“He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot.” Douglas Adams The rebuttal... And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music. - Nietzsche A little debriefing is in order. Hopefully these comments will be of value. Gear - I didn’t really bring an excessive amount of stuff. Of the things I didn’t use my hiking boots took up the most space. I wore my trail hikers and flip flops and that was it. Had I done more serious trekking the [View Full Entry]

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Monday March 23, 2009 “The sun is shining, birds are singing…here at Camp Granada” Alan Sherman. Wonderful weather for my last full day in Middle Earth. Following Steve’s directions I find Cathedral Square. After strolling the streets for a while I get on the streetcar tram that circles downtown. The driver gives a brief history of different sites as the car rolls along. First stop, the arts center. The buildings that make up the center are actually the original campus of the University of Canterbury. There are wonderful shops as well as student and artist [View Full Entry]

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Saturday March 21, 2009 This is the Equinox, Vernal or Autumnal depending on your side of the Equator. I’m glad to be going back to the Vernal. Spring is my favorite time of year. Four hours of driving today, mostly boring. There is a power outage in Takapo. In fact I had to wake up the manager to unlock the electrically controlled gate to let me out of the park. No power, no coffee! Before leaving I go out to take some pics of the Church of the Good Shepherd, a local landmark. Down the road is the first of today’s [View Full Entry]

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Thursday March 19, 2009 “In Mother Nature… there’s such a clearing of the air after a rampage that she may go off whistling to herself, all settled down, ready for dinner and a good sleep.” “The Water of Life” by Michael Meade And so it goes. All that was crappy yesterday is wondrous today. As I sit in the van talking to Carla (on the phone, thought I do swear I hear her at other times) a tiny bird lands on the windshield wiper not more that a foot from me. Today I plan to walk so after breakfast I pack [View Full Entry]

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Wednesday March 18, 2009 "Up in the air junior birdmen..." old camp song Bright and early at the crack of nine I roll out of bed and walk over to the Southern Gliding office. There is actually a little camper park adjacent to the airstrip with clean well-kept facilities. They do it on an honor system so I just filled in the envelope, enclosed the money and dropped it in a box. I talk to Chris, the owner and Darren, my pilot, and even though it is a bit cloudy we can give it a go. Since I’m the only one [View Full Entry]

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Monday 16th of March - “You can’t be a country unless you have a beer and an airline. It helps if you have some kind of football team … but at the least you have to have a beer.” Frank Zappa I guess you would have to call Speight’s the beer, since they are by far the most widely promoted. Dunedin is the home of Speight Beer. Today is tour day, however my allergies are never predictable so I opt for the other tour in Dunedin, the Cadbury Chocolate Factory. Chocolate has never been known to make me sneeze and it [View Full Entry]

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Thursday March 12th Te Anau to Riverton “Here’s the thing… I’ve already gone crazy once. I know what my limits are.” Stephanie Meyer (Eclipse) “Or so I thought…” jss The day started off pretty slow. Cleaned up and left the Holiday Park and went into town to do laundry and get caught up on my reports (which you read I guess) It’s sunny but cool. I head south on the Scenic Trail which starts at Manapouri. It is approx 80 klm from here to Tuatapere. This is a big expansive valley with snow-capped peaks on both sides. By my co [View Full Entry]

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Saturday March 14, 2009 - The Otago Central Rail Trail A little after 8:30 I meet Mike at Altitude Adventures, we gear up, meet a couple from Boston and head out. He will drop us at a point on the trail called Ida Valley. It is 50k from this point back to Alexandra. The clouds are big and fluffy but gray and we are hoping they burn off as forecast. Right away I am glad I brought my windbreaker/rain jacket. In the wind it is just plain cold. We start off down the train trail and after a while I am [View Full Entry]

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Sunday, March 15, 2009 Naseby to Dunedin “I was gratified to answer promptly. I said ‘I don’t know’. “ Mark Twain That just about sizes up what I did today. I got up at a reasonably early hour, 7:45, with the idea of eating breakfast in Naseby. By the way, I was more than mildly surprised that I didn’t have aches and pains after the ride yesterday. Anyway, being Sunday it was too early for the one café to be open so down the road 13k I go, into Ranfurley. Even though it is now 8:45 there still is only one [View Full Entry]

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Wednesday March 11, 2009 And now for something completely different…Doubtful Sound. When I was planning my itinerary I debated whether to see Milford or Doubtful Sound. I settled on both. It is getting cooler here. All the peaks in the area have shown additional accumulations of snow in the past three days. I actually used the little space heater provided with the van this AM. Driving to Manapouri this morning on the doubtfulsoundcruise.com bus I see my first deer farm. This “cruise” is different from Milford in several respects. First we (limited to 20) are s [View Full Entry]

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