Hey, everyone! This week has gone by in the blink of an eye. The week was capitalized by a weekend trip with my dear friends Jasper and Yvonne to The Catlins. It was our first and, unfortunately, last (for now!) overnight trip together but we had such a good time. Lots of adventures to be had in under 48 hours. Read on below for more!

Slope Point

Jasper, Yvonne, and I met up at 8am and began our drive from Queenstown to Slope Point, which was about four hours. We had gone grocery shopping the night before and were stocked up on road trip snacks, dinner and breakfast food.

The first part of the drive was from Queenstown down to Lumsden – a road which I’ve traveled a number of times since living here. You have to go that way to get to Te Anau or Doubtful Sound or Green Lake Hut or Milford Sound. I think it is the route I’ve driven most often since living here. While I recognize it’s a beautiful drive, I was eager to get down into Unknown Territory. It didn’t take long – and plus, we were having good conversation and listening to good tunes. I think I annoyed the hell out of Jasper and Yvonne by singing along to practically every song I knew… but that’s just how it goes when I’m in the car haha. (Pro Tip: Best to just play music I don’t know if you don’t want to hear me singing.)

Eventually, we turned off towards Gore, which was a spot I’d never been to. We stopped for a bathroom break, ate a banana and some croissants, then continued down to Slope Point.

Slope Point is the southernmost point on the South Island of Aotearoa New Zealand. It’s not technically the furthest south for all of New Zealand. Of course, there’s Stewart Island, and past that, Campbell Island which is just a little island in the middle of nowhere. Those islands are still technically part of New Zealand.

But still – it has a novelty to it.

Upon arriving, we got out of the car and entered farmland. There were sheep blanketing the landscape. A majestic view, with green hills and the ocean just past them. Oh, to be near the ocean again. I love it so.

The path was maybe only ten minutes. We walked through muddy farmland, dodging sheep shit along the way. A bird fluttered above us, flying practically in place. I think it must have been calling to its lover. I had never seen a bird just hover like that – it certainly was waiting for something.

We arrived at Slope Point. For all intents and purposes, it looked like the edge of the world. To the south, a long stretch of horizon. To the southwest, we could see the shadow of Stewart Island off in the distance.

It did feel a bit like the edge of the world. We were at the edge of a cliff, with ocean waves lightly crashing onto the rock shelf below. And then… nothing.

Slope Point is marked by a sign that shows the distance to the Equator and the distance to the South Pole. How cool is that?

The venture to Slope Point was certainly more of a novelty, but I’m glad we did it.

Curio Bay & the Petrified Forest

From Slope Point, we drove another half hour to Curio Bay. We were going to be at Curio Bay again later in the evening, but I figured we’d stop by to look at the Petrified Forest and do a small walk in the area.

The Petrified Forest is not what you might think. When I first heard of it, I thought it would be a bunch of trees that were practically whittled down to the stump, stripped of bark. But actually, if you didn’t know what you were looking at, you wouldn’t even realize they’re trees. They had been flattened and pummeled by waves enough over the years that you could walk across them.

The forest is interesting because it actually dates back to the Jurassic period. The tree fossils are approximately 170 million years old. WOW!

Upon further inspection, we realized that the fossils actually had the grooves of tree bark on them. Seeing that made the experience much cooler. But when we returned later in the evening, it was even better because at low tide, you get a better sense of the area. It was really neat.

Enter: The Catlins Coastal Rain Forest Park

When we’d finished exploring the Petrified Forest, we went over to the Living Forest – which was a really nice half hour loop track. The forest was beautiful. Lots of different trees.

It was highlighted by two bellbirds calling to each other. I finally was able to get a good picture of a bellbird – yahoo! Their call is so beautiful. Look it up on YouTube if you’re interested!

From there, we drove another half hour to get to our accommodation – The Whistling Frog. So named because it is host to a bunch of.. you guessed it, whistling frogs (from Tasmania). We didn’t hear any.

Our accommodation was about ten minutes into Catlins Coastal Rain Forest Park. The scenery changed as we entered the park. Suddenly, we were in rolling hills, filled with trees, trees, and more trees. The grass was incredibly green all over. Just beautiful!

We checked in at reception and stopped for lunch. After eating, we went to our “chalet” (fancy). It was a really nice space! We each had our own beds, a fully equipped chicken, etc. (OMG, am I turning into Daisy from Girl, Interrupted? I meant fully-equipped KITCHEN.) We unpacked, put food in the fridge, and relaxed. Jasper napped. Yvonne and I were both reading outside at one point. Eventually, Yvonne took a nap, too.

