Destination #20: Checking out some stones in Petra (Jordan)

Wednesday 26 January 2011 - Sunday 6 February

Petra (Jordan)

"A quiet house in a noisy neighbourhood" is how Jordan's beloved late King Hussein called his country. And it feels like he wasn't far off.

A short flight from Abu Dhabi, on what could have been my personal airline - Royal Jordanian's RJ615 - got us to Amman. Royal Jordanian must be the most chaotic airline in the whole world. As the flight attendants didn't speak any Arabic one confused passenger almost opened the emergency exit door during take-off after he misunderstood the safety instructions.

From Amman we drove one of the largest rental cars to date - a GMC the size of a tank - over the Desert Highway all the way to Petra. The Desert Highway does exactly what it says on the tin, it is just a 240km long stretch through the desert, passing nothing but sand and the occasional lost camel.

 

The ancient Nabataean city of Petra however is an incredible site. It is sort of a mix of the grandeur of the Grand Canyon, combined with the steps of the Inca Trail and the ticket prices of Disneyland. We got ourselves an excellent guide named Hassan. Hassan, a father of six - "I try to control them, but to be honest it doesn't really work" - guided us through the ever narrowing Siq gorge, towards the Treasury (which featured in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade as the final resting place of the Holy Grail), past the Place of High Sacrifice (according to Hassan so named because the climb up requires a "high personal sacrifice") and finally to the well-hidden Monastery.

In the evening we joined the "Petra by Night Tour" where candles lit up the path through the Siq all the way up to the Treasury. We have to admit that a visit to the Old City of Petra is a once in a lifetime experience. It is truly fascinating site and as far as we are concerned it is rightfully considered as one of the New Seven Wonders of the World.

We also made a desperate attempt to visit Lawrence of Arabia's Wadi Rum, but a lack of fuel and a surplus of rain got the better of us and we had to turn the tank around before we could actually make it there.

After spending a couple of days in Petra, and having managed to get food poisoning at the Moevenpick's "Fine Dining Restaurant" (seriously, you can't make this stuff up), Em drove the tank back over the Dead Sea Highway to Amman. I have to admit we have never seen this many military checkpoints and police controls in our life and we have been to Israel and South America. When we eventually did get stopped the conversation ended up being almost comical: "Where are you from?", "ehmm Holland", "Where are you going?, "ehmm Amman", "Oh welcome to Jordan then!".

Amman looked like a really nice city, but unfortunately we didn't do it justice as we only stayed one night before catching a RJ flight back to Sam & Guy in Abu Dhabi. Despite the fact that the King sacked the whole cabinet during our stay, and while protests crippled neighbouring country Egypt, there was never any sign of unrest in Jordan. A quiet house in a noisy neighbourhood after all then.

Abu Dhabi

One of the first things Guy did when we arrived in Abu Dhabi was to take us to the recently opened Ferrari theme park named "Ferrari World". The best ride here is without a doubt the Formula Rossa Rollercoaster. With 240km per hour, this hydraulically launched rollercoaster is the fastest rollercoaster in the world. It was so good we went twice and then another time. However, the other main ride, V12, which is as much as a boat ride through an enormous Ferrari engine, received our vote of "gayest ride in the universe".

What else did we get up to in Abu Dhabi? Well I almost was tempted in trying the Camelcino (Cappuccino with camel milk) at the fancy Emirates Palace, we also hired some crazy fast jet-skis at the harbour next to the Fishmarket (100 km per hour no probs), had some excellent ribs at The Meat Company in the Souq Qaryat Al Beri and met Beau and Max for some bellinis and a really nice Italian dinner at Cipriani at the Yas Yacht Club. I also got a Tunisian bloke called Mohammed to trim my beard Sheikh Khalifa style in Marina Mall. And to finish it all off, Em of course couldn't resist but hitting the local shoe and diamond shops.

Dubai

Dubai is where it all started to slightly unravel. It started innocently enough with a stroll through the Dubai Aquarium and a visit to the tallest man-made building in the world (828m): Burj Khalifa (it was supposed to be called Burj Dubai, but one of the conditions of the Dubai bail-out by big brother Abu Dhabi was that the tower was to be renamed to Abu Dhabi's ruler Sheikh Khalifa).

