Noosa – the first trip

Our next destination was our first where we would be starting our first trip that we had booked back in Sydney. As we were told nak all by wicked travel we were a bit apprehensive as to what to expect but were looking forward to meetings some new people. On the way to Noosa (where we would start the Kanoeing/Camping/Bush trip as described above) we had a night over at the glass mountains look out. This was a very picturesque spot slightly inland which we stumbled upon when looking for a go kart track that we had seen signposted. We attempted to BBQ chicken by moonlight before retiring to bed ready for an early start planned for the next day. And for once we actually woke up when the alarm went off and were on the road by 9. After a few Km we accidently bumped into the kart track we had been looking for the previous day and felt it was necessary to have a go. Always a good laugh and we all caned the locals on the track. We got back on the road for a while before stopping at a place called Caloundra on Kings beach. Here we had an awesome time being immature kids again. I.e playing Frisbee, frolicking in the sea, making sand castles and digging holes to bury each other (of course adding certain body parts to the buried individual. In the end we made our way to Noosa and prepared for the trip the following day.
We stayed..somewhere that night, oh yeah it was actually in Noosa, we had made it there and were ready after an early night’s sleep to start our Bear Grylls, lets catch a wild boar with some fishing line and a flip flop adventure. Or so we thought. As ive just mentioned, we thought we were in for a 3 day, be thrown into the bush/everglades with a tent and a stove and camp wherever. We had packed enough tinned goods to sustain a nuclear winter and had only our day bags to take, we were ready to take on any bush animals that might awake us during the night..or instead maybe just Pete. Anyway, thanks to the lovely folk at “Wicked” Travel, who as Sam has already explained, are shit, we knew nothing about the trip. It turns out that wer were basically staying in a rudimentary dorm for 2 of the three nights and camping at an actual campsite on the third. Not quite Bear Grylls eh? Well we met up with th van that takes people to the camp and we followed him to the supermarket where everyone was going to get their food for the trip, did we feel smug or what ught our food and walking out of the supermarket with Home Brand mossie spray and a carton of custard (oh yes!)having already bo We chatted to a few others going qand it turned out they had no idea what was going on either and had funnily enough booked it with “wicked” travel. So we drove to the bush camp, which is a road not desgined for our rig, but it pulled through and we parked up and got familirised with the place. After the usual meet and greet between everyone, we went for a quick walk around a path out of the camp to see what we would be in store for. It seemed pretty nice, not too much going on, apart from the huge incestual/Deliverance vibe obviously, we realised we had gotten a pretty good group. Some more people arrived later that day and that night we got to know everyone a little better with the only way that is right – Ring of Fire. After drinking maaany XXXX’s and hardly feeling drunk, because they have only 3.5% alcohol in them?! (this is a country of supposed ‘hardcore’ drinkers and one of their choice of about 2 beers is 3.5% proof – shouldn’t of exported Fosters, its much better) we deicded to reitre to our sketchy dorm bed to be up at 7.30aqm sharp for our briefing.
Several hours later and wishing that it really couldnt be 7.30am already, we begrudgingly got out of our bed which had happily not collapsed during the night and attened the briefing about the next 3 days. The man that gave us this briefing was clearly an alcoholic whose poor jokes, weird stories and obvious racism and misogynist-ism(?) did nothing to change the fact it was 7.30am. The briefing consisted of a map the we didnt have or werent to be given and some random pointing at a lake and saying what we would be doing and where we would be headed. After drifting off and regaining conecntration near the end after the words box and jellyfish were mentioned the “briefing” had come to an end. We were now left with about an hour to saunter around before we began the first bout of canoeing. This made the getting up so ridiculously early seem pretty unnecessary. Eventually we were on the water and sat in our much deliberated positions. (The guys had recommended putting the strongest at the back as apparently they did the most work etc so it was clear to me and Pete that Matt would take this job in a small attempt to begin his regime to become a meathead.) We reached our destination after a short while and some guess work/navigation and naturally won the race that according to the gagaju workers was not going to happen, beating our biggest rivals in the process – team Canada which included none other than Arni himself (he was actually called Paul but was totally ripped so we decided Arni was more appropriate and provided us with many amusing anecdotes in the mean time. “Yaaoo” a particular favourite of mine. We embarked on a short hike to the beach we were headed for with a short stop to take pictures and feed the wild kangaroos that we saw on the way. It was worth the walk. The beach was like many of the other aussie beaches we had been to, but as it was only accesible by 4WD was nearly empty. re enjoyed a frolic in the sea to cool down and then decided to soak up the rays and feel the deep burn. We even engaged in a bit of beach football while there – had a good 3 on 3 match which ended only when we decided that a half time was a good idea – we didnt make it to the second half. Arni went for a short jog around Australia and everyone just chilled out and enjoyed the awesome wheather before heading back to the gagaju base camp to sleep on the floor that night.

After a pretty awesome day and now everyone was getting to know each other from the previous nights escapades and that days trip we decided that there was only one thing for it – some more ring of fire. Pete and Alex went off to buy more beer (proper strength beer this time) we ate some pie that took about 3 days to cook in the old skoool industrial style oven at the camp and then commenced the inevitable onslaught. We were on the third game of ring of fire by the end of the night and the Jagermeister had been broken into. We also met some crazy Isaraeli guy and a funny irishman that enjoyed ganging up on himself in drinking games. I say no more. After a heated discussion between Matt and Pete in the tent we retired in the knowledge that we would have slightly longer in the bed that morning.

