Middle-earth lies behind me. Christchurch in front of me. The journey on the 1.60 metre high bus takes almost 9 hours. Afterwards I’m a bit dejected. From Cathedral Square I lug 35kg of luggage back to the bus terminal and drive to the nearby Shalom Hostel. Nothing special, but cheap and WiFi.

First day: storm and rain. I walk through Christchurch soaking wet. Everywhere in New Zealand, the city planners have somehow managed to blend different architectural styles into a beautiful whole. In Christchurch they have failed completely. No two buildings fit together. Disneyworld, Brutalism, Victorian, timber house, Bauhaus, tower block, Mies. No two houses are the same scale. Bears! (more…)

I’m hanging out in Wanaka. No wind. The hostel is nice, the people are good. But just no wind. Sometimes I’m happy that it’s sometimes so easy for me to be happy. Sometimes it annoys me. Today, for example. No wind. I’m hanging around all day, wandering through the city. Nothing new in Wanaka.

I sleep to videos in the living room. Cook my salmon. Chat a bit with good people at home. Work. Then I head out into the nightlife – it’s Friday after all. The first bar sells beer at prices below supermarket level. The second is well above. A drunken Maori twat knocks over the first half of my Heineken. The second half is stolen. I watch the people partying. My day? (more…)

I somehow feel like I should be travelling a long way today. I manage 650 kilometres by the evening. First I head back south through the hot coastal plain. Then I turn off onto completely empty roads heading west. I’m heading into the Alps again. Although it quickly becomes much cooler, the whole country is still golden in the rain shadow of the Alps.

There are several large lakes along the way. Turquoise, white and blue skies. The bush is on fire at Lake Pukaki near Mount Cook. It’s raining on my side. Mount Cook is hiding behind thick clouds, so I drive on to Wanaka. There’s a salmon farm on the way. I pick up half a salmon for very little money. (more…)

I continue northwards. I’m riding fast today. 300 kilometres to the Akaroa Peninsula near Christchurch is a lot. I thought so. But between Oamaru and Christchurch is probably the longest, most boring and straightest road in New Zealand: 40 kilometres without a bend. I arrive four hours earlier than expected.

Akaroa is the Tuscany of New Zealand. An old volcanic crater, open to the south. Turquoise blue water and Mediterranean temperatures. It smells of lavender, thyme, cedar and pine trees. The fields are dry and golden in colour. Even some of the houses are imported directly from Tuscany. I drive to Omuku Farm Lodge. Kerstin is working here for three months. (more…)

The largest gold mines in New Zealand are located near Palmerston. Unfortunately, the tour on the 200-tonne monster trucks is fully booked. Once again, it’s just as well: shortly afterwards I’m at the Moeraki Boulders. Once submarine boulders that have crystallised over the millennia. Round stone balls on the beach. Lots of tourists.

The beach is beautiful. 200 metres wide, fine sand, gently sloping. The wind is even nicer. Very laminar, 18 knots, side-onshore. Perfect. Kite out on the beach and off we go. Directly in front of the boulders, I make a few really great crash landings after unsuccessful jumps. At least jumping is now possible with the Vegas. (more…)

The journey continues to Dunedin. For once, I set off early after little sleep. I arrive in Dunedin early in the afternoon and am quite impressed. I can almost smell something like history. Old buildings, imitation Italian Renaissance, neo-Gothic and again Art Deco alongside classicism. The first city in New Zealand where there are more stone buildings than wooden houses.

Why is clear: Dun-Edin means New Edinburgh and goes back to a Scottish foundation. Scots don’t like wood, but they really like black and white stone. It lasts longer and is therefore cheaper. I wind my way through Dunedin and soon find my hostel high up on a hill. (more…)

I sleep through the night. The villa is too beautiful and nobody is snoring in the 7-bed dorm today. When I wake up, it’s 11am and almost everyone has left. I get ready, take a Berlin woman to her plane to Stewart Island and set off eastwards.

