The axe is entirely mine to grind, so let me just paint the picture for why I so despised this blameless Clifton drinking establishment.

The Fine Line, which once inhabited the unit at 59-61 Whiteladies Road, was a superb pub and one of the few quality venues on that long street. Nestled just beyond the triangle between the wide avenues lined with trees and the BBC buildings and just before the bustle of the main drag, it was wonderfully located for a post-work pint. An attractive but unpretentious outdoor seating terrace invited you in to watch the world go by over a cold beer on a summer’s evening.

It was upmarket enough that it kept the riff-raff out but it was affordable for even my modest pocket when I first arrived, and wore its classiness in a laid-back Antipodean style, not a townie, centre of Bristol we-think-we’re better-than-we-are way.

Most crucially, it served the most consistently sensational pint of the best beer in the world (inside or outside the capital — and notoriously it doesn’t travel well). It also served Hoegaarden when it was a novelty, and great cocktails and basically ticked boxes for all tastes of drinker and reveller, but never remotely at the risk of being lowest common denominator.

It also had great sentimental value for me. It was the first pub I went to as an official resident of the city, back in August 2000. Not that I was a Clifton resident then, but our letting agent‘s offices were just down the road, and my girlfriend and I had made the trip all the way from Reading to Bristol just to sign a piece of paper saying we could move in. It marked an exciting time because, not only were we moving in together, but as unemployed recent graduates it was near impossible to rent property (we had to stump up 6 months’ rent in advance to persuade them). So what did we do? Celebrated at the Fine Line with the first of many pints of London Pride! Especially decadent as I recall it was about 11.30 am.

Along the years I celebrated at least two birthdays there, and – it now occurs to me -it was the location that two future living arrangements were conceived.

And later it became the regular watering hole for me and the friend I’ve probably shared the most pints with.

One day, Ian Carpenter and I rocked up there for a pint to find it had closed for refurbishment. Shit happens, and we drank somewhere else for a few weeks. On opening night we returned (loyal, see?) to find…. to find…. THE RANCH!! In all its gawdy tastelessness and over-priced drinks-ness.

There was not a single brown beer on offer, and the only decent lager we could see was some Japanese import selling at about twice the price of anything else. And it was horrible. We drank it through gritted teeth and misty eyes, until I eventually suggested we tried The Victoria, a mere five minutes away.

Which is what we did, and we were greeted by the barmaid who apologised that “we’ve only got 5 ales on tonight”. Music to our ears.

But I’ve never stopped lamenting the demise of The Fine Line, and shuddering at the sight of the trashy Ranch every time I passed, seeing it represent all that is and was bad about Bristol nightlife.

So I make no apology for the eruption of joy I felt when I saw it had finally fallen victim (well I assume so) to the recession, and can only hope that it is replaced by a new generation of Fine Line, that serves excellent London Pride, and is frequented by a future Tim and Ian, whoever they may be.

Will somebody keep me posted?

The reality was somewhat different.

I’d read that Fiji’s humidity slaps you in the face as you step off the plane. What I hadn’t expected was how much everything in the air conjured up memories of Kenya and by extension all the concomitant challenges like trusting the taxi drivers, the road users generally and the roads (pot-holed to the max). Everything about it told me I was back in Africa.

And the sun wasn’t even shining; we were in the middle of a cyclone.

Contrary to my visions of being at paradise island within an hour of touchdown, I in fact had to stay overnight on the mainland before catching a boat the next morning.

One review on Trip Advisor, entitled “Don’t stay here” has this to say:

…isolated from anywhere else … which means you have to eat in their restaurant. Stick to fish and chips and pizza – anything else is poorly cooked. The ‘continental’ breakfast consists of rice bubbles, toast, fake orange juice and tea bags. The staff lack communication abilities, even amongst themselves. And check your account when you check out for extra costs. Disappointing, cannot recommend.

Well in actual fact it wasn’t as bad as all that (in my experience). Although to avoid the 30-bed dorm that I’d been warned about, I paid out for the luxury of a private room which I’m pleased of, but for an overnight stop off I didn’t even want to do it felt like a bit of a waste of money.

