We managed to get to Invercargill in one piece, and booked into a nice quiet hostel. Our tent decided to break again (only about a week after we got it replaced) so we headed to Kathmandu once more. After trying to fix the zipper for a while the guy behind the counter gave up and announced that he would just replace the whole tent for us (last time they only replaced the outer tent). However we'd have to come back the next day because we didn't bring our tent poles. Because we had nothing to do we decided to go to the cinema to try and watch a 3D movie, but just like the other 3 times we tried to watch a 3D movie here they weren't playing one, Doh! So we just watched Greenzone instead, which wasn't too bad. The next morning we picked up our brand new tent, which was actually a newer version than the one we had (and was about 500 dollars more expensive!). We wasted some time on the internet and headed back to our Hostel.
The following day we walked for an hour before arriving at the edge of town so we could start hitching a ride, but before we got our bags off our backs a car stopped. The guy obviously saw that we were planning to hitch-hike and offered to take us to Gore, which was about an hour further up the road. He dropped us off at the edge of town where it took us just over two and a half hours (!) to get our next ride. We finally ended up in Dunedin where we checked into another hostel (no campsites in town here), which was actually really nice and cozy. We spent a day exploring town and decided to go to Oamaru the next day to check out the penguins. After a long hour of walking we reached the start of the motorway and started to hitch-hike. After about 20 minutes a guy stopped and took us a short while up the road to the next town. From here another guy took us halfway to Oamaru. Rain then proceeded to piss down and after 5 seconds we were drenched, luckily we managed to get a ride after about 15 minutes, all the way to Oamaru this time. Oamaru actually looked very nice, it had a Victorian theme to it and the buildings all looked very clean. The campsite wasn't too flash, but it gave us a chance to test out our brand new tent. Turns out it was the exact same tent as the one we had, only with different colours, totally worth $500! That night we checked out the penguins, it was an hour walking to the first colony. Here Yellow-eyed penguins (one of the rarest penguins in the world) came ashore just before sundown. When we arrived there there was already a penguin ashore, he was standing in the bushes in plain view. After about half an hour of staring at the same penguin we decided to head to the other colony. This one was occupied by blue penguins, also called little penguins. We sat down on the huge podium they made on the edge of the sea to watch them come ashore. After about half an hour, just as it was starting to turn dark we saw the first wave of penguins swim towards shore. You first saw them as a swarm of little black spots, usually about 7 at a time. They were hard to spot at first because it was so dark, but once you saw them they were quite easy to follow. Even though it seemed like they got a brutal pounding as the waves crashed them onto the shore they were quite alright. We were told we couldn't take any pictures because they didn't want any flashes to accidentally go off, but when we were walking back to the campsite we found a few penguins that were coming ashore at a different spot so we took a few pictures of them here (making very sure that we'd turned off our flash). The next day we explored town, especially the old part of town was nice, it had a cool dutch bakery and a very nice 2nd hand book store. Of course I couldn't control myself and bought 3 more books, my bag is getting heavier and heavier. . .
When we started to hitch-hike to Christchurch I wasn't really feeling it as much as usual and because of the long distance (3 and a half hours) between Oamaru and Christchurch we were fairly pessimistic.
When at 2:30 pm we still didn't find a ride we decided to change our goal a bit so we wouldn't arrive at the hostels too late to find a bed. But just as I was writing our new destination on our sign a car stopped and the lady that got out offered to take us all the way to Christchurch.
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/NZ%20Maart%2020/
Friday, 26 March 2010
Thursday, 18 March 2010
Yally!
Getting from Queenstown to Te Anau was surprisingly easy, though we had to squeeze all our bags with us on the back seat again. The weather was slowly turning bad with grey skies and fierce winds, so for the first time in ages I had to put on my sweater. After booking our accomodation we decided to go for the dive trip into Milford sounds despite the fact that the two dives were only 25 minutes long (this was because we had to get over a mountain on the way back and a longer dive would make us risk decompression sickness). We had to get up at 5:30 the following morning and drowsily got in the van that would take us to the sounds. It was to be a 2 hour journey and it was still too dark to see anything outside so we just tried to catch some sleep. When we got to the dock in Milford Sounds our dive guide introduced himself as Alex (his real name was masouf or something), he was an egyptian guy somewhere in his 60s who said he'd been a diver all his life and used to train navy seal divers. He was an interesting character to say the least.
After a quick toilet break he had us (me, Jasper and the American Guy who was with us) carry a small pontoon boat into the water, the skipper then rammed his boat into the pebbles next to the small boat (he wasn't allowed to use the docks). We would then step from the small boat onto the bigger one (a very interesting system for getting on the boat if you ask me. . .). As we sailed out to the first dive-site we spotted some dolphins jumping out of the water in the wake of the boat.