The following night we would be staying at a campsite further up the river, so we had to packthe boats with tents and general camping equipment that morning. Everyone feeling a little worse for wear. The ground was not very comfortable to sleep on. Anyway, that day we had the possibility of pissing about on a rope swing and eating spit roast pig and beef if we were to get there in time. The paddling was “less enthusiastic” today as can be expected so we made slow progress until we eventually found the rope swing. After much diffculty parking the canoes near the river bed and different people getting out whilst trying not to capsize any, Sam and Ed jumped out of the tree and had a go on the swing – realising that hyperthermia was a genuine possibilty afterwards – whilst some people took pictures. We then continued on to the camp site where it was a short walk to the much awaited spit roast. In the end only a few of us got to the roast in time and just as they were clearing up. But oh my god what a win – a big plate full of pig and cow so tasty and tender and all for 10 dollars. One of the things I have missed a lot whilst away – a good old roast – and it was glorious! Arni trumped us all by polishing off two plates – one of just meat and one of salad. We had no idea at this point of his eating habits apart from the fact that he ate a lot – including a lot of plain tins of tuna. We all set up camp and then chilled a bit more – Sam and Matt went the whole hog and had a napage. One conversation that stuck in my mind from that day was when Dale (quite an open Candian guy) asked Allan (a fairly quiet but awesome israeli guy) what Israel was like. Allan answered “oh horrible, I live in a mud hut” or something along those lines. There’s something about an israeli being sarcastic that just makes it more amusing. Anyway it led to us trying to find out what Allan did in the army when he did his compulsory service as they still have this in Israel – Each bloke must do two years when they turn 18. Turned out he was in intelligence but, even after a lot of probing from the rest of the group, would not elaborate much. We cooked soup for dinner then everyone huddled round what you might call a camp fire – others would refer to it more as a BBQ with logs that are on fire in it. A little more beer was drank and we got a pretty motivational speech from Arni and then went and slept on some more ground.

The next day had nothing planned – we just had to pack up everything, attempt to put it all back in the canoes and paddle back the base where we would get our infamous deposits back (basically we payed 20 dollars each deposit for the camping stuff when we got there and throughout the weekend the gagaju staff used this as a sort of power to make us do what we were supposed to do – pointing out many things that would loose us the deposit. This inevitably turned into a bit of a joke for the group involving what they would buy with our deposits which we were so definitly not getting back etc) before returning to civilisation. We arrived back just in time and milled about for a bit at the camp before leaving – surprisingly with our deposits. Deciding in the end that we would go straight up to Hervey Bay that night so we could stay with basically the same group of people for our next trip on Fraser Island. Unfortunately leaving behind Dail, Mallika, Rachel, Toby, Heather, Ed and Allan but staying with Candaian Dail, Arni, Jen, Alex and Eve. So we drove, and drove some more until we arrived at the hostel that evening.

Australia 1!

The next day – I say day I mean afternoon as we didn’t see a lot of the morning – Sam and Matt ate as much foder as possible while Pete suffered from the night before and spent most of the day in bed. Matt and Sam polished of over a Kg of lamb for dinner and then packed – ready to leave NZ the day after. After a short shuttle journey to the airport and a short delay on our original flight time we were on our way to Aussieland. We arrived to the expected quarantine point but were surprised how they let us stroll through without checking anything just because we had said we were bringing food in. We then ventured outside and were greeted by lots of rain – not good.

We arrived at our pre booked hostel (recommended by STA) to find that (even though we had booked about 6 months in advance) we were squeezed into a 2 person room meaning me and Matt would have to get cosy on a double bed – because we wouldn’t be doing that enough in 5 weeks that we were renting the camper, clearly… – after a day of travelling we couldn’t be arsed to change rooms so after discovering that there was no plugs, the mattresses were made of concrete and the showers were a hike away we decided to drown our sorrows by purchasing some unsafely cheap ”Chinese” which surprisingly made none of us ill. Before the Chinese however we mistakenly wondered to Wicked travel – a company offering packages for travel up the east coast – as they had what looked like some good deals on for that day. About 2 hours later the naggy sales women finally let us go after we had parted with $550 dollars of our hard earned cash for trips to islands etc as we travelled up the east coast. In the end I think we got a good deal but it was just the way the women sold it too us that really pissed me off – typical sales tactics inc the infamous good cop bad cop technique “Oh your bad for giving it too them for that price Zoey, I would not have given it to them for that”; full of bullshit. Anyway, rant over, back to the terrible Chinese. After we ate we enjoyed our first free sample of the infamous goon that we had heard so much about whilst we took part in a quiz at the hostel. Goon is basically an alcoholic drink which is mascara ding as wine but served from 4L+ boxes and made of, well, no one really knows.

The next day we woke to a sunny day and after checking out made a sort trip to Travellers Autobahn to pick up our camper van – passing several gorgeous car garages on the way. The van wasn’t ready at first so we went and got a smoothie/juice drink to pass the time. One of those that are made in front of you using a blender – heavenly. Pete ordered an apple juice and there the women must have blended about 12 apples into a 500ml container for it. When we returned we were given the decision of Excess Waiver or not. Basically when you hire the van it is insured but with an excess of about 1500 pounds if it is written off etc. You can however reduce this to 125 pounds if you pay a daily fee adding up to about 450 pounds for the length of our rental. After much discussion we felt the only way to reach a fair decision was the trusty rock paper scissors. Who ever wins gets to choose – we didn’t get the excess waiver. At time of writing this at has worked in our favour, fingers crossed well have no mishaps from now on in.