The next morning the bus transfer to the ferry was an hour or so late but I didn’t let that dampen my spirits. Weather remained disappointing but still. Soon I was to be experiencing the most unimaginable paradise on earth.

The driver arrived with bad news: the waters were extremely choppy thanks to the cyclone and woudl be delayed. That’s if it ran at all.

Well it did run. But what should have been 1 hour, was two hours. And choppy doesn’t begin to cover it. I clutched to my stomach and once my mind had decided that I wasn’t going to vomit, my next concern was the number of times my head was hitting the ceiling of our 10-seater. I was on the back, virtually IN the water, getting sprayed for the full 120 minutes. It was pretty awful and all I could think was “I’ve got to do this in return as well!”. That, and “turn back I want to go home!”.

[ to be completed.... one day]

I’m in a hostel near Nadi which was repeatedly recommended and yet is a dive. Best of a bad bunch I guess. The staff all know that no one wants to be here really; mainland hotels are nothing more than a post-flight stop over before visitors cruise off to their island paradise.

When booking I steered clear of the 34 – yes thirty-four – bed dorm and splashed out on my own room. Now I’ve seen the place, I’m doubly glad I did so.

On the plus side prices are low. Well comparatively. It’s the first sub-£3 beer I’ve had since leaving home. In fact it was £2 and jolly nice (even if they have got the nomenclature a bit mixed up: Fiji Bitter, in actual fact a sweet-flavoured lager).

I’ve also ordered two main meals for less than $30 (so under ten quid). I doubt there’s much these attractive prices can do for my waistline but hey.

Oh, and it’s grey and raining. And locals aren’t hopeful for any improvement. And why am in Fiji again..?

En route we stopped in Blenheim again as it’s the one place we’ve visited that I didn’t manage to scour the bookshops in search of a reasonably priced copy of my prized book. I found it for $36 which was about the best price I’d found anywhere and certainly cheaper than some.
So I hedged my bets and am now the proud owner of The Penguin History of New Zealand by Michael King. It is completely fabulous and enlightening – as evidenced by the fact that I’ve read 250 pages in two days (which is most unlike me).

So back to Nelson and four evenings with Trish and Paul, which went something like this.

Tuesday: pizza and ale (real hand-pulled ale like home) at the Freehouse, a converted church in Nelson.

Wednesday: total admin catch-up day and finish off the Bone People by Keri Hulme (no relation of the infamous child murderer AFAIK). In the evening I went to lend a hand at Paul’s football match, part of the region’s Summer Soccer season whereby dozens of teams play on a huge sports field, each week for the summer months. Paul’s team hadn’t won a single game yet… until tonight :-)
More pub time, this time at their local, the Sprig and Fern, in Richmond which also has great beer.

On Thursday, a trip to Abel Tasman National Park for a bracing morning’s kayaking and an exhausting afternoon’s walk back to basecamp – 12 km in the sweltering 30 degree heat. The national park — a favourite amongst travellers — is picturesque certainly, but following my Fiordland visit, seeing Sarah’s Routeburn pics and my west coast drive, this place just didn’t have enough variety for me to rank it as part of my must-sees.

Abel Tasman was the Dutchman who discovered (and named) New Zealand 140 or so years before Cook and the rest of Europe found their way there. However, because his ship and crew were attacked by the natives they turned around and didn’t come back. The north western area of the south island was later named after him anyway — as was Tasmania if you’re wondering.

I returned to Trish’s to a lovely barbecue and to meet lots more of her friends.

Friday was another admin day – collecting my replacment glasses (hurrah I can see again!) and booking my Fiji trip (something of a challenge but hey). In the evening we went into Nelson and to the Boatshed and Boathouse for sumtuous seafood and a view to match. (photos to follow)

Saturday I took the bus to Greymouth to get the TransAlpine train to Christchurch, where I was due to fly out of the next day. I chose right to do that journey in that direction, by far the most breathtaking landscapes being on the east and therefore presented as something of a climax.

It was lovely to have a second, if equally brief, visit to Christchurch. It has so much charm and epitomises the ‘Better Britain’ aims of the pioneers and early governments.

I took Trish’s advice and headed for the Twisted Hop pub, which like Nelson’s Freehouse specialised in genuine cask-conditioned ale. Another taste of England, ahhh!

