Day 1 in Christchurch was an interesting experience. It did not go the way I had originally expected it would but I figured it all out. I wanted to go Jet Boating (boats that go very fast) after seeing a brochure and looking it up on their website but unfortunately I got an email from the company telling me they didn’t have space for single passengers and offered me a full refund.

Instead I ended up exploring the Botanical Gardens which was very peaceful and then made my way over to the Canterbury Museum which was interesting for a little while. After the Museum I took a Hop-on-Hop-off bus tour of the city of Christchurch and the tour guide was hilarious! One of the stops was the “Cardboard Cathedral” which Is completely false advertising because it turns out only the pillars inside are made of cardboard, not the entire thing.

By the time the tour had ended and I was back to the room at the hostel I was staying at it was still only 12:30pm. I ended up just relaxing in the room day-dreaming about the things to come later in this trip!

Eventually I got back out and went in search of dinner but really didn’t do anything else memorable the rest of the evening.

Day 1 of the actual tour got off to a good start. I got to meet all the people I’ll be touring with and did a walking tour of Christchurch with them and my tour guide.

The tour guide’s name is Andy (his nickname is “Baby Jesus”) and he is the coolest dude! While everyone else was wearing winter gear, Andy and I were out in a t-shirt and shorts!! It started to rain at one point and I have a rain jacket but I chose not to wear it because if Andy didn’t need it, neither did I!

We all went to this Greek place for lunch and then got on to our tour bus to head off to the next destination: Lake Tekapo.

On our way to Lake Tekapo we stopped at the iconic New Zealand cookie store “Cookie Time” where I got a cookie (obviously) and a brownie which were both delicious.

While continuing on our way to Tekapo we went across the longest bridge in New Zealand. There was a challenge to see who on the bus could hold their breath the entire length and out of the 17 on the bus just me and one other successfully did it (I was really dying at the end but I pulled through!!!).

After a 3 hour bus ride we officially made it to Lake Tekapo and it was beautiful there! Took a bunch of pics of the Southern Alps and the lake itself.

Ended the day with a great meal with my tour group at a small local bar & grill and found a Colorado Avalanche hockey jersey hanging on the wall! GO AVS!

Day 2 got off to a very foggy start. Unlike the previous day where there literally was not a single cloud in the sky, that morning you could not see the lake or the mountains at all! It was quite beautiful but in the opposite way of the clear sky beauty of the day before.

After leaving Lake Tekapo we made our way to Lake Pukaki and did a bunch of rock skipping. My tour guide Andy and I were having rock skipping competitions which was a lot of fun. Not gonna lie, Andy’s better than me (but not by much!!!).

Later, after leaving Lake Pukaki, we went to our third lake of the day: Lake Dunstan. It was my favorite by far because we got to go swimming and I got to experience my first big thrill of the trip! First fun part was jumping off the rocks into the water with Andy (my tour guide) and one other peer from the group named Patrick (he’s from Germany). Then, Andy and I jumped off the 60ft bridge into the water and it was an amazing and thrilling experience!

While continuing on to Queenstown there was a quick stop at a vineyard. I did not participate in the wine tasting but did have fun hanging out with all the other people who decided to be lame like me.

The day ended with a group BBQ and some walking around the local shops.

Day 3 got off to an early start...sort of. I woke up at 6am and knew I was not going to be going back to bed so I decided to get up and try and be productive. The only problem though was that nothing in the city of Queenstown opens earlier than 7am so for an hour I had to just sit around.

When stores started opening up around town I did some exploring and was able to find some nice souvenirs to take home!

At 11:30am I met up with the Jet Boating company to finally get to do what I was hoping to do the first day in Christchurch!

Jet Boating was a ton of fun! We did a lot of spinning and swerving around tight corners at high speeds (top speed 90kph). There were times when we got really close to the rocks and I just had to keep reminding myself that the boat driver is a professional who knows what he’s doing!!

After the Jet Boating I was starving and decided to get the world-famous “Fergburger”. The wait for my burger was almost 30 minutes but totally worth it!

After eating my Fergburger I went back to my lodge and did some MUCH NEEDED laundy. It took me forever to figure out how to operate the dryer because it didn’t specify anywhere that it only accepts $2 coins! I eventually got it though.

For dinner it was suggested to me that I try another local burger place called Devil Burger and get the their signature “Devil Burger”. I was told that even though Queenstown is famous for the Fergburger, the Devil Burger is even better. Personally, I loved them both and couldn’t decide between the two on which was better.

Well today was the big day! I had never been so ready for anything in my life. It was the day I got to ride the Shotover Canyon Swing and the Nevis Bungy!! When I first woke up at 6am and realized what day it was, I knew I was never going to go back to sleep. I was practically shaking I was so excited!

The Shotover Canyon Swing was an incredible experience! The people that work the swing give you a ton of options on how to go off the edge and I chose the “Chair of Death”! They had me sit in a lawn chair attached to a harness and the big swing cables and I just had to lean backwards in my lawn chair and fall backwards off the edge! They faked me out about 5 times where I thought I was about to go and they caught me at the last second. Very fun experience and would absolutely do it again!

Just a couple hours after getting off the bus from the Shotover Canyon Swing I got on another bus to go to the Nevis Bungy! It’s a 134m free fall over a river inside a giant (and beautiful) canyon! The Nevis Bungy is the funnest and most thrilling thing I’ve ever done and would absolutely do it again!

The day ended with a drive to Wanaka where we had some beautiful views that my phone camera failed to capture the real beauty of.