Sam drew the short straw and had to drive “the rig” first through the horrible busy roads of Sydney with its grose one ways systems and thousands of traffic lights and lanes that randomly end with no warning and toll roads that have no cashier because all the locals use Etags which means people like us a pretty buggered – I think this sets a nice picture. Anyway, we had a mare – driving 74km and passing through toll roads that led to places we didn’t even want to go – so we decided to purchase a city map. Which worked well and we found a nice spot by a sports park with WC’s and a BBQ where we stayed for to nights in the end whilst seeing Sydney. Fortunately man points were still intact as we did not ask anyone for directions. That evening we planned the drive for the next day – circling points of interest etc and having a rough idea of a route to make it as easy as possible when it cam to actually driving it. This worked quite well as we made it back from North Sydney over the Harbour bridge (tick) into circular quays where you can board a ferry to go to toronga zoo – our original plan. Unfortunately the weather was not as expected and hindered this plan – forcing some on the spot thinking over some noodles at lunch. We visited the opera house (the funny shaped building in all Australia pictures) while we were their which was pretty epic but photos were difficult because of the rain(tick). After this we decided to head into town in the direction of aquarium – we felt it was a decent substitute for the zoo and would involve being dry. On the way we got distracted for quite a while in an awesome apple store. An 3 story all glass building full of apple shininess – you imagine that Matt was struggling to contain himself. Anyway, we finally made it too the aquarium and finally made use of our useless ISIC cards to pay for the entry fee. This place turned out to be awesome. We saw Crocodiles, sharks, manta rays, sting rays, massive cod, huge crabs, eels and of course manatees amongst others. They had these cool tubes that you could walk down as if you were inside the pool that the sharks etc were swimming in which were pretty awesome. We left the aquarium to experience Sydney at night – the bridge etc lit up – which was pretty cool and it had stopped raining! On the way back to the rig we stopped at a sports store to purchase a footieball and Pete bought some running shoes to commence his get fit regime in Oz.

We headed back to our camp, a car park on the outskirts of Sydney, cooked up some dinner and turned in for the night ready to be nine years old again tomorrow and head to the Sydney Zoo.
We awoke the next day and headed to the Zoo for more childishness and again made use of our ISIC cards (they were finally coming good!). We meandered around the zoo seeing all the interesting animals (the ones that could kill a man – not the shitty ones that are basically rats) until <we saw the best thing in the Zoo that day. The lesbian. I say 'the' lesbian, because this..lady..was the dykiest dyke I have ever seen, so much so that we all thought she was a man before she looked up and made face to face contact. Sam even gave a brief Fruedian slip by saying 'Lets go back up and see the lesbians…I mean Zebras' which provided much entertainment for all. We headed back to the rig for a brief spot of lunch and got the real road trip under way.
Deciding we needed to make up a fair nit of driving that day to compensate for the time we had spent in Sydney, so we cained it up the coast to Port Macqurie where we made camp for the night by parking about 10m from the sea, which as waking up to a view goes, was pretty awesome. Not really being much there, we hit the road the next day and moved onto Coffs Harbour another smallish town along the east coast but according to our guidebook was worth visiting. We stayed in a proper campsite that night, making use of our fully functioning microwave (!) and having power for the first time in a few days. We decided that it would be a good time to wop out some of our duty free alcohol that we had purchased from SYD Airport and play our collective favourite drinking game – Ring of Fire. We opened our Mango Malibu and began to play, realising the small pleasures in life – just sitting around a table with good company and good times in general, reflecting on basically how awesome we are. After becoming slightly intoxicated (ahem) we remembered that the campsite had a bouncy 'pillow', like a bouncy castle submerged in the ground and that the addition of rain could have only made this much much more fun that it could have possibly already been. We headed over there and began to realise just what a great idea this was as the water was going everywhere and it turned into a game of who would fall over the first – and as I had been ganged up on in our game of ring of fire prior to this, it was me. Several times in fact. We put our clothes in the wash forgetting we had washing powder I n our drunkenness and hit the hay, on our way to Byron Bay the next day, our first proper stop along the coast.

We headed up to Byron the next afternoon which was just another uninteresting drive along the motorway until we stopped at another rest revive survive stop where we encountered many other campers and caravans doing the same thing. One man especially caught our attention, he was dressed as if he was just about to venture into the heart of Africa when in fact we were only 1000 km north of Sydney, needless to say he was a strange one. After eating some lunch we resumed the drive onto Byron bay, which if the information we had received was correct, was going to be awesome. We came off the motorway early to take the scenic route to Byron which passed through a place called Lennox head where we could view for miles from a cliff side car park. When we got to Byron we drove around for a while trying to find a suitable hiding place to stay that night – this proved quite difficult as they seemed to be quite tight on that sort of thing here. In the end after a trip to the lighthouse for another pretty awesome view out over the sea and long sandy beaches, we headed to the beach car park for a bit where we cooked our first BBQ which after a lot of effort to get it going (the cheapest charcoal and cheapest fire lighters are not always a good shout) it turned out to be a win. Although Matt felt unwell which meant me and Pete ended up having to eat half a cow and a whole pig in burgers in sausages. We finished off with some marshmallows which were questionable and got chatting to a German guy who was also staying in a van/car and had been around Byron for a few nights. He recommended the local supermarket car park as a place to stay for the night. Awesome we thought, right in the centre of the town – a lot easier than we thought it would be. It inevitably didn't end so well. As Pete would probably put it “answering a knock on the door at 530am to a big dyke and being told to move on was a definite loss of man points” According to Pete Caulfield on Lesbians, Dykes are more powerful than men. So we moved 5 mins down the road to a hostel car park and stayed there for the rest of the night. Quite funny looking back at this but not so much at the time!