In the morning, before I caught my shuttle bus to the airport I had the overwhelming joy of seeing the cathedral choir rehearse. I was initially disappointed that my transfer times would mean I missed Eucharist. However, the choir were rehearsing in the choir stalls beforehand so I was able to listen to them for almost and hour. And theyre a really tip-top outfit. Not merely ‘good by New Zealand standards’, they would hold their own against many of the top-league UK cathedral and collegiate choirs. I heard them rehearse a movement of Rubbra’s mass (thitherto unknown to me) and Dove’s Bless the Lord O My Soul – which I did recognise but needed my iPod inorder to place! Neither of which are trivial to sing well. So ‘big up’ to ya, Christchurch cathedral choir.

I set off for the next leg of my adventure restored and uplifted.

This is wise I think! This trip has taught me that imagination is often far riper – or at least more idealistic – than reality, and dwelling too long on a destination before arrival may end in disappointment. Which may explain why Auckland and Wellington somewhat disappointed and why Chrischurch, Queenstown and Nelson scored highly on the Reader approval scale; I thought far less about the latter.

In particular we found the most charming restaurant – the Secret Garden – where I chose a Reisling that was a hit with everyone and where they even served London Pride. I was staggered to discover that a beer that normally suffers from travelling 100 miles down the M4 tasted incredibly palatable half way around the world. A brewery in the Pacific perhaps? (I always thought it was Chiswick-brewed only)

It was a thoroughly nice evening being reunited with some old friends and meeting some new ones – Sarah, Carolyn, Nicky and Amy – and an honour to share a dorm with four chicks :-p
What goes on tour to Blenheim stays in Blenheim.

Actually the only thing that needs to remain under lock and key FOREVER is the video footage of the sing-along in the common room of the hostel. It was fun at the time, but I imagine the results were excruciating!

—

The next day was the long-awaited wine festival.
First a visit to Nick’s – local and friend of Carolyn’s – place for a fortifying breakfast of salmon and scrambled eggs. Quite apart from being a sociable (and high living: Nick’s pad was veeery des res) way to start the day, it was also a stomach-lining exercise, but I had to remind myself that the festival was also a food event, and not to over-eat. Not until later at least =)

We got bused out to the winery and upon entry were handed an engraved glass (which I still have) and the option of buying a very fetching and practical round-the-neck wine glass holder. We all looked like pricks, but didn’t care.

The festival had around 30 wineries with half a dozen wines to try. You could choose between a 100ml taste for $2-4 or a full glass for the standard rate.
Food stands included pies (of course! – they’re big here) and seafood.
Price-wise the best deals were to be had with the food, seafood platters available for $10 and pies for about $5. You could spend more of course but this selection suited me!

I spent the the first half of the day on white, with a vague plan to switch to reds later. This I did, but with Pinot Noir being the main varietal here, and it not being my favorite, and moved back onto whites and the sweet wines for the rest of the day.

I also made the initial mistake of heading straight for the names I recognized – Cloudy Bay, Villa Maria, Wither Hills etc – all of which you can get back home. So I promptly diverted to less-known wineries.

Of particular hit status amongst our crowd was Charles Wiffen and his late harvest Riesling. We ended the day on a full glass (my only non-taster) of Cloudy Bay’s take one the same, which was a delight, every swig heaven sent.

The only downside to the event was the live festival-style music. I like that NZ can have an event like this which bridges the divide between connoisseurship and youth culture but the two headline acts (Opesouls, The Checks; openers Sola Rosa were good, I thought) didn’t for me suit the ambience at all. And the less said about the terrible covers band that followed them the better. My ears, as well as my head and my sunburnt body, ached.

The festival closed (by our standards) quite early – at 6pm – and the coach services did an impressive job of shuttling several thousand winos back to town.

We attempted some pubbing after but we were frankly too far gone for it and were only good for sleep. The girls were in bed by 10, so I went online in the hope of finding my girlfriend on the opposite side of the world, at the opposite end of the day doing the same. She was! So I ended the day with some thrills and spills on Skype.

