December 24, 2002 - Wellington, New Zealand

Merry Christmas!!  We are having an extremely lazy morning here in Wellington.  All the Christmas shopping is done (1 present each) so it should be a very stress-free day.  The biggest challenge will be scouting out a good restaurant to have dinner tonight.  We are staying in a lovely apartment-hotel right in the centre of Wellington and will be here until the 26th when we begin the last leg of our journey up to Auckland.

Our time with Johnny and Carolyn couldn't have been better.  They showed us a fantastic time and it was a real pleasure to see them again after a couple years.  On our last weekend they took us to a place called Hanmer Springs which is a lovely little mountain town a couple hundred kilometers from Christchurch.  They organized a beautiful house with stunning views of the town and mountains and only a short walk from the hot spring pools where we enjoyed a good soaking in the afternoon.  We had the most chilled out night sitting in front of a crackling fire in the fireplace with some great wines, cheeses and music.  Johnny and I learned that it is actually possible to have an enjoyable night together without getting absolutely blind.  But for old times sake, we got the big guns out for our last night in Christchurch which resulted in a magnificent hangover the next morning.  I was happy to wave Johnny bye-bye one last time as he trotted off to work with bloodshot eyes and this alcohol vapour seeping out of him which gave him the appearance of being surrounded by a force field.  He called me from work to report that the staff in the office had taken up a collection to go buy him some breath freshening gum.  Mission accomplished!

Kris

December 17, 2002 - Christchurch, New Zealand

I was born to be a biker, of this I am now sure.  Our Harley ride was spectacular and to make the experience complete, day two was a complete washout and we looked like eels after spending a full ten hours on the bike through torrential rainstorms.  Luckily, we made it back safely and had pure sunshine on our last morning's ride into Christchurch, which was a stunning ride through Allan's Pass which had some incredible views.  We did a total of about 1200 kilometers which isn't too bad considering it was very slow going on many of the mountain roads.  One of the most scenic things was the proliferation of gorgeous yellow and purple wildflowers in the fields around the mountains.  Now all we need to do is settle down somewhere so I can get myself a bike!

We are nearing the end of our visit here in Christchurch.  We leave here on Thursday and will be heading up to Nelson for a few days then we'll take the ferry to the north island and spend Christmas in Wellington.  After that we only have a few days to get back up to Auckland for New Years and the next leg of our journey... to Chile!

Kris

December 10, 2002 - Christchurch, New Zealand

It's been a busy time in New Zealand!  We arrived in Auckland about a week ago to gorgeous weather and decided to bus north to a town called Paihia which is on the coast of the Bay of Islands, an idyllic island paradise off the northernmost part of the north island.  We took a 24 hour tour on this unbelievable houseboat called "The Rock" and packed in a lot of activity including fishing, snorkeling, diving for mussels, sea kayaking, hiking, billiards, dolphin watching, and even some relaxing on the beach!  I also did a half day fishing excursion (Ana passed on this) and caught a pile of red snapper which we ate for dinner that night.  We returned to Auckland and then flew to Christchurch where Johnny Eyre-Walker was there to meet us with a smile and three cold beers.  It was great to see him again!  We moved into his and his girlfriend Carolyn's house then settled in for a night of hangover construction.  I made sure to arrive on a weeknight so I could wave Johnny bye bye as he left the next morning for work - revenge is sweet!

It was Carolyn's 30th birthday last Saturday so they had a big barbeque party at their place where we met a lot of their friends and family.  We got a little rained out, but that didn't stop anything - it was a great party.

We are now getting ready for our tour of the South Island and have reserved a Harley Davidson Softail Classic for two days beginning tomorrow!  I am so excited I can hardly contain myself as I've never ridden a Harley before.  I think we are going to ride to Queenstown then back up the west coast and over to Christchurch, as it's meant to be a spectacular drive.   We will return on Friday then are planning a weekend away with Carolyn and Johnny, destination unknown.  Next week we'll likely hang around for a few days then make our way northwards and find a nice place to spend Christmas.  We'll be missing you all but at the same time enjoying the weather!

Kris

Nov 25, 2002 - Hervey Bay, Queensland, Australia

Today is Ana's birthday!  And we are celebrating by getting on a bus at 7:00 and traveling to Brisbane where we will go out for a nice birthday dinner and spend the night.  Tomorrow we will continue to Byron Bay where we will spend a night or two before making the final stretch to Sydney.

Our trip to Queensland has been magnificent!  We'd say that the six days sailing in the Whitsundays was definitely the highlight of our stay in Queensland.  It felt great to be back on the water enjoying the salt, sun and surf.  The only disappointment was the diving which was unremarkable, but we weren't too worried about that.  We put together a page on our sailing trip with plenty of pictures.  I was wishing that the boys from the Lost Shaker could have been with us on the trip as it would have been a great reunion!  After such a great time, Ana and I have decided that we definitely need to own another sailboat in the future!