However when Sam and Em hit the shops for an 11-hour shopping bonanza, Guy and I made our way over to the desert to do some good old "dune bashing". And this is where things really came apart. The lesson I have learned here is that when somebody calls a sand-buggy "his baby" it is generally not a good idea to crash it. And crashing it is what we, or should I say I, did. It has to be said that Guy didn't help by shouting "faster, faster, faster' but going full speed over the top of a sand dune in the middle of the desert while you can't see what is on the other side of that sand dune is not one of the smartest thing I ever did. Especially when it later became clear there was a pretty steep drop on the other side of that sand dune. Let's just say we found out the hard way, having flipped the car and having found ourselves hanging upside down in it in the process. 

Despite our best efforts to sweep the whole thing under the carpet, there is not much you can say when both front wheels point in a different direction. We parted company with a wad of cash and the rental guy accepted the fact that "his baby" would never be the same again. One day this will be a great bedtime story, stuff of legends. Anyway where can you still crash a sand-buggy for the price of a pair of discounted Jimmy Choos?

Special thanks to Sam & Guy for being such fine hosts and of course to their "special needs cat" Buster and his occasionally grumpy sister Sparkles who lightened up our visit with non-stop entertainment and acrobatics. Thanks guys we had a great time in the desert!

Next stop: Destination #21: Havana (Cuba)

Destination #19: Chilling out in Copenhagen (Denmark)

Thursday 13 January 2011 - Sunday 16 January 2011

Short but sweet, was the theme of our, well, as Emma sat this one out, my first destination of 2011: Copenhagen.

Copenhagen has to be my favourite European city and that is despite the fact that my former Interim Global Co-Head of Northern European Coverage Freddy is running around causing havoc there. By the way our inspiring leadership campaign lasted no longer than a couple of days and they did have to sack the whole team for us to move up by default (it was not like there was anyone else left in the team "to manage"). Our short reign was brutally ended when the real management guys found out they forget two guys in the cull and moved us to some other team in order to do some actual work for a change.

Not only did our personal lifestyle guru and Wallpaper & Monocle founder Tyler Brûlé choose Copenhagen as "2nd most liveable city in the World for 2010" for the second year running, but also I bet you didn't know that the average police response time is just 3 minutes and 30 seconds (that is what happens if you spent too much time on airplanes, you start to store utterly useless facts).

Copenhagen used to be the place for copious amounts of gay drinks ("With an umbrella please. By the way do you happen to have a straw as well? Yes the pink one is fine") and stumbling out of nightclubs in the wee hours of the morning. Unfortunately I passed my peak a long time ago, the only sport I would currently qualify for is sumo wrestling and those small headaches in the morning after a night of heavy drinking now take days to clear. So, just like the old days, Freddy and I spent three mornings on the squash court. And just like the old days, I managed to lose each and every set. Nothing beats getting up early in the morning and getting your ass wipped three days in a row. Some things just never change. Well actually one thing did change, the lovely Marie, who must have lost her mind as she is actually living with Freddy, made us a killer breakfast every morning. Noma eat your heart out. After all that hard work, I have to admit that we did manage to squeeze in a couple of White Russians in a killer bar called Ruby as well.

Over the last couple of months we have done a lot of new adventurous and exciting things. But never before have I had to wear a more ridiculous outfit than when we went "hunting" in the forests outside Copenhagen that Saturday. As the puppy was still being groomed for the real thing, I was dressed up as a sort of disastrous outcome of a cloning experiment between Rambo and the Michelin Man gone pear-shaped. Furthermore, it still makes no sense to me why I was dressed up all in green, in a snow covered forest, where besides Freddy an me, there was nothing, and I do mean nothing, that actually slightly resembled the colour green. Good news of all this was that Bambi saw us coming from miles away and no animals were spotted or hurt in this disastrous hunting expedition.

As I made my way to the gate at CPH on Sunday evening, holding an "Energizer" from "Joe and the Juice" in one hand (great recommendation by Christian by the way) and my Tumi bag in the other, I could think of only one thing: Damn I love Copenhagen.

Special thanks is due to the stunning Marie (I still have difficulty sleeping after that ghost story you told me), the lovely Sofie, the crazy Pitou (aka Little Terror) and of course the main villain of the piece Freddy "Gay Drinks" Scheibel. Thanks guys, I had a blast.

Nest stop: Destination #20: Checking out some stones in Petra (Jordan)

And then there were 10...