–

On Sunday we were invited to Nick’s other swanky home – his bach – just outside Picton in the Marlborough Sounds.
Here were are hooning around in them:

I also collected our hire car, Femmy, and hooked up with notyap to embark on our road trip round the west coast bound eventually for Blenheim and the ‘legendary’ Marlborough Food and Wine festival on Saturday.

We paid full insurance on it, which allowed us to abuse it as we saw fit, with no threat of any excess to pay even if written off. Pictured.

The drive from Queenstown to Nelson took in the zig-zag heights of the crown ranges, Wanaka’s most beautiful lake, the rugged beach of Hokitika with driftwood forming the beach’s signage, Fox Glacier (didn’t stop), Franz Josef glacier (could stop), Greymouth (to which I was to return), Westport, Punakaiki (pancake rocks and blowhole) and innumerable

ONE

LANE

BRIDGE(S)

which is how they are road-marked as you approach, in a kind of ‘how many more times do I have to tell you’ way.

It was around these bridges that the most alluring scenery could be seen.
I’m glad I travelled south to north in this way (flying would have been an easy option). There is so much worth seeing, yet so little of it would warrant a dedicated trip (the glaciers aside) so a roadtrip like this is about the only way to take in this stuff if you are on a shoestring schedule.

The most remarkable thing of all was the rapid and dramatic change in landscape and surroundings. Every 30 or so minutes there was a sufficiently different vegetation, wildlife, coastlines, weather and so on, to give the impression of being so far removed from the last lot that you could be in a different country or continent.

I don’t have sufficient knowledge, understanding or vocabulary to adequately describe the variety we saw, but all I can say is that I’ve never witnessed so much natural variety in all my travels.

This is where my road buddy came in handy. Much more versed in the natural world, she was sure to point out sights of interest and, importantly for me, explain why there were of interest. And in spite of my frequent feigned indifference (‘it’s nothing you can’t find in Scotland’), it doesn’t mean I didn’t appreciate it, so thanks Payton.

Also helpful having a driving partner, apart from the extremely long travel times (Jo – don’t underestimate it!), I had lost my glasses in Queenstown AND, having contracted conjunctivitis, was unable to wear my lenses, making driving for any length of time somewhere on the unwise-uncomfortable-unsafe scale.

Fortunately it turns out new specs in NZ are uncharacteristically cheap – only about $79 (£40) – and Nelson specsavers assured me they could have them turned around by my return the following week, hurrah.

Calling my UK opticians for my prescription at 9am GMT whilst half cut in NZ at 10pm was rather surreal, but fun.

On then to Blenheim, of which I have no expectations at all, other than the certainty that I will spend a LOT of money and get VERY pissed on Saturday.

A Sound is a kind of mountainous inlet, a flooded river valley. Milford is considered to be touristy and overcrowded and Doubtful, though more remote and therefore requiring an overnight cruise pushing up the price, is superior by far.

According to Wikipedia, Charles John Lyttelton, 10th Viscount Cobham, Governor-General of New Zealand (1957-1962) wrote this about Doubtful Sound:

“There are just a few areas left in the world where no human has ever set foot. That one of them should be in a country so civilized and so advanced as New Zealand may seem incredible, unless one has visited the south-west corner of the South Island. Jagged razor backed mountains rear their heads into the sky. More than 200 days of rain a year ensure not a tree branch is left bare and brown, moss and epiphytes drape every nook. The forest is intensely green. This is big country… one day peaceful, a study in green and blue, the next melancholy and misty, with low cloud veiling the tops… an awesome place, with its granite precipices, its hanging valleys, its earthquake faults and its thundering cascades.”

The bit I underlined is exactly how it happened for me – our particular party was very lucky.

Blowing the budget

Just a diversion here. NZ is expensive. It’s partly the exchange rate for us Brits (these days only 2 dollars to the pound, where once it had been 3 or nearly 4) but it’s expensive for the locals too, being on lower salaries than uk counterparts.
A friend did a like for like online shopping basket with Sainsburys (UK) and Foodtown (NZ) and the latter was 50% more expensive. Indeed, I have rarely found it cheaper to cook at the hostel than go out for a light bite.
A small beer is about $8.
Excursions are steep. If you want to buy a new paperback novel out here, expect to part with $30.
However there is value to be had; many hostels work out to around £13. (imagine the value with a better exchange rate!) and transport is cheap enough.