Last night we returned from a three day tour of Fraser Island, which is the largest sand island in the world with some amazing natural features.  There are no real roads on the island so the only way to get through the sand is with a good 4WD vehicle.  It is quite a feeling doing 80 kph down a beach with the surf crashing in!  One of the most amazing things we did was a hike across a huge "sandblow" which was just like being in the middle of a desert.  The hike ended in a beautiful clean freshwater lake that was great for swimming.  Now that I think about it, I better put together a little feature page on Fraser Island.

We are getting very close to the end of our time in Australia.  It has been an extremely easy place to travel through due to the highly developed (and competitive) tourist industry.  By the same token it makes it much more difficult to get off the beaten path and explore on your own, which is what we like doing.  Oh well, we are going to get plenty of that in South America so we're just enjoying the easy traveling while we have it!

The next update may be from New Zealand....

Kris

November 11, 2002 - Airlie Beach, Queensland, Australia

It's already been a week on the east coast and the time is passing much too quickly.  Ana and I arrived in Airlie Beach this evening after a 12 hour bus ride from Cairns which was surprisingly relaxing and comfortable.  Tomorrow we embark on a six day and night sailing trip around the Whitsunday islands on the Solway Lass - a 127 ft Tall Ship!  We are hoping that this will be one of the big highlights of our trip.  The ship was built in The Netherlands in 1902 and has been through two world wars, four name changes, innumerable countries, and has served as a cargo vessel, ice breaker, war ship, coal transport, floating restaurant, and now a fully restored tourist sailing vessel (check out www.soxsail.com.au).  Our plans after that are to visit Fraser Island on a multi day trip then work our way toward Sydney in time for our Nov. 30 departure to New Zealand.

We had quite a nice time in the Cairns area.  We found Cairns to be a very busy tourist town, but quite a fun place to be.  The first hostel we stayed in was called Castaways and seemed okay until we found that our bed was infested with bed bugs which were biting us as we were sitting on the bed.  Unfortunately, the office was closed by that time and there was no staff around so we had no choice but to strip the bed and clean it the best we could then put our own sleep sheets on it.  We still got a few bites during the night but not too bad.  The next day we found another place called Dreamtime Traveler's Rest which turned out to be a real gem with great staff.  From there we took a lovely two day tour to their sister hostel called On The Wallaby which was located near a rainforest.  We went on some interesting walks in the forest as well as biking, swimming, and even canoeing where we saw three platypussies (not sure of the grammar on that one, but that's the most humorous word I can think of for the plural of "platypus").  Strange little creatures, sort of half duck half muskrat but impossible to differentiate between the head and the ass end.

One thing that has surprised on the east coast is the tourism saturation.  It is certainly one of the more commercialized areas we've ever been to.  In fact, there's so many backpackers around that it's sometimes tough to find an Australian!  The average age of backpackers here is also much younger than it was in South Africa, likely because this is such an obvious place for a first time traveler to visit, and I think that any 20 year old would find the party of their life here!  The other day we saw a t-shirt in a shop window that said, "The Liver is Evil and Must Be Punished!".  Made me think of my time in the Bahamas...

We were lucky enough to meet up with our friend Pavin, who is from Saskatchewan but is currently in school in the States.  We spent an afternoon together in Cairns enjoying the sun and some cold beers before seeing him off to the airport for his flight back home.  Too bad he wasn't staying overnight then we could have punished our livers more thoroughly.  Actually, I'm going through a little dry therapy at the moment after the ten days I spent boozing with Jamie in Western Australia which I enjoyed thoroughly and am still enjoying every time I look in the mirror and see those little spare tires peeking over my swimsuit.

Next update after the big sailing trip!

Kris

October 31, 2002 - Busselton, Australia

Auuuustralia!!

Yes, we made it to stop number two on our round the world wine tour. We have been in Western Australia touring around with our friends Karen Barlow and her boyfriend Jamie and they have been showing us an absolutely splendid time!

We wrapped up our South Africa trip with a few day in Johannesburg with our friends Trudy and Philippe. They were the perfect hosts! We spent more than a couple hours enjoying their mind blowing home entertainment system and vast collection of DVDs which was a great break after all the driving around. We also enjoyed some great meals together and really had a nice visit. It was the best ending to a wonderful time in South Africa.

We arrived in Perth about a week ago and were met at the airport by Karen and Jamie, who had both taken time off work to spend a long weekend with us cruising around Western Australia. It was so nice to see Karen again and also to met Jamie, who is a super guy. We spent the first night in Fremantle, which is a coastal town near Perth, and sampled all the local beers we could find. The next days we drove to a small town called Denmark which is on the south coast and spent for two nights. We saw some great things around there including a magnificent canopy walk through the "Valley of the Giants" which is a forest of huge karri and tingle trees. We also saw our first kangaroos! Ana tried her best to catch one and ride it but it was just too fast for her. We visited some lovely wineries and sampled many varieties of delicious wine.  Unfortunately, the price of wine here is astronomical compared to South Africa, likely three times the price!  But I'm glad to report that hasn't stopped us from consuming vast quantities...

