our light refreshment (cake) and went straight to the top deck to get a good spot to enjoy the views. There are also complimentary coffee and tea. We were very lucky to have a such a clear and beautiful day! Spot the lil' elephant in the bottom left photo.

Amazing cruising around the fjords surrounded by soaring mountains all around us.

Plenty of time to take plenty of photos, we took way too many photos and realized they all looked similar...lol!

Spotted some penguins and seals and got up close and personal with the waterfalls.

Panaroma to show the vastness of Milford Sound.

After 2 hours of cruising, we ended our cruise at 11am. Was the cruise worth the price? Definitely...how often do we get to cruise through fjords like this right? Funny coincident, we had a Malaysian tour group on the same cruise so half of the people on our cruise were Malaysians...lol!

We had the rest of the day to slowly drive back to Queenstown so we took our time and stopped along the way for photos.

Random waterfall and river at the side of the road, and soaked up the views of the lush forest from the Hollyford Valley Lookout.

Colorful flowers blooming at both sides of the road along our drive back to Queenstown.

Drove along Lake Wakatipu as we got closer to Queenstown.

These 3 panoramas were taken at 3 different lookout points. Same same but different. =P

Finally made it back to Queenstown at 5pm after 12.5 hours! Time to get some food, some rest, and take it easy for the next two days. =)

That's it for day 3 of our road trip in New Zealand. Stay tuned for the next post! As a token of appreciation for scrolling through this long post, here's our map and itinerary to help you plan for your New Zealand adventure! Click on the top right 'square' to open in Google Maps.