Penguin Viewing

At 4pm, we reconvened and drove back to Curio Bay. The reason being we were in search of yellow-eyed penguins. I was hoping to see one closer-up. Curio Bay is well known for its penguin viewings, although in hindsight, I feel the experience at Katiki Point was actually far superior. Alas.

Curio Bay had a “Penguin Walk” which was a little trail that had a fence with built in viewing points. There was also two lookout sections to watch the penguins as they came in after a day of fishing. It was still a bit early, so we went back to the Petrified Forest. At this point, the tide had really gone out and we had a great view of it.

We walked along the beach – er – forest? And I made a little “OOP!” noise as I saw the back side of a penguin and its arm disappearing into the bush. I couldn’t believe I wasn’t able to spot it in time to get a picture! It must have been fifteen feet away from me. It would have made for a nice picture had I seen it a moment earlier. I suppose our group spooked it and it retreated into the bush.

We walked along for some time. Others were out at the beach too. Then a ranger came by and started asking people to leave the beach, since it was almost time for the penguins to come in. It’s important to give them space. While I understand the need for this, I feel it’s a shame it has to be that way. It’s unfortunate that people can’t be trusted enough to just safely observe wildlife from a distance. But I guess it just isn’t possible.

For the next hour and a half, I paced back and forth through the Penguin Walk, intently watching the ocean and the beach for any activity. We did manage to spot another one (or actually, probably the same one) off in the distance. It was right where I had seen it before. It stood at the edge of the bush, waiting for its lover to come back from the sea. I was excited that this time, Jasper and Yvonne were able to see it. Even if it was far away, it was still a yellow-eyed penguin and it’s one of the rarest penguins in the world. Quite a treat to be able to see in person!

I was a little disappointed when that ended up being the only penguin we saw the whole time. At Katiki, I think I saw five or six come in? And Curio Bay was regarded as such a great spot for seeing them. It might depend on the season, although they live there year round so who knows.

Jasper came up with an alternative reason. He came up with a joke that a pod of orcas ate all the Curio Bay penguins and the one we saw was waiting for her husband to come back. When she realized he wasn’t coming back, she would go back to her chickling and say, “I’m sorry, son… Your dad’s dead. And so are all your uncles.” Awful. But we were cracking up. The next day, we suggested that it was the weekend, and maybe the penguins were just off duty.

In all seriousness – after thinking about it, I do wonder if maybe the penguins had started to come in even EARLIER in the day. I wonder if the penguin we’d seen was simply drying off after a day in the ocean. Anyway – just a thought. Who knows?

Glow Worms

We drove back to The Whistling Frog and Yvonne cooked up a delicious meal for us. Somewhere around this time, Jasper announced that we had three different roles on the trip. Jasper – Driver, Yvonne – Chef, me – Planner. We all had our own roles to play.

Yvonne made dumplings as an appetizer, and then Filipino Spaghetti – which is basically like regular spaghetti, but it’s much sweeter, and also has ground pork and pieces of hot dog. Very yummy! We also had fried chicken with gravy. It was absolutely delicious, but the three of us were stuffed afterwards.

While looking through a map of the area earlier in the day, I realized the nearby McLean Falls is home to glow worms. Yvonne had never seen glow worms and Jasper had only just seen the small patch of them that reside in Queenstown. We drove five minutes to the trailhead of McLean Falls and went on a night hike.

On the drive there, I was very upset to find that the road was teeming with possums. As regular readers know… possums are a major problem here in New Zealand. They destroy trees by eating all their leaves and stripping off the bark. They have evolved to become carnivorous, unlike their Australian counterparts, and eat native birdlife, including the beloved kiwi (bird). We saw four possums in probably two minutes of driving. I rolled down the window, shouting at them to go back to Australia, to stop killing the kiwi and to tell their friends. Jasper and Yvonne were cracking up but joined in on the verbal assault as well.

We saw even more than that – one on our hike, and a few on the drive back.

I was well equipped with a super-bright head torch, so I wasn’t worried about the night hike, but Yvonne sure was. She hadn’t gone on a night hike in a long time. The last time was with her dad many years ago and he would turn the light off and spook her. So, she was a little scared. She held my hand as we walked along.