The last few days we've been hanging around Karen and Jamie's place in Busselton, keeping ourselves busy with squid fishing, crabbing, and drinking beer.  Poor Karen has been working all week but Jamie managed to ditch work and is spending his hours showing us around, lucky Olsons!!!  This morning Jamie and I were up at 5:30, same as yesterday, fishing for squid off the incredible 2 km long jetty.  We caught four including two biggies so have amassed enough squid for a big feast tonight.  In a couple hours we are traveling to Karen's parent's place which is near Bunbury.  The plan is to try and catch some marron (lobster-like shellfish, indigenous to western Australia) this afternoon then join Karen's parents for a big barbeque tonight, which they have kindly invited us to.

We extended our stay here to include this weekend (Karen's off work, yeah!) so we plan to do some interesting day trips and probably drink some more wine.  Jamie introduced me to Emu Bitter so we'll likely drink a few more crates of that as well.  It's good to be on vacation!

We will be leaving from Perth on Monday for Sydney, then catching a flight to Cairns to hit the beaches and diving!  We are planning on meeting our friends Pavdaddy and Jayesh somewhere along the east coast...meeting point as yet unknown but that is sure to be a blast.

That's it for now, next update from the east coast!!

Kris

(almost forgot, Happy Halloween!!!!!!)

October 10, 2002 - N2 Highway on the way to Drakensburg Mountains

We apologize for the lack of communication in the last week.  We've been busy making our way up the east cost of S. Africa.  It's been fantastic and we've seen so much...it feels like we've been here for months.  After we left Hermanus we made our way into an area in the mountains called Outdsdoorn.  It is Ostrich capital of the world.  There are more there than anywhere.  They grow them for their meat and their feathers.  We went on a great tour of an ostrich farm and I even got to ride one.  I'm sure will show you the hilarious video at some point. 

The area is also known for its caves.  There is a huge cave system in the mountains there called the Cango Caves.  We went on a tour into the caves called the adventure tour.  I must not be very adventurous because it was hard work.  We firstly went into 3 large caverns, all with their own unique names and stories.  Then the more we walked the smaller and smaller the caves and their entrances got.  The last tunnel we had to climb through a chimney like formation.  If you weighed 10 lbs more then I do you'd have a hard time make it up.  Then the last one you had to lay on your stomach and pull yourself through and then go head first out of another hole.  It was an interesting experience, not for the timid or claustrophobic.   

Our next stop was a beautiful place, aptly named Wilderness. This is where our friends Trudy and Philippe have built a gorgeous home overlooking a cliff and the Indian Ocean. The village is also home to a lagoon so it has plenty of places to go canoeing and hiking. We mostly stayed around the house and tried to help out a bit with a plumbing problem that soaked their entire main floor. They showed us such a splendid time there from the champagne sunsets to the fantastic meals out at the local restaurants.  From Wilderness we also made a trip on the local steam train to a place called Knysna.  t has a beautiful harbour area and we went on a tour of the Knysna Oyster Co. For a whole $1.00 we went on a little tour and did some oyster tasting. 

As we continued our way up the coast, things are getting less and less developed and more and more African. The next area we went to was called the "Wild Coast" or also known as the Transkei. The Transkei use to be its own  country, but in the last 10 years they have become part of S. Africa.  Not soon enough as the locals have stripped every tree in sight, so the initial drive was a bit of a bore. The trees were replaced by these interesting little green and brown clay huts. These belong to the local Xhosa people.  This tribe dominates the area and we spend some time getting to know a bit about their culture.  We stayed on the coast in a teeny little town called Coffee Bay. The hostel was owned by a couple who have turned this very primitive place into a paradise. There are hammocks and a bar, a walk to the beach and lots of place to hide and read a good book.  They even have yoga!!!  In the evenings they have traditional drum lessons and they have the local kids come and sing and dance their traditional music. 

Perhaps the nicest part of our trip so far was on a Town Tour we went on. Silas our Xhosa guide took up to his house to meet his family and told us about his tribe. We walked to their sacred pools were they baptize people and make sacrifices to their ancestors.  Lastly he took us to the local bar.  It was quite dark as there was only one candle, (no electricity in the village).  Inside there was a few ladies and 3 men smoking and enjoying a brew as they sat on some beer crates.  Silas bought us some local beer made from corn and the music came on and all the ladies got up to dance.  It was like a regular nightclub except that the women were wrapped in blankets and some didn't have shoes. One even had a beautiful baby wrapped on her back. So we danced, and drank and laughed. It was amazing. 

So today we left our new friends, to find a few new ones in the mountains. Hope to hear from you all soon.  Happy Birthday Mom!!!

Ana