We geared up and jumped into the water and it was freezing! We weren't exactly used to warm waters, but this water was only 12 degrees and that was a bit difference compared to the 16-18 degrees we were used to. After a quick weight check we descended into the very mirky looking water and reached the clearer salt water layer. Because of all the rain there is a fresh water layer on top of the salt water which causes a lot of light to be filtered out and thus creates a dark cold environment which is very similar to conditions at 60-70 meters. This makes the sounds a very unique place to dive in and you can see rare sea life that you wouldn't normally find at such shallow depths, such as black coral (which is actually white). We quickly spotted a nudi-branch and black coral. The black coral rose up like small white trees and there were fish hanging all around it like fruit. It seemed the American was having some problems with his buoyancy and was swimming hand in hand with Alex. Too soon the dive was over and we headed back to the boat. On the way to our next dive-site we passed by a bunch of seals and Ox our skipper said he was going to clean the boat. We were wondering what he meant by this, but he said we'd soon find out. While we were taking pictures of the spectacular scenery ox sailed the boat towards one of the many waterfalls in the area. Before we knew it water was pounding down on the roof and deck of the boat. After this refreshing shower we went to our next dive site, though the water here was even colder than ta the first site it didn't bother us as much as the first time. This time we swam along a 160m deep wall (though only at about 16m deep) taking our time to search the wall for all sorts of sea life. After we got back to the boat we sailed to a small island where we were to clean our wetsuits in one of the waterfalls. As Alex rowed the small boat ashore he sang an egyptian song and has us sing "Yally!" after every sentence, it was a very amusing situation. Once we reached the island we stepped into the waterfall and jumped into a pool to clean the wetsuits. After we arrived back in the port we hung around a bit and had some lunch to get the nitrogen out of our blood before we headed over the mountain.
The American guy went to the toilet while me and Jasper jumped into the van, when the American came back we drove off and stopped at a place to take some pictures. After I had gotten out and was about to walk towards the river to take some pictures Alex called and asked me where my friend was. I looked around to see where Jasper was, but I couldn't see him. I was sure he didn't walk past me yet but I was also sure I'd seen him get in the car but he wasn't in the car either. . . In the end we concluded we must have left him back in Milford Sounds somehow and Alex and Ox went back to get him while me and the American checked out the river. When we came back Alex and Ox had picked up Jasper, who apparently went to the toilet after he had dropped his bag in the van and without anyone noticing. We then drove back to Te Anau and I slept most of the way, I was dead tired.
After a few more days of resting we headed towards Invercargill.
After a quick toilet break he had us (me, Jasper and the American Guy who was with us) carry a small pontoon boat into the water, the skipper then rammed his boat into the pebbles next to the small boat (he wasn't allowed to use the docks). We would then step from the small boat onto the bigger one (a very interesting system for getting on the boat if you ask me. . .). As we sailed out to the first dive-site we spotted some dolphins jumping out of the water in the wake of the boat.
We geared up and jumped into the water and it was freezing! We weren't exactly used to warm waters, but this water was only 12 degrees and that was a bit difference compared to the 16-18 degrees we were used to. After a quick weight check we descended into the very mirky looking water and reached the clearer salt water layer. Because of all the rain there is a fresh water layer on top of the salt water which causes a lot of light to be filtered out and thus creates a dark cold environment which is very similar to conditions at 60-70 meters. This makes the sounds a very unique place to dive in and you can see rare sea life that you wouldn't normally find at such shallow depths, such as black coral (which is actually white). We quickly spotted a nudi-branch and black coral. The black coral rose up like small white trees and there were fish hanging all around it like fruit. It seemed the American was having some problems with his buoyancy and was swimming hand in hand with Alex. Too soon the dive was over and we headed back to the boat. On the way to our next dive-site we passed by a bunch of seals and Ox our skipper said he was going to clean the boat. We were wondering what he meant by this, but he said we'd soon find out. While we were taking pictures of the spectacular scenery ox sailed the boat towards one of the many waterfalls in the area. Before we knew it water was pounding down on the roof and deck of the boat. After this refreshing shower we went to our next dive site, though the water here was even colder than ta the first site it didn't bother us as much as the first time. This time we swam along a 160m deep wall (though only at about 16m deep) taking our time to search the wall for all sorts of sea life. After we got back to the boat we sailed to a small island where we were to clean our wetsuits in one of the waterfalls. As Alex rowed the small boat ashore he sang an egyptian song and has us sing "Yally!" after every sentence, it was a very amusing situation. Once we reached the island we stepped into the waterfall and jumped into a pool to clean the wetsuits. After we arrived back in the port we hung around a bit and had some lunch to get the nitrogen out of our blood before we headed over the mountain.
The American guy went to the toilet while me and Jasper jumped into the van, when the American came back we drove off and stopped at a place to take some pictures. After I had gotten out and was about to walk towards the river to take some pictures Alex called and asked me where my friend was. I looked around to see where Jasper was, but I couldn't see him. I was sure he didn't walk past me yet but I was also sure I'd seen him get in the car but he wasn't in the car either. . . In the end we concluded we must have left him back in Milford Sounds somehow and Alex and Ox went back to get him while me and the American checked out the river. When we came back Alex and Ox had picked up Jasper, who apparently went to the toilet after he had dropped his bag in the van and without anyone noticing. We then drove back to Te Anau and I slept most of the way, I was dead tired.
After a few more days of resting we headed towards Invercargill.
