George, george, george of the ocean, friendly as he can be!

hey all,
After leaving kaikoura we headed up to a little town called Picton. On the way there we stopped at a vineyard called Montana's, which i guess exports a lot of wine to the Uk and area as everyone on the bus (it was pretty much an irish fest) got very excited. Learned quite a bit about wine there, and once again that i'm not a very big fan of red wine, got fairly happy, and then we all piled back onto the bus. Some people started to sing drinking songs, but their accents became so thick you could only understand everyother word or so.

Most people were not getting off at Picton. Its just a little stop on the way, where all the people going to the North Island get off to get onto the ferry, and most other people carry on to Nelson. I spent two nights there, and somewhat wish i hadn't. It was a nice enough place, dont get me wrong, but possibly i should say i wished i had stayed at another venue. The lady who ran it was fairly insane. But she liked me, which was a good thing. But yah, she was insane and very opiniated, and at times seemed a little lonely (she would just keep talking to you, even if you told her you had stuff to do or she would run out of the office to talk, the moment she saw you, ever single time). I had also been informed by same lady that there was nothing to do, it was a s*&t town, and once when i left to get groceries she yelled at me and asked where i was going. Lets just say its best to skip the YHA there.

I met a really nice japanese girl while i was waiting for checkin to open (its only open in random spurts, which i still dont understand). She was waiting for a friend to pick her up, and we ended up getting along very well. One thing i've noticed is that i always meet very cool people right before they head home, which is a little sad but i guess thats life. Anywho, we spent over 1 1/2 hours just talking and chilling, and when she left i read the new sookie stackhiouse novel, or at least it was new to me.

So i spent most of my first day in picton relaxing and trying to not buy a lot of food (its about 3X more expensive then kaikoura). Second day, the elderly couple i met in kairkoura was there, and we had a nice chat. The lady, Jackie, gace me what she called was a Gold Kiwi fruit, and it was loads better then the normal green ones (i havent had one of those in years, but i was never a very big fan of them). That night i met a guy named Josh who i exchanged some movies with (on our laptops), and as he was watching the BB Evolution movie another guy named Angus wandered in. I went to bed once the movie was finished, and found that i had a korean roomie. we talked for awhile and then crashed. i guess she had a pretty good time because she viciously poked me away just to say goodbye.

The nest day i left Picton, and pretty much as soon as i did i found out about a ton of cool stuff i could have done. There was a seahorse aquarium! Le gasp. I'm kind of kicking myself for not exploring, but in my defense it had been pretty crap weather. First sign of winter i had seen in awhile. I was waiting at the ferry terminal with a british girl named Laura and her two friends who were dropping her off. The bus arrived on time, but the driver said that he needed to change buses and so when we left it was a little late. Ironically, when we were about 10 mins out of town the 'new' bus began to belch black smoke and slow down. We ended up having to turn around, head back into town (which took us 30mins), change back to the drivers origional bus (which he called Gollum), and then leave pig (so dubbed the other bus) behind. Laura sat in front of me, and an american girl behind. The american girl was traveling with her little sister, and they were only here for three weeks, which is a short time but they seemed to be enjoying themsleves heaps.

Just because the day wasnt full of enough excitement as it was, i had an allergic reaction to something i ate. I ordered a venison pie (deer), but they used the same prongs top serve it as the ocean critters pie. So either there was cross contamination from a langostine, or i'm alleric to venison. anywho, on the bus my throat started to swell shut, and once i managed to keep my heartrate down and a steady breathing rhythm, i leaned forwards and asked laura if she had anything like benadrill because i was having an allergic reaction. She freaked out. When we got to the hostel, i asked the front desk lady if she knew where a pharmacy would be open (it was the queens birthday and most places were closed, as goes my luck). SHe said no, and asked what was wrong. I told her, and one of the american sister pipped up and said she had a benadrill knock off and gave me two. So, as the swelling did go down and i began to feel much better, i guess you could say i owe an american my life. And the best part, we ended up rooming together.

The next day was another early morning. I seem to be having a lot of those lately...We had to be outside for a 7:30 bus which would drive us 1 1/2 hours up to Able Tasmen, one of the largest and dubbed most beautiful national parks in NZ. The day before i had signed up to go sailing and then a fourhour walk (it was only $20 kiwi dollars more than going on a jetboat right to the desination). It turned out that Laura had booked the same thing, and we were the only two on board with our skip Mark. He gave us free tea, answered all my questions for about 3 hours, unfurled all three sails (tho not at the same time), and we got to help. The boat used to be an old racer, so the front had a kind of trampolene material covering it, which i was at first hesitant to walk on, but soon began to enjoy running across it and got decent at doing so. We went in to islands to look at cormorands (which here are called shags), went on a stingray expidition (we didnt find any, but i'm now pro at telling the difference between them and clumps of seaweed), and saw seals and their pups. On the way into the bay at the very end, we met a solo friendly bottom nose dolphin named George. I was the first one to see him, got really excited and let out a highpitch "EEE!" of excitement. that got the other two running around, trying to figure out why i was jumping and poiting. Laura only saw the fin coming out from under the boat (turns out dolphins like to rub themselves against boats) and she shreaked. But it turned out to be a nice dolphin, and not jaws, and so we were running around the boat with cameras, even out skip. George came right into the shallows with us, and even tho people showed up later in speedboats, i was resolved to go play with him if he came in close again. or at least wade and and trade water to see if he was interested in playing or anything.