Nine months down the line, a fortune down the drain, and still 10 destinations to go. As you know we will do anything to avoid doing a day of honest work. 

We managed to strike off 18 destinations of our List of 28 in 2010, although to be fair, we had to be a little bit creative for three of them:

1. "The World Exposition in Shanghai, China" was replaced by "Sandboarding in the Death Valley in Chili" (August 2010) after being unceremoniously dumped by Vijverberg Sr. (no hard feelings dad...)

2. "Globalising the orange juice trade in Malawi" was replaced by "Crossing (and surviving) Bolivia" (August 2010) after we found out that my cousin and her partner had fled Malawi before we could book a ticket, having left behind a fully-fledged flourishing orange juice business

3. "Relaxing in The Datai in Langkawi" was replaced by "Thrill seeking in New Zealand" (November 2010) as after nine months we were pretty much maxed out on relaxation already anyway

So what is left for 2011? Well, this is what we are still looking to do in the next couple of months:

1. Party like it is 1999 in Copenhagen (Denmark)

2. Checking out some stones in Petra (Jordan)

3. Meeting Fidel for tea in Havana (Cuba)

4. Chilling out at the Ice Hotel in Jukkasjarvi (Sweden)

5. Trekking to Mount Everest Base Camp from Kathmandu (Nepal)

6. Getting admitted to the SAS-led Ultimate Bootcamp in Devon (England)

7. NEW: Wrestling Grizzlies in Alaska (USA)

8. NEW: Skiing with the little monkeys in Saas Fee (Switzerland)

9. NEW: Drinking port with the Portuguese doctors in Porto (Portugal)

10. New York, New York for the Grand Finale of our Sabbatical (USA)

Having had the chance to have another look at our remaining 10 destinations during the festive period, we decided to include Alaska (special thanks to Julio and Basil for being so convincing), Porto and Saas Fee at the expense of Strasbourg (we missed the Christmas market due to heavy snow), Turin (Juve managed to sell "The Atomic Ant" to AC Parma before we could book our tickets) and Vietnam (this one hurts the most as we had genuinely looked forward to visiting Ruben and Frederiek but we had to drop one and Alaska just sounded as too good to be true). So, 10 adventures still to go in 2011, we will keep you all up to date with our progress. And before we forget: Happy 2011 to everyone!

Destination #18: Discovering The Land of the Rising Sun: Japan

Tuesday 7 December 2010 - Tuesday 21 December 2010

Lost in translation in Tokyo

Always fascinating, occasionally frustrating, Japan is definitely the country that gave us biggest culture shock so far. We have rarely felt so foreign, useless and lost as in Japan. On the other hand, we have never met so many nice people, witnessed such a level of impeccable service and been treated so politely as in the land of the rising sun.

Japan is just such a refreshing change in many ways from other countries we have visited so far. There are only a limited number of people that speak English, so finding out even the most straight-forward things can be a struggle, but on the other hand we were often the only tourists in many places - and definitely in most if not all restaurants - and the Japanese are not only very polite, they also go out of their way to help you when lost (and that happened a lot, given that there are often no street signs and if there are, they are definitely not in English).   

It has to be said that I am not sure how we would have survived without our good friends and excellent hosts Soichi and Kazuko who guided us through the city and more importantly Japanese customs and traditions with patience and a smile (we probably would still be wandering around the Tokyo subway somewhere without them).

So here is how we did on our to-do list of the "weird and wonderful" that we encountered in the 12.5 million people metropolis we call Tokyo:

# Pressing all the buttons while sitting on a toilet in a Ginza department store and starting to slightly panic when you can't work out how to put an end to the water cannon that has been splashing your bum for the last 5 minutes - Tick

# Having a Bill Murray "Lost in translation" moment while strolling through Harajuku checking out the schoolgirls dressed as Alice in Wonderland - Tick

# Getting completely lost on the Tokyo subway, convinced that you are on the Yurakucho line while you are actually on the Hibiya line - Tick

# Strolling over the Tsukiji Fish Market early in the morning, gazing at those massive tunas while fearing for your life as you try to jump out of the way of those crazy electrical carts that prowl the market - Tick

# Choosing your Tsukiji sushi restaurant by just joining the longest cue you can find, having given up on trying to work out where that particular restaurant out of the Lonely Planet is located exactly - Tick