Friday, 12 March 2010
Hold your breath
We woke up to a cold wet morning, rain was coming down in streams and we didn't feel like getting up. We had to however because today was going to be a busy day, we had two dives planned and they promised to be exhausting. After some quick breakfast we headed up to the dive-shop and after all the gear was loaded into the van we went to pick up the third guy. After he was on-board it was about 40 minutes to the first dive-site; a bridge that got flooded as the lake rose in water level. The water was cold, but fortunately Lance and Simone had extremely good gear and as soon as the water in my suit had warmed up you didn't notice it at all.
After we had descended to the bridge, which was at about 10m deep, we swam in between the steel fencing across what would have been the deck of the bridge. The light shining through the steel structure gave it a very eerie glow. After we swam the entire lenght of the bridge we descended along one of it's stone pillars before swimming underneath the bridge and finally ascending through the steel structure. After surfacing and walking back to the car (which was very tiring with all our gear still on) we drove to the next dive site, which would take us about another hour.
This time we would dive into a fast flowing river and let the current take us downstream while we tried to avoid the numerous rocks scattered all over the bottom. We jumped in the water in a small inlet where there was virtually no current before swimming to the center of the river to let the current take us. The first few seconds, as the current grabbed hold and you knew you had no choice but to go along with it, were quite scary. We started to pick up speed fast now and as Lance led us to the center of the river it felt like all our furious finning wasn't helping at all. The rocks we encountered ranged from small to the size of a car and sometimes it took a lot of effort to go around them. At first Mattieux (the third guy) was behind Lance, followed by me and then jasper, but as we progressed along the river I found myself floating faster than Matt and there was no way I could stop or slow myself down. After a few desperate attempts at changing course and slowing down I collided with Matt, the current pushing me straight into him and then slowly over him. After seeing that he made no effort to speed up I decided to just go past him and to follow Lance directly. Lance was taking a lot of pictures and didn't notice two large rocks that were approaching fast, they were too big and too shallow to swim over comfortably so we were forced to bunny hop over them, pushing ourselves out of the water just slightly. Eventually we reached a whirlpool in the river where the water was deeper and we swiftly descended as the ground fell to about 8 meters, trying to stay out of the circling water as much as possible. Once we got to the bottom the water was relatively calm and we sat there for a few minutes looking at the trout that was swimming around us before continueing. After we got through the wildest part of the river where there were some very shallow white water rapids we ascended to the surface to catch our breath. When we descended again we passed through a relatively calm part of the river and we all had fun floating upside down and on our backs. A few minutes later we arrived at the exit point of the river and walked back to the car. When we arrived back in Queenstown we had a beer with Lance and Simone. We were dead tired.
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/Nz%20maart%2013/
After we had descended to the bridge, which was at about 10m deep, we swam in between the steel fencing across what would have been the deck of the bridge. The light shining through the steel structure gave it a very eerie glow. After we swam the entire lenght of the bridge we descended along one of it's stone pillars before swimming underneath the bridge and finally ascending through the steel structure. After surfacing and walking back to the car (which was very tiring with all our gear still on) we drove to the next dive site, which would take us about another hour.
This time we would dive into a fast flowing river and let the current take us downstream while we tried to avoid the numerous rocks scattered all over the bottom. We jumped in the water in a small inlet where there was virtually no current before swimming to the center of the river to let the current take us. The first few seconds, as the current grabbed hold and you knew you had no choice but to go along with it, were quite scary. We started to pick up speed fast now and as Lance led us to the center of the river it felt like all our furious finning wasn't helping at all. The rocks we encountered ranged from small to the size of a car and sometimes it took a lot of effort to go around them. At first Mattieux (the third guy) was behind Lance, followed by me and then jasper, but as we progressed along the river I found myself floating faster than Matt and there was no way I could stop or slow myself down. After a few desperate attempts at changing course and slowing down I collided with Matt, the current pushing me straight into him and then slowly over him. After seeing that he made no effort to speed up I decided to just go past him and to follow Lance directly. Lance was taking a lot of pictures and didn't notice two large rocks that were approaching fast, they were too big and too shallow to swim over comfortably so we were forced to bunny hop over them, pushing ourselves out of the water just slightly. Eventually we reached a whirlpool in the river where the water was deeper and we swiftly descended as the ground fell to about 8 meters, trying to stay out of the circling water as much as possible. Once we got to the bottom the water was relatively calm and we sat there for a few minutes looking at the trout that was swimming around us before continueing. After we got through the wildest part of the river where there were some very shallow white water rapids we ascended to the surface to catch our breath. When we descended again we passed through a relatively calm part of the river and we all had fun floating upside down and on our backs. A few minutes later we arrived at the exit point of the river and walked back to the car. When we arrived back in Queenstown we had a beer with Lance and Simone. We were dead tired.