The next day was fairly productive. I bought a surfboard and we all bought various rash vests/wet suits so we could piss about in the sea on the new board. The current was carnage – we later found out that only experienced guys were in the sea that day. You literally loose concentration for a minute and just drift. Anyhow, we enjoyed getting a good battering. A new experience for Matt and Pete who haven't been in real waves before. We felt it would be necessary to have a proper shower etc after larking about in the sea all day so checked into a camp site and after much discussion about the meatball dinner and pasta we were going to make, we settled for a cuppa soup and got to bed at a human hour. In the morning Matt and Pete went and hired a board each and we spent most of the day in the sea again. The current had eased off a bit but it was still pretty big surf and we were having quite a hard time getting the hang of it. Loved every second of it though. That evening we got round to making the much discussed meatballs which turned out to be awesome then went to check out a recommended bar in town called cheeky monkeys. All in all – pretty disappointed so we again retired to bed. We planned to move up the coast to a place called surfers paradise on the gold coast the following day which, after a while sorting some stuff out that wed left a while (like giving lots of money to wicked travel), we did. We were surprised when we got there at how big the place was and how commercialised it was. Lots of high rise buildings, lots of tacky looking shop s etc etc. Very much like a typical American city. We found a handy place right next to the beach where we managed to stay for two nights without getting moved on. The beach here was awesome – white sandy beaches like a lot of the other beaches we had been on in Australia but it stretched for miles; lined by tall executive looking buildings and posh apartments. The surf was smaller than Byron but neater and just rolled in in nice barrels. The whether while we were here was not bad the first day but the second day we woke to glorious sunshine. No clouds in the sky, the best since we had been in Oz. Had a good day here – Sam surfed in the morning while Pete and Matt wondered into town to sort a couple of things for further up the coast. Then we whopped the football out for a bit of cuppy which, although ridiculously hard work on sand, was a good laugh. After some lunch we decided we should have a change of scenery and move towards Brisbane – hopefully somewhere a bit more low key than surfers. Ended up driving over 100km after getting a bit lost and having a tour of paradise point (an obviously very raaa area where not owning a yacht was abnormal) and some of the more inland towns of the east coast. We ended up at a place called Victoria Point just 40km south of Brisbane which was basically a little crossing point to one of the tiny islands off of the mainland. This was a pretty awesome place – good views and scenery- and we were treated to a beautiful sunset in the evening after a great day for the weather. To finish off we had another BBQ with a large amount of cow and Pete had his first go at driving the rig. Failing quite badly I hasten to add. We woke again to glorious sunshine and after dosing about again for a while we headed up to Brisbane – arriving in plenty of time to look at a few hostels as we felt we needed some time in a proper bed. In the end found a newly built YHA just out of the centre wear we park our van for free – ideal! We checked into our room and sorted out various shit that had been building up after a few days in the van and had a glorious showers – you learn to appreciate the simple things. In our a room were a 3 other guys who, after much deliberation, turned out to be Irish. They came from a little village near Cork and spoke the most un-understandable English I have ever heard from someone who speaks it as their first language. We got chattin to them in the pub that night whilst eating 7 dollar steak/chicken breast and it turned out they were leaving in 2 days and had some stuff to get rid of – inc a car. Eventually we just took a few sleeping bags and bits n bobs off them but at one point were going to have an additional vehicle for just 60 dollars as they couldnt be arsed to sell it. Anyways, we had a couple of nights in Brisbane – a pretty nice city. Very much like Sydney but smaller and a little more chilled out.

Skiing/the rest of NZ…

So we arrived at the base of Mt Hutt got into our gear and purchased our passes for the afternoon. The weather was pretty decent – all was going well. For a while anyway…

We all had a few goes down the learner slope so Matt and Pete could get a feel for being on skis and learn to turn etc. Pete managed to fall over before he got to the lift to go up this slope – Matt 1, Pete 0 I believe. They seemed to pick it up a little – well they could both go straight anyway – so we decided the best way was to throw them in at the deep end and go up on the green run. This seemed like a good idea at the time – what was the worst that could happen? Well… about an hour later and we had got to about half way down the slope. Majority of time Matt had spent on his arse, Pete had gone ahead slightly but also encountered a couple of heavy bails including one which resulting in his infamous convict hat blowing off the side. Eventually Matt started getting the hang of turning without just falling and getting back up facing a different way so we continued down the slope, until Pete fell in front of Matt whilst he was on a roll – causing some more time on the deck. When Pete went to clip back into the skis he noticed that the binding was bent and he wasn’t able to get back into it. In the end he had to walk back to the top of the slope where he handed his skis to a women to take down for him and he got a lift down on a snow-mobile. Meanwhile Sam and Matt went up for another go. When we met up with Pete again, he had got his ski fixed and so we headed back up in the mindset that it can only get better for him. We were wrong. About half way down the mountain, when he was just getting the hang of it, he took another good tumble, banging his head and this time breaking the opposite ski binding. This “threw him into a rage” as he had to walk up the mountain again and follow the same procedure – this time coming down in the chair lift. Whilst Sam and Matt did a couple more runs Pete got the other ski fixed and we met him at the cafe. He didn’t fancy going up again.

Anyway, Matt went up for a final run and managed to get all the way down without falling; out of control for the majority of the run but nevertheless – done well. Sam did a few more runs and ventured to the top chair lift where it was flippin freezing and windy while Matt waited with Pete. This is where it gets more interesting… Pete turns to Matt and says “ I think ive got concussion – I feel like ive been drinking and my vision is a bit blurry.” When Sam had finished his final run we decided it was a good plan for Pete to go get checked out by the on site medical centre. Little did we know that when Sam and Matt returned from waiting in the cafe for a while we would see pete hooked up to oxygen and a blood pressure monitor and shortly be informed that he was going to be transported by helicopter to Christchurch hospital – an hour and a half drive from where we were supposed to be staying that night.

As I’m sure pictures will show you I got into a helicopter to be airlifted to Christchurch hospital, I was not the only person to be airlifted to hospital on this day, I shared the journey with a girl who had at about the same time as I hit my head had faceplanted the ice, unfortunately they had deemed me to be serious so the paramedic in the back of the hospital spent the whole journey staring at me and asking if I was OK, if being in a helicopter on your way to hospital wasn’t disconcerting enough this certainly pushed it over the edge. The helicopter journey was about 20 minutes long and the views were amazing but that was not really what was on my mind, we landed about 10 minutes from the hospital in a park where an ambulance was waiting to take us the rest of the way at blistering pace. We arrived at hospital to be put in beds in the corridor next to the nurses station so they could monitor us closely. When the nurse eventually came to see me they did all the checks I had already had twice which consists of checking my neck isn’t broken, taking me pulse and blood pressure, checking my pupils were dilating correctly etc.