We didn’t have to go far before we were seeing the occasional glow worm here and there. I figured the closer we got to the waterfall, the more there would be. Glow worms tend to like damp places – most notably, mossy bluffs and creeks.

Maybe ten minutes into the walk, we started to see really healthy populations of glow worms. I was thrilled to be able to share the experience with Jasper and Yvonne. There were a lot!

It was pretty comparable to the ones in Dunedin (although, I would argue that the ones in Dunedin were even more plentiful). However, the benefit of these is that with a light shone on them, you could really clearly see the sticky webs the glow worms make to catch their prey. I’d never been able to photograph that before. So cool!

We stayed for some time, taking 30sec exposure photos with our phones on my tripod. At first, whenever I’d turn the light off to take a picture, Yvonne would cuddle into me. She didn’t like the dark! Over time, she seemed to feel more comfortable.

It was a cute bonding experience.

After observing the glow worms, we went back home to sleep. I did some research about the glow worms and learned some things I didn’t know before. Glow worms are larvae. They have a tube that they kind of live in – I guess it’s sort of like a tunnel? They can exit the tunnel and weave a bunch of sticky, stringy traps to catch their prey. At the end of their tube, that is where the “glow” comes from… and it actually is their excrement. So the “glow worms” we are seeing… the glow is actually their shit. Mother Nature sure has an odd sense of humor!

Breakfast & McLean Falls

We woke up at 8am. Yvonne cooked up a storm for us. We had pancakes, hash browns with the leftover gravy, sausages, bacon, eggs, leftover Filipino Spaghetti. It was a total feast. But it set us up super well for the day. With the porch door open, the sun shone its morning light on us as we shared breakfast together.

Thank you so much for being such an incredible chef, Yvonne!

After getting ready for the day, we began our next leg of the journey.

We had a return visit to McLean Falls first thing.

It was a very different experience during the day. Less spooky, and really, really beautiful.

The night before, we could tell the falls were pretty strong due to the loudness of the water. Seeing it was a different thing entirely. I audibly gasped when I first saw it. Incredible! We took some selfies and admired the falls before heading back and continuing our day.

There was also a… GOAT on the path on our way back! I was completely shocked.

The goat very quickly scurried off the path and up into the bush.

Purakaunui Falls

Our next stop of the day? ANOTHER waterfall! There are a lot in the Catlins region, but we only had two planned for the day. We had a long drive back to Queenstown so couldn’t see it all. It was certainly more of a Best Of trip, but that’s alright.

Jasper turned off the main road and we drove about ten minutes through… GRAVEL! Jasper and I hate, Hate, HATE gravel roads. They’re the worst! But before long, we arrived at the head of the trail. It was only about five minutes to get down to the waterfall. While it was a beautiful waterfall, we were all slightly underwhelmed after having just experienced the beauty of McLean Falls. This is the problem with seeing multiple waterfalls in one day – I think we tend to compare one to the next. Had we seen Purakaunui first, I’m sure we would have really loved it!

According to Jasper, this waterfall was “insignificant” hahaha.

After the falls, we began driving to Nugget Point, but needed to fill up on gas. The Catlins is sort of in the middle of nowhere, so there aren’t many amenities around. We had planned to get gas at Owaka… but there was only one gas station and the pumps were closed due to a power outage. We could see the workers repairing the power lines lol. Wild. Luckily, we had enough gas to get to Nugget Point and then to another gas station. Otherwise… we would have been in trouble.

Nugget Point

I had heard of Nugget Point before, and I think even glimpsed a picture once upon a time, but I wasn’t prepared for how beautiful it would be. I think it was maybe my favorite spot over the entire weekend!

As we neared Nugget Point, we started driving right next to the ocean. I kept my eyes peeled for seals and sea lions, but didn’t see any. We got to the parking lot and began the hike. The area was so gorgeous. It was a tall peninsula reaching out to the sea. We walked down the middle of the peninsula and had ocean on either side of us. The views were surreal.

Far down below, we could see two fur seals playing with each other in a tide pool just at the edge of the ocean. Very cute!

At the end of the peninsula, there was a lighthouse, which had a wonderful view of the “nuggets.” But the best part of all was that at the end of the hike, there was a food stall giving out chicken nuggets! (JK – that’s a joke I trolled Jasper with.)

We looked out at the nuggets below and snapped some pictures.

It was a really great scene. I think more than the nuggets, though, I really liked the mountain that rose far above the sea. It had a small, black-pebble beach, with strong waves crashing onto it. While the day had been absolutely gorgeous thus far, thick clouds started to roll in. The atmosphere changed. It suddenly got moodier.