# Wondering how bizarre it is that you just managed to get a can of steaming hot coffee out of a Coca Cola vending machine while Soichi and Kazuko are slamming away on a driving range in the middle of Tokyo ...  at midnight - Tick

# Staring out of the massive windows of Soichi and Kazuko's amazing apartment on the 33rd floor on a clear morning and being able to see Mount Fuji more than 100km away - Tick

# Tying up the Omikuji (paper fortune) on the board outside Senso-ji temple in Asakusa, in the hope that the wind will blow away the bad fortune while you are still wondering what "Hearing a morning call of a cock, you will have to wait for a chance to come" was actually supposed to mean - Tick

# Despairing when the taxi driver who doesn't speak any English seems to be even more lost than you are, and that is even before you realise you don't have any cash on you and he doesn't accept any credit cards - Tick

So what else did we get up to? Well we did some shopping in Harajuku, crossed the famous four-way crossing in Shibuya, had a Gordon Ramsay styled breakfast with Mike in the Conrad Hotel, noodle lunch with Kobanawa-san in Ginza, coffee with Yumi in Yebisu and a memorable dinner with Miyanaga-san and Omura-san in a traditional Torisuki restaurant called Tamahide.

Eating Wagyu beef in Kobe

After 4 days in Tokyo, we flashed our Japan Rail Passes at Tokyo station and jumped on the Shinkansen bullet train to Kobe. At a speed of 300 km per hour, the Shinkansen are a fantastic way to travel through Japan and the trip took us just under 3 hours. The Japanese railway system is amazingly efficient, all trains are precisely on time and only stop at a station for up to half a minute. The carriages are extremely quiet as the use of mobile phones is seen as socially unacceptable (although funnily enough smoking is still allowed in designated carriages). And the best part is that all seats can be turned around, so if you don't like the person opposite you, you take your chances and press the button to swing your seat around. NS eat your heart out.

The port city of Kobe has a population of around 1.5 million and is best know for the massive 1995 earthquake that not only brought down many of the city's buildings, but also my first employer London merchant bank Baring Bank (thanks to good old Nick Leeson who had bet on an rising Nikkei Index, oops). The "foodies" probably also know Kobe because of the famous Kobe Wagyu beef (the dad of LA Lakers star Kobe Bryant liked it so much he named his son after it). Some stockbreeders are said to give their dwarf Kobe Wagyu cattle beer and a massage in order to get to the best end result: a fat, marbled beef which is rightfully considered a delicacy. We were more than happy to follow Per's recommendation - "Eat Kobe beef until you are broke" - and we have to admit that massaging the cattle clearly does bring home the bacon.

The real reason for coming to Kobe was of course to visit good old Robbie. Robbie, who works for the youth set-up of the J1 football team Vissel Kobe, has somehow managed to master the Japanese language and is as good as fluent (given our complete lack of understanding of the Japanese language he could as well speak Korean for what we know, but we will give him the benefit of the doubt). Drinking sessions were limited to two nights - ok maybe three  - and Rob only had to crash on the sofa in our gigantastic hotel room once.

Spotting whale sharks in Osaka

Just a 15 minute Shinkansen ride from Kobe lies Japan's third largest city, Osaka. Osaka Kaiyukan Aquarium is home to the mother of all fish tanks, showing off two massive whale sharks, a tiger shark a few leopard sharks and a hammerhead shark. A pair of mantas somehow cohabitate peacefully with this lot. And this wouldn't be Japan if they wouldn't dress up the scuba diver that feeds these guys in a Santa Claus suit.

Before catching our Shinkansen ride back "home" to Kobe, we couldn't resist but sampling the local specialty Okinomiyaki, which is as much as a pork and cabbage omelet, doused in a syrupy version of Worcestershire sauce. Not the most healthy dinner ever, but very nice nevertheless.

Hugely impressive Hiroshima

Another day-trip from Kobe on the Shinkansen brought us to Hiroshima. Hiroshima is sadly best known for the fact that it was the first city to be targeted by an A-bomb on 6 August 1945. The A-bomb leveled the city instantly and killed 145,000 people before the year-end. The hugely impressive Peace Memorial Park and Museum commemorates this historic event in an impressive way.

