The Life & Death of Trixie the Toyota & Other Stories

The Josh Franco Section
We did some bungy jumps. We nearly lost everything. We jumped out a plane.

It's been a crazy couple of weeks. Prepare yourself for the most pulse pounding, heartbreaking, nail biting blog entry yet. If you're of a nervous disposition you may want to look away now. If not prepare for...

The Life & Death of Trixie the Toyota & Other Stories

So last time I left you we were in Te Anau. From here we explored the obscenely scenic surroundings. First this involved a boat journey across the lake to the Glow-worm caves. These dark caves were filled with little glow-worms shining light out their bums like shining stars in the sky. It was really cool, kind of like being in space. Floating around we completely lost our sense of where we were. The next day we went to The Milford Sound. This was even more incredibly beautiful. We went on a boat cruise around the sound (Boring Fact: It isn't actually a sound but a Fiord) and basically just sat out in the fresh air admiring our surroundings. You can look at the photos of the place but it's difficult to understand the sheer scale of it all without being there. There are waterfalls three times the size of Niagara Falls and mountains above the cloud line.

From Te Anau we drove to Queenstown. This is where it gets extreme! The first bit of excitement happened on the drive there. You should definitely fill up on petrol before you start a drive like this. You can't just hope to fill up on a town on the way if there isn't such thing as a town on the way. We just about made it to Kingston with the Empty light having been flashing for about half an hour. From here it was just a short drive to scenic Queenstown. Q-Town has a reputation as New Zealand's adventure capital and it is totally justified. After getting in and setting up camp we walked down the main street and were spoilt for choice with activities to book. We selected a couple of things and then carried on exploring. The place surprised both of us. I think we were expecting more of a city instead of the picturesque mountain town we got. It was a pleasant surprise anyway.

Our first extreme activity was the world's highest swing The Nevis Sky Swing. A kind of warm-up for what was to come it is 166m high with a 300m arc and 70m free fall. We decided to go backwards as a tandem first of all. We had to tip-toe out to the edge where we were strapped into harnesses. They then dangled us over the chasm before pressing a button and sending us flying. It all went so fast with neither of us really knowing what was going on. The harness flew up and hit me in the face leaving me with a cut. It was awesome. As we kind of got our heads back together we both decided we wanted to go again. This time we went backward and dangling upside down which was even more fun. I'd never seen Nic look as scared as she did before this (this title would soon be taken) but she enjoyed it too. In the afternoon we went up the gondola to Bob's Peak to enjoy the views over the city and have a go on the luge.

The next day was the most extreme day. We didn't have a great night's sleep in preparation for it. Our delightful neighbours (who had decorated their pad with used condoms and empty bottles) were a little bit noisy. You know the neighbours theme tune - with a little understanding good neighbours become good friends. I'm not sure how much understanding would be needed for these guys. From the hours of 11 to 12 we had the sound of violent retching as one of them was sick pretty much everywhere. This was topped at 3am when we were awoken by the porn star noises being made by two of the others as they boned presumably on top of the corpse of the girl who'd vomited herself to death. Nic got up and pretty much told them to get a room rather than a paper thin tent. Anyway, we were a little bleary eyed when we got up ready for me to jump off a bridge. I was doing the Karawau Bridge. 43 metres - the world's first commercial bungy jump. The bus dropped us off at the jump site around 10.15. Within a matter of minutes I had been weighed and processed and I was having a towel strapped to my legs. The staff at AJ Hackett were completely professional and didn't give anyone a second to be scared. Before I'd even really processed where I was I was tip-toeing to the edge. The jump-master whose nickname was Killa (Brilliant) told me to look out toward the bridge and jump on 1.
3-2-1...
I jumped. It was a total head rush racing toward the water and then hitting the surface. I was soaked but I felt brilliant dangling there. I'd definitely do it again and I even managed to inspire Nic to do a jump too. In the afternoon I went River Boarding. This wasn't so much River Surfing but more grabbing onto a board and trying to go with the flow as I hurtled down grade three rapids and swirled round whirlpools. It wasn't what I expected (really hard work) but it was fun anyway. As I got back it was time for Nic's jump. We got the Gondola again up to The Ledge. Nic had a bit more of a wait than me but soon enough she was being strapped into the harness. Nic chose this one because you got to do a run-up and didn't have to stand with your toes over the edge. They counted down from 5 this time and off she went. It was absolutely hilarious. Maybe, even more fun than mine. She jumped off the ledge and kind of doggy paddled in the air before in true Wil.E Coyote style realising that gravity still applied and rushing 48 metres toward the trees below. I have never heard such a girly scream from Miss Nicki Wray. I insisted on buying the DVD so we could watch it again and again. Check out the photos and things. It really was great stuff.