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/Nz%20maart%2013/
Wednesday, 10 March 2010
Queenstown. City of extreme sports and insane stunts. Initially there was no mention of doing anything like bungy jumping but after hearing so many stories about the canyon swing Jasper managed to persuade me into booking a jump with them. We also decided to switch campsites the next day, seeing as the one we were in now was horribly overpriced, charged you for showers and everything closed at 11pm. After booking the canyon swing we stopped by an i-site to check out some more brochures and happened to run into one for a dive-shop in Queenstown. The dives were quite expensive so we were initially not planning to go, but I remembered nine mentioning them when we dived the Lermontov so we checked it out. Nine told us where to find them, just behind the supermarket, so rather than giving them a call we decided to just pay them a visit. Behind the supermarket were a bunch of modern office buildings with appartments on the 2nd floor, but nothing to indicate that there was a dive-shop there. Then we spotted a van with 'Dive Queenstown' written on the side and decided to see if there was anyone there. Eventually someone showed up, a bit surprised he asked us what we wanted. After verifying that this was the dive-shop we asked some questions about his dives. After he explained a few things he apologised for the fact that there was nobody there to meet us initially, but that he wasn't really a dive-shop and so wasn't used to people turning up at his place. We explained that Nine told us where to find him and this seemed to please him, he told us Nine was a good friend of him. After talking some more and after he showed us his gear and the dive scooters he used he offered to take us on 3 dives for the price of 2 because we were sent by Nine. We said we'd think about it and would give him a call later. After we walked out the door we talked about it "Do you want to do this?" "Yes." "Then let's just tell him right away, haha." So we turned back and booked the dives. He asked if we could do the scooter dive the day after, and even though we already planned to move campsites and do our canyon swing later on the day we figured we could probably squeeze the dive in the middle somewhere.
The next day we woke up early and packed up our tent, before heading to the other campsite we went to an outdoor shop to have our tent fixed. One of the zippers wasn't closing properly half of the time and it was really starting to annoy us, so we figured this was a good time to have it fixed. Rather than try to fix the zipper they just replaced the entire outer tent, which was nice.
We quickly moved our tent to the new campsite, had a shower and headed over to the dive shop (that wasn't actually a dive-shop). We (when I say we I mean Lance and his girlfriend Simone who run the place) loaded in the gear and headed off to the lake. Because he only had two scooters (and it would be too dangerous to escort two people on scooters) only one of us would dive at a time and after a game of rock-paper-scissors it was decided that jasper would go first.
About 40 minutes later Jasper and Lance resurfaced; Jasper seemed pretty excited and told me of the tricks he'd done and that they shot all the way down to 40 meters, the deepest we had ever gone. Then it was my turn. First we did a few excersises to get used to the system lance used, which was a little different from what we were used to, and after that Lance went back to pick up the underwater scooters. First we went down slowly so I could get used to the controls and the scooter and after that we started to descend quickly. Soon we stopped and Lance pointed at his computer, I looked at mine and saw that we were at 41.8 meters, eat that Jasper haha! We then slowly started to work our way up doing barrel rolls and all sorts of stuff along the way. Eventually Lance pointed at his computer again and I saw that it showed Deco, which meant that Lance had stayed down a little too long and too deep so he had to make an extra long safety stop to prevent decompression sickness. When we were doing our safety stop I looked at my air gauge and saw that I only had 10 bars of air left (which is virtually nothing) so I tapped Lance on the shoulder and signalled I was low on air. He looked at my gauge and when he saw how low I was he gave me his extra regulator to breathe from while we did our safety stop. When my 3 minutes were up Lance signalled for me to go up while he waited out the rest of his stop. When Lance was back on the surface as well I took off my gear and we discussed the dive a bit (Lance ended up on 30 bars, 50 bars is the usual ending pressure for a dive) and they dropped us off at our campsite so we could get ready for our canyon swing.
30 Minutes later we headed into town and I was really nervous. The jump was going to be a 60 meter freefall before the rope caught hold and swung you sideways. For more details see their website: http://www.canyonswing.co.nz/
They drove us up the mountain where they had their platform set-up. After they hoisted us in harnesses we got to jump off the edge one by one. The way in which you jumped depended entirely on you. I decided on "The Chair", meaning that they strapped me to some plastic lawn chairs and positioned me on the edge of the drop, backwards. I had to rock my chair back and forth until I finally fell backwards into the canyon. However, everytime I almost fell they grabbed the rope attached to me and pulled me back, and every time they did this they started making small talk again. After about 5 or 6 times I was ready to punch them in the face and my nerves were totally on edge. Then, finally, I leaned back again and slowly but surely fell off the platform, 60 meters down. After all the toying it was so unexpected that I totally forgot to scream as I flipped over and over on my way down. After they towed me back up and me and jasper checked our pictures we decided that $20 for a second jump was too cheap to turn down. For the second jump they suspended me head down, legs up facing the ground below me. Seconds after I got into position they unexpectedly let me go and I let out a loud scream as the ground came rushing towards me.
That night we were dead-tired, so it was fortunate that we had nothing planned for the next day.
Diving pictures:
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/NZ%20maart%2011/
Preparation video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDGQR-fFe4U
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/NZ%20maart%2011/
The next day we woke up early and packed up our tent, before heading to the other campsite we went to an outdoor shop to have our tent fixed. One of the zippers wasn't closing properly half of the time and it was really starting to annoy us, so we figured this was a good time to have it fixed. Rather than try to fix the zipper they just replaced the entire outer tent, which was nice.