I continue along the coast and soon arrive at Catlins Forest Park. In the 19th century it was practically completely mown down. The last remnants now form the centre of the park. Even before the forest, there are beautiful stretches of coastline. High cliffs, green grass, sheep and windswept tree hedges. The sun is blazing. (more…)

On the journey to Invercargill, I notice a lot of trees that look like wind tunnel dummies. All the branches grow in one direction. Almost every house before Invercargill is surrounded by a hedge more than a house high. Good signs put the pedal to the metal. My hostel is small and cosy: Southern Comfort, an Art Nouveau Victorian villa near the park.

Invercargill is quite old compared to other cities in New Zealand. Many different architectural styles, neo-gothic, classicism, imitation baroque and of course art deco. A beautiful town. Unfortunately no wind on the day I arrived. No matter. The neighbour’s WiFi is hijacked. Good people here, good conversations and a beautiful sunset by the sea. (more…)

Well, unfortunately no more wind in Te Anau. Continue southwards. Shortly after Lake Manapouri, my map shows a turn-off into the Fjordland National Park. It’s probably the thinnest line on the whole map…. and the first map ever to show a track. Hey, a path is a path. I turn off at Lake Monowai. First 20km of gravel track.

Then there’s a gate and a sign warning of avalanches, washouts, rockfalls, tight bends and steep gradients. Sounds quite adventurous. At the bottom there is a sign: strictly for 4WD. I get out, walk round my little runabout. Count. Oh my God! 4 wheels! So let’s go! (more…)

A new day. Some people who were involved in yesterday’s kiting permission ask how it was. Short and sweet! Everyone who hears the question immediately gets their camera out and shows me pictures. I must have put a nice splash of colour in Milford Sound. I keep asking around: Has anyone done it before me? No one has ever seen one.

We take the boat out onto Milford Sound early. If there had been anything going on at that time of day, I would have tried to top yesterday. Out with the boat, chat to the captain and then 15 kilometres downwinder to the entrance. But the wind didn’t arrive until much later. The captain was already in Regensburg, which gave me a great view from the bridge for a while. (more…)

Georg and Arnulf go on a day trip to Milford Sound, I book a jetboat trip in an old gold mining canyon in the mountains north of Queenstown. First we go up to the ski resorts, then on a gold rush gravel track through spectacular high mountain scenery. Next to the track you can see the footpaths of the gold miners of 1862. T

he gold rush only lasted 7 years, then it was all over. The 7km long track was completed after 7 years at the end of the gold rush. Huge amounts of equipment were hauled up the steep slopes. If it wasn’t lost on the way, crashed during transport or washed away by the first tidal wave after 2 weeks of use, every piece was still for nothing after 3 years at the latest. Gold. Everyone does everything for it. (more…)

We drive further south. The mountains get higher, the valleys deeper, the meadows greener and the petrol most expensive. There are only a few villages left, and they are small. The roads look as if they were built exclusively for the summer tourist crowds. You simply couldn’t designate anything as a scenic road. Otherwise the next road would be a stinker.

My head is great after the New Year’s Eve party, as is my stomach. I look forward to every single bend on the 300 kilometres to Lake Wanaka. There are countless of them. Shortly before Wanaka, we stop at Lake Hawea, a very thermally active mountain lake. Unfortunately, there is not enough wind for kiting. On to Lake Wanaka. The wind is blowing strongly here. (more…)

We continue south to New Zealand’s highest peaks. Our accommodation is right next to Franz Josef Glacier. We take a short tour to the glacier break. Chunks of ice up to 1 metre in size lie everywhere in the valley. A DOC ranger tries to stop the crowds from going as far as the last barrier in front of the quarry. The chunks all came down in a big wave yesterday.

The evening is quiet in Franz Josef Village. The next day we continue to the neighbouring Fox Glacier. Less crowded. We have booked a tour over the glacier tongue. The ascent first goes through the valley, then 200 metres up a steep face next to the glacier break. After an hour we reach the starting point for all the glacier tours. We are given crampons and ice sticks, then off we go. (more…)

As soon as we get up, Captain Josh from EcoRafting picks us up. We head south to Mount Cook in a VW bus. Numerous rivers pour into the Tasman Sea in endlessly wide gravel beds. At around nine we reach the helicopter landing site in a lonely mountain valley near the New Zealand glaciers. We will fly up the Whataroa River by helicopter, then raft 10 kilometres over grade 5 white water back to the sea.

