Anyway, regular readers probably noticed my updates getting more and more infrequent.  Its been ages since my last post actually.

After skydiving (which was awesome!) we headed to the north island and took our car across on the ferry into Wellington.  We stayed there for a few nights, its a really nice city and has the only welsh pub in the southern hemisphere!  Its a converted public toilets.

We didnt have long in the north island before our flight so didn’t manage to stop in many places.  We were heading for Tauranga which is where some friends lived and we were gonna spend christmas with,  the suburb they lived in was, get this – Bethlehem!  Well I thought it was funny.  Having Christmas in the summer in a place called Bethlehem on the other side of the world to where I usually spend it was a bit disorientating to say the least.  The family we stayed with though were very hospitible and made us feel right at home (as possible).

While we were there we climbed Mt Manganui which is right on the coast  and is an extinct volcano.

So after a few peacful days there including christmas day where we had a BBQ instead of turkey and shrimps instead of stuffing, we said our farewells and jumped on a bus to Auckland airport.

Next came the dreaded 20 hour flight.  I spent some time in the airport trying to get my head around the time differences and how many hours we’d actually loose or gain because of the international dateline etc but gave up in the end coz it gave me a headache!

No one new I was on my way back because I had cunningly told you all that I’d changed my flight to the 16th January where infact I hadn’t changed it at all! Har har!  I let Dad in on it because I was going to walk in new years eve but needed to know everyone would be there so needed an inside man.  That plan didn’t really work out so surprised even Dad when I got to the house on Dec 30th.  Mam was just outside the house cleaning up the leaves as she does so I walk up and say “Hello” and she returns it just as casually before realising who it is. Mwa ha ha.

So I kept it quiet that I was back and still managed to surprise most people when they showed up at the house New years eve and I answered the door to them, it was brill, I like surprises.

So.  The trip is over.  Spose I’ll have to find somthing else to do now…

Skydiving is awesome! I did it from 15000ft (The highest available) where you free fall for 60 seconds and in those 60 seconds travel 2 miles vertically down to earth where your new best friend pulls the parachute cord and you slow down to a glide down to earth. My new best friend was a guy called Adam who was from Liverpool and has been a sky dive person in America and Israel before working for Skydive Wanaka.

They give you the option to get a video and photos of the whole thing by a second man that goes with you to do the filming so I’ll put the video up here when I can but for now there’s plenty of pics.

It was me, Jon and some other person up first and as I got in the plane last, I was the first out. On the way up Adam was explaining to me what was going to happen, told me if I couldn’t breath to scream which would make me breath (apparently) and he said ‘I bet you havn’t been this close to a man in while eh!’

Then 15000ft came and my cameraman got out and hung onto the side of the plane until I was sitting on the edge with my legs dangling out. Then before I knew it I was upside down flying through the air! After a few seconds when they tap you on the shoulder you can let go of your harness and put your arms out and pull funny faces for the camera. I was soon finding that I couldn’t breath, or scream like he suggested and was trying to think of ways I could let him know that I might pass out but then thought there probably wasn’t much he could do for me anyway so I concentrated on trying to smile and look like I was saying ‘woooooh’ and ‘weeeee’.

The adrenaline rush is something else and it didn’t seem like 30 seconds before Adam pulled the parachute and we were decending at a much slower pace, he let me have a go at controlling the parachute too but I wasn’t doing a very good job so he took control back. Then he started pointing out all the different rivers and mountains we could see which was interesting an calmed me down a bit.

I landed with a bump and managed to stand up albeit with shaky legs and shook his hand, then met up with Jon who somehow managed to get to the ground first (heavier I guess).

 Yes I reccomend you do it too!