We quickly moved our tent to the new campsite, had a shower and headed over to the dive shop (that wasn't actually a dive-shop). We (when I say we I mean Lance and his girlfriend Simone who run the place) loaded in the gear and headed off to the lake. Because he only had two scooters (and it would be too dangerous to escort two people on scooters) only one of us would dive at a time and after a game of rock-paper-scissors it was decided that jasper would go first.
About 40 minutes later Jasper and Lance resurfaced; Jasper seemed pretty excited and told me of the tricks he'd done and that they shot all the way down to 40 meters, the deepest we had ever gone. Then it was my turn. First we did a few excersises to get used to the system lance used, which was a little different from what we were used to, and after that Lance went back to pick up the underwater scooters. First we went down slowly so I could get used to the controls and the scooter and after that we started to descend quickly. Soon we stopped and Lance pointed at his computer, I looked at mine and saw that we were at 41.8 meters, eat that Jasper haha! We then slowly started to work our way up doing barrel rolls and all sorts of stuff along the way. Eventually Lance pointed at his computer again and I saw that it showed Deco, which meant that Lance had stayed down a little too long and too deep so he had to make an extra long safety stop to prevent decompression sickness. When we were doing our safety stop I looked at my air gauge and saw that I only had 10 bars of air left (which is virtually nothing) so I tapped Lance on the shoulder and signalled I was low on air. He looked at my gauge and when he saw how low I was he gave me his extra regulator to breathe from while we did our safety stop. When my 3 minutes were up Lance signalled for me to go up while he waited out the rest of his stop. When Lance was back on the surface as well I took off my gear and we discussed the dive a bit (Lance ended up on 30 bars, 50 bars is the usual ending pressure for a dive) and they dropped us off at our campsite so we could get ready for our canyon swing.
30 Minutes later we headed into town and I was really nervous. The jump was going to be a 60 meter freefall before the rope caught hold and swung you sideways. For more details see their website: http://www.canyonswing.co.nz/
They drove us up the mountain where they had their platform set-up. After they hoisted us in harnesses we got to jump off the edge one by one. The way in which you jumped depended entirely on you. I decided on "The Chair", meaning that they strapped me to some plastic lawn chairs and positioned me on the edge of the drop, backwards. I had to rock my chair back and forth until I finally fell backwards into the canyon. However, everytime I almost fell they grabbed the rope attached to me and pulled me back, and every time they did this they started making small talk again. After about 5 or 6 times I was ready to punch them in the face and my nerves were totally on edge. Then, finally, I leaned back again and slowly but surely fell off the platform, 60 meters down. After all the toying it was so unexpected that I totally forgot to scream as I flipped over and over on my way down. After they towed me back up and me and jasper checked our pictures we decided that $20 for a second jump was too cheap to turn down. For the second jump they suspended me head down, legs up facing the ground below me. Seconds after I got into position they unexpectedly let me go and I let out a loud scream as the ground came rushing towards me.
That night we were dead-tired, so it was fortunate that we had nothing planned for the next day.
Diving pictures:
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/NZ%20maart%2011/
Preparation video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDGQR-fFe4U
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/NZ%20maart%2011/
Monday, 8 March 2010
A new family
Standing just outside of Franz Jozef with a sign saying "Haast", we got picked up by a station wagon that seemed to already be packed to the brim. But, upon closer inspection there was plenty of space left for us and our gear, despite the fact that there were already four people inside. Apparently the two girls in the back had screamed at their dad that he had to pick us up and he complied. Sometimes I guess being two guys has it's advantages as well. Unfortunately they could only take us to Fox Glacier, which was about 50km south of Franz Josef.
After a while of standing there a van pulls over just in front of us, then 2 seconds later a second van pulls in and then a third van. We were unsure if they were stopping for us or for some other reason, but decided to ask anyway. Turns out they did stop for us and they were all travelling together, there was only 4 of them so they had exactly two seats left (they all had beds in the back), so Jasper jumped in one van and I jumped in another. The guy I jumped in with was called Jan and was from germany. The others were called Sebastian, Claudia and Colleen, two Germans and a french girl. Apparently Jan and Claudia had already met before in South America, but never exchanged adresses and then ran into each other again in NZ. Claudia was travelling with Sebastian after they met up in New Zealand a few days earlier and they picked up Colleen along the road, she was hitch-hiking like us. We travelled in formation and stopped at Fox Glacier along the way to take some pictures. We stopped several more times to take some pictures, the scenery was too stunning to be ignored. At first they were going to stay in Haast as well but eventually decided to go all the way to Wanaka. Seeing as we only picked Haast because we figured that was as far as we were going to get in one day we tagged along all the way to Wanaka. We went for dinner in a restaurant while Claudia was having some problems with her bank card and Sebastian was away half of the time to smoke. When the waitress asked if we were ready to order Claudia said "Mommy and Daddy aren't here yet but we'll order anyway" (Because Claudia and Sebastian were older than the rest she called em Mommy and Daddy). When she came back to bring us our drinks she asked if our parents had come back yet; by then Sebastian was there as well and the look on his face when Claudia said "Well this is daddy but mommy is still away" was priceless. After dinner we went to visit one of Wanaka's greatest attractions, Cinema Paradiso. A small cinema where instead of chairs they had couches, sofas and even an old VW Beetle for you to sit in. They were also renowned for their great ice-cream and cookies. The movie we watched wasn't particularly interesting but it was a nice experience.
