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Published: December 16th 2009
I have discovered the most wonderful invention ever. Cars and phones and penicillin...yeah yeah yeah...they're
okay and all, but they got nothin' on electric blankets! Oh the warmth...the snuggly factor...the delightful sensation of easing under the covers and feeling like you're sinking into a hot tub...why oh why don't we have these in Florida?
Oh yes. I remember now. Because Florida isn't a mere 2,000 miles from Antarctica, that's why! We have no need for lovely, plush, deliciously warm electric blankets. As I sit typing to you, I have the sensation of being like melting butter in a toaster oven...even though our un-heated room is quite frigid. It's fabulous. And all you northerners can go right on laughing at my naivete...I won't be offended...
So this is the part of the trip where the blogs will probably be a little less frequent. We've arrived at what we hope will be our home through the next six months at least (longer if I can survive the winter, but so far that is NOT looking promising, electric blanket or no electric blanket!), so we're settling into a somewhat dull routine of job-hunting, apartment-hunting, grocery shopping...not really the kind of stuff you
guys want to read about every day. You have better things to do, I'm sure.
But for now, let me catch you up on our journey down here and our weekend in Wanaka. Wanaka is simply gorgeous...the stuff paradise is made of. Pristine snow-capped peaks, icy blue lake, turquoise skies, lush rolling farmland dotted with sheep and deer (domestic deer, farmed for venison). We woke up to yet another distant snowstorm, up on the high peaks (we had bright sunny skies down by the lake)...and decided to take a drive towards the 10,000-foot peak of Mt. Aspiring. The road wound around Lake Wanaka, past stunning waterfalls and every type of farm animal you can imagine, then turned dirt and gave our little Toyota its first off-road adventure. We reached a washed-out bridge with a small stream running around it, and were assured by a local ranger that our car would make it (being the cautious Floridians we are, we had no intention of testing the waters). But, with that assurance, we plunged in and crossed the ford rather effortlessly...and onward we went!
As we wound into the mountains, the snow above us reached us as light, misty, chilly
rain, which permeated the air for the rest of our afternoon. We crossed another ford but stopped shy of the third one, which appeared to be too deep and swift for us to attempt (better safe than sorry!). So we pulled over and hiked across a suspension bridge over a wide river, then began hiking through cow pastures towards an enormous waterfall we'd spotted from the road. Half an hour later, soaked from the rain and mist, we stood at the base of the spectacular waterfall, surrounded by tall trees and the largest ferns I've ever seen. It was amazing, simply amazing. Totally worth getting our sneakers soggy!!
The rest of the day was spent doing such luxurious things as sitting in a laundromat FOREVER waiting for our clothes to wash and dry. We hit up a nice restaurant on the lakeside, where Jeremy chowed down on lamb (and apparently did an amazing job getting every possible morsel of meat off the rack...all the waitresses came out and said they were inspecting it in the kitchen and had never seen anyone pick a rack so clean...it was quite funny!) and I had a delicious seafood pasta with shrimp and
gigantic mussels - yum!! We paired our meals up with a couple glasses of local pinot noir - not my favorite type of wine, but theirs was actually very good! NZ is known for it pinot and it sauvignon blanc - again, not one of my favorites, but I'm hoping to expand my palate while I'm here.
Before hitting the sack, we couldn't resist changing into our swimsuits in the 40-degree weather and plunging into the guesthouse's outdoor hot tub. There we sat until we were wrinkly prunes, chatting with (amazingly) three American guys from Arizona, Wisconsin, and Virginia (we figure the U.S. was quite well-represented by that hot tub!), searching the sky for the elusive Southern Cross constellation that we have yet to see. (Orion is visible, though, but he's turned upside-down, like he's doing a cart-wheel across the sky). Oh, and I know you've all been wondering, and YES!! The toilets DO in fact spin the other way when you flush. And YES!! The sun is at such an odd angle in the sky, it is impossible to tell which way is north, south, east, or west. And YES!! I figure the reason I've been congested for
two weeks is because we're upside-down and I'm actually standing on my head (allowing my nose to get all stuffed up)...makes sense to me, anyway!