Skydiving

Since I’ve done a fair bit in the last few weeks I’ll chuck it all into one post rather than making a post for each, coz I’d have to think of titles for each one, publish each on and put the picture links in each one so for my laziness’ sake here it goes…

We went on a day trip to Akaroa, a little harbour town about 80kms from Christchurch. You get some awesome views of it when driving there from the top of the hills and there’s a scenic drive which takes you over the hills around it giving impressive sights and the sun being out topped it off. The French landed there in 1840 and planned to colonise but unfortunately for them, we (the brits) had already proclaimed sovereignty over New Zealand . There’s still some frenchness there though, with street names and French flags dotted around.

Akaroa

Not long after we quite our jobs at The Warehouse and got travelling again, heading south we stopped at Dunedin which is the second largest city in the south island after Christchurch. It’s a nice city and has a Speight’s brewery and a Cadbury factory, we did both the tours which were cool, they both gave out freebies . At the end of the Cadbury one, you go into one of the silo’s and they show you a chocolate waterfall, well 1 tonne of chocolate run down in front of you. In the Speight’s one you get to pull you’re own beer (a few times) for each of the different beers. I must say that after going through each tour and seeing how they’re made, I have a new respect for them and no what to look for when sampling different brands. My favourite Speight’s beer is the Summer Harvest which has a refreshing apricot flavour and I’m gutted you can’t get it back home so I’ll be getting some at the duty free at the airport .

The next day we jumped on a train, the Taieri Gorge Railway which is a tourist train that runs from Dunedin Train Station. The line was closed in 1990 so the Otago Excursions Trust and Dunedin City Council bought part of the Railway from the Dunedin Train station to Middlmarch. There’s some remarkable views along the way and going through the tunnels is always cool.

The other cool thing in Dunedin is, the worlds steepest street! I’ll have to get a spirit level on Hill Street in Deri and check but this street was steep! And much longer than Hill Street.

Dunedin	Speights Brewery Tour	Taieri Gorge Railway

Milford Sound was the next stop for a bit of kayaking. We had to get up at 6am for this because Milford Sound is so out of the way, there’s only one road there and it takes about 2 hours. Oh yeh guess what, Milford Sound was originally called Milford Haven by the Welsh guy that found it John Grono. It’s also incorrectly named a sound because its actually a fiord, but there wasn’t an English word to describe a fiord at the time apparently. Its an amazing place whatever it is, with in-your-face cliffs either side of the river. There were some small(ish) waves which made it interesting and our tour guide Blake gave us loads of info. We saw some penguins and a seal but no dolphins. On the way back we made a raft by joining the kayaks together then he Blake gave the people at the front of the two person kayaks a sail and the people at the back attached the rope of the sail to one end of their paddles then when we held our paddles up the sail caught the wind and we were off. It was quite difficult to keep it going but we got some speed fair play before the Germans started seperating from the raft and capsized ha ha! So Blake rushed of to save them while we waited, and waited until Blake comes back toeing the Germans coz their rudder broke during the capsize. Great laugh

Milford Sound

Wanaka was next. This is kind of like a smaller Queenstown but I liked it just as much as Queenstown, its got the same sort of chilled-out vibe and there’s loads to do in and around. It sits right next to the Lake Wanaka where you can swim, sunbath or go out on your yacht, if you have one. Time was against us but if you’re ever in the south Island of New Zealand, go to Wanaka!

Wanka

Queenstown, this is a cool town. Named so for being “fit for a Queen” its known as the adrenaline capitol because this is where all the fun things are from skiiing, mountain biking, jet boating, bungee jumping and skydiving. We didn’t manage to do these here but there’s always next time. We did go up the gondola which from the top gives awesome panoramic views of Queenstown and there’s a luge ride which was good fun and we found our Italian friend that was in our kayaking group so we had a chat with him.

Queenstown

So they came to pick us up at 8am, getting up for that was a shock to the system I tell you! We set off in the wrong direction but didn’t know this until Jon noticed it on the GPS by which time we had gone to far to turn around so kept going and took the next right so we ended up doing a triangle before even getting back on the right heading to where we were going. Lesson learned.