The next day they were going to Queentown and we wanted to stay a bit longer in Wanaka so we booked another night at the campsite. Turned out that they were also staying the day in Wanaka so we tagged along with them as we paid a visit to the Puzzling World. First we had a play around in the great maze, which had 1.5km of paths to get lost in. First we had to find each of the towers in the right order and then back to the centre, this was a lot harder than we first thought and it took us quite a while to finish, eventually me and jasper were trying to find the exit and just kept ending up at the same place. Then we went into the halls of illusion where they had all sorts of 3D pictures and optical illusions.
At the end of the day we said goodbye to our new friends and promised we'd meet up again in Queenstown. The next day we started hitch-hiking pretty close to our campsite, this was what looked like the shortest road to Queenstown, even though it wasn't part of the highway. There was a couple already hitch-hiking and this was the first time we were actually hoping another couple would be picked up soon. When after an hour we still hadn't found a ride we decided to walk to the other side of town to where the highway was and try again there. We had been standing there for almost an hour and a couple of people had shouted to us that Queenstown was the other way; we starting to despair a bit and were unsure if we should remain there or walk back to our original spot. Luckily at just that moment a car stopped for us on the other side of the road and took us to Queenstown.
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/NZ%20Maart%208/
videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXjKqpTQfts a kitten that was hanging around our tent in Franz Jozef
Puzzling world:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPmcMFHBzUI&feature=channel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjApAJCyTGY&feature=channel
After a while of standing there a van pulls over just in front of us, then 2 seconds later a second van pulls in and then a third van. We were unsure if they were stopping for us or for some other reason, but decided to ask anyway. Turns out they did stop for us and they were all travelling together, there was only 4 of them so they had exactly two seats left (they all had beds in the back), so Jasper jumped in one van and I jumped in another. The guy I jumped in with was called Jan and was from germany. The others were called Sebastian, Claudia and Colleen, two Germans and a french girl. Apparently Jan and Claudia had already met before in South America, but never exchanged adresses and then ran into each other again in NZ. Claudia was travelling with Sebastian after they met up in New Zealand a few days earlier and they picked up Colleen along the road, she was hitch-hiking like us. We travelled in formation and stopped at Fox Glacier along the way to take some pictures. We stopped several more times to take some pictures, the scenery was too stunning to be ignored. At first they were going to stay in Haast as well but eventually decided to go all the way to Wanaka. Seeing as we only picked Haast because we figured that was as far as we were going to get in one day we tagged along all the way to Wanaka. We went for dinner in a restaurant while Claudia was having some problems with her bank card and Sebastian was away half of the time to smoke. When the waitress asked if we were ready to order Claudia said "Mommy and Daddy aren't here yet but we'll order anyway" (Because Claudia and Sebastian were older than the rest she called em Mommy and Daddy). When she came back to bring us our drinks she asked if our parents had come back yet; by then Sebastian was there as well and the look on his face when Claudia said "Well this is daddy but mommy is still away" was priceless. After dinner we went to visit one of Wanaka's greatest attractions, Cinema Paradiso. A small cinema where instead of chairs they had couches, sofas and even an old VW Beetle for you to sit in. They were also renowned for their great ice-cream and cookies. The movie we watched wasn't particularly interesting but it was a nice experience.
The next day they were going to Queentown and we wanted to stay a bit longer in Wanaka so we booked another night at the campsite. Turned out that they were also staying the day in Wanaka so we tagged along with them as we paid a visit to the Puzzling World. First we had a play around in the great maze, which had 1.5km of paths to get lost in. First we had to find each of the towers in the right order and then back to the centre, this was a lot harder than we first thought and it took us quite a while to finish, eventually me and jasper were trying to find the exit and just kept ending up at the same place. Then we went into the halls of illusion where they had all sorts of 3D pictures and optical illusions.
At the end of the day we said goodbye to our new friends and promised we'd meet up again in Queenstown. The next day we started hitch-hiking pretty close to our campsite, this was what looked like the shortest road to Queenstown, even though it wasn't part of the highway. There was a couple already hitch-hiking and this was the first time we were actually hoping another couple would be picked up soon. When after an hour we still hadn't found a ride we decided to walk to the other side of town to where the highway was and try again there. We had been standing there for almost an hour and a couple of people had shouted to us that Queenstown was the other way; we starting to despair a bit and were unsure if we should remain there or walk back to our original spot. Luckily at just that moment a car stopped for us on the other side of the road and took us to Queenstown.
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/NZ%20Maart%208/
videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXjKqpTQfts a kitten that was hanging around our tent in Franz Jozef
Puzzling world:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPmcMFHBzUI&feature=channel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjApAJCyTGY&feature=channel
Thursday, 4 March 2010
Cool
Carefully balancing on the front spikes of the crampons attached to my shoes I remove my right axe from the ice and hammer it as far up as I can. Dividing my weight between my right axe and my feet I remove my let axe and thrust it into the ice as high as I can. After feeling if my axes are in deep enough I shift all my weight to my arms and move feet up step by step. Suddenly the ice under one of my axes crumbles and breaks away. I fall, sliding down the ice. The cold hard surface of the wall grates against my chest. I stop with a thud, a large shock moving through my right arm. My right axe withstood the pressure of my fall and I was now hanging from one arm. Slowly I bring up my left arm and ram the axe in the ice, double checking to make sure the ice is strong enough to hold my weight. A little reluctant I continue my ascend.
