Anglican Cathedral in Cathedral Square in Christchurch, the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand. Christchurch's iconic cathedral escaped relatively unscathed the earthquake in September 2010. But many of Christchurch's character commercial buildings, which many regard as giving the city its soul, were badly hit and many of the region's smaller historic churches and grandest old homes have been devastated.

An female of Elephant Seal caused quite a stir on the beach in Chirstchurch. For unknown reason the huge animal spent hours in shallow water close the beach, despite of the many people surrounding her. One of the Maori guys at the picture supposed, that the Elephant Seal female would be sick.

A typical country house in New Zealand. In such houses we stayed over the night during our 4 days Southern Bays Walkway on the Banks Peninsula near Christchurch. The houses were empty, but well equipped with TV and refrigerator fool of food and beer. For the food and beverages we taken some money according the price list should be thrown into the money box. Remarkably: nobody controlled this and this system worked apparently yet. This says a lot about the honesty of the New Zealand's citizens.

Dramatic coastline with many scenic bays on the Southern Bays Walkway. Despite of the high air temperatures the water in the bays was very refreshing, making only short swimming possible. Normally the coast on the Banks Peninsula is covered with lush green vegetation, but I visited it in an El Nino year. In the Southern Pacific this oscillation results in drier conditions, with partly dramatical effects, especially in Australia, where big parts of the country are afflicted by bush and forest fires.

The clock tower of the Otago University in Dunedin. Dunedin is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand. The majority of its citizens is of scottish heritage and the scottish influences are omnipresent in the cityscape.

Christoph scanning the opposite slopes for the suitable places to take some rock cuttings. Christoph was my former colleague and a Geologist from Germany, who made his Ph.D. in New Zealand about geology of Fiordland. One week long I helped him to collect some rock cuttings for his work at the north fiord of the Lake Te Anau in Fiordland.

Typical landscape in Fiordland National Park at the Lake Te Anau. It is the largest of the 14 national parks in New Zealand, with an area of 12,500 km². Fiordland features a number of fiords, not only at the coast but at the big lakes like the Lake Te Anau too. The highest peaks of the mountains in Fiordland rich over 2,700 m.

The crimson flowers of Southern Rata (Metrosideros umbellata) are red bursts in the green forest canopy. This small tree is very useful for the people. Early Maori people of New Zealand used the nectar of rata trees as a food and as a remedy for sore throats, and the inner bark as a remedy for diarrhea. More recently, the nectar is still used to produce "rata honey". Southern Rata has wood so dense that locals call it "ironwood." The timber is strong and durable and used for many purposes.

The blossom of the shrubs, water and snow capped mountains: Fiordland landscape at Lake Te Anau. The lake, and its three long arms that penetrate into the mountainous forested shore, was gouged out by a huge glacier. It is 417 meters at its deepest, and 53 km long and 10 km across at its widest, making it NZ's second largest lake after Taupo in the North Island.

The whole week we have trouts to dinner, which we caught evenings after coming back from the mountains. The trouts were so abundant in the Lake Te Anau and the rivers, that we never had to fish longer than 5 minutes to catch two of them. Although the fish were very tasty, after eating them each day at the end of our week in Fiordland I couldn't see them anymore. The european brown trout and the rainbow trout from California were first introduced to New Zealand in 19th century. The lakes and rivers of the country proved to be ideal for these fish, so they rich here much bigger sizes than in the countries of their origin. All trouts we caught at Lake Te Anau were clear bigger than half a meter and thus looked more like small salmons. New Zealand is regarded to be worldwide the best place for fly fishing.

Taking a quick sip and then proceeding with the climbing. To collect the rock cuttings we often have to ascend to the top of the mountains. To get there through the impenetrable mountain forest was very tough. If possible we wade in the streams because it was still easier than going through the dense forest and additionally good for the orientation. Unfortunately plenty of waterfalls forced us to often to leave the river trail. Sometimes we were lucky to cross deer paths. Following them seemed us to be so convenient as driving a highway.

