Steward, Oz and Tazzy

This is my third update while backpacking in kiwi-land. The previous ones you can read here and here. I’m not really into writing a diary or travel log, so I figured I’d just share some pictures that I’ve taken on my trip with some comments.

Early March I arrived in on Steward Island to hike the Rakiura great walk, among things. I usually love islands, and this one was no different. It was a beautiful place, as you can see from this picture of sunset over Halfmoon Bay in Oban.

Steward Island is home to about 20000 Kiwis (versus about 800 human inhabitants). Unfortunately though, this sign was the closest I came to seeing one after spending close to 3(!) hours sitting on the edge of a damn rugby field. Stupid birds.

Via a short stop in Auckland, Wouter and I flew up to Brisbane to meet up with Dwight in his natural habitat, the Gold Coast. This is a picture of Mr. D. driving us around the Gold Coast in his pimp mobile.

After hanging out in Surfers Paradise (not recommended), Wouter and I waved Dwight goodbye and drove our (free) Juicy chevy to Sydney via Byron Bay. I’d forgotten what an awesome place Sydney really is. After doing the usual tourist hocus pocus and some proper nightlife exploration, we topped off a great weekend by watching the Waratahs beat the Brumbies (Super Rugby).

After lingering around in Sydney one more week and meeting up with some of my brothers old mates, I went on to Melbourne via Canberra. I must say I really loved Melbourne as well, and would find it hard to pick between the two (which interestingly enough, almost every Ozzy in Melbourne asked me to). Melbourne is all about fashion, hipsters and the arts, and there is awesome street art like this around pretty much every single block.

In St. Kilda, one of the suburbs of Melbourne near the beach, there lives a penguin colony. I thought it was amazing that about a 1000 penguins live in such an urban area.

After my days in Melbourne, I went on to see one of Australia’s major tourist attractions: the Great Ocean road. Occasionally I was able to dodge the Chinese tourist walls forming in front of me and take a shot of the Twelve Apostles. Next to the amazing scenery, I saw several koalas hanging in eucalypts alongside the road, which was pretty cool.

The next morning I jumped on the ferry from Melbourne to Tasmania. On my second day here, I climbed Cradle Mountain, the highest peak in Tasmania. This picture is from the top summit at around 1500 metres. As you can see, the national park around cradle mountain is absolutely stunning, and definitely one of the most beautiful places I’ve visited the past few months.

Another shot from Cradle National park, where Autumn colours are slowly appearing this time of year.

This picture is from another national park, Mount Field. Here grow the second tallest trees in the world, after California’s Redwoods. This big boy is a whopping 95 meters tall and about a thousand years old. Mount Field was a truly great experience and another reason why I absolutely loved Tasmania.

Alright, that was it for now. I took a plane from Hobart (highly overrated place if you ask me) to Auckland yesterday, and will be traveling North towards Bay of Islands and Cape Renga for the last week of my trip.

I’ll be back next weekend just before Kings day, so hope to see you all by then!