One of my favorite towns anywhere!

top of mount roy
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I hitched a ride to Wanaka with a couple of German girls who enthusiastically told me that the drive would take us through some of the best scenary in NZ. It didn't disappoint and by the time we reached Wanaka we all got the taste for some more. Their guidebook suggested a walk which climbed a peak called Mount Roy, so we parked a few kms out of town and started the climb in the heat of the day. After several hours, over a thousand vertical metres and a slightly hairy path near the summit we reached the top to see the fantastic 360 degree views. In the distance i saw the local big peak of Mount Aspiring and i made a mental note to explore the possibility of getting near it while in Wanaka.

crash
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Wanaka is another town on the shores of a lake, but it has a much more relaxed feel than Queenstown and i found it to be one of the most beautiful towns i've ever seen.

I made camp as the last light vanished in a glade of soft, tall grass.

My first full day i went biking in a place called Sticky Forest, which had loads of mtb dedicated short trails. Many of them insane and having taken some knarly descents with gusto on my Avanti hardtail (bit of a dodgy bike) i decided to do 1 with lots of jumps, including some large double hump typies. It was on 1 of these that my afternoon was foreshortened as i didn't carry the necessary speed or gain enough elevation and hence plowed into the 2nd hump fairly hard, breaking some spokes, gashing my arm and leg and badly bruising lots of ribs. Gingerly i poodled back to shop and managed to convince the guy that the bike just broke and that the mud and blood all over me was solely the fault of inadequate equipment and certainly had nothing to do with my rather stupid decision. Strangely in the hostel i was staying i'd met a friend who i travelled to Peru with more than 3 years earlier, and that night i attempted to ease my pain with a few beers. Walking back to the hostel accross a small field i looked up to see a blanket of stars and the milky way striking a path in the sky.

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Having failed to book any accommodation for the following night i decided to catch a bus about 70 kms up the road to camp beneath Mount Aspiring. Along with the walk up the Matukituki Valley to the base of M. Aspiring i decided first to climb Rob Roy Valley (not to be confused with Mount Roy) to get a close up view of Rob Roy glacier. I climbed through shaded beech forest full of moss and lichen, before breaking into the open next to a river to see massive waterfalls plunge from the giant glacier facing me. After watching the sun sink lower i decided to descend back to the Matukituki river for the 4 hour hike to Aspiring flats where i would spend the night.

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The evening walk was fantastic, i saw deer running through the woods, rabbits, birds of prey and lots of cows freely grazing next to the clear river. I crossed path with only 2 people coming back from the flats and all the time i was in the most perfect alpine scenery. I made camp as the last light vanished in a glade of soft, tall grass. There was one other tent and i had the feeling we were the only people for miles around. The next morning i discovered what happens after sleeping in a tent with sand flies - lots of bites. But this couldn't dampen my spirits as i crossed the river and walked further up the valley to raspberry flats and saw more stunning mountain glades full of birds and flowers, surrounded with snowy peaks under the bluest sky. Later, after walking back out of the valley, i managed to hitch a ride with a friendly old couple from Sussex who seemed as invigorated as me by the beauty of the place.

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In Wanaka i discovered an energy bar that claimed to have the properties of one square meal and contained a honey callled Manuka. They claim that the honey is a NZ wonder product, and i think they may be on to something as the bars easily sustained me while trekking.

I left Wanaka early the next morning, south to Fjordland.