My excursion to Doubtful Sound was an exclusive-sounding and eye-popping $450 (£225) – quite considerable when you consider my daily budget is £50. I got a deal that pushed it down to $380 (£190).
For this I got an overnight sleep, 3 meals, activities (kayaking), transfers to the cruise ship from Queenstown (3-4 hours each way) and a cruise of breathtaking beauty that you can’t do anywhere else in the world. Suddenly extremely good value.

Doubtul Sound must be one of the most remote places on earth that I’ve been. From Queenstown it’s a 2 hr coach journey to Manapouri, an hour’s ferry and then another 30 mins by coach down the Wilmot Pass to Deep Cove — population: 1 — where the cruise begins.

Here are some of the things I did, and below some videos and pics:

• Saw the Sound in glorious sunlight
• Went kayaking
• Went swimming possibly in the deepest waters I’ve ever been in
• Saw seals and sea pups (but no dolphins or whales or penguins, blast it!)
• Had delicious warming soup
• The biggest ever feast in the evening
• Entertained my fellow passengers on the piano
• Saw the sounds in the mist and the rain, which created waterfalls from every mountain
• Drank water we collected from one of these waterfalls, which had passed through a thousand feet of filtering
• Experienced the most blissful silence as they pulled the boat into a rain-drenched valley and switched off the engines. We were miles from the nearest humans or man-made noises

The one true other-side-of-the-world experience of the trip so far.

Day 1, outbound. glorious sunshine on our initial connecting cruise to the Sound across Lake Manapouri

Doubtful Sound on day 2 of our cruise – eerie mist and waterfalls galore.

I managed to catch a lift from Rotorua to Napier with a mother and daughter (Beryl and Stephanie; no prizes for guessing which is the mother!) who had been staying with me at Funky Green.

We stopped in at Taupo to see NZ’s biggest lake (Lake Taupo), under which is a volcano. I was really pleased to see Taupo having been tempted by a visit anyway; by the same token I was glad to have chosen against staying.

Napier on the other hand, no sooner had I arrived than I decided to book a second night. Which was handy because Beryl and Stephanie were staying 2 nights and left me an open offer of lift-sharing down to Wellington on the Friday.

On my first evening I took in a walking tour of the art deco architecture.
I then went for a strenuous swim followed by a languish in the jacuzzi and got talking to some very friendly locals, one of whom was kind enough to be the first to inform me of the Rugby Sevens tournament in Wellington coinciding with my forthcoming trip. “there won’t be anywhere to stay now mate!”. Right. Thanks for that.

That evening I hung out in my hostel, the Criterion, which currently gets 5 gold stars for facilities, friendliness and style (it, too, is built in art deco).
However, Napier’s nightlife was less peaceful and palatable. How a sleepy coastal idyll can turn into Ibiza by night I don’t understand. Hard to sleep through.

Next day was my wine tour of Hawke’s Bay and I was bang up for this.
‘Vince’ had been recommended to me on the basis of being ‘a character’ – which can also be a substitute for ‘total pillock’ if you’re not careful – though I was prepared to take the risk and thankfully in this case he really was deserving of the accolade. In spite of calling me Ted a couple of times and asking me how Oz was (‘well you’re dressed like a bloody Aussie!’) he seemed very pleased of my enthusiasm and, upon expressing my minimal understanding of viticulture, pegged me as a VIP and introduced me personally to the owners at the last couple of visits with a “look after this guy” kind of introduction.
Though this might have been more to do with the increasing appearance of my wallet…
I went on the tour resolved not to buy anything; by the second winery I caved and bought two bottles, and enquired about shipping. Only €160 to ship back to the UK – up to 12 bottles. So I may as well buy 12, no?

Not all for me of course. Be nice and your NZ Hawke’s Bay Reisling may appear in your Xmas stocking…

Frankly, no I don’t want to go skydiving, bungee jumping, canyoning, zorbing, jagairing, ziptreking, or on any other suicide mission. however ‘adrenaline fuelled’.

I’m guilty of doling out these untargetted recommendations too, and I suppose it’s the done thing on the backpacker trail to make recommendations to your fellow travellers — which on the whole I appreciate very much.

