The South Island of New Zealand is an amazingly beautiful place, and great for hiking! I especially liked the mountains (Australia has no mountains with permanent ice), and the cool temperate rainforests.

I spent 32 days in the south island. I had intended to see the whole south island, but after my first tramp I decided to skip the northern part to give me more time for other tramps. I'm sure I could have easilly spent five (or more) times as long there as I did, but unfortunately I only had 5 weeks off work. I packed quite a lot into the time I had however, spending 19 of the days hiking various trails, covering over 250km.

New Zealand very well set up for hiking, with hundreds of well marked trails and excellent backcountry huts. The DOC (Department Of Conservation) visitor centres provide maps, route descriptions, weather forecasts, intentions forms, and will even organise search and rescue should you fail to return. New Zealand is also well set up for backpacking, however I found that I really didn't like the way that many of the backpacker busses zoomed travellers around the country without pausing.

The Southern Alps are wonderful. It is almost impossible to take a bad photo on the tramping trails that run through the Southern Alps - the area is just so spectacular. I sometimes would take a photo of a beautiful vista only to find that just around a corner was an even more amazing view. It's lucky film is cheap.

This trip certainly re-affirmed that some of the places I most like to be, are those that are wild, remote and beautiful. New Zealand has huge areas that fit this description, and which most travellers will never see. I learned how easy it is travelling and hiking in English speaking developed countries like NZ.

I found that the people I met hiking, and in backcountry huts, were the friendliest, and easisest to talk to of any of the people I met. If I go back to New Zealand, there are lots places of places I'd like go, especially, the Tongariro Northern Circuit, Ball Pass, the Routeburn, etc.