The story of 11-year old leukemia victim Sadako Sasaki is the single story that touched us both most. In 1955, 10 years after the bomb, 11-year old Sadako was diagnosed with leukemia. Young Sadako decided to fold 1,000 origami paper cranes, as there is a saying in Japan, that if you fold a thousand origami paper cranes your wish will come true. Sadako had only one wish and that was not to die. Despite folding over a 1,000 paper cranes on her sick bed, leukemia still got the best of her and Sadako didn't make it. In her memory, and of that of all Hiroshima children affected by the A-bomb, the Children's Peace Monument was built. Fittingly, the monument is surrounded by thousands of origami paper cranes.  

Hiroshima is not the most fun place to visit, but it is hugely impressive and sad at the same time. Definitely an everlasting impression.

Kyoto's temple bonanza

We spent four days in Kyoto and without a doubt this is the prettiest of the Japanese cities we visited. Kyoto was the imperial capital between 794 and 1868 and is considered Japan's cultural capital. It has no less than 1,600 Buddhist temples, over 400 Shinto shrines and 17 Unesco World Heritage Sites.

We had a good go at those 1,600 temples and managed to visit...ehmm four of them. We will have to do the remaining 1,596 when we come back. So far we ticked off the Kodaiji Temple, the flamboyant Kiyomizu-Dera (with great views over Kyoto), Nijo-Jo (technically speaking not a temple, but famous because its first owner Tokugawa shogun Ieyasu wasn't the most trustworthy of shoguns and fitted the whole place with "nightingale" floors that squeak at every move, making it difficult for intruders - and that bloke that was shagging his wife - to move about quietly, and last, but not least, Ginkaku-Ji or the Silver Pavilion. Despite its name, no actual silver was used for the Silver Pavilion.

In Kyoto we stayed in the small 7-room boutique Hotel Mume in the Gion geisha district and they managed to get us some reservations at well-hidden places such as Yata and Kokoraya, eating at sunken tables while being surrounded by confused locals wondering how those clumsy Westeners who seemed to be trying to kill the staff with chop-sticks managed to get in in the first place.

We finished off our Kyoto experience by walking Tetsugaku-No Michi or the Path of Philosophy. This is a 1.5km path that runs along a canal lined with cherry trees and which takes its name from 20th-century philosopher Nishida Kitaro who used to walk this path while meditating.

Eating cod sperm in a Hakone Onsen

No visit to Japan is complete without a visit to a real Onsen or traditional Japanese spa. All credit to Soichi and Kazuko who took us to one of the oldest and most renowned Onsens in Hakone, a place where emperors and prime ministers used to come to spend their weekends. Staying at an Onsen is a real treat, we stayed in a huge centuries old wooden house and before we had a chance to dip our toes in the steaming hot water a traditional nine course Japanese dinner was being served. And what a dinner this was, we had cod sperm (it tastes a bit creamy, no surprises there), sea snails (the gut is the best part), fried fish bones (very crispy), sweet potatoes (apparently the Japanese Emperor liked the sweet potatoes here so much, that the Onsen sent him a bag of it every year until his death), fresh sashimi, beef stew and a traditional Japanese desert. Fully satisfied, we shuffled towards the Onsen bath through the dark night and splashed ourselves into the hot water while looking at the stars in the sky. What a fantastic experience.

The next day we managed to drop by the Owakudani Natural Hot Springs which finds itself at the center of the Hakone volcano. This place is best known for its "magic" black eggs that are boiled in the Owakudani Natural Hot Springs. Each egg is said to prolong your life by no less than 7 years. Always in for some "black magic", we bought 10 of them for the 4 of us, adding 70 years to our lives or at least 16 and a bit years each.

Thanks to British Airways we even ended up with an extra day in Tokyo. A day Em gladly spent getting her nails done "Kazuko style" with glitters and other funky stuff. This also gave Soichi a chance to show off his new yellow BMW M3 in a garage that resembled the movie set of the "Fast and the furious". Billy Walsh did manage to get us on another flight the next day and reluctantly we left Tokyo. We had a truly amazing time here and special thanks is due to our fantastic hosts Soichi, Kazuko and Rob. You guys made our trip to Japan one never to forget. From Japanese ghosts to playing football on the top of a skyscraper, we loved every second of it. Damn we miss Japan already!