Yeah. So. Where was I? Oh yes, Wanaka. So Monday morning we awoke and met up with Brad, when we finally retrieved our boxes of clothes we'd mailed over two months prior. Ate the most delicious gluten-free French toast ever made (you would NEVER know it was gluten-free; Jeremy nearly cried in happiness!) before hitting the road. On our way out of town, we stumbled upon a "Lord of the Rings" guidebook, which shows driving directions to all the different places where the movies were filmed. Naturally, we had to buy it. Funnily enough, we looked up across Lake Wanaka and we staring right at a scene from the first movie - when Gandalf is rescued by the giant eagle off the top of the tower, the eagle soars right over the top of Mt. Aspiring and the surrounding mountains! Ha!! We'd been staring at those mountains for three days and had no idea.
We took the "scenic route" (translation: crazy windy switchback alpine road with lots of sheer cliffs and blind curves)
out of Wanaka and south towards Arrowtown. There we stopped at Karawaru Bridge, home of the first modern bungy jump. With pounding hearts, we made our way to the observation platform to watch perfectly sane people pay $175 to throw themselves 130 feet off a perfectly safe bridge towards the raging icy river below. Some girls as young as TEN years old were doing it! You'll be happy to hear we stayed on the ground...gladly! The real reason we stopped at the bridge, though, was for the view up the canyon, where another LOTR scene was filmed...the scene when the fellowship paddles past the gigantic Argonath statues (which of course were added digitally, but the river and canyon is instantly recognizable). Sorry to you guys who aren't LOTR fans - I promise not to bore you with every little snippet we see from the movies, but even if you don't like the movies, you have to agree they picked a heck of a location to film them!!
After our fill of watching all these goofy people jumping off the bridge, we hit up a winery and cheesery and sampled about twenty types of homemade cheese - yum!! Declined on
the wine as we still had a long way to drive...unfortunately...
It started raining as we approached the east coast and Milton and, well, hasn't really stopped for three days. We're told the weather is very unusual for this time of year, as it's been cold, rainy, and blustery for most of our trip so far. We're hoping for some more summery weather soon!! Anyway, we arrived Monday night to our friends Kate and Steve's gorgeous five-acre farm, where we'll be staying for a while until we can get set up with a place of our own. And no, we did not personally know Kate and Steve before we left Florida, but through our local congregation back home, we were able to get in touch with them before we left, and it's worked out splendidly! They're a chipper couple in their 60's, with lots of energy and contagious enthusiasm. They've given us the grand tour of their farm, which is stocked full of sheep, cows, goats, pigs, chickens, ducks, and turkeys! They grow all their own produce and use their own dairy and eggs...as fresh as it gets!! It's a lot of work but they seem so happy doing
it...I wish we could be so self-sufficient in the states!
Yesterday we headed up to the nearest "big" city, Dunedin, to stock up on some essentials and some warmer clothes. It was a cold and windy day, so we'll definitely have to go back at another time, because the city was beautiful with really pretty architecture. Dunedin is also home to the world's only mainland albatross colony (the world's largest birds), nine types of penguins, and lots of seals and sea lions! Can't wait to see some of the local wildlife...aside from sheep, of course...and speaking of sheep! Tonight I bottle-fed Baby, their three-month old lamb...which is a LOT harder than it looks! She's tiny but she almost knocked me over a few times in her over-enthusiasm for her bottle. We just missed shearing season (as many of you know, my goal here is to shear a sheep!)...so alas, it will have to wait for a little later in the trip...
So here we are!! It's a gorgeous area and we hope to stay through at least the summer and autumn months...the winter remains to be seen (we may head back to the north island, where it's considerably
warmer). We're in the process of hunting for jobs and should be touring a couple small apartments in the next few days. For now, though, we're in great hands with Kate and Steve, and they'll be keeping us plenty busy around the farm (tomorrow's task...milking Bonnie, their cow). Catch you guys soon...
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Karim
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toilets
toilets, Do they acctualy flush counter clockwise down there?!