Summer 2003 / 2004

Between Christmas and New Year's Eve 2003, I cruised down the south island along Lake Tekapo, Mt Cook, Wanaka and finally Queenstown. In the second half of February 2004, I then visited the north island from Palmerston North up to the Bay of Islands, spending six days in Tongariro National Park and subsequently visiting Hamilton, the Bay of Plenty, the Waitomo Caves, Auckland and the Bay of Islands (Paihia and Waitangi). The purpose of this page is to give my friends an impression of the beautiful landscape that I got to experience during the journey.

All pictures on this page have the same height, but vastly different widths - so don't forget to scroll on the panorama pictures or to view them in a resolution that fits your screen (if your browser supports that). You might want to press <F11> to use your full screen for viewing.

Tim, one of my best kiwi friends.

Tim's grandfather had a very exciting life and is still quite fit - Tim gave him a hacky sack for his birthday.

Christmas titbits

The children distributed the presents.

three of Tim's best friends

yeah right

The beautiful Lake Tekapo

Lake Tekapo from a different perspective, with the church of the good shepherd on the small peninsula

beautiful landscape near Lake Tekapo (panorama)

different perspective

Typical Otago landscape - looks a bit like Afghanistan in a dry summer, as far as I can judge from what I saw from the plane.

Stuart Landsborough's Puzzling World near Wanaka - featuring a nice collection of puzzles and a maze

Inside the leaning tower - the horizontal step appears tilted

nice illusion due to the tilted floor

leaning forward to stand vertical - looked funnier in reality than in the photo

Nice challenge to alleged mind readers; so far, six persons attempted to discover the treasure's hiding place in vain, yielding a total of $NZ 6000 for charity.

I think I'll adopt that tile pattern for my next bathroom!

The maze from one of the bridges that make it even more fun!

Weight training - sorry for the disadvantageously cast shadow

beautiful Lake Wanaka

Cinema Paradiso in Wanaka is one of the premier attractions and features not only comfy sofas and a car instead of the normal armchairs, but also hot fresh-made cookies in the break!

Queenstown, with one of the fast jetboats used for the shotover river cruise for tourists.

Queenstown scenery - isn't this landscape just amazingly beautiful?

enlarged part of the scenery

Landscape close to Queenstown, along the road to Wanaka through the Cardronas valley

Lake Hawea, north-east of Wanaka

extremely beautiful river scene near Wanaka

The annual world busker's festival in Christchurch

The birthday present that I got from my flatmates: An inflatable kiwi (I bet they were the first non-Asians to buy it)!

New Zealand Summer on 27/12/2003: extremely dry.

New Zealand Summer on 04/01/2004: extremely wet (photo courtesy of Stephen France (?)). The wettest hour alone saw 104mm of rain.

Mike Steel, my professor and supervisor, and the director of the Biomathematics Research Centre.

Mt Ngauruhoe (Orodruin / Mt Doom) in one of the very few sunny moments.

Mt Ngauruhoe at dusk.

Beautiful small waterfall in Tongariro National Park.

Me in sexy outdoor outfit (near Lower Tama Lake).

Even more sexy without the jacket.

Bay of Plenty, the north-eastern shore of NZ's north island - note the phenomenal long white cloud!

further to the left

Glowworm cave in Waitomo - the curves instead of dots are camera shake artifacts.

Me right after abseiling 100m down into the lost world cave - an exciting, but expensive adventure.

Typical north island vegetation and relief.

further to the right

above a cave in Waitomo, with some typical pancake rock

closeup of a piece of layered pancake rock

Beautiful river near the Mangapohue Natural Bridge Scenic Reserve

the same river a little further upstream

Marokopa falls (note the faint rainbow!)

nice hill with rocks and two trees

context

pancake rock (turned 90°)

interesting rocks

interesting wood and rocks

another interesting rock

rock skyline

beautiful shore with dark, mineral-rich sand at the west coast

view from above

view inwards

interesting dead tree

Karsten "Spiff" Sperling at Taharoa Lake, north of Auckland near Dargaville.

Te Matura Ngahere (The father of the forest) - a 2000 year old giant Kauri tree (trunk 10m high, 5.22m diameter, total height 30m). These trees were used for Maori war canoes (wakas) and for sailing ship's masts.