After Nugget Point, we stopped at Roaring Bay, which is a popular viewing point for yellow-eyed penguins. I didn’t expect to see any since it wasn’t late enough in the day yet, but I decided to give it a shot anyway. Alas, there were none.

Just like that, we had completed our attractions for the day. What a whirlwind weekend it had been!

We drove parallel to the ocean again, and then headed in the direction of Gore. Rain started to pour down. It continued the entire way until we got to Queenstown and on through the evening. I can’t believe the weather held out for us the entire weekend. It could have been pretty wet and miserable, but it wasn’t! Winter weather can be kind of unpredictable… but as of today, it is officially spring. I’m looking forward to the warm weather. It was actually so warm the second day – so much so, I didn’t even need my coat. In the car, I even took off my sweater. Warm days ahead!!! I can’t wait.

We passed so many different types of terrain. We left the alpine wonderland of Queenstown behind, entered farmland, drove past rugged cliffs lining the ocean, drove through winding roads lined by lush, green hills. The rainforest of The Catlins, down to coastal terrain, and eventually back to alpine. We saw a lot. It was a really great weekend.

Miscellaneous

With such a long blog post after only two days of exploring, I don’t know WHAT these blogs are going to look like once I leave Queenstown. I definitely have to edit and convert these blogs into a book one day.

We had a function for a skin care brand at work the other day. I had helped the organizer get all the details sorted via email ahead of the event and she actually thanked me by gifting me a face moisturizer with built in SPF. I looked it up online and it’s $62 NZD. Insane! How thoughtful.

On Thursday, I went to dinner con mis chilenas. Katy, Nittsy, Vale, and I went to SODA and shared an incredible dinner. It was the first time the four of us had gone for dinner together. They are all from Chile and have always been very kind and patient with me as I practice Spanish. Throughout dinner, there were times where I needed translation. Other times, though, it was pretty cool to be able to understand and converse in Spanish throughout the meal. I actually was a little nervous about it ahead of the dinner – wondering if it would be annoying having to translate everything into English for me. But nah. Such a lovely time with my gals. Te amo!

While it’s still a bit away – I am looking forward to seeing family and being home for my birthday this year. I was wondering when the last time I was with family/friends for my birthday was. I’ve broken it up below.

2016 – Iceland
2017 – South Africa
2018 – Norway
2019 – Home??? (Hawaii)
2020 – Denver, CO
2021 – North Carolina
2022 – Rottnest Island, WA
2023 – Milford Sound

I think I actually was working on my birthday (in 2019) since it was a Monday and I then went to Hawaii on the 27th. I probably celebrated with my parents the weekend prior. (Mom/Dad, do you remember?) BUT STILL – I think 2015 was the last time I was actually, properly, with my family/friends on the 25th of November. I’m looking forward to being with my parents this year!

Art of the Week

Reflections

And now, for a few reflections.

Boy, is it getting close now. After counting weeks since March… I have just about a week to go before I leave Queenstown. Time is speeding up. I had a moment while we drove along the coast where I suddenly felt incredibly excited and ready to be adventuring full time. Soon. So soon.

While Yvonne made dinner and breakfast, we were listening to music. The three of us would break out into dancing fits. I think these are the memories that make life worth living. It’s not always about the sights you see, it’s often more so about the moments spent with the people you see them with. Unfortunately, I am alone on much of my travels but of course, I enjoy it. But the experiences are amplified ten-fold when spent with loved ones.

I’m so grateful to have had this weekend with Jasper and Yvonne. I love you both! It was such a beautiful, memorable trip filled with gorgeous sights, laughter, wildlife, and singing. I think when people go on trips like this together, they remember the experience forever. They reinforce friendships and create strong bonds. It’s sort of like going to summer camp. I bet years from now, we will message each other and go “remember when we ________?” That’s the magic of travel. Sigh.

So… what’s next?

I have one final weekend left in Queenstown. On Saturday, I’ll be having some people over at the hostel to sing a song for them while playing guitar. Afterwards, we’ll have one last big night out dancing. On Sunday, I’d like to go up the gondola to get a view of Queenstown from above. And later, I’d like to go to Queenstown Hill one final time. Hiking up Queenstown Hill was one of the first activities I did when I arrived in Queenstown. You all know I love doing things full circle – so it seems fitting to do it one last time.

Until next time – sending you all my love. xx