Quick Post

A pause to the blog to say that I am leaving New Zealand today to go to South America. I have been very bad with my Spanish lessons which I will start in earnest on the plane to Santiago.

I am not sure what the internet set up is like over there but I will need to try to save some money while I am travelling so I might not be on as much.

I shall continue to update the blog - still ALOT to do for New Zealand which has been fantastic but also very expensive but what to hell!

Two months travelling in South America to come - with hopefully some conservation work at an animal rescue place (thats the plan anyway)

Adios for now.

Queenstown, New Zealand

Jet boat - 31st Jan

Queenstown is probably the most famous adventure resort in the world. I decided before I left Wanaka that I was going to stay there for at least 3 days and Party!

I arrived a little after 1pm and booked myself into the large Base hostel which I knew would be used by all the Kiwi Experience people. Once I had done that I decided to immediately set about doing something so I went to the Base travel desk and booked myself onto the local Jet boat ride at shotover gorge for 3pm.

At just before 3 I made my way up to the company office where myself and several other people were placed on a shuttle bus to take us up to the starting point. The trip only lasted 15 minutes before we were there.

We all got kitted up in raincoats and a lifejacket before jumping on the boat. I was at the back with another couple who turned out to be a girl from Ireland and her English boyfriend.

After the obligatory photo we were off down the river.

The boat trip basically consisted off the driver heading straight for rocks before turning at the very last minute. From the back it looked as if we were going to hit them everytime. We hurtled down through the gorge doing this sort of thing until we entered a more open area of the river. Here the driver did their trademark 360 turns.

Up until this point nobody had really been soaked but on the turns the people at the back (me!) got the full force of the spray.

It was all very enjoyable and was over in about ½ hour which was a pity.

Afterwards we all went up to the visitor centre where we could purchase a photo pack for the trip. As part of the deal Base had I had a voucher which entitled me to one photo free of charge which I duely collected – much to the annoyance of a old English guy who started giving out stink about having to pay full whack for his photos (wanker!) . I had the choice of going back on the next shuttle or hanging around so I decided to hang about to see if I could get some shots of other jetboat trips. After waiting what seemed like forever (but was probably only 5 mins) I assumed that there were going to be no more trips and went to get a beer.

Of course half way through the beer I heard the jet boat starting up again. I managed to get a small sequence of long cistance shots before it carried off down the gorge.

That night all the Kiwi ones were in the base bar. Two of them had done a skydive in Wanaka early that morning and still seemed to be on an adrenaline rush from it saying it was the best thing they ever did (having now done mine I can well believe them!). Others on the bus had already done the small bungy jump on the way in to queens town. It’s regarded as the very first Bungy in the world and is a mere 43m off a bridge.

I was still saying I had no intention of doing an bungy jump or canyon swing. It was a good night which involved rather too much drinking. The hostel held a prize game of killer pool which I put my name down for but was I was soon out of contention having squandered my 3 lives with some rather bad misses.

Everybody was talking about what they were going to do tomorrow. Some were going to Milford sound, some were doing the big bungy like Nevis or the Ledge as well as the canyon swing. I decided I would go white water rafting.

A group of us ended up in the New World bar up the road which had better music and was open late then it was over across the road for a Ferg Burger. I thought I would help the eradication of pests effort by having a bambi burger (deer being another mammal pest). Then I went back to base to sleep it off.

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White Water Rafting - 1st Feb

I somehow managed to get up early enough the next day to book myself onto an afternoon white water rafting trip run by the same company who do the shotover jetboat.

Again we were taken by bus up to the same place as the jetboats only this time we had to put on a complete wetsuit before transferring to another bus that would take us to the rafting start point. The journey took over 45 minutes (not the most comfortable journey to do in a wetsuit!) and took us down skippers road which is one of the most dangerous gravel roads in New Zealand with needle sharp corners and 100m cliffs.

Eventually we got there and I was teamed up with the rest of my crew for the journey down stream.

Things I have learnt.

1. Don’t say you have done white water rafting before because that means you will get put at the front of the boat like I was. The people at the front have to do most of the rowing and get most of the soaking!
2. When you come to a ‘gentle’ part and are allowed to jump out into the water to swim about, DON’T. Jumping out and swimming around is all very well but then you have to try to haul your big ass back in again and I am just not fit enough. When I did manage to get back in (with help from other members of the crew) I spent the next 5 minutes trying to grab my breath. My very tightly bound lifejacket was acting like a boa constrictor on my lungs and I honestly thought I was going to have a heart attack!

The trip would probably have seemed like a very good and exciting introduction to most other people but this was my third time white water rafting and in comparison to the other two experiences in Australia and Costa Rica I found it quite tame.

For one thing it was too expensive at $169 for what was basically a 90 minute trip. For another thing although they had some reasonable rapids they were all at or near the end of the trip so the first part just seemed like an amble down the river (still the scenery was good and we did get to go through a rather cool tunnel at the end).

I am pretty sure there are better and cheaper places to do this in New Zealand.