It wasn’t long after that we got to a police checkpoint checking for drink drivers (It was the day after the world cup final). Steffan wasn’t drunk but he’d been using his UK licence for 6 months more than he should have and the nice policeman kindly told him that he could give him a $400 fine and take his car from him. Thankfully he didn’t and let him off with a warning, saying if he was to drive it any more, that’s what would happen, then told him to drive off (logic?). Thinking it might have been some kind of test, we pulled over and I drove. They failed to notice there was no tax disc in the window either (Steffan has paid for that and its in the post) .

Thanking God we carried on determined to get to Arthur’s Pass and finally got there about 12:30, checked what routes there were and told the guys at the information desk our plan. I had to change into a pair of Steffan’s trousers and borrow Ben’s boots coz Jeans and trainers weren’t gonna cut it apparently and that turned out to be very true.

It only took 5 minutes after starting the climb that I found out how unfit I am and we had to keep stopping every other 5 minutes to take a 10 minute breather, but it gave us time to look at the waterfalls. Despite the constant stopping we did get up there in good time and getting to the snow was cool. The trick is to step in the footprints of the man before you, but this didn’t always work as you’d step in that footprint but your foot would go another two foot down and you’d be stuck in snow up to your hip.

It wasn’t far now to the top and the views were awesome! Check the pictures. We found another of those cheeky Kea’s perched on a ledge and it’s amazing how close they let you get, their just not bothered by anyone and we fed it out of our hands when we reached the top.

Coming down was a lot more fun, because the snow was about 6 foot deep in places, you could run down and not worry about falling over and literally slide down some parts (but trying not to slide over the edge). Great fun .

When we reached the bottom, it was straight into the nearest café for a much needed cup of tea.

The next stop was a place called Castle Hill which is close to where some of The Lord Of The Rings and Narnia scenes were filmed. Its a range of limestone boulders that make for some good bouldering and picture taking. There are a few well known challenges such as being able to straight up of one that was a test of becoming a man in an Maori tradition (something along those lines any, I will check up on it) I got to the top of it but I cheated… and another which is called the chimney, a small (small) gap that you can climb through which I’m chuffed at doing .

I can see us going there again and spending more time there though because we were all quite tired after climbing a mountain but still had a awesome time. (Better than sitting on the settee all day).

What better way to finish off a day than with a nice meal? Steffan and Ben introduced us to a Chinese restaurant called Yummies that make meals with their own ‘yummy’ sauce which is actually yummy believe it or not. Anyway, after coming out of the Chinese we found the car with the lights on ha ha, and guess who had been driving… Buffy (The car) didn’t want to start so we had to bump start it, on legs that just couldn’t take any more lol.

So that was our Monday. What a day!

Out.

Avalanche Peak

Castle Hill

Last Saturday we went on a road trip to a place called Arthurs Pass which is like a little village in a national park of the same name. Melissa and Hannah go through here every time they go back home to Greymouth (lucky them).

We didn’t really do all that much and probably could have had a look around a bit more but it wont be the last time I see it im sure, we stopped to get some food and take a few pics of the Kea’s then we set off a bit further on to the Otira Viaduct, which FYI was finished in 1999 and was awarded the IPENZ Environmental award for the challenges of building the viaduct in the geologically complex and fragile alpine ecology of Arthurs Pass .

The on the way back we got a little excited about the snow and had a good ol’ snowball fight (I won btw) which was great fun but cold on the hands.

Not long after leaving Christchurch we could see the mountains on the horizon and the scenery just kept getting better and better, I can’t wait till we set off again proper to explore more.

Enjoy the pics

Arthurs Pass

Out.

