How a lost diary at Lake Tekapo sparked an ongoing treasure hunt

A steady stream of visitors has been seen combing the shoreline of Lake Tekapo since February in search of a mysterious package that has become a viral phenomenon.

Scouring the rocky landscape near the Church of the Good Shepherd, the visitors are trying to find a bag containing at least eight unofficial guestbooks.

Those who are successful in their search scrawl a message in one of the books before hiding the package amongst the rocks again.

The activity began in February after a nine-year-old Chinese tourist accidentally left her diary at the lake.

Subsequent visitors who stumbled across the blue-covered book soon filled the blank pages with messages and scribbles of their own, transforming the journal into an impromptu guestbook.

The first entry in the diary was penned on 31 January by Handong Zi, a primary school student from China who visited Lake Tekapo with her family during Lunar New Year.

"Today me, Mum, Dad, my brother and grandmother went on a jet boat," she wrote.

"I thought it would be like that shark ride with the hydro attack, but it was a boat with many people sitting together, moving so slowly."

Meng Li, Handong's mother, told RNZ the diary was part of her daughter's homework.

However, the diary went missing soon after her daughter had written that solitary entry in January.

Upon returning to China, Li discovered the diary had taken on a life of its own.

Posts about the journal began circulating on Chinese social media platform RedNote as visitors who stumbled across it started leaving message of their own.

Li reached out to people who had posted photographs of the diary on social media and, five months later, the book was returned to the family by a Chinese woman living in New Zealand.

"Everyone in our family was so excited to see the diary again," Li said.

"It's wonderful that travellers from around the world left their messages in it. Some of them are very heart-warming."

Li said about a third of the entries were messages for her daughter.

Li described the diary as a shooting star, carrying with it the wishes of those who found it.

She said a publisher in China had contacted the family with plans to turn the diary into a book.

One would have thought the return of the journal to China should have ended the commotion on Lake Tekapo's foreshore, but the opposite has happened.

Now, eight separate notebooks have been tucked into waterproof bags and hidden beneath rocks.

And visitors to the area haven't stopped searching for the newer journals.

Australian tourist Andrea Li tried to find the notebooks in July but found the search more difficult than she had expected.

"There are so many rocks along the shore," she said. "The notebooks are hidden underneath, so you can't see them directly."

Li was thrilled to eventually uncover the notebooks, finding the entries left by travelers from around the world incredibly moving.

"It feels like meeting an old friend after a long time," she recalled.

She hoped the notebooks could be preserved in a safer place instead of being left in deteriorating waterproof bags and stored beneath rocks.

"They were stored in a waterproof bag and covered with a green plastic bag that's really torn and worn out," she said. "If it rains or if there's any unexpected natural disaster, they could disappear."

Yuzheng Peng, a language school student based in Auckland, visited Lake Tekapo in August to track down the notebooks but came up empty-handed.

Instead, he bought a new notebook from a local souvenir shop and slipped it beneath a large rock, hoping to keep the tradition alive.

"Searching for the notebook and writing something in it has become a must-do activity for many Chinese tourists," Peng said. "It's a kind of romance that belongs to us here."

Hao Wu, a student at the University of Canterbury, also visited Lake Tekapo in August, stumbling across the notebook that Peng had hidden a week earlier.

Wu said he enjoyed the search along the lakeshore, describing it as a "treasure hunting game."

He said the notebooks appeared to move from place to place, which made the search challenging and fun.

Wu said the practice had grown popular among tourists because of the unusual way it helped to connect strangers.

"The practice has become part of the 'Lake Tekapo experience'," he said.

"It's a form of engagement and connection. We all come to the same foreshore at different times, but the notebook ties us together.

"We're all passing our messages along. It's an interesting experience, and it keeps your memory of the place alive."

Wu called for completed notebooks to be preserved in a local museum or visitor centre.

Rev. Craig Allan, minister of the Church of the Good Shepherd, said the church committee was unaware of the practice.

He said the church would discourage the practice, noting that shifting rocks along the lakeshore could disrupt the environment.

"This does affect the natural habitat of native geckos species," Allan said.

A spokesperson for the Mackenzie District Council said tourists were encouraged to follow the "leave no trace" travel philosophy and to consider potential environmental impacts when visiting New Zealand.

"Whilst this is a lovely sentiment and unique to our region, activities like this can have unintended impacts on the environment and on the community," the spokesperson said.

The spokesperson said the council was open to exploring a guestbook - in digital or physical form - that might be managed by local tourism operators or the wider community, if there were interest.

René de Monchy, chief executive of Tourism New Zealand, said the agency had learned of the notebook practice through Chinese social media.

He said the agency supported local tourism operators who wished to preserve the spirit of the tradition while ensuring it did not create litter along the lakeshore.