Our loud neighbours had left (Maybe a Roman style orgy to attend?) but we still couldn't get a good night's sleep as our tent pole snapped AGAIN. Rebel Sports tents are definitely not the best quality.

And now for the REALLY exciting part...

After buying a new tent (Kathmandu this time – pay more but for better quality) we left Queenstown heading toward Wanaka. There are two ways to drive this route. The long way along the relatively flat route 6 and the more direct path through the crown range. We chose the more scenic second option. What we didn't realise is that this would mean taking Trixie on the steepest sealed road in the whole of New Zealand. This would prove to be a mistake for a car that had struggled on the flattest of roads. We'd been going for about twenty minutes before the problems started. A whirring noise, the revs going through the roof and a horrible burning smell. The clutch had gone. Everyone to panic stations. We needed to pull over. Mostly due to indecision I waited until the next layby as a row of cars started to build up behind us. There were some cyclists resting here so I couldn't get the car onto the flat. I pulled up the hand-brake and put the car in gear. We both managed to get out. Then the car started to roll. Down the hill, back toward the road, back toward the cliff edge and a plunge down the mountain side. Everything we owned was in the back. We tried to push, fighting against gravity. It didn't do any good. The car continued to roll. This was more terrifying than bungy jumping, scarier than river boarding, the world's highest swing didn't even come close. The car slammed back into a wooden fence just about wedging the bumper against it. Nic had her door open which helped too. I was straight on the phone to the AA. Speaking to different people giving me different quotes and times. They suggested an agonizing 45 minutes wait until help could get there. Two hours later someone finally arrived. My new hero Garry Ross of Shamrock Motors.

The two hours actually went by quite quickly. We played cards with some fellow travellers whose car engine had overheated, we spoke to a nice biker who had got a puncture and the police stopped by and checked on us telling us they'd been looking for a man who'd been threatening cars with a knife on the other side of the hill. It could have been worse, I don't know if Trixie could have outran a man with a knife. The nicest thing was the number of people who stopped to see if we were OK. There are good people here. Once Garry got us hooked up he dragged us further up the hill so we could use the momentum to get Trixie onto his trailer. This resulted in another much smaller crash before we got her on and were heading back into Arrowtown. At this point it was clear that Trixie had driven her last mile. We weren't sure what we'd do. Sure we could get another car but we'd lose a number of days and probably have to work a lot earlier than planned. It also meant we'd probably have to go back into Queenstown to find the new car. This is when Garry saved us. His wife had a Toyota Corona for sale. Only slightly more expensive than Trixie we took it for a test drive. Despite being a year older it was obviously in much better condition. So we shelled out the cash and christened our new car Trixie 2.

We spent a night at the camp-site in Arrowtown and then went to say a tearful goodbye to Trixie as we left her in the car graveyard and were on our way to Wanaka via the long route. On the way in we stopped at the weird but fun Puzzle World. Our potent mix of aggression, impatience and incompetence meant a fun time in the maze turned into a massive struggle. Check out the pictures for Nic's face when finishing! Today we performed our final EXTREME activity – Sky Diving. We went from 12,000 feet with a 45 second free fall over Lake Wanaka. It was hugely enjoyable but neither Nic nor I felt too terrified being up there. I guess being strapped to a giant Brazilian called Mac will get rid of most of your fear. Some great views as we floated down to the ground though.

After all these crazy adventures we're hoping for a little more relaxing time as we finish off the South Island before heading North. No more jumping off bridges or out of planes and certainly no more Near Death Experiences with cars, cliffs and steep roads. It's good to be alive!

Missing you all,

Steve & Nic

xxxx

Seal The Deal

The Josh Franco Section
We are still in New Zealand. You shouldn't be ashamed of playing badminton. We saw lots of animals.

Hey there kids. The blog is back and this time it's personal. Actually I guess every time it's personal. If it wasn't personal it wouldn't be much of a travel blog and would maybe be a work of fiction. Anyway, last time I left you I was feeling slightly hungover. Not now. As I write this I am sitting looking out to the mountains towering over Lake Te Anau. I think the only suitable word for the view is Bonertastic. It's making it more difficult to type anyway. So since last time we have travelled down the East Coast in Trixie the Toyota (Despite her best efforts to stop us) and now we're heading back up West. For those of you who are confused (Josh) and had to ask my Mum which country we were in (Josh) – We are in New Zealand. Whatever the case I think I can safely say it's better than Old Zealand.