A cultivated landscape near Lake Te Anau looks very much like comparable landscapes in the temperate zone in other parts of the world. Only the beautiful broad-leafed Cabbage tree (Cordyline australis) remains us, that we are in New Zealand, because this tree is endemic to the islands.

View from the Kepler Trail over the Lake Te Anau over the Fiordland ridges. There was never any settlement in Fiordland. The steep slopes and huge rainfall make any agriculture impossible, because of the erosion. So almost the whole mountain ridge was never penetrated by humans. As me and Chirstoph roamed through the untouched forests curious small birds and parrots came very close to us, because they probably have never seen humans before.

The Mirror Lake along the way to Milford Sound in Fiordland is a very scenic place with a lake that is so clear, the reflection is like looking into a mirror.

Scenic subalpine zone in Fiordland near the Milford Sound.

Many hundreds of temporary waterfalls can be seen running down the steep sided rock faces that line Milford Sound, the most famous fiord in Fiordland. With a mean annual rainfall of 6,813 mm Milford Sound is known as the wettest inhabited place in New Zealand and one of the wettest in the world. One can see, how much rainfall is it, by comparing it with the only 581 mm of annual rainfall in Berlin. The huge amount of fresh water couldn't fast enough mix with the salt water, so the top 10 meters or so in the fiord is actually fresh water. A dark surface layer of fresh water, stained by tannins from the surrounding forest, allows the black corals, which are usually only found in much deeper waters, to grow close to the surface.

A resort town Queenstown on Lake Wakatipu is called the adventure capital of New Zealand. In winter is it a big skiing centre. In summer there a plenty of adrenaline activities on the water (e.g. white-water rafting, jet-boating), in the air (bungy jumping, heli-bungy, parachuting etc.) and on the ground (mountain biking, motorcycling etc.). I didn't like Queenstown very much, to my mind it is too commercial.

Arriving at the Rob-Roy-Glacier near Wanaka I made a break to eat something and was immediately surrounded by 3 or 4 Keas (Nestor notabilis). I had to keep all my stuff close too me, because the intelligent parrots with their notorious urge to explore and manipulate would steal not only my food but all other things too at the first opportunity. Almost since the beginning of the shepherding in the mountains of New Zealand the Keas were under suspicion to attack and kill sheep. But first the modern technology like infrared cameras helped to unravel the mystery. Video recordings confirmed what many scientists had long suspected, that the small Kea uses its powerful curved beak and claws to rip through the layer of wool and eat the fat from the back of the animal. Though the bird does not directly kill the sheep, death can result from blood poisoning or accidents suffered by animals trying to escape.

The mighty river of ice and lush green vegetation on the Franz Josef Glacier in Westland National Park. Together with the Fox Glacier 20 km to the south, it is unique in descending from the Southern Alps to less than 300 meters above sea level. The reason for this astonishing glaciers' development is threefold. The first reason are the high snow fall in the high elevations because of the prevailing westerlies and short distance to the sea. Secondly, the zones where the ice accumulates are very large, so there's a lot of ice to push down the valley. Finally, they're very steep glaciers - the ice can get a long way before it finally melts. Because of the steepness and the huge amount of ice the Franz Josef glacier can move at up to 5 m a day, over 10 times as fast as glaciers in the Swiss Alps.

On the way to a walks up to and on to the Franz Josef Glacier. The latter tour required some specialized equipment, namely ice axes and crampons that latch onto a sturdy boot. Because of high water level in the river emerging from the glacier terminal we had to take alternative tough route through forest on the steep slopes to rich the ice. This took so long, that we had only few time for walking on the ice.

Deer farming on the West Coast of the South Island. The majority of dear meat, which is offered in the supermarkets in Europe, come from such farms in New Zealand. The only mammals living in NZ prior to the arrival of humans were 2 species of bats. Especially the european settlers introduced a lot of animals from their home country, e.g. the red deers for hunting. Today they are however officially regarded as a noxious pest and are still heavily culled using professional hunters working with helicopters, or even poisoned.