Today was yet another thrill filled day! It started off with the “Tiger Moth Biplane Ride” which was an incredible experience! I never imagined I’d be saying this but this biplane ride was more thrilling than the Nevis Bungy! The pilot asked me before the flight if I wanted to do acrobatics (and I of course said yes) which ended up being the most wild ride of my life! The pilot did barrel rolls, loopty-loops, and other insane tricks that were so amazing and fun I could barely contain myself!

After I got back to Lake Wanaka I went to checkout the tree in the water that Lake Wanaka is famous for. It wasn’t that spectacular in all honesty but still worth posing for a few pictures.

After checking out the tree I made my way back I the hostel and hopped on the tour bus to make our way to Franz Josef.

We stopped for a quick photo shoot at Lake Hawea which had to most beautiful views I’d experienced yet on this trip!

As we continued making our way towards Franz Josef we stopped at a couple of cool spots with waterfalls and a couple of beaches along the coast.

The day ended with a costume party/dinner which was a lot of fun. I had bought a silly hat that holds beer cans as a joke costume prop. I somehow got talked into singing more Kareoke songs than I can count and didn’t get to bed til almost 2am!!!!

This was the day I was supposed to be riding in a helicopter up to a glacier to hike around on. Unfortunately it got cancelled due to weather which was a big bummer.

Instead I went on a much more boring and uneventful hike that was only about 20 minutes long. After the hike I went back to downtown Franz Josef and explored the local shops. I went to a jade carving shop to make a cool necklace.

At the end of the day we all went out to dinner and watched a lot of rugby (or at least Andy and I were in to it).

Overall, today was the most relaxing but uneventful day of the tour.

Day 7 was another day with a lot of traveling involved with a few cool stops along the way. The first stop was in Halitika which is where I got to see a Kiwi Bird for the first time. I remember getting a good laugh because the Kiwi Bird tripped over a log and face planted into the group.

We stopped at the beach as well to take a fun group photo and then headed off to another cool viewing spot around 30 minutes later on our way to Punaikaki. There was a fun and easy 20 minute hike up to the viewing spot where I took a few photos and then we all headed back down to continue to Punaikaki.

We made it to Punaikaki about an hour later and I was amazed at how tiny the town is. There’s literally almost nothing other than a cafe and a gas station.

Finished the day with a nice group dinner and then played some fun games for a bit.

This was the day I got to try “Underground Rafting”. I wasn’t even quite sure what it entailed when I first heard about it but it sounded cool so of course I signed up!

The Underground Rafting consisted of both hiking and rafting in personal inner tubes through caves that were absolutely stunning on the inside! The best part was seeing the glow worms hanging from the top of the caves!

After the Underground Rafting we all went to checkout the “Pancake Rocks” and walk along the beach. While at the beach, Andy and I had a rock throwing accuracy contest.

The day ended with a game of charades and my team won!

Overall, today was a very fun and relaxing day. I am falling more and more in love with New Zealand everyday!

Day 9 got off to a kind of a slow start. I worked on sorting all my pictures up to that point and then cooked breakfast with others from the group.

We hopped onto the bus around 9am and then headed out to our first viewing point in Charleston. Charleston is a small town with a population of roughly 70 people. After stopping there for about 15 minutes, we headed off to an even more awesome spot with a big seal colony. We watched the seals and hung out for about 30 minutes before going for a beautiful 45 minute walk with two others from the group (the rest all took the short 15 minute way back to the bus) and got some great pictures which made it totally worth it!

After that walk there was about an hour and a half of driving before getting to Marahau. Andy and I had an awesome conversation telling each other stories about all the ridiculous things we did growing up (I won’t go into specifics about the stories).

The day ended with another delicious meal at a pizza joint with very fancy pizzas (I got the “meat lovers” pizza).

Today got off to a very disappointing start but got progressively better. I was supposed to go “Canyoning” but I didn’t get to do it because the company messed up and made my reservation for December 22nd, not November 22nd. Canyoning involves sliding into rivers, jumping into rivers, and zip lining over rivers in the canyon which sounded like and absolute blast.

I was pretty livid in the moment but then Andy invited me to go with him to “Cleopatra’s Pool” which turned out to be really awesome! It was a natural pool with a natural water slide that Andy and I rode down first feet first, then face first!! After that we jumped around on the rocks for awhile like little kids and then made our way back to the beaches of Abel Tasman National Park to meet up with the rest of the tour group.

After hanging out at the beach for a bit, we hopped on a boat that we were spending then night on. Andy and I put on a show for the rest of the group doing tricks off the top of the boat into the water (even though the water was quite cold).

That night on the boat I experienced the best meal of the entire trip. All the food was homemade by the people who owned the boat and treally they put a lot of hard work into making us as happy as possible.

My second to last full day of my Adrenaline Junkie Tour started out at 3am when I woke up in the middle of the night and decided to get out of the boat and do some stargazing. It was a perfect night and the Milky Way Galaxy was so visible that I really wish I had a camera that could capture its beauty. I went back to sleep eventually but was up again at 6:30am.

Later that morning (around 8:30) we all got off the boat and hiked from Anchorage beach back Marahau through Abel Tasman National Park. It was roughly a three hour journey with some very cool views of the ocean to checkout along the way.

After the long three hour trek, we hopped on the bus and drove off towards Nelson and then Picton to catch the ferry to Wellington. As usual, the sights along the drive were stunning and my phone camera really couldn’t capture what my eyes were seeing.

Andy and I wanted to watch the New Zealand National basketball team play but the lame sports bar on board insisted on showing cricket instead (yawn). Instead I just hanged out with the rest of the tour group and reminisce about our favorite parts of our trips.

The final morning with my tour group was an emotional time. Having to say goodbye to all my new friends and my amazing tour guide Andy was very hard.

I will truly never forget the people I met on this journey and this trip will always be remembered as one of the major highlights of my life!