Meanwhile, Matt and Sam were left too drive down the 12km mountain up to the ski base in the quickly dissapearing light before sorting out the hired skiing gear that needed to be returned and the hostel booking that we had for that night (but hadn’t paid for yet) whilst squeezing in an awesome battered Mars or Moro bar; of course. This all went pretty well – the ski store gave us a full refund for Pete s equipment, we didn’t have to pay a penny to the hostel for a late checkout and the battered mars bar was potentially the best ever. To finish it off we decided to push the boat out and get a full fish and chips before setting off to Christchurch. After about an hour and a half – inc a short stop for our pudding of ice cream – we reached Christchurch hospital to find Pete doing what he does best… sleeping! After a short chat with the doctor he was discharged into our care. This inevitably led to many comments and threats that we would take him back to hospital if he was to say, snore that night, for example. After Pete effectively inhaled a subway because he had not eaten in 10 hours we checked into Charlie B’s where we stayed the first time we were in Christchurch. They have possibly the best mattresses in all of New Zealand. The next day we went into the city centre were Sam designed and booked his tattoo and matt booked his to be designed properly on the day he got it done. After that was done we hopped in the car and because we were in Christchurch a few days early we decided to head north to a place called Hanmer Springs we new there was very little there but we went to go into the hot springs they have there after all we had driven most of the south island in the last few days and after the the Mount Hutt incident we thought we would just take a day to relax. Hanmer springs is only 2 hours north of Christchurch and is basically a road with some hot pools in it, but is well worth visiting. We went to the hot pools to chillax and go in their sulphur pools to smell like a stink bomb, but apparently so good things for you, who knew? After being slightly disturbed by the smell we went back to our hostel to eat our dinner and make win cake – atrleast I thought so. Sam and pete were less impressed by the small cake and how it turned out. We rented Wedding Crashers, lolled heartily and went to sleep to head back to C’Church the next day.
After arriving back in C’Church we booked into good old BASE, as we knew it would be a decent hostel and did sweet fuck all, knowing we could just chill out for the next few days and our last in New Zealand. The next day Sam dropped the car back off and he and Pete went out to get ham and came back with $100 of food…..riiight. Whilst a bit confused initially, it soon became clear that all the food would be eaten before we left NZ. And it was…mostly. Anyways, back to the food later. We again did naff all all day and prepared ourselves for the the next day were sam and I would get tattooed.
Not quite sure what to expect when we walked into DV-8 tattoo, which I would highly recommend if anyone ever happens to be in C’Church and wanting a tattoo, I watched as Sam went first having his already been drawn up a few days earlier. I watched as Sam looked mostly comfortable but with a few painful bits – it was hard to tell from the other side of the room going on only his hands clenching to guess that he was feeling the pain. Well after about an hour, he was done and it was my go. Pete and Sam went with Kris and Neils for a well earned subway and to pay Sams fine whilst he prepared mine on his win I-mac. Sam and Pete returned when I was about half way through to see that it was going pretty well – not too many skirmishes just a decent amount of fist clenching. After a short while all was complete and a second visit to subway was in order before we returned to the hostel. That evening we had a few drinks at the hostel with Kris and Neils before venturing out to the bar below which turned out to be pretty poor. We then went for a tour of what C’church has to offer at night before returning home in the early hours of the morning – Pete admittedly most worst for wear.

Neuseeland 1

The last few days have been, as Pete would say, full of win and also an eventful few. I’ll recount the story so far.

So we’ve left Fiji, and are now in cold but awesome New Zealand. After a stupidly early 5am start to get to the airport in time, we landed in Auckland, preparing ourselves for our ridiculous 6/7hr layover until our flight to Christchurch. Luckily we got bumped onto an earlier flight to Christchurch and avoided our pointless and unnecessary delay. That coupled with finding our first subway in three weeks – the day was going well. Now, we’d been told that NZ was cold, but having ventured outside the airport in Auckland we wondered what everyone was complaining about as it was sunny and warm. However, by the time we got to Christchurch we had seen what everyone meant. It was like coming to England, with it cold wet and raining when we arrived. A bit bummed out, but still eager to see what NZ was like we headed to the hostel and came to the realisation that it was going to be cold as we were provided with heaters and proper duvets for the first time in nearly a month after being used to air-con and sleeping in a sheet in Fiji. We did our first proper ‘shop’ together, got some fodder for dinner and cooked a ‘win dinner’ as it is now known of beef fajitas. We’re a bit good. The next day we headed out into a rainy Christchurch again and went exploring. It’s a nice city, very historical and picturesque, but not really a city for backpackers though. We had a look around, took some pictures and headed back to the hostel to discuss the burning question of the day – How were we going to get round NZ?

We had heard great things about the Kiwi Experience, a bus that tours round the country doing different routes depending on what package you buy. There are a few other companies which do the same thing, but everyone we’ve met has said do the Kiwi Experience because it was so good. So we didn’t….We decided that the bus package things were too much money for what you got and we could do it better and cheaper ourselves by renting a car and driving down to Queenstown at least, as that’s where all the crazy shit like throwing yourself out of planes is. So we gave a few rental places a call and before you knew it we had rented ourselves a beautiful Toyota Echo! In eager anticipation, we spent one more night at the hostel ready to go and pick it up in the morning.

Morning came and we got picked up to collect our beauty of a car and arrived at the rental place massively underwhelmed. We had been given a Nissan Pulsar – whatever the fuck that is – and to make it much much worse…it was an auto…eurghh. They didn’t have any manuals to rent apparently, so we would have to make do. We stopped at a supermarket to stock up on some rations for the journey and got on our way. Out of Christchurch the roads opened up and we got to see what a beast of a car (we had grown to start to like it by now as it was so easy to drive and required virtually no effort at all from us) could do. Mostly boring straight highways inland towards Lake Tekapo, our stop for the night, we were trying to raise the banter to make this a quality road trip. We needn’t have bothered. Treated to some unbelievable changes of scenery, going from normal suburbia then suddenly changing to mountain ranges in the distance, we were starting to love NZ more and more. It also turns out the man who designed NZ and its road system made it into one giant race track/rally course with the hill/mountain roads being super fun and well….being man children and all we couldn’t resist going back on ourselves to drive the same bit of road for the 2^nd/3^rd time for funsies. Video below.