But let's not get ahead of ourselves. After the knife making we went up to the pancake rocks and blowholes in the dark. We had to go either in the morning or at night to see the blowholes at high tide, and we'd not morning persons. At first we couldn't see anything and dismissed the blowholes as a lot of nothing, but then suddenly they spewed their watery load several meters in the air. We tried to take pictures, but it was way too dark to capture anything, despite the full moon iluminating the way for us. On the way back I suddenly saw something moving by the side of the road. I saw that it was a creature of some sorts so I took a quick picture. The picture showed a pair of bright red eyes somewhere in the trees. It was a possum! We quickly snapped a dozen pictures, the possum didn't seem afraid of us at all and at one point even got really close to us, but ofcourse moved just as I tried to take a picture.
The following day we hitch-hiked to Greymouth, a particularly grey and ugly looking town. The fact that it was pissing rain probably didn't help either. We decided to book two nights because Jasper wanted to do some quad biking. The rest of the day it didn't stop raining once, all of the grass turned into marshlands and big pools of water started to pop-up everywhere. The next morning we woke up to a sunny day however, and seeing as getting mud is half the fun of riding a quad bike it proved to be a good day. It would just be us two and a guide, so we wouldn't have to wait for any slow drivers or anything like that. After a quick lap through the practice track we headed out onto the track. It started off relatively easy, riding over rocks and through puddles of mud but it gradually got harder. Eventually our guide stopped and told us to put our quads in 4WD, we were starting to get to the hard part. After a long ride up a steep slope we started to go through a forest eventually ending up on the other side of the hill to descend a steep mud covered track. It required some careful maneuvering and half the time I ended up going down sideways. The overall track was quite tricky, but we managed to conquer all obstacles and after 90 minutes we arrived back at the farm.
The next day we headed to the Franz Jozef glacier, the rides hadn't been coming easy in the South Island and this day was no exception, but finally at about 4 pm we arrived in the town of Franz Jozef and booked into a holiday park. We had to pitch our tent on a miniscule patch of grass between the toilets and the playground. We went into the tiny village to book our trip to the glacier, arriving at the booking agency just after a bus load of people arrived. After waiting about 20 minutes we finally got to booking our trip and we decided to go for the ice-climbing, rather than a full-day walk over the glacier, since the ice climbing seemed to include a fair amount of walking as well.
We went to bed early and woke up the next morning at 6:15 still feeling pretty tired after people kept tripping over our tent all night. We showed up at 7:45 exactly on time and were told to sit and wait for the others. 25 Minutes later we were finally assembled and walked across the road to pick up the rest of our gear. Everyone received a pair of overpants, a backpack, a harness, a helmet, crampons, a pair of boots and gloves and a hat. A short 20 minute and a 30 minute walk later we arrived at the glacier where a couple of guides were still cutting out a path up the first steep part. Walking with crampons was awkward while we were still on rocks, but once we got to the ice it felt very natural. A short walk later we arrived at a vertical wall where one of our guides was already working on setting up our safety lines. When the lines were finally up we received instructions on how to use the axes and crampons. The trick was apparently to drive your axes in the ice one by one and then moving your feet up slowly while driving the spike on the front into the ice. Once your helmet reached your axes you'd rest your weight on your feet and move your axes up as far as possible, repeat until your at the top. I was the third person to give it a go and it was easier than I had feared, but slightly harder than I expected. Especially driving your feet into the ice hard enough to acquire some form of support proved to be challenging. After we all tried the wall on to different spots one of the guides moved to change the location of the lines while the rest of us went for a walk through the glacier. The scenery was beautiful and the sun made sure the temperature didn't drop too low. The ice cave we crawled through was bright blue and extremely slippery. After the cave we made our way back through the wall, the guide hacking away steps in the ice at points too tricky to walk down.
The second set of climbs proved to be harder than the first and I was to be the first to try one of them out. On my path, just before the top, was a large hole. I got up there fairly quick and easily but then I had to decide wether I was going to try and go around the hole or try to somehow climb in it. I figured going around was my best bet, but this was easier said than done. I had to move my left hand over the rope and try to get far enough to the right of it to be able to use my left pick as well, because the hole itself offered no spots for my axe at all. Hanging there almost sideways on the wall my axe decided it was enough and I was sent plummiting down, luckily I was attached to the safety rope and after a second of catching my breath I hacked my way back up to the hole and this time made my ay inside it, which proved to be a lot easier than going around. After everyone had their climbs we moved back down to the van and drove back to town.
We had been talking to a German girl during the day and we decided to have a drink in the local bar and play some pool. She was training to be a vet and did her internship here in New Zealand. When we asked if she had any crazy vet stories she said no. When we asked if she had any normal vet stories then she told us the story of how she castrated her own cat during a "bring your pet to school and castrate him/her" day.
