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Published: September 2nd 2007
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Well well well…..look who it is
For those of you wondering… yes I am still alive and well.
Time has flown by over these last few months, as I try to do everything this country has to offer before I leave for OZ in the next few weeks. And I am proud to admit that my list of activities is nearly complete. Though a few great adventures still lay around the corner before I can truly say I have experienced New Zealand.
August 5 /2007 … the month of the dislocation
Snow snow snow… yes if you want it… please don’t come to New Zealand..haha joke… but seriously this year had been a series of highs and lows when it comes to the white stuff. But it hasn’t all been bad…oh no, just take a page from the Remarks. This little beauty of a hill is known for one thing and one thing only…its backcountry snow, which when its good, makes ya wanna cry with joy. So when it snowed 25 cm one night at the beginning of August, you know that the lifties of Coronet had to check this place out. The day was perfect… blue
sky’s, children laughing through gumdrop forests… ok that might have been an exaggeration but it was still good, as we looked at endless first track runs on a gleaming white bowl of powder. But all was not right in this little world of Queenstown…as it seems I had angered someone in my previous life… and after experiencing my favourite run of the season through ankle deep powder, I found myself in a world of hurt. The Remarks it seems has a policy of not removing rocks on the runs as they are protected as an endangered species. Well maybe not but its not far from the truth. Anyways while skiing at only a few km/h it seems I ran over one no larger then an apple… a few seconds later I had to pop my arm back in the socket…ow. This was all the more embarrassing as several of my friends happened on by to watch me roll around on the ground cursing murphys law. Thankfully I wasn’t too bad, and a few days later I was back at hitting the trails once again.
August 26 / 2007 …the week of the Renihan
Well what can I say….
If you have had the pleasure of meeting this guy, you know that I had one hell of a week ahead of me.
After nearly 3 weeks in Oz, Geoff Renihan had made his way to this little itty bitty country in the middle of nowhere, to make sure I was partying hard enough… it turns out I wasn’t. Within hours of arriving in the country he had already met an entourage of people which we partied with till the wee hours of the morning… much to my pain as I had to get up for work by 6… but that’s the price you gotta pay.
Our next leg of the journey took us to the frolf courts of Queentown for a match I had been looking forward to for some time. We both had a ball as I rediscovered the fact that that I suck at such a simple game…though not as bad as some. Case in point Mr. Renihan who after his 3 shot was still behind the tee off point…if that’s possible…haha.
Our next little mission was to take Reg skiing up at Coronet. Though he hadn’t been out on a pair of skies
for nearly 10 years, there was still little I could actually help him out on… which was sweet as my hangover prevented me from doing such. And after only a few minutes on the green runs we were hitting the blues with style...
Though I passed by it a million times on my way to Frasers bar, I had never gone to check out Minus 5 until this week. This bar was made entirely out of ice, from the bar itself to the walls and even our glasses… a novelty act to be sure, but a surprisingly fun one…well if you like vodka.. as that’s all your getting. Though the drinks were a little overpriced, we still found a surprising lively crowd from a bar the same temp as my job up at the mountain.
Well I couldn’t put it off anymore… I had to do it, and what better timing. Twelve months ago I was reading everything I could about NZ, from its geography to its sports and even its crazy outdoor activities… and there it was… between scuba diving and surfing… a little bungee jumping company called AJ Hackett was advertising a jump that actually made
me sweat reading it…. After showing this little article to Alex Schroen, he asked me a simple question… “would you do it?”. Now if memory serves me correctly, I think my answer was something like #@%* NO! Sadly that response in my mind meant that I had to do it. Suspended more then 150 meters in the air this bungee jump was the 3rd largest in the world, making one fall 440 feet, with nearly an 8 second free fall… u heard me. I had honestly dreaded this day for months…more then any other jump or crazy activity I had done to date… for no other reason then it was ridiculously high. Unlike most activites in NZ this one is taken seriously and you had to follow precisely what they said when they said it… which made me fear it all the more. After a 40 minute drive out of town I finally got a view of my friend…death. Sadly it looked even higher then I thought…
Taking you in groups of 5 the Nevis crew placed us on a small cart with a mesh floor, to take a short ride over the canyon to a gondola which had
been renovated into our jumpzone. Once we arrived we all waited to take our turn. Hearing my name called to get suited up was one of my worst memories to date, as I seriously considered bailing as I had been psyching myself out for weeks. It also did not help that I had just filmed renihan jumping on his digital camera forcing me to stand over the edge for a few minutes. But I had to do it… especially since I had dropped my contact at the bottom of the valley and needed to retrieve it… Luckily around this point my brain turned off and my emotions stopped working… thus allowing me to jump…
Sadly our Skydive, schedualed the next day, was cancelled due to weather...which I am sure Reg was happy about.
The scavenger hunt…. By Ryan hand
After weeks of work I had creating a bar hopping scavenger hunt which turned into one of my most memorable nights out in town… thus proving to myself and the rest of the world that I rock… This little game consisted of 30 questions which needed to be completed in a couple of hours…consisting of things from mooning
Off Piste at the Remarks
20 minutes later I was laying face down in the snow... fun times traffic to giving a stranger a piggyback ride and even a kiss… Though only 4 of the 16 people involved dressed up for this little event, it remained nothing short of hilarious as I looked over everyone’s photos at the end of the night.
But like all good things they had to come to an end… and after one final big night out and an hour an a half of sleep before I had to get to work, I had to say goodbye to Reg as he headed back to the best country on earth.
One last thing I have posted my Nevis jump at the top of the Blog..enjoy
Well I am tired of writing…so I bid you all adu
Catch ya on the flip side
- Ryan
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