Christchurch, Take Tekapo, Mt. Cook, Queenstown

For my last couple of days, I was able to meet up with long time friend Neil and his girlfriend Katherine.

Since I've seen the area we were covering together quite well, I was the tour guide for a couple of days. I took them to the usual places in Christchurch, and then we headed out of town for Lake Tepako. Of course we stopped at the world’s largest sweater in the world.

(Neil and Katherine in front of the gaint sweater)

After that we headed for Lake Tepako. This area is well known for clear, dark skies which make an ideal location for observatories (i.e. large telescopes used for looking at outer space). We did a couple of hikes around the area. The hikes were quite scenic because of the awesome sunset.

(Enjoying the view. Yes I am wearing a fleece with shorts. Its the cool style in New Zealand)

That night we were planning on camping out. We didn’t get to our campsite until dark. Upon arrival, it was really sketchy as there were tons of abandoned campervans. We elected to move on from the creepy situation, and head for Mt. Cook. On the final road into Mt. Cook, we came across a car in a ditch, but no one was there. Too much creepyness for one night. When we drove by it the next day, the car was already gone.

The next day we did another hike around Mt. Cook and got some amazing views of the mountains. It was then back to Queenstown! I was scheduled to go heli-biking that day, but there weren’t enough people signed up to go. Crap! Oh well, back on the bus to catch my plane out to Australia!

(Neil and I waking up with the mountains in the background)

(Looking good in front of the ice burgs floating down the river)

(Eating a roadside triple decker PB and J sandwich. I look kinda gross this photo from hiking and camping and no shower)