But travelling simply serves to highlight what a diverse breed we all are. A good lesson for me as I get my head around a future business venture (more to follow) that one size most certainly does not fit all.

Some things in life have universal appeal, and perhaps you can safely recommend a minority of things to just about anyone. But only a minority.

It’s not always strangers who get it wrong. Also striking were the contrasting reactions from people who do know me when I reported home that my visit to Wellington would clash with the ‘Rugby Sevens’ tournament (which is almost the world cup to these people). Some exclaimed how much fun that would be – carnival atmosphere, “what great timing!” etc.

I thought I would probably hate it. And I did.

I think I would otherwise quite enjoy Wellington. But it’s hard to tell. The sort of dickheads who swarm arond city centres at these events – drinking, shouting, vomitting, marauding and, in this case, haka-ing – become the only thing you notice, as you try to avoid them for fear of an unprovoked kicking. So to be honest, I barely even noticed Wellington behind that din.

Christchurch on the other hand. So many people said ‘don’t bother’. The charge against the place being that it’s too like England, what’s the point. I took this advice and limited my time to two separate 16-hour stopovers, most of which I’ll be sleeping, before catching a morning flight.

And yet I got there, had a look round and rather fell for it. Yes Christchurch is extremely English and one might ask: why bother, when you could just visit Oxford any time you like, and when the latter is the real McCoy. But it’s that side of things I find fascinating. Parellel universe sort of stuff. Imagine an Oxford or a Cambridge that was reliably balmy, not overcrowded (by either tourists, students or residents) and where all the service staff were friendly and genial (as they are across NZ). Well you’ve got it right here!

I now learn that Dunedin is modelled on Edinburgh – right down to its town planning, is that right? – so all the more sorry that I can’t fit that in.

Imagine if they’d done a London!

So – very glad I came to Christchurch. Will be looking forward to Saturday in two weeks’ time. And may even try and get here a day early.

Or arrange a choir tour here. Yes.

Or, one day, come and live here for a few months…

:-p

Not that I want to over-state it; of course it wasn’t anywhere near as epic, gruesome, drawn-out or extreme as 127 Hours, and the denouement nothing like. But having seen the film only days ago, scenes from his predicament haunted my imagination as I swam across the 3 kilometes of Lake Tikitapu (‘Blue Lake’) in a leaking and ever-inflating wetsuit, feeling my energy draining, my legs tiring and my spirit fading.

What if I actually can’t carry on. What if I get cramp? Can anyone see me? How deep is this water? I’m a long way from shore…

Did I tell anyone where I was going?

Then oddly enough another film came into my head. Run Fatboy Run! Like Pegg’s Marathon-runner in that story, I knew that hitting the wall is just psychological and can be overcome. As I guess any great athlete will tell you, your only limits are the ones in your head.

I powered on — not very elegantly — and arrived at the other side, much longer after I’d departed than expected, and certainly rather more exhausted than any other swim in my life has left me.

—

All this was on my Rotorua trip, first stop after the Auckland stint, and en route to Wellington.
I liked Rotorua in many ways. Once you’re over the pervasive sulphur smell that it is famous for there is plenty to do and see, and is actually known for being one of the most wallet-busting stop-offs for backpackers.

I had to take in the Polynesian Spa, containing seven different hot mineral spring pools, and followed this with a visit to the surprisingly feature-rich museum. A film about the Maori arrival in ‘Aotearoa’ (New Zealand) was in equal parts a proud achievement and amateurishly risible. The CGI/animations were impressive and the auditorium-shake during the earthquake startling and effective; however some acting and make-up (obviously stuck-on beards) less professional.

The day after was when I took the 22k return bike trip out to the lake and did my 3km swim. In the evening I immersed myself in some Maoriana with a trip to the Tamaki Maori Cultural show, including a ‘hangi’ — pit roast of lamb, chicken and veg – a feast fit for a king.

Next up: Napier

Napier is the coastal town that was levelled by an earthquake in 1931 and rebuilt in all art-deco. In fact, not by design, I’ll be there on the 80th anniversary, to the day.

It’s also the Hawke’s Bay wine region. Bring it on.