We continued on some fantastic roads again and began to realise what a great trip this was turning out to be. The car held up, even after some intense ragging of the engine to see what it could do, and after pushing it to 160kph, we realised that anything higher might cause certain death to all three of us. We reached Lake Tekapo late afternoon and after visiting our intended hostel n being slightly creeped out by one of their 80 yr old guests we stumbled upon our hostel (after following signs to hot springs) for the night, an awesome log cabin type buildings about 200m from the Lake itself, with a stunning view from our room. We rounded off the day by cooking another win dinner, following it with a massive bowl of Angel Delight of which when we brought it out to the TV area you could see how jealous people were of it and watching There’s Something About Mary to finish. We went to bed satisfied and content that we had made a great choice by hiring a car.

We awoke the next day ready to continue our voyage to Queenstown with less than half the total distance to go. It had snowed during the night slightly which made our view that little bit better as we looked out onto the lake in the morning. We dumped our stuff back in the car and headed back en route to Queenstown.

We had decided to take a slight detour up to Mount Cook, New Zealand’s biggest mountain, which involved a 180km round trip against where we should have been going, however it was totally worth the detour as yet again we were treated to some awesome mountains and some epic roadage which we larked about on whilst we still had the opportunity to – naturally. We stopped in a café nestled in Mt. Cook and milked the shit out of the free refills on our hot chocolate before heading back onto the racetra- I mean road back to Queenstown.

During the trip, well actually before the trip, we had been advised that the route we were planning to take to Queenstown had a mountain pass in it, Lindis Pass, which could be closed due to poor weather/snow and that snow chains could be necessary. We took the offer thinking they wouldn’t be needed, but it couldn’t hurt just in case. Well, we got onto the Lindis pass without really realising it, thankfully it was open so we ventured in expecting some more awesome views and we got them. We also got an unexpected mishap during our passing through. Basically, we decided to pull over halfway through the pass, about an hour from either side and civilisation to fuck about in the snow as we don’t get snow like that at home. After pissing about for about 15mins, we got back into our trusty car to warm up and carry on to find the engine wouldn’t start. At first I thought Sam was dicking about trying to be funny, but I soon realised that the car had actually died. On a hill, in the snow, in the middle of fucking nowhere. And no phone signal to ring the breakdown company. Great. We popped the bonnet and almost everyone passing by stopped to offer assistance, but none had jump leads which we needed to jump the car (collectively, with no mechanical experience between us, we decided that the battery had probably died, or the starter motor maybe). Anyway, lady luck must have been on our side, because the next guy that stopped had jump leads on him and offered to tow us further up to a safe place where he could jump start us. We got towed up the hill and missed the safe place as the guy towing us was too busy rolling a cigarette and bitching about Japanese cars (whilst driving a Toyota van I hasten to add), which was reassuring, so he got in our car and reversed it down the hill with ice and snow on the roads with no power/brakes into the safe spot. He then returned to his vehicle remarking how “that was a bit sketchy ey, I can see why ya didn’t wanna do that ey.” The saga continues – he had to reverse his car down to so he could park it close enough for the leads to reach – turns out the car batteries are now on opposite sides. With gravity no longer on our side we had to push our car back so he could turn his round n match up where the batteries were – sounds easy… So now his car is stuck in the snow. All three of us then pushed his van out of the snow (harder than it sounds when your footing is on ice), the bloke turned his van round and we eventually attached the leads. Finger, toes etc. crossed he turned the key and the sound of an engine running has never felt so sweet. He went on his way so he would not be obliged to stop if we had any further problems and so we followed shortly after. Between him leaving and us being able to get on our way a people carrier full of Japanese people decided to bomb it into the ‘safe’ spot only to beach their car in deep snow. Doing them a favour we helped to push them out before have to push our selves back onto the road. We drove in a way we thought would charge the battery quicker shall we say and didn’t turn the engine off for the rest of the day!

Anyway, we finally arrived in Wanaka and were met by more glorious views of the mountains and another huge lake just metres from the main road through the town. The town itself was a small typical ski town but with not too much going on in the way of partying in the evening we stayed in the hostel n got through some vodka we had bought from the airport – we felt it was appropriate after our roller-coaster day. The manager of the hostel turned out to be a fun killer though so it ended up being a pretty poor night – resorting to playing poker with ripped up leaflets. We also soon realised that our food bag was missing a vital component. Pete had managed to leave a whole box of unopened rice bubbles at Lake Tekapo. This may sound a fairly small inconvenience but we felt it gave us the right to lay into him for a good few days solid. Matt had to venture out at 9am to buy cereal to satisfy his appetite. Sam improvised with a bit of bacon we had left over. Pete to this date shows no remorse!

We continued on our journey – now the final leg to Queenstown. Just a short drive today but we decided to use a secondary highway to cut off a corner n shorten our journey slightly. This turned out to be a bit of a win decision as unknowingly we ascended to the peak of another mountain to reveal stunning views of Queenstown and surrounding areas (Kawarau River etc.) Their was again a stop required to piss about in the deep snow and take some pictures. It was a gorgeous clear day and their were a few other people at this stop off point. One man of note was a Japanese guy who had migrated to Australia some years ago – accent was comedy! After our trusty steed started on the button we started the descent of the mountain and unfortunately got stuck behind a lorry full of hay bails which was “shedding its load” as Pete bluntly put it. A little while later we arrived in Queenstown and were pleased to see it was busy.

After driving around for a while we made a collective decision that a fergburger was a necessary lunch. For anyone who doesnt know, Fergburger is basically a gourmet burger place that has a reputation that proceeds even Monster Micks (its a similar idea but actually has a shop.) Anyhow, we ordered our chosen burgers and waited with a ticket number wed been given when ordering. Problem was, an Asian guy was calling the ticket numbers and didnt speak great English. Twenty one, for example, was more like hehee hon – ok when you know what he’s trying to say but somewhat problematic when your guessing between about 10 different numbers. Nevertheless this provided us with some entertainment while we waited and we got our burgers – if you can call them that. Pete and Matt ordered a Mr Big Stuff which consisted of ½ pound of beef, bacon, BBQ sauce, cheese, onion, tomato, lettuce, aioli and relish. I think this paints a pretty good picture. The burger, we all agreed, was another win decision but concluded that, being faithful to our roots, Micks was still the winner.