So before we left Christchurch we wanted to give the car a little test so we did a few day trips. We drove to Sumner and along with our gal pal Ian we did a walk to Taylor's Mistake. The highlight of the trip for everyone was seeing a pensioner sun bathing naked on the beach. The weird thing is there wasn't even any Sun. Here is also where we discovered Trixie's handbrake was by and large useless. On the plus side I managed to figure this out before slowly rolling back into the sea. Our second testing trip was to Hamner Springs where we relaxed in the eggy smelling bubbling natural hot springs. We also had a game of mining themed mini golf. It was a course I think most people would enjoy. Actual miners like ToM might find it a bit of a busman's holiday. I should also mention that at this point we were staying in The Jailhouse – an old jail refitted as a hostel. A really cool place to stay with all of the jail features pretty much intact including cells doubling as rooms. 'Anything can happen when two people share a cell cuz.' I don't know what all those prisoners complain about. It was really nice. I didn't get raped once. Just in case I did draw the prison layout on my stomach a la Michael Schofield.

Reasonably confident in our driving ability we then left 'The Church' as the kids are calling it apparently and headed out on our adventures. Our first stop was the Banks Peninsula and the small town of Akaroa for our first nights camping. We eagerly set-up our brand new tent, put out our totally useful citronella candles and prepared ourselves to go wild. And for the first night it was fine if a little cold. It was on the day after the first night that the tent pole decided to snap. This presented a couple of problems.
1.The tent was now not really capable of having people sleep in it.
2.Due to a snapped lever on the back seat of our car the back seat couldn't go down.
We were a little distressed and none too pleased with Rebel Sports' $50 tent. I drove to the shop and bought super glue and needles. The glue wouldn't fix the pole and I don't really know why I bought the needles. It was looking pretty bad. I didn't panic though and started randomly prodding the broken lever with a tent peg. Much to my surprise it worked and we got the seat down. This meant we could now sleep in the back of the car like motorized hobos (Mobos?). I revelled in my hero status for the next forty minutes. The town of Akaroa was itself a really nice little place. It markets itself as a French settlement though its Frenchness pretty much boils down to it having a bakery. I can make judgements on this because I am basically French. The main attraction was seeing The Hector's Doplhin. The world's smallest dolphin and native only to New Zealand's coast. We donned our wetsuits and headed out in search of them. It took a little while to find them but we were soon in the water. The idea was to stay still and let them interact with you but a German man in our group took this to mean flap around as much as possible and if you see a fin chase it down like a dog chasing a stick. Eventually he got the idea and the dolphins had a little swim amongst us. It was pretty cool.

After Akaroa we were heading back toward Christchurch and onto the East Coast proper. On the way we picked up a new tent pole... Or so we thought. Our first stop was the small city of Timaru. Not an especially exciting place. It didn't help that it rained most of the time and we were on an abandoned gypsy camp-site and despite there being loads of room the only other people in there (a woman and her 7 annoying children) decided to camp pretty much on top of us. Then the tent pole didn't work. It required assembly and was a completely different size to the one we already had. At this point I reached the status of 'angry'. We went to Rebel Sport in Timaru and the girl at the counter offered her sincerest apologies that we had been completely fucked around but said they didn't have any spare poles. At this point I reached the status 'HULK'. This doesn't happen often and few people have seen it. I kind of blanked out what actually happened but whatever the case we walked out with a brand new tent. Score.

It was only one night on the camp-site of the damned (and 7 irritating children) before we were heading onto Oamaru. Thankfully the camp-site was much nicer. Set quite a distance from the city The Olive Garden was spacious and open with trees and a stream trickling along side and sheltered by a cliff face. The owners were also really helpful in providing tips for our main Oamaru mission – spotting penguins. On their advise we stayed away from the city on the first night and instead went to Moeraki Village and beyond to the end of Lighthouse Road. Here we walked through a gate and literally a couple of metres to our left we saw our first penguins. An adult and its big fat fluffy chick. Here we saw about 10 penguins in total only metres away from us going about their daily business. As a bonus there were also countless seals littering the beaches and rocks. Most were just lying around but a few were swimming around in the rock pools and plain just having a great time. The next day we went to the Moeraki Boulders in the morning. After a cold walk in the wind and rain we got a few pictures before Nic's camera packed up. They were as much fun as a bunch of rocks in the sea could be and kind of cool to have a look at and a jump around on. In the afternoon we went into the city to see the Blue Penguins. In the early evening we did a Behind the Scenes Tour of the colony which was pretty lame. The guide was unable to answer any of my well thought out questions about the little things. Much better was our return at 9 for the main event. As it got dark rafts of the Blue Penguins rolled into shore. We sat in a stand and watched 116 penguins climb up the rocks and waddle to their nests. Both sets of penguins were great fun to watch. They waddle with such intensity like they have really important tasks to accomplish. The blue ones are like Lemmings from the old PC Game except without the umbrellas and drills and things. Watching them run and then fall on their stomachs never got old.

