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Istanbul — Here I come!

I'm off to Istanbul tomorrow. Never been. Previously known as Constantinople and Bysantium, Istanbul has got to represent one of the greatest concentrations of antiquities and past civilizations in the whole world. I'm only staying for three days and am there for business so it won't all be sightseeing but I'll try and pack in as much as I can and keep you informed. I can't say that I know a whole lot about Turkish

Cruise Bargains

Cruising represents some of the best — if not the best — value for money around and it is doubly good at the moment, following the recent tragedy that befell the Costa Concordia. Cruise bookings, not unexpectedly,  took a dip right across the board with all the major cruise lines suffering a considerable reduction in sales during the traditional peak booking season. Consequently, you can expect some great offers form many of them. Straight out of the

Hanmer Springs

My second last night in New Zealand and I’m spending it in the small town (most towns on the south island are small towns) of Hanmer Springs famous for — yes, you’ve guessed it — its hot springs. As coincidence (or bad luck) would have it, my back finally gave out on me yesterday. It’s been at me for a few days now and I’ve suffered from it for almost thirty years. No doubt due

Kaiteriteri

Kaiteriteri is the only other place besides Queenstown that I’m spending two nights in. Kaiteriteri is a small seaside resort located just a few miles north of Motueka, which itself is located some 60 kms northwest of Nelson in the far north of the south island. The drive today from Barrytown was about 300 kms and took me around 4.5 hours on a route that bypassed Westport and through Murchison. The rain is still falling

Punakaiki

I was up early this morning and own to the local tour shop where I donned my wet gear, hiking boots and staff for the trek up to the base of the glacier. The walk was about 1-2 kilometres  along a morrain before we got to the actual base of the glacier itself. The weather was bloody awful with driving rain which made it all the more surreal, given that we were about to commence

Hokitika & Fox Glacier

The weather up to today has been extremely good for this time of year — sunny days with temperatures that allowed me to walk around in my shirt sleeves although the evenings were cool enough. That all changed as soon as I crossed over from the East of the Island to the West. Now New Zealand (with the exception of the Omni-present southern alps and giant fern trees ) resembled Ireland because of its relatively

Queenstown — Day 2

Oh the joys of not having to pack and unpack again! That’s probably the worst part about any itinerary that has you staying just one night at each location. The guest house that we’re staying at in Queenstown has the most extraordinary views over Lake Wakatipu and the Remarkables and the couple who run it are delightful. Indeed, the whole B&B ‘experiment’ has been a resounding success to date as the accommodations chosen have been

Queenstown — Day 1

It’s often difficult when preparing a multi-centre itinerary such as this one to decide on how long to spend in each place. Should it be one night or two? Will there be enough to see and do there to justify the additional night? From the outset, I had decided to overnight in Queenstown for two nights whereas almost every place else on the itinerary was getting just one night. As it turns out, I made

Milford Sound

If you look at both Queenstown and Milford Sound on a map of the South Island, they appear to be approximately 70 or 80 kms apart but because of the tortuous topography of this part of the south island, you have to travel almost 290 kms via Te Anau in order to drive between them. The last 60 or 70 kms between Te Anau and Milford Sound itself is a lovely drive and passes through

Te Anau

Todays’ drive was a long one from Twizel to Te Anau, passing by Queenstown along the way. Door to door, the journey was about 385 kms and took about four and half hours, not including a stop for lunch that I took along the way in a place called Cromwell. Cromwell was a lovely looking town and someplace I would have liked to have spent more time in. It’s set in a very scenic location

Aoraki — Mt. Cook

When planning my trip to New Zealand, I considered a number of different options — hotels, camper van and bed & breakfasts. In the end, I opted to go down the B&B route. My reasoning was twofold: (1) B&B’s by their very nature, tend to have more character than the relative anonymity of hotels; (2) You’re more likely to get a feel of a country by statying in someone’s home and benefitting from their local

Twizel

Did nothing yesterday as was too tired from all the travelling and anyway needed to rest before hiring my 4x4 today. Didn’t even bother going in to the city as there was nothing much left of it to see anyway. The devastation is on a much larger scale than appeared to be indicated by any of the reports that I had seen on TV. I stayed in a B&B in one of the suburbs out

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