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Published: March 6th 2007
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Drove from Chirstchurch to Wanaka, a six hour drive and chatted the whole way there. We had rang ahread to book our sky dive over Lake Wanake the day before so we were already anticipating the next day. Cooked food and headed to bed early, but only to be woken at 1am by a fat Irish guy snoring like a train for hours. This drove both of us mad until I whipped him with my towel and he finally turned over, but continued to make the most offensive of noises. Very tired the next morning we headed for the sky diving place both quite nervous. However, we had to wait for an hour and a half, and as we waited and talked to people coming down about how amazing it was, by our turn we wern't too nervous. Three of us went up, though me and Sarah were the only ones that morning who had chose to jump from 15000 ft. As the plane went up and the views were becoming more and more amazing, I didn't feel at all scared, just excited. The guy with us jumped at 12000ft and watching him fall was actually very scary but still I
didn't feel scared about me going. Then we were at 15000ft and it was my turn. Within seconds my feet were out of the plane, my head was back and we were flying. It was the most amazing yet surreal feeling, and I loved it!! I had a camera man jump with me so was concentrating on smiling for him and also trying to take in the views as I feel but it was all over so quickly. The shot then opened we we were bobbing along slowly heading down. I saw Sarah above me and then she was so close to me we could talk to each other. The scenery was just spectacular. I had a massive grin on my face the whole way down and felt such a buzz on landing. Sarah had been a bit unsure about it all, but she was soooo pleased we'd done it, esp from 15000 ft. We left with a really cool DVD of us jumping and loads of pics. We then drove to Te Anau discussing it the whole way.
The next day we rose at 6.30am and drove the 2 hours to Milford Sound, one of New Zealands largest
fiords. The weather was very wet and stromy but this gave the mountains this amazing dramatic look, we were actually quite pleased it was bad. The drive there was amazing as when it rains, the mountains are covered with hundreds of tiny waterfalls that I couldn't really capture properly on the camera. We had booked ourseleves on one of the smaller boats and as we arrived well before the numerous coach loads, there was only about 15 of us on this boat. At we sailed out and the rain fell, we wrapped up in many layers and stood out the front. The mountains towered above us, the sea was bottle green and the clouds were so low our view was distored, but it just looked so mystically beautiful. We sailed past huge waterfalls and seals lazying on rocks. Although we took loads of photos, I've just looked through them now and they don't go anywhere near to showing just how amazing the Sound is. As we drove back to Te Anau, we stopped to take more pictures, but again, they did not do the amazing views any justice.
The next day we set off for Queenstown. Sarah went on
a horse trek (she tried to convince me to go but I declined as I can't stand horses!!!) and then took a ride on the Shotover Jet Boat in the afternoon. I had a very lazy day interneting and sleeping. We then headed up to Franz Josef Glacier and the following day took a 3/4 day walk up the glacier. It was amazing, this HUGE block of ice in the middle of grassy mountains. With grips attached to our feet, we climbed up onto the ice with a guide and walked through Very narrow passage ways, up steep steps and even crawled into a small ice cave. I was a little nervous climbing up but it was actually very safe and we were extremely lucky to have a sunny day. Glad we didn't do the full day though as were shattered by the end.
Our next destination was Abel Tasmin National Park. We got a room in a nice little house in a small town called Marahau just next to the park. On our way we stopped off at a salmon farm and caught us a whole fish,which Sarah named Ceril, then took him home and baked him -
very tasty!! The next day we went for a short kayak around the bay and stopped off at a beach for a paddle. In the afternoon we took a water taxi up into the park, were dropped off at a beach and walked the 4 hour back in Marahau. The views across the park and bays were so beautiful. We took a swim at one of the beaches which was very invigorating, ie bloody cold and then carried on back to the town. That night we made yummy potato wedges and ate chocoate cake, we definatly felt like we deserved it!!
The next day we drove on to Kaikoura ready for our EXTREMELY early swim with the local dusky doplins. This morning we were up at 5am and on the water before sunrise. Watching the sun appear from below the sea line was amazing and it made the mountains all around glow. We soon spotted dolphins and looking extra fine in our wet suits we slipped into the water and came nose to nose with a whole pod of Dusky dolpins. They swam all around us, so close we could touch. It was such an amazing feeling, at one
point I had 3 swimming in circles around me so I merrily joined in swimming round and round. In order to attract their attention and make them wanna come and play, its best to makes lots of noise. So the whole group was swimming around making loads of really stupid noises, was quite funny. Me and Sarah had an under water camera, but are both pretty sure we took photos of water and maybe a fin or two, so they prob won't be anything special. Though we later stood at the front of the boat and watched about 10 dolphins swim along with us which was very cool. They constantly jumped and flipped in the air, though it was quite tricky to get a pic of this. The 5am start was well worth it though and we both had a fab time.
This afternoon we drove up to Picton and got the ferry across to Wellington. Now our adventures begin in North island, but i'll save that for the next blog.......laters.
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anonymous
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I'm very jealous but glad you're having a good time! 42 degrees here today...went to the movies with Lennie. lots and lots of love Di