They rang up about an hour ago saying they’d ‘love to have us aboard’ and told me the shifts they can give me – Tuesday to Friday 8pm – 1am which I think is pretty good coz I get the weekends and all day to do whatever.  I’ll be stacking shelves which doesn’t sound all that fun but i’m not bothered really, just something to bring the travel money in, and I think there was mention of having to use those machines that lift crates to the top shelves which sounds fun . The place of employment is a chain called The Warehouse (‘Where everyone gets a bargain’ – the catchy slogan). I don’t know what I’d compare it too back home, they sell pretty much everything in a big b&q style warehouse building. We went for interviews last week which felt strange coz i’ve never had to have an interview for a job before.

So now that’s sorted I guess I can go out and blow what money I’ve got on a big celebratory meal or something

Hope you have a good day out on the zimmer frame. Sorry I can’t be there but your present is in the post (i think) but might not turn up for a while…

So let me know what you had and what you all did. Happy Birthday.

I woke up this morning/afternoon to find a big empty space where the telly used to be because it actually belonged to one of the guys who used to live here and so he came and took it back. The girls aren’t too keen on our idea to get a new 32″ LCD though so thats a pity.

The next thing is to get a job to build the funds back up to travel around New Zealand and maybe fall out of a plane or off a bridge or 3…

Our last night in Rarotonga didn’t have enough sleep in it for my liking. We were rudely attacked by a Houdini-style cockroach! First of all it climbed the wall and got our attention, then jumped off the wall and started flying around our heads. We sat there, screamed our heads off like little schoolgirls for a few seconds then sprang out our beds and were on the other side of the room quicker than you could say entomophobia. We eventually pulled ourselves together and I constructed a trap from a fruit basket and carrier bag and Jonny proceeded to beat my bed with a pillow rather than the cockroach. When it was on the floor I slammed my trap over it. Sigh, relax. But then, was that another one on the other side of the room? No, there wasn’t anything under my trap so he had magically escaped! We then had him trapped in a corner behind Jonnys bed but it ran under it and disappeared again! We searched for it for about 20 minutes but couldn’t find it. At this point we realised we were well out-gunned so admitted defeat and retreated to the other building where the kitchen and lounge area was and calmed our nerves with a brew holding out as long as we could.

We did the cross island walk a few days before we left which takes you past the ‘Needle’ which is a landmark feature of the island, a piece of rock that stands up out of the mountain. The walk was surprisingly tough and the trail is near vertical at times, thankfully there weren’t any bugs (that we were aware of) and the only wildlife we saw were some lizards and chickens. When you get to the Needle, you can climb up further round it after the sign that says “At your own risk” and there are some chains and ropes there to help you up (see video). The whole walk took 3 hours altogether and the weather was really good for it too. I’d recommend it to anyone.

Did you know you have to pay $30 tax to leave Rarotonga? No? Neither did I until I was in the middle of the departure process lol, live and learn.

Unfortunately there weren’t any locals giving those flower necklaces out and the banjo man only just came out and was tuning his banjo as we were getting on the plane. So I’ll have to go back one day I spose. All in all though, it was a cool little island and a good place to have a holiday

Im in cold Christchurch, its the height of winter here atm and is about 4 degrees usually which is pretty cold and I’ve only had the one jumper (which isn’t very warm) up until today when I found a nice jacket thing for 20 quid. But I like the winter, its a nice change from Darwin temperatures of 40+ (and that was their winter too!)

Christchurch looks to be a very nice place and is quite similar to back home. Theres a huge park called Hagley Park thats split into North and South and has loads of rugby and football pitches on it and then just loads of trees and open spaces. Very cool.

We’ve been scouting around for somewhere to stay like a house or apartment and are waiting on people to get back to us on a few hopeful ones, been looking for jobs too but nothing there yet either. It’s gonna be strange starting work again though, im used to not working and could easily to it forever if it was possible…

The Internet cafes are a lot nicer here and cheaper and have games on them too which is cool.

I haven’t taken any pictures of Christchurch yet but will do soon, I have uploaded all my pictures now though so that should keep you busy for a while lol.

Missing you all still.

Out.

Pictures -

Adelaide

Sydney

Cook Islands – Rarotonga