Once again I met up with the Kiwi Mob and drank for most of the night in Base backpackers. I had been trying to think what to do for my last day in Queenstown and was eventually decided to go on the Kiwi Experience run day trip to Milford sound the next day. The ones that had been on it that day said it was fantastic and several of the others were doing it the next day so I thought why not. It meant an early night though so no World Bar.

Wanaka, New Zealand

30th - 31st Jan

I arrived in Wanaka and booked into a small quiet hostel. I then did a walk around town and bumped into some of the Kiwi gang from Franz Joseph Glacier who intorduced me to more of their bunch. I arranged to meet them later at Base backpackers where they were staying to continue drinking.

After a rather good cheap BBQ at base hostel we were all looking to go out and explore the town for some good bars. After looking around we learnt that BASE was the only happening bar in the town and so ended the night back there getting merrily pissed.

The next day everyone was heading to Queenstown via Wanaka puzzle world which is a great stop off - for only $12.50 you can get to look at holograms and visual art and weird tilted rooms. Then you can go and try their rather hard maze which I did in the hot feirce sun but I eventually did it!

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Glacier Hike - Franz Joseph, New Zealand

28th-30th Jan



Before I arrived in Franz Joseph I phoned ahead and booked what looked to be the best hostel going by BBH ratings. Booking was a long drawn out process as the Kiwi girl on the other end of the phone didn’t seem to understand a word I said. It doesn’t seem to matter if I say my name is Ray, Raymond or bleeding Rasputin nobody seems to understand me the first time. For this booking I had to resort to police mnemonics.

Kiwi: I am sorry could you repeat that name please.
Me: Its Ray that’s R for Romeo, A for Andy, Y for Why don’t you bloody understand me I am speaking English!

I arrived at my Back packers in Franz Joseph at about 6pm. An English girl was on reception and when she heard my voice she said – ah yes you must be the Irish guy who phoned earlier. The Kiwi girl said there would be an Irish guy arriving who she couldn’t understand. Just as well the English girl could.

Once I had booked in I had to decide what to do tomorrow. I knew I was going to the Glacier but I did not know how or for how long. I started asking round via phone texts to people I knew had already been here. The 3 options were:

1. Don’t do a guided hike but simply walk to the base of the glacier and take photos. I immediately dismissed this option. I did not come all the way to New Zealand to not walk on a glacier.
2. Option 2 was a half day walk which took you onto the ice for about 2 hours
3. Option 3 was a full day hike which had you on the glacier for at least 5 hours.

The problem with option 3 is that it was described in the brochure as adventurous and for fit people. I was neither!

I still had not decided by the time I went to bed after a ‘couple’ of pints at the local bar.

Early the next morning I went round to the guide place and booked myself onto the full day hike – what the hell you only live once!

DM was going to come with me but we decided to leave Taz behind as it may prove to be too risky:

DM explaining to Taz about the risks



Poor Taz – don’t worry we left one window slightly open and some water for him to drink – I am not cruel!

At 9am I went back to get kitted out along with over 40 other people who would be doing the hike with me. A looked around at the other people trying to gauge how fit they were from age, weight and height. I saw enough old, fat or tiny people to ensure that I had nothing to worry about.

Each person was given an overcoat, leggings, hat, gloves, boots and most important of all ice crimps for putting on the boot soles. Then it was onto the bus and the 10 minute drive to the start of the hike. To get to the bottom of the glacier meant that we had to walk at least 2km from where the car park was – over some rough terrain as well.

Before we started walking up through the valley to the actual glacier we were put in groups of 11 – 4 groups in total. Rather than have the guides decide who went were we were asked to assess ourselves in terms of how fit we are. The ones who thought they were the fittest would be in team A. They would be ascending the glacier the quickest. The next 2 groups would be for people who thought they were quite fit and the last group would be for the people who wanted to take it nice and slow. They would still get there – just not as quick as the others. Guess where I went – Group D!

After we had sorted our group out our guide Kevin asked us to introduce ourselves to the rest of the group. I knew I had chosen the right group when the first guy introduced himself

‘Hi I’m Steve, from Ireland and my biggest drinking injury was….!’

And so it went round the rest. Each saying there name, where they were from and what there biggest drinking injury was. I thought I had them stumped when It came to my turn:

‘I’m Ray from Ireland and my biggest drinking injury was breaking my Elbow’ I looked smugly around me thinking ‘Beat that’. The next guy beside me said well Mine wasn’t a drinking injury but I did have a motorcycle accident and lost my foot which was sewn back on. Okay he beat me!

It turned out that most of my group were from a Kiwi Experience bus. As well as Steve there was 3 cork girls (all nurses), and 5 English Guys – one Doug was well into his 50’s. It was going to be an interesting hike

We started our walk to the glacier which went through forested areas as well as rivers and rocks. By the time we got to the actual glacier we were all quite poopped. At the bottom of the glacier we were shown how to put on are crimps then it was up onwards and upwards onto the ice.


Are we nearly there yet?


Upwards onto the glacier


DM helps with the icepick carrying


It soon became apparent thet some people were fitter than others on our group. One of the English guys – a big guy called Steve was not enjoying himself at all. I thought it was great and not half as bad as imagined.