Next stop: Destination #19: Party like it is 1999 in Copenhagen

Destination #17: Thrill seeking in New Zealand

Saturday 20 November 2010 – Thursday 2 December 2010

New Zealand (NZ) is literally a freak of nature. The country has one of the most varied and spectacular landscapes we have seen to date, ranging from snow-dusted mountains and drowned glacial valleys to lakes with turquoise waters on a backdrop of rolling hills. And given that it wasn’t even on our initial list of 28, it almost hurts us to say that this is probably our favourite destination so far.

Spanning 268,680 square km, NZ is actually bigger than the UK. It is also one of the few countries in the world with more sheep than people. For every Kiwi – and there are 4.4 million of them – there are 8 sheep to keep him or her company. Surprisingly even the sheep are outnumbered, this time by a small rodent called a possum, of which there are no less than 70 million on the island. As these possums tend to chew through millions on tonnes of foliage a year, they also happen to be the most hated animal in NZ and the national slogan is “Kill a possum, save a tree”. Fortunately the possum has a tendency to jump in front of speeding cars at nighttime, making the “bunny suicides” look like mere amateurs.

Christchurch (South Island)

We arrived in Christchurch around 02:00 in the morning on the last flight from Sydney. As only hours earlier a massive explosion had trapped 29 miners in the Pike River Mine just north of Greymouth, the plane was packed with TV crews from various Australian news agencies. In the days that followed it became clear that there was not going to be a repeat of the Chilean miracle as further explosions in the mine put an end to the last remaining hope of getting the trapped miners out alive. A real national tragedy, plunging the whole nation into grief. 

Queenstown (South Island)

We got our first taste of the dramatic NZ scenery while driving our massive 4WD Toyota Highlander from Christchurch to Queenstown past the turquoise waters of Lake Tekapo and through towns with quant names such as Fairlie and Twizel.

Queenstown is the real deal though, a stunning place overlooking Lake Wakatipu with a cinematic background of snow-tipped mountains. More importantly, it is the self-proclaimed “Adventure Capital of the World”, and as such is basically a Disneyland for grown-ups. Bungee jumping, skydiving, jetboating, white water rafting, you name it they do it. This must be the best city in the world.

We kicked off our thrill seeking to do list in style. What better way to celebrate Emma’s birthday than by jumping out of a plane? We got those nice people at Nzone to toss us out of a perfectly fine airplane from 15,000 feet, making us scream like babies during the 60 seconds free fall (at 200 km per hour) before landing safely minutes later. A fantastic adrenaline boosting experience, at least with hindsight it was.

The next day we took a trip on a Shotover Jet through the rocky Shotover Canyons. These jetboats are basically speedboats on steroids as they attach a jet motor to the back of the boat. This means that a jetboat only needs as little as 10 cm of water to speed through the canyon. Our timing was spot on, as the previous day one of the guys had managed to crash his Shotover Jet into the canyon wall. The jetboat goes pretty quick and the 360 degree turns were very cool, but to be fair it doesn’t even get close to the skydive.

After that we got that bloke from AJ Hackett (yes the one that invented bungee jumping in the first place) to push me out of a small pod suspended over the Nevis River 134 meters below. I was a bit skeptical at first, especially when it became clear that the jumping sequence was determined on the basis of weight, which somehow meant that I was going to be the first to jump that morning. It felt a bit that the strategy was like “Let the fat guy jump first, if he hits the rocks we need to shorten the line”. It also has to be said that Emma – who chickened out herself – wasn’t being overly helpful when she felt the need to tell everyone after the jump “Yes, Fat Jesus can fly”. All in all a pretty awesome experience, but if I am honest, I would have to say that the skydive was definitely scarier as those 60 seconds freefall actually give you time to realise what is happening (well that would be, “I just stepped out of a plane, I am going 200 km per hour and the ground is approaching pretty quickly now”).

In between jumping off cliffs and out of planes we also managed to include some more relaxing experiences. We signed up for the “Ride of the Rings” on horseback with Glenorchy Dart Stables on two horses called “Boris” and “Harry”, galloping past some of the famous locations where Lord of the Rings was filmed. We also flew to Milford Sound for a day, taking the cruise through the fjord while spotting dolphins and being splashed by waterfalls. Emma, for some reason unclear to me, would like to point out that a naked Hugh Jackman jumped off one of these waterfalls for a scene in the movie “X-men Origins: Wolverine” (e.g. the one where he escapes from the laboratory).

