The rest of our time with Amanda and Randy

New years day was spent mainly sitting around chatting with no hangover (first time ever!), but we decided in the afternoon that we should probably get a move on.

Amanda and Randy were due to leave on the 10th so decided to travel with us for their remaining days and leave us a few days before to hitch back to Christchurch (they'd hitched their way round the south island so far so were old hat at it!)

We decided we wanted to see Mount Cook and so headed in that direction and stopped close by at lake Tekapo to camp. However, the camp site was heaving and was quite expensive even if we could squeeze in, so headed a bit further out to a place called Twizel where we found a campsite that wasn't so expensive. It seems that the Kiwis love to camp over Christmas and New Year!

Next day we woke to ferocious winds, Amanda and Randy had already taken their tent down but we saw a couple that had blown down (hee hee)! After breakfast we set off for Mount Cook, the wind was still howling and rain was coming in horizontally!! A pretty hairy drive for Rich. We had to drive through a flood to get to Mount Cook village and when we spoke to the people there we were told that they were expecting more bad weather and snow below 1000 metres, very unseasonal! They said that if were weren't planning on staying in the village to leave now as the flood would get a lot worse and we'd be stuck. Oh. So we did. With our plans for Mount Cook a bit scuppered we headed for Wanaka. I wanted to go there for my birthday anyway so I could go and see King Kong at the cinema they have there with sofas, waitress service and homemade cakes and the like! So that's where we went, found somewhere to camp and set up for the night.

My birthday! Rich took me out to puzzleworld today which was a crazy place with a fun maze and lots of optical illusions on display and odd rooms and stuff. Next we were supposed to go the groovy cinema but they were all sold out which was a bit disappointing. So, we had a look round the shops and Rich bought me a beanie hat (necessary given the recent weather). Then we went for a cheeky pint, which turned into a couple, then a bottle of wine (we stole the wine glasses!!) and got back to camp a little bit giggly. We'd planned on having fish and chips for tea so when we returned we had that in the camp kitchen. After that was home made apple pie and ice - cream which Amanda and Randy had cooked, then after that was home made carrot cake, complete with 32 candles and party poppers which Amanda and Randy had also cooked. Nice, I was right chuffed!! Of course, some cake ended up in Rich's face (couldn't help it, it had sloppy icing, and I was drunk!!). Can't really remember any more after that! I know I had a good time though and ate a lot of nice things :-)

Next we headed to a place called Omarama and found a really nice backpackers that did camping and was as cheap as chips. It was a great place, out in the sticks, really dark and quiet. Whilst there we took a walk to the clay cliffs we had driven by on the way. We asked the owner how long it'd take to get there and she said about 2 hours. It was all pretty flat and an easy enough walk, only it took us about 4 hours to get there! We had a look at the cliffs which were formed by an earthquake that forced an old river bed up out of the ground to form towering spires. It was all very nice and interesting. On the way back we were a little tired and it was getting late so we hitched! Got a lift from an English guy in a bit campervan who could only take us to the main road as he had no seatbelts. Then a short walk and we hitched again, when a local stopped and took us to town! Nice!

Next day we took a walk up a mountain that was on the land owned by the people who ran the backpackers. That was cool. It was quite a long walk, uphill but not too steep. We had almost reached the top and could see Mount Cook quite clearly in the distance, which was nice, but I had to leave it there as the last bit up was steeper and I'd got an almighty blister on my heel, but Rich, Amanda and Randy went to the top and I waited. They told me the views were awesome but it was bloody cold, 2047 metres according to Randy's Altometer!

After that we went to Omarau, where Randy managed to get us all into a campsite for about $28 (normally about $13 each), he told them that's all we had between us, that boy's got some front, but it works, nice one Randy!!

It was time then for Amanda and Randy to leave us to get back to Chrischurch. We'd also decided that we'd done New Zealand and were ready for somewhere new. The weather had been a lot shit recently and whilst there were still a few more places we wanted to see, we were pretty much done. So, decided to stick with our leaving date of 20th Jan and Randy did us a route round the rest of the South and the places worth seeing and the ones not, so that helped us. We had just under 2 weeks to do the rest plus get back to Christchurch for about the 15th to get our van sorted out and sold.

We dropped Amanda and Randy off at the main road, said our goodbyes and left them hitching with their great bit cardboard thumbs!