If you buy freeze-dry camping food made in NZ you get amazing meal choices...including this Smoked Fish Pie that Mac is eating on the left. Tastes amazing....but there are consequences with this particular meal, so be careful, especially if you're sharing a tent with others...
That's what I wrote on my leave request form under "reason for leave". Four days to visit Stewart Island, the baby brother of the South Island. Most people haven't heard of Stewart Island. One hour on the fast ferry will get you there from Bluff. There's only one town, and a lot more wildlife than people. It's how NZ used to be--jungle, without so many introduced predators, like the stoat, that devastate native bird populations. We did our fifth Great Walk there, the Rakiura Track. Compared to the Routeburn it was a piece of cake, and we were rewarded by staying up late one night to be able to view a kiwi in the wild--quite a rare and special treat in NZ. Five days and four nights of camping. I'm proud of this trip because it's my personal best for days of continuous trekking. And, we had five days of perfect weather, which apparently is unheard of in Fjordland. The Routeburn Track was our fourth Great Walk and we circled back on the Caples Track. The rivers were turquoise (see pix below) and the scenery reminded me a LOT of Alaska. If you buy freeze-dry camping food made in NZ you get amazing meal choices...including this Smoked Fish Pie that Mac is eating on the left. Tastes amazing....but there are consequences with this particular meal, so be careful, especially if you're sharing a tent with others... There were waterfalls, alpine lakes, and amazing vistas all through the hike, so it was really impossible to get bored. Also on the Routeburn there are side trips like this little diversion to see the giant Split Rock. Cooler than the split rock were the trees growing on top of the huge rock that had to spread their roots twenty feet to the ground. I have a picture of Mac communing with the Crack (they have a lot in common) but he says I'm not allowed to post it on the blog. When you get tired of waterfalls you can mix it up with prehistoric boulders that look like marbles God dropped on the beach. Sometimes they split open, looking like giant crystal eggs! Moeraki Boulders--definitely a must-see. There are many other rounder, more perfect-looking boulders but the people on them wanted to do dozens of poses and I got tired of waiting. Three days of goofing off in the Catlins and the Otago Peninsula before heading up the East Coast to the ferry. Circumnavigating the South Island plus a side trip to Stewart Island makes for one of those vacations you need a vacation to recover from. Cambria will attest to the fact that sometimes I become a tyrant on vacations and insist that everyone gets up at 6am so that we can see and do it ALL. Mac was a super trooper and put up with my tyrannical ways, and even stayed out until almost midnight a couple nights on "penguin watch". We did end up seeing some very cool penguins, but I've decided that that will be part of another blog entry on "The Six Coolest NZ Animals". :)
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The Campbells in New Zealand
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