After two places that could barely be described as cities we headed to the real city of Dunedin. On the way we stopped at the very cool Asylum hostel which was as you may guess an old Asylum turned into a hostel and classic car museum (scrap yard). I should also mention that before leaving Oamaru Trixie had to get her first jump start. Thanks Olive Garden man! We stayed just a stone's throw away from the beach at another nice holiday park. We had two full days to explore. On the first we did tours of The Speight's Beer Factory and The Cadbury's Factory. Both were interesting but the Beer was a little more fun. Our tour guide was 'basically a chilled out entertainer' who after the tour told us some stories of how the mayor of Dunedin had called him without even a day's notice and got him to do a show and explaining how he crafted cutting edge jokes on subjects such as Tiger Woods' infidelity. The free beer at the end of the tour was a nice little bonus too. The Cadbury's tour also gave out freebies but only their crappier chocolate. Not a Crunchie in sight. The factory wasn't in full swing as it was still Christmas holidays but I would recommend going. We went in search of the forgotten chocolate of yesteryear The Fuse and although we saw a wrapper in the museum section there wasn't any available to buy. On our second day we drove out to the Otago Peninsula. Here we went to New Zealand's only castle that wasn't really a castle but more of an old house. We went to the Albatross sanctuary but thought it too expensive. The joke was on them because I saw one flying about. We also tried to go on a walk recommended in our pamphlet but after driving down a suspicious track were told by some farmer types that the walk we wanted to do had been closed for about 11 years. Eventually we found a walk that we were actually allowed to do heading down through some rock formations resembling pyramids to the beach. The peninsula was a nice way to spend a day and good preparation for the next section of our trip. I should also mention in Dunedin we had our first of two free AA call out as the battery went again. The guy who came to fix it moved a wire and it came back to life. He explained it was a loose connection and then I think to make me feel better bashed it with his hammer a couple of times.

From Dunedin we had a two day drive through The Catlins. No mobile phone reception, no cash points and very little in the way of civilisation. On the way we stopped at waterfalls, caves and after a long drive down dodgy track (most of the side roads were a bit of a nightmare) we found a beach that Sea Lions called home. We saw a male and female on our walk along the shore. Unlike seals Sea Lions are not scared of humans and will charge if they feel threatened. After seeing the 400kg male get up on his flippers I didn't want to do anything to make them feel threatened. Our camp-site at Curio Bay was very basic but the location was incredible. On one side we had waves crashing onto the rocks and on the other side we had more yellow eyed penguins. It was also in such a place that many Sea-Lions decided to crash there taking up camp-sites and even lying in the entrance. A German man got too close to one and ended up getting chased. It was pretty funny.

Back from the Catlins it was back to civilisation and phone reception for our phones that don't really work all that well anyway. We stayed the weekend in Invercargill with Matt and Sam Hall, their 2 year old Phoebe and Scooby Doo look a like dog Jazzie. Phoebe, Jazzie and I formed a gang and solved some mysteries. The Halls kindly allowed us to recharge our batteries and agreed to look after Trixie whilst we went to Stewart Island.

15 minutes on a tiny plane with a 10 person capacity and we were there. Stewart Island is at New Zealand's southern tip and although much bigger than Jersey it's population is minuscule with the majority of the island covered in forest. We had a day in the township of Oban to prepare ourselves before embarking on a 3 day great walk trek. It was 36km total spread out to 12 km per day with stops in basic huts with bunks and cold running water and festival style toilets. Because we had to carry all our food and provisions in our packs it was actually tough going. By the last hour of our trek we were pretty tired but with the help of a few word and memory games we got through it. It was fun and a great feeling to finish but I'm not sure if we'll do many more like it. Walking can be kind of boring when there isn't a whole lot to look at and you have to do it three days in a row. We flew back a day later and because of over booking I had to co-pilot the plane. The pilot was a bit of a dick and wouldn't let me have a go on the wheel or press any buttons but I was fully prepared to take us to our firey death if anything happened to him. Matt and Phoebe picked us up at the airport and we had another night of their hospitality (who knew putting a hat on a dog could be so much fun?) before we started our western trek.

Epic. So we are now in Te Anau basing ourselves for The Milford Sound. After this it's up to Queenstown and some EXTREME activities that I'm not allowed to talk about yet because it might upset my Mum, Wanaka and then the Glaciers.

Hope all is well wherever you are my dear readers and that you haven't been too inconvenienced by the snow. Let it be known we were totally jealous looking at the photos on Facebook. If you want to get in touch leave a comment or hit us up on the Facebook. It's always good to hear from people unless you're the type of person I secretly hate. Now I'm off to play mini-golf!

Missing you all,

Steve & Nic

xxxx