Videos of our surf instructor in Gisborne that took us to the rehe rockslides as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gVQ4aizLw8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMTOSwJMn_E&feature=channel
Pictures:
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/NZ%20Maart%205/
But let's not get ahead of ourselves. After the knife making we went up to the pancake rocks and blowholes in the dark. We had to go either in the morning or at night to see the blowholes at high tide, and we'd not morning persons. At first we couldn't see anything and dismissed the blowholes as a lot of nothing, but then suddenly they spewed their watery load several meters in the air. We tried to take pictures, but it was way too dark to capture anything, despite the full moon iluminating the way for us. On the way back I suddenly saw something moving by the side of the road. I saw that it was a creature of some sorts so I took a quick picture. The picture showed a pair of bright red eyes somewhere in the trees. It was a possum! We quickly snapped a dozen pictures, the possum didn't seem afraid of us at all and at one point even got really close to us, but ofcourse moved just as I tried to take a picture.
The following day we hitch-hiked to Greymouth, a particularly grey and ugly looking town. The fact that it was pissing rain probably didn't help either. We decided to book two nights because Jasper wanted to do some quad biking. The rest of the day it didn't stop raining once, all of the grass turned into marshlands and big pools of water started to pop-up everywhere. The next morning we woke up to a sunny day however, and seeing as getting mud is half the fun of riding a quad bike it proved to be a good day. It would just be us two and a guide, so we wouldn't have to wait for any slow drivers or anything like that. After a quick lap through the practice track we headed out onto the track. It started off relatively easy, riding over rocks and through puddles of mud but it gradually got harder. Eventually our guide stopped and told us to put our quads in 4WD, we were starting to get to the hard part. After a long ride up a steep slope we started to go through a forest eventually ending up on the other side of the hill to descend a steep mud covered track. It required some careful maneuvering and half the time I ended up going down sideways. The overall track was quite tricky, but we managed to conquer all obstacles and after 90 minutes we arrived back at the farm.
The next day we headed to the Franz Jozef glacier, the rides hadn't been coming easy in the South Island and this day was no exception, but finally at about 4 pm we arrived in the town of Franz Jozef and booked into a holiday park. We had to pitch our tent on a miniscule patch of grass between the toilets and the playground. We went into the tiny village to book our trip to the glacier, arriving at the booking agency just after a bus load of people arrived. After waiting about 20 minutes we finally got to booking our trip and we decided to go for the ice-climbing, rather than a full-day walk over the glacier, since the ice climbing seemed to include a fair amount of walking as well.
We went to bed early and woke up the next morning at 6:15 still feeling pretty tired after people kept tripping over our tent all night. We showed up at 7:45 exactly on time and were told to sit and wait for the others. 25 Minutes later we were finally assembled and walked across the road to pick up the rest of our gear. Everyone received a pair of overpants, a backpack, a harness, a helmet, crampons, a pair of boots and gloves and a hat. A short 20 minute and a 30 minute walk later we arrived at the glacier where a couple of guides were still cutting out a path up the first steep part. Walking with crampons was awkward while we were still on rocks, but once we got to the ice it felt very natural. A short walk later we arrived at a vertical wall where one of our guides was already working on setting up our safety lines. When the lines were finally up we received instructions on how to use the axes and crampons. The trick was apparently to drive your axes in the ice one by one and then moving your feet up slowly while driving the spike on the front into the ice. Once your helmet reached your axes you'd rest your weight on your feet and move your axes up as far as possible, repeat until your at the top. I was the third person to give it a go and it was easier than I had feared, but slightly harder than I expected. Especially driving your feet into the ice hard enough to acquire some form of support proved to be challenging. After we all tried the wall on to different spots one of the guides moved to change the location of the lines while the rest of us went for a walk through the glacier. The scenery was beautiful and the sun made sure the temperature didn't drop too low. The ice cave we crawled through was bright blue and extremely slippery. After the cave we made our way back through the wall, the guide hacking away steps in the ice at points too tricky to walk down.
The second set of climbs proved to be harder than the first and I was to be the first to try one of them out. On my path, just before the top, was a large hole. I got up there fairly quick and easily but then I had to decide wether I was going to try and go around the hole or try to somehow climb in it. I figured going around was my best bet, but this was easier said than done. I had to move my left hand over the rope and try to get far enough to the right of it to be able to use my left pick as well, because the hole itself offered no spots for my axe at all. Hanging there almost sideways on the wall my axe decided it was enough and I was sent plummiting down, luckily I was attached to the safety rope and after a second of catching my breath I hacked my way back up to the hole and this time made my ay inside it, which proved to be a lot easier than going around. After everyone had their climbs we moved back down to the van and drove back to town.
We had been talking to a German girl during the day and we decided to have a drink in the local bar and play some pool. She was training to be a vet and did her internship here in New Zealand. When we asked if she had any crazy vet stories she said no. When we asked if she had any normal vet stories then she told us the story of how she castrated her own cat during a "bring your pet to school and castrate him/her" day.
Videos of our surf instructor in Gisborne that took us to the rehe rockslides as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gVQ4aizLw8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMTOSwJMn_E&feature=channel
Pictures:
http://s713.photobucket.com/albums/ww138/lingonlas/NZ%20Maart%205/
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