Early this morning we took a scenic flight in a light aircraft around the Southern Alps from Lake Tekapo. Views of Mount Cook, and of the Tasman, Fox and Franz Joseph glaciers were absolutely breathtaking. It's the first day that the tour company has been able to fly since Christmas because of high winds and poor visibility, but everything was perfect today, and the pilots were obviously delighted to have happy customers!

We've now driven up to Christchurch, and are working out where we're going to be spending our New Year's Eve -- probably at a party in Cathedral Square.

We've had a very enjoyable, relaxing and fattening Christmas. The eating was interspersed with a few walks along the lake side and up the hills for some great views.

Here are some photos from Fiordland and Wanaka.

We're off to Mount Cook village tomorrow and then Christchurch for New Year.

We've had some lovely weather for the past week. Anyone would think it was summer. After an unforgettable drive to Manapouri, the sun shone for us on our trip to Doubtful Sound. Naturally, the guide told us that the fjords looked far more impressive in the rain, but we were happy to have blue skies.

From Manapouri we headed up the impressive Milford Road to spend a night on Milford Sound. Even swarms of sandflies didn't manage to spoil the experience, especially waking up to see the sunrise with pink skies and a seal sculling gently around the boat. We've got some nice photos, but will wait for a rainy day before posting them!

We arrived in the Queenstown region a day early, so spent a night up at Wanaka before moving into our lakeside apartment in Queentown where we're spending Christmas week. Lots of Christmas presents and cards were already waiting for us under the Christmas tree. We've got a terrace overlooking the lake and the Remarkable range of mountains. Lovely.

Merry Christmas everyone!

We had a nice couple of days on the Otago Peninsula seeing lots of wildlife. The highlights were watching Royal Albatrosses glide over Taiaroa Head and having a seal stick up its head right next to me as I sat down on a rock at Allans Beach.

We're now in Invercargill having travelled along the South Coast and through The Catlins Forest Park. We spent a sunny day walking along the Catlins River Track and enjoyed spotting seals, sea-lions and penguins at various lookouts on the South Coast.

Here are the lastest photos.

We're driving on to Manapouri in Fiordland tomorrow and looking forward to our cruises on Doubtful and Milford Sounds.

A combination of low cloud and overly-pessimistic weather forcasting kept the helicopters grounded while we waited in Franz Josef for our heli-hike. We were initially disappointed, but after we'd spent a few hours on a walking tour of the glacier (climbing up from the bottom instead of being dropped off near the top) we felt a lot better about it. The sun came out for us, and we got to walk through a blue ice cave and several deep crevasses.

My dad's cousin Ceri lives near Christchurch, and we managed to arrange to meet him and his wife Denise this weekend. From Franz Josef we've headed back north to Hokitika, then crossed the Southern Alps at Arthur's Pass. Ceri and Denise showed us around their farm in Rangiora. They had lots of beautiful deer including some new-born fawns, a few sheep, chickens, and Morris the donkey. We were also introduced to the local wine region and given a brief tour of the Christchurch area. We'll be going back to Christchurch for New Year.

We're now heading down the east coast, currently in Dunedin. On the way down we saw several yellow-eyed penguins and loads of blue penguins at Omaru. Tomorrow we hope to see albatross on the Otago Penninsula.

The Queen Charlotte track was superb. Four days of walking along stunning ridges with views into the Queen Charlotte and Keneperu Sounds and through beautiful forest full of tall fern trees. We had good weather for the first three days and walked the last day quickly in the rain. We rushed to get to the Blist'd Foot Cafe for hot chocolate and carrot cake while waiting for our boat back to Picton.

We've also been for a day's walk along the Abel Tasman Coastal track which had similar forests and views, but with the addition of nice sandy beaches. We've then been travelling down the West Coast of South Island. At Punakaiki we visited the Pancake Rocks which are strangely layered limestone piles that do manage to look like stacks of pancakes.

We're now staying near the Franz Josef Glacier waiting for the rain to clear up so that we can we can visit the glacier. We've booked a Heli-hike for tomorrow which involves taking a helicopter onto the glacier, exploring the ice for a couple of hours and then flying back down again. Everyone who's been says it's spectacular.

As it's a rainy day we've spent some time putting some more photos onto the web. There's one page from North Island and one from South Island. Enjoy!