We really loved Queenstown and special thanks is due to Sam & Guy for recommending the outstanding Queenstown Park Boutique Hotel, which we absolutely adored, and making sure we didn’t grow hungry by sending us to Fergburger for the best burgers in town. Fergburger’s slogan is “Ferg loves you” and they even have an official doctor’s note on the wall, confirming that somebody dislocated his jaw while eating Fergburger’s signature burger the “Big Al”. For what it is worth, our own culinary recommendations in Queenstown would be Wai at the pier, where we went for Emma’s birthday dinner and Pier 19, which was so good we actually went twice.

Franz Josef Glacier (South Island)

After 5 days of playing adrenaline junkies we left Queenstown behind and made our way over to Franz Josef Glacier on the West Coast of the South Island. This particular glacier was first explored by an Austrian fellow called Julius Haast and he named it after the Austrian emperor. We only spent one night in Franz Josef Village and as true tourists we walked all the way up to the terminal face to take our pictures before jumping back in our 4WD to start our drive up to Kaikoura on the North side of the South Island.

Kaikoura (South Island)

Until the 1980s, Kaikoura was a sleepy crayfishing town, but nowadays it is the whale-watching capital of NZ and it has an abundance of wildlife with whales, dolphins, seals and the occasional penguin stopping by on a regular basis. Taking no chances we went whale-watching on one of the boats of “Whale-Watch Kaikoura”. These guys have a success rate of 98% and even refund your ticket if they don’t manage to spot any whales. To be fair, they were pretty good and we are currently the proud owners of over 250 pictures of the tails of two massive sperm whales.

Kaikoura is a real picture-perfect peninsula town and there can’t be many places in the world which have snow-topped mountains that close to the sea. Of course we couldn’t help but dropping by the legendary “Kaikoura Seafood BBQ”, which is not much more than a roadside stall, but they make the best crayfish sandwiches in town.

Ohakune (North Island)

After eight days on the South Island we took the ferry to the North Island, first stop Ohakune, which, believe it or not, is NZ’s “carrot capital” (don’t ask). We found this amazing B&B called Manuka Lodge run by a guy from Brighton and his Kiwi wife. They also had a cat called Flaps, who was a legend in his own right. The brochure described him as follows: 

“Flaps the cat. Please don’t be falsely lured by his cuddly façade. He is a ruthless, calculating miscreant, rumoured to be the evil mastermind behind the 2008 Great Furniture Laceration. Under no circumstances must he be left alone in the lounge, however slumberous his demeanor – chuck him outside into the night; he can get into the garage where he has a bed. Also be prepared for him jumping into any windows left open at night.”

As true amateurs we of course left our window open when we went to bed, only to be woken up in the middle of the night by the ruthless, calculating miscreant himself.

We got up early the next morning for the Tongariro Alpine Crossing, a full-day hike, and reportedly the best one-day walk in NZ, which traverses active volcanoes and beautifully coloured lakes. We also passed Mount Ngauruhoe, which Lord of the Ring enthusiast would probably recognise as Mount Doom. Peter Jackson used Tongariro National Park as the setting for The Land of Mordor in the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

Taupo (North Island)

After all the excitement of the previous days, we decided to opt for some chillaxing on the shores of NZ’s largest lake, Lake Taupo. The town of Taupo itself reminded us a bit of Flagstaff, Arizona, a small, slightly isolated but charming place. We spent two days in Taupo and the best part was being able to watch the sun set over the lake from the hot tub on our balcony, while sipping Chardonnay.

Wellington (North Island)

We ended our NZ adventures in the capital, Wellington. On our way down from Taupo, we passed the completely forgettable town of Palmerston North. John Cleese probably described it best when he said: “If you ever do want to kill yourself, but lack the courage, I think a visit to Palmerston North will do the trick”. In revenge, Palmerston North city council named a rubbish dump after the British comedian.

Wellington on the other hand is a nice city. It is a sort of smaller and sleepier version of San Francisco. We did manage to contribute to the local economy after getting a parking ticket for parking our car illegally outside the Ohtel hotel.

We spent two weeks in NZ and we can only admit that this is a truly fantastic country. Everything you read in the travel guides is true. NZ is definitely our favourite country so far.

Next stop: Discovering The Land of the Rising Sun: Japan