30th December 2017 – 2nd January 2018 30th December After our super early start in Melbourne, we arrived at Avalon airport much earlier than we needed to, but that was probably because everything had gone so smoothly at this point: there was no traffic, we parked up easily and there was no queue at security, …
20th December – 30th December 2017 20th December We arrived at Christchurch airport, in plenty of time. We checked in and sent our bags off before wandering through the airport to our gate. We had loads of time to spare, so we sat at the gate for a while and waited for it to open. …
16th December – 20th December 2017 As we drove towards Christchurch, from Mt. Cook, I couldn’t believe we were already heading for our last stop in New Zealand. We arrived in the city centre at around 7.30 and lucky for us, the bus was doing a stop at a hotel around the corner from our …
13th December – 16th December 2017 After leaving Invercargill at 10.45, we had two short bus rides to get us to Queenstown, for our chance to explore the city properly. We arrived at around 2.30, after a bus change and getting stuck in some traffic on the way. Despite Joe saying that it was a …
11th December – 13th December 2017 After boarding the bus at Te Anau, we both drifted off for a nap – Joe had been awake since 5, and I had woken up with a headache, so we both needed some more sleep. We had to get two different buses to get to Invercargill, so when …
8th December – 11th December 2017 After we left Wānaka at 2.30, we drove towards Queenstown for the night – we had to spend a night in Queenstown because the bus wouldn’t go straight from Wānaka to Te Anau. The driver of the bus was full of energy and chatted to us the whole way, …
5th December – 8th December 2017 After getting on the bus at 7.45, in Franz Josef, we knew we had a long day ahead of us, even though Wānaka wasn’t that far away. We were driving and stopping all day long (at least once an hour), which was kind of frustrating, as I just wanted …
1st December – 5th December 2017 When we boarded the bus at Hokitika, we had to sit separately on the bus, as it was so busy, there weren’t two seats together. It didn’t matter too much though, because of course, once we got going, Joe fell asleep, so even if I sat next to him, …
29th November – 1st December 2017 Although we were a little bit late setting off from Punakaiki, we didn’t have very far to go, to get to Hokitika. However, after driving for about half an hour, we had to swap buses at Greymouth. At around 2.15, we arrived in Hokitika, although we pulled up at …
27th November – 29th November 2017 We arrived at the bus stop nice and early, but the driver was already there, so that was okay. He was very chirpy for that time of morning, which worked in our favour as we needed to ask him if he would drop us outside our hostel, as it …