We are given thick neoprene suits for the ice-cold glacier water. Thermal overalls and jackets, thick life jackets and helmets. Two rafting boats, a kayak and the rest of the equipment are stowed in a large net. Then the helicopter arrives and the net is hooked in at the bottom. (more…)

I hitchhike from Golden Bay back to Nelson. It’s much better on the South Island. I need a good four hours for 160 kilometres and nice drivers from Jena, Israel and Holland. I arrive in Nelson exactly five minutes before Georg and Arnulf. I still know Georg from Fiji and we’ll be touring the South Island together for the next few days.

We take another hostel right on the beach, there are far fewer children here. Georg and Arnulf are both 26, which is old for world travellers and a real blessing for me – as much as I like travelling with younger people. We hang out on the beach and play poker. Then they also go to Abel Tasman National Park for a day. Meanwhile, I wander around Nelson. (more…)

The next day, I’m still feeling under the weather. I hitchhike from Pahara to Takaka, where I realise as it starts to rain that I’ve forgotten my rain jacket in the hostel. I hitchhike back. Nothing. Back to Takaka. Ah yes, it was in my rucksack the whole time.

Takaka is a nice little hippy town in Golden Bay. There are three clothing shops. All of them sell hippie wear. A few fair trade and organic products shops. And that’s about it. A toboggan gives me the first lift to Collingwood, a young German couple the second. The Sommerset Hostel is an old Sunday school above the 19th century church. (more…)

We set off at 9 o’clock in the morning. The Abel Tasman Coastal Track winds all the way through the hills along the coast. On the left is always dense jungle or forest, on the right the azure blue sea and golden yellow beach. Lots of boats and kayaks are touring around. Wild chickens keep crossing the path, sometimes with chicks. The southern part is rather unspectacular. Have I been to Fiji before? Have I seen the most beautiful beaches in the world?

The evening before, I even tore off the parts of the map I no longer needed to reduce my weight. My rucksack is still too heavy. My shoulders are really tense and I can’t tighten my waist belt because the buckle is wrong. A full 17kg is a big difference to my usual daypack. (more…)

I take the bus to Abel Tasman National Park. The same sign flies past several times at the side of the road: “Home Kills”. That means something like “home kills”. I have to grin. It could also be translated differently.

My last stop before the big hike really is the very last hostel before the Abel Tasman National Park. The Barn, a small farm, campsite and dorm. The last place is already 15 kilometres behind me. Chimes and flowers blowing in the wind. Birds are chirping, bees are buzzing. There’s a saying on the wall: “Life does not consist of the number of breaths we take, but of the places and moments that take our breath away.” (more…)

The third day in Nelson finally brings all my dreams: up to 60 km/h wind, side-onshore and very stable. The waves are up to 1.5 metres high and sometimes just as close together. I’ve never been out in conditions like this before. Several times I take waves at the wrong angle at the wrong time and get a good wash. The rest is jumping, jumping, jumping.

After more than two hours on the water, the wind gets even stronger. I can hardly feel my knees any more, but I’m still having fun. Then I misjudge a big wave. I crash into it almost head-on and at high speed – just as it breaks. It feels like riding into a concrete wall. Shortly afterwards, I realise that my harness has snapped. (more…)

The waves are crashing in Wellington, three whole nights. On the first, I go to a small indie club. Good music, but not enough people. Back out into the night, and after five minutes of walking it’s clear why: there’s a club every 50 metres where something is being performed live. Wellington is hardly any bigger than Regensburg, but has probably 10 times as many clubs. That thins out the crowd a bit.

In the second club, a noisy rock band is playing, a mixture of Hives and Black Crowes. There’s a lot of jumping around until one o’clock, then I’m suddenly standing next to a really wild punk. I go through a few clubs with her, then I ask about her parents. “My stepfather’s in prison,” she says, “I got him in.” I ask why, then there’s a long silence. (more…)