Now we had filled our stomachs we decided it was time we looked for a place to stay tonight. The first two places we asked which were located right in the middle of town were both fully booked. So we drove around for a while eventually finiding a place called deco backpackers. Free wifi etc we decided to go for it. Hostel was pretty nice but room was so cold – the hostel manager had been using it for a workout room so windows were left open, heating turned off, I think you get the idea. Matt retreated to his cocoon as has become expected when we turn at a new place.

Aaaand….thats all I, well we, as you may have noticed that Sam and Pete have started to add to this as well and will be doing so from now on, I can be bothered to write. Until next time when there is more tales of tomfoolery and japery to tell. Goodbye!

Skydivving

Why jump out of a perfectly good aeroplane? This is a question quite rightly posed to you as you turn up at the airfield ready to do the exact thing that the question poses. Allow me to rewind a few days. Now we were in Queenstown we had decided it was time to do some of the crazy stuff associated with the town. We ummed and aahed and deicded we would do a skydive first, hearing that it wasn’t actually as scary as it sounds….yeahh. Well we went into the shop and booked one for two days later hoping that it wouldnt be cancelled as skydives are notoriously easy to be cancelled if there is low cloud, high wind, rain, poor light etc. Now skip forward two days to a bright and sunny and also brisk tuesday morning when we were going to jump out of a plane. Surprisingly, none of us felt nervous as we made the short walk to the shop from our hostel. Upon arriving we handed over the money which was a depressing act, but as we would soon discover, completely worth it. We went into some kind of briefing room where we filled out some forms alerting us to the fact we were about to fall 15,000ft and the risks associated with this. After everyone else had arrived and filled in forms etc etc, we bundled into a van and headed to the airfield. A nervy drive later and we arrived at, well basically a field with a building in it. Somewhat confused as to whether this was really where we would be skydiving from, we soon saw several dives come in to land, looking rather awesome as well may I add. I’ll now skip forward about 45mins, as were the second last to jump – we were called up to go through to the bit where you get kitted up and ready. After putting on our giant romper suits and looking particularly foolish, we each met our jumpmaster/instructor person who we would be attached to. They put on the harnesses, gave us gloves, goggles and hats and made sure we were ready to dive. We then had potentially the shortest safety briefing ever, which was slightly disconcerting considering what we were doing, which can be summed up as – make your body into the shape of a banana. Not feeling any safer, we were told to wait as our plane was coming back in to land. About 5 or so minutes later, we made the walk from waiting area to plane. During this time, your divemaster walks behind you, guiding you where to walk in realtion to the very old school front-propellor plane and there was a pretty good reason why. By doing this, you never get to see the parachute, and I never would have if Pete hadnt dropped one of his gloves as he got into the plane. My divemaster went and got it and in doing so I saw the size of the parachute – a tiny red backpack that was smaller than all of our daysacks we had bought with us travelling. Feeling slightly nervy now, I got into the plane, sat between my instructors legs and we took off. This was an experience in itself, as the diminutive nature of the plane meant all 9 of us (Us 3, our partners and 3 camera guys doing some solo stuff) were crammed in as it was and take off only meant everyone slided towards myself, who was at the tail end of the plane, about half a metre from falling out of the door. My instructor and I made small talk during the plane journey and I discovered that he had never been a passenger in a tandem skydive, he had only done it as the lead jumper. I glanced out the window/door and began to realise how high we were, waay above the mountains, at which point my instructor showed me his altimeter and I saw we were on 5,000ft high. WTF?! We were only 1/3rd of the hight we were going to jump from and it already looked a long way down. Soon we were climbing higher and higher and I got strapped to my instructor, by about 5 clips, which again was not completely reassuring, but I had faith – people do this everyday and don’t die, right? Another glance at the altimeter and were at 14,000ft, now this was high, waay above the mountains, clouds, everything basically. I goggled up and was ready-ish. The door opened and it was then I realised just what I was about to do. Throw myself out of an aeroplane at 15,000ft. The 3 camera guys went first and in a blink of an eye, they were in the plane, then had disappeared completely. Now it was my go. We shuffled to the door, and with my hands on my harness, head titled back and legs wrapped round the underside of the plane, I was hanging out of a plane, and should have been falling with the way my body was positioned, but the fact that I was attached to someone else was stopping me from doing so – for a few seconds at least. My instructor counted down from 3….2…..1 and that was it. In an instant I was falling. Falling at 200kph straight towards the ground. We hit terminal velocity within 12 seconds and I’ll be honest – it was fucking awesome. There is no worry, no sense that you are essentially plummeting to a certain death if the parachute doesn’t open, only realisation as to what you are doing and how unbelievably good it is. Eventually the parachute opened and after being loosened slightly, you are able to take in your surroundings, with the awesome mountains of Queenstown everywhere around you, all 3 of us couldn’t stop smiling. I landed first, then Pete and finally Sam and all three of us were grinning massively – and shaking from the adrenaline rush that comes with it. And that’s basically it. We threw ourselves 15,000ft out of a plane and it was epic.

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

FeeeJeeee!!

Ok, firstly huuuge apologies to anyone that has been checking this blog often, not many I’m sure, but I am aware i have hardly updated this, so I am now going to try and recollect that last 3 weeks and put it into words.

I’m currently sitting in The Uprising Beach Resort in Pacific Harbour, Fiji. Its raining and windy which sucks and whilst my compatriots have gone diving, I’m using my downtime to finally update this. Let me begin….

We arrived in Fiji after having enjoyed LA, though 2 days was plenty of time there really and also having spent 10hrs on a plane to Nadi, arriving on a Monday having left on Saturday night and completely losing Sunday as a day. We got through the usual airport boredom and got to our hostel and having perhaps one of the best views i imagine we’ll have all trip..

room with a view?