From the beach we said goodbye to mark and headed off on our hike. the hardest part was right at the start, and once we got that out of the way things went pretty smoothly. we met up witha Belgin guy whose name i wont even try to spell, and a girl named sophie from Quebec. We walked the 4 hour hike together and had a pretty great time. we finished it early, and so hung around in a bone/jane shop, which had some really neat statues outside. When we got back, we watched the 3rd LOTR and were asking people if they knew where the sets had been.

THe next day i went to book skydiving up in Able Tasmin. It had come highly recommended, and i thought might as well. the forcast said beautiful weather for the next few days, and it got more expensive as one heads closer to QUeenstown. Anywho, i went down at about 9am to set it up for the next day, and the lady informed me that it was booked that day but i could go that day at noon. So a little freaked out i said sure, they booked me in and at about noon a guy named tom, with aspirations of being a trained/psyio guy for athelets, picked me up. It was about a 45 mins drive to the jump site, where i watched an awesome movie, and got suited up to go. My tandum master was also named tom, was from the Czeh republic, and it turns out i was his first tandum. Ever. I was so excited, talkign to the other jumpers (all of whom were either certified or working on getting certitified), and then we all climbed into the plane. GOing up 13,000 feet took awhile, and i was having a great time, with no worries, until the first of 6 people in front of my jumped out that plane. and then i paniced a little (She was pretty much just sucked out and out of sight instantly in my defense). In the video, for my first 15 secs of 50 sec of freefall, i am looking at the ground screaming. I had a good time, once i realised that i wasnt the only oen plummitingdown, but still the inital feeling was terror. It was great, and i defintantly want to do it again sometime soon. But i just didnt want to do ti again on the same day.

that night i got moved to a different room, ironically ended up rooming with Laura. An ISV group came in for two days, and i had considered doing that if people can remember. They were the group doing the skydiving the next day, hence why it was packed. I got along really well with a guy anmed Westin in the group, and the two of us as well as some other ISV people and people from the magic bus (plus this girl named kai) went out to a pub. I was very sad that i did not have a hangover the next day. The next day, which is June 4th if anyone else got lost along that way of this garbled retelling, Laura, Kai and i hiked to the center of NZ. or what was consdiered the center in 1887. It was on a hill, conviently, and the hike up was a pretty good time. that night we had a movie fest of both the kill bill movies, and drank some cheap wine. Which i have discovered tastes a lot like goon when mixed with juice, but is not as good.

On the 5th, had yet another early morning waking up for the bus. Which left at 8am. we stopped at quite a few places along the way from nelson to greymouth, which most of which have escaped memory. i just remember that there were a lot of them, because it took us nearly 8 hours to cross over to the west side of the island. Greymouth is a smalltown, not a very large population and not tooo much stuff to do. most people were surprised that i was spending two nights there, but i really wanted to go blackwater/cave rafting (they stick you in a wetsuit, and give you a tube and you go down a river and through a cave system with glowworms; its better on the N island i've heard, but i'm not sure how much time i'm going to be spending up there). ANywho, i ended up doing that with two other canadian girls, which was kind of nice, and a aussie couple celelbrating their 30th anaversery. Afterwards, we were led to a hottub and given some beer/wine, which was a pretty nice way to end the day.

on the 7th we left Greymouth for Franz Joseph, made popular by being located next to the two tallest mountains in NZ, mt. cook and mt.tasmin. It also has an abundence of glaciers. On the way there we stopped in a little minin town called Ross, where we learned how to pan for gold. When we arrived in Franz Jospeh, i went on whats known as a Helihike, where you get flown via helicopter up to an unclimbable part about 1/3 up the glacier, and taken around by a guide. It was myself, a UK couple, and a guy from austria in the group, so it was nice and small, and we had a blast. our guide had been around a lot of different glaciers, in many different countries so he told us about the differences, how they formed and what they did. i asked him some q's derived from EOSC, and he said he would just forward all glacier questions to me after that, which i thought was kind of funny. we went hoping around with metal skiped shoes, and several times got down on our bellies and crawled through little caves or slid on our bums down natural slides. Our guide said that we had discovered a lot today, because we were a smallgroup and all fairly fit, he had been making about the last 2/3 of the whole trip up! After getting flown back to basecamp we exchanged emails so that we can pool all the pictures together.

thats about all thats happened for now. hope everything at home is going well, and will try and be a little more on the ball with these updates. Lov ya!

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