We went through Ice caves:


And crevices:


and up steep ice stairs:





Getting further and further to where we would stop and have lunch (which we had to have prepared ourselves) One of the Cork girls Midge had already munched through about 2 chocolate bars by this stage.

It was soon after Lunch that Steve gave up – he just was not enjoying himself so Kevin was able to put him in a group that was already descending the glacier.


The crew minus Big Steve

The rest of us went on up the ice sheets getting into ever steeper crevices.



Everything was going great until our Guide Kevin decided to try to get past us all by scaling a vertical ice wall:



2 Seconds after this photo was taken he slipped and fell to the bottom dislocating his shoulder!

In all credit to him he carried on with the rest of the trip even though he was in agony. One of the Cork girls offered to give him some pain killers which he refused more out of Pride then common sense.

The journey back down the Glacier was more dangerous than on the way up. Partly this was due to being tired but also because Kevin had decided to go at a breakneck speed so he could get down in time. I nearly went over on my ankle a couple of times. Eventually we all got off the glacier and started the long march back to the bus which seemed to take an eternity (why is does it always seem twice as far when you go back down a path!).

Finally we were in the bus and heading back to the hostel. It was exhausting but I think that was because of the time not the distance or the effort – I am really glad I did the full day.

That night we all met up again in the Kiwi Experience peoples hostel to partake in some beverages. Kevin even turned up to say that the Nurse had looked at his shoulder and he should be back at work again next week!

The next morning I had planned to go and do a half day Kayak at Okirito Lagoon which is supposed to be a very famous wetland area in New Zealand. Sadly it started raining so I decided it would not be a good idea to be out on a lagoon so I started on my way to Wanaka via sight seeing stops like Fox Glacier and the blue pools on the way.

Facebook pics

Punakaiki, New Zealand

27th - 28th Jan

I had promised both Sam and Brecht that I would try to see them again so after I filled up my running on fumes car in Westport I drove down the West coast to Punakaiki. I booked myself into the Te Nikau Hostel which was about ½ mile away from the Volunteer house.

Once I had booked into the hostel I called into the volunteer centre to say hi to Brecht and the new volunteers who all turned out to be Korean. I found out that Sam was actually staying in the same hostel as me as he his girlfriend had come to visit. When I went back to the hostel I bumped in to them making their tea.

As the pub was too far away to walk to and stagger back I decided that after I had my own food (some tin of something with microwavable rice) that I would return to the Truman trail which was were I got the good sunsets the previous time I was there.

The sunset was not as good as the previous time but its still a great place to go last thing at night. The weather was far worse this time which meant that I managed to slip on my arse on some wet rocks.


Sunset


Slippy rocks - with the indent of my bum!

After the sunset I went back to the hostel to have an early night. Te Nikau is not really a hostel but a set of lodges set into native woodland . Each lodge was self contained with kitchen and bathroom. My lodge was about 50m from the main reception and slept 7 people. The good thing about the lodge was that there was no bunks. The bad thing was that that my bed and two others were all set end to end. This wasn’t really bad for me but was potentially lethal for the Swedish girl who was in the next bed. Why was it lethal – well let’s be honest 6 months travelling has not been kind to my feet - which stink. This is not normally a problem to me as my nose is at least 5 feet away from them. Unfortunately this girl would not have that luxury!

So before I went to bed I resolved to get my feet as clean as possible so I spent some time in the bathroom washing my feet in the sink - yes the sink! I know what your thinking – why did he not just have a shower. Trust me when I say that my feet needed special attention that a simple shower could not handle! I hope that Swede realises the antics I went through to make sure she had a smell free night. I probably kept her awake anyway with my snoring.

The next day I met up with Sam and the volunteers who were – guess what - gorse bashing. What they were doing was clearing a path so the DOC people could get Quad bikes into the midst of the gorse to finish them off with sprays. We also tried to make a path through to the beach through some really thick gorse but ended up giving up before lunch. I said my final farewells to the lads and then headed off on another long journey to Franz Joseph Glacier.


Gorge near Punakaiki


People I have seen/met:
On the way back from the sunset beach I seen this idjit who, having crossed the barriers was taking pictures on other slippery rocks close to the edge of the cliff. Myself and a number of other people stood and stared in disbelieve (Actually what we were doing was waiting for a freak wave to come and wash him away!) Luckily (or unfortunately depending on how evil you are) for him it never happened

Idiot photo taker - sorry for the shaky photo it was very dark and I wasn’t going anywhere near any cliff edge!



Things I have learnt:
Never leave your food on the ground for even a minute when there are wekas about, I was transferring my food from the lodge to the car and set it down on the ground to go and get more stuff. When I got back a weka was busy rummaging through my food! The crafty wee bird!

Facebook pics

Driving in New Zealand

THINGS I HAVE LEARNT

I have learnt several valuable things about the road system and driving habits of kiwis while I have been driving round the country:

1. In most parts of New Zealand the speed limit is 100kph which is about 60 miles an hour. In a lot of places the road is so windy (see glossary update) that this is an just not possible. I thought Tasmania had windy roads until I came to New Zealand!

2