We spent a couple of days in Nadi Bay, having adventured into Nadi Town itself, which was, well, and experience at least. After getting mugged off by the bus driver on the way back and missing the hotel and ending up in the airport, we got a free ride back with our hotels shuttle bus and were now looking forward to heading off on our island tour.

potentially the nicest beach ever...?

We spent 11nights/12days cruising around the Mamanuca and Yasawa island groups off the west coast of Fiji, beginning with our first stop at South Sea Island. About 30mins from the port, this tiny island which is the smallest in the Mamanuca group can be walked around in about 5mins. We had a good 2 nights there though, having almost died trying to kayak in crazy strong currents on our first day, we then spent that night drinking 2 litres of vodka between ourselves and two other people we met and generally having good times. It wasnt such good times however, when we had to go on a Seaspray cruise the next day…eurgh. Still feeling slightly worse for wear from the night before, the 5 of us went on a cruise to some of the nicest places im sure i will see ever. After parting ways with our new found friends who we had known for less than 24hrs, we headed back to South sea for our lastr night before heading to our next destination of Kuata.

Kuata, we have collectively decided had probably the nicest beach of all the places we visited – sandy, sunny, nice water and friendly locals. The dorms were slightly questionable, with mice prevailant and the beds so wobbly, I was praying that every time Pete moved above me wouldnt be the last sound i hear. We went on a fantastic Reef Snorkelling trip there and saw an amazing reef and sharks! (only tiny reef ones, but sharks nonetheless!) It was good fun and whilst there wasnt loads to do there and the food wasnt great, the locals on the island are what made it as good as it was. They have been the friendliest people we have met so far who were always interested in you and made you feel very welcom and accommodated. We had a particularly enjoyable game of ‘rugby’ – playing keep away with a rugby ball on the beach and sea is as close as i’ll get to playing rugby – with the local kids, who are unbelievably good at rugby. I’ll just mention now though that we won .

After Kuata, we headed north to Korovou Eco Resort for 2 more nights there. It was fairly quiet in Korovou, mostly just spent reading and chillaxing by the pool as the beach wasnt fantastic. A chance to do some more realxing and top up the tan and also get in contact with the outside world as this was one of the few islands which had internet available. Whilst on those islands, the whole of the UK could have disitergrated and we wouldnt have known a thing. It really is a conmplete getaway. However, being the youth of today, we couldnt resist checking facebook and letting everyone know what we’ve been doing. We saw a really good fire dancing show and learnt perhaps the shittiest drinking game everon there as well, but not much else.

We then headed further north to the Coral View resort which wins the award for possibly having the best cake of all the islands, which is kinda a no contest as no other island had $1 cake with afternoon tea, but i felt it was worth a mention anyways. Again, we didnt really do too much on Coral View, however going caving was a particular highlight. We took a 30/40min boat ride to these caves on another island and did a bit of ducking underwater and seeing the natural caves in..action. The caves were great, and the guides we had made the whole experience even better, with on of them getting us to sing ‘row, row, row your boat’ to try and creep us out. We met some quality people there as well and had two pretty good nights with all of them, mostly drinking, playing cards and offending several people with our collection of sick, sick jokes. There was also some hilarious banter as sat at the table were 2 Arsenal fans, a Spurs fan, 1 Man U fan and a Chelsea fan. Needless to say, so character building was done those nights! Our little group of 6 all boarded the flyer with us all headed different ways. For us, we were heading south to Manta Ray Island.

Manta Ray, we have again decided was probably our least favourite island we visited. It had reaaly nice facilities, but was poorly laid out, so that meant if you went to the bar to get drunk, you would then have to navigate your way, drunk, down a slope back to the dorm in near darkness. Then, if you reached the dorm, and you then decidded you need the loo, you would have to walk to the bottom oif the hill, to then walk up some stairs, to defecate into a hole. basically. It wasnt actually too bad, but it was a pain having to walk so far for the loo.  The food on the other hand was fantastic. Having been used to buffets and sometimes piss poor food, we were loving the fact that you were not only given a 3 course meal for dinner, but that you could choose what you wanted. It was pretty good really. The island is named so after the fact that you can see Manta Rays there. Sam went on the boat but only saw one,. which was a bit of a dissappointment. However, only spending one night there, we knew we would be heading to our last island and probably the one we were all looking forward to the most – Beachcomber.

Right down south  in the Mamanucas and about 40mins from port lies the party island of beachcomber and its 80+ bed dorm. I was a bit uncertain as to what to expect, but it wasnt actually too bad. You did wonder how they could fit that many beds into such a small space, but evenm then there was room for more! We had two pretty heavy nights, with general merriment and good times all round, helped mostly by the fact that at happy hour a jug of beer was a freakin steal. We recovered by playing some dreadful mini golf and catching up on the football highlights thanks to the huge tv screen with sky sports on at dinner. It was a great island and probably our favourite one between the three of us.

We headed back to the mainland and spent one night in good ol’ Horizon backpackers then made our way here – Pacific Harbour while pete does his dive course aqnd we chillax some more. Hopefully ill keep up to date with this a bit more, but for now – Ciao!!

Oh Canada….

Finally after 12 hours on a plane we finally made it to LA. Unfortunately, this included a stopover in Edmonton, Canada due to someone on the plane needing to be taken to hospital for feeling unwell. Finally got to the hostel and after a fairly stressful day and being awake for bout 20hrs, we were told our booking didnt exsist. Great! Anyway, it all got sorted and after dropping our stuff down and grabbing some pizza, im sat here having been awake for approx. 23hrs and am verrry tired. so, for now, thats all!

Hello….and goodbye!

Well basically if you’re reading this you might care or something..My fellow compatriots and I are going travelling and this is most likely where I’ll keep everyone up to date and let you know what we’re up to. I’ll update this as we go along – we leave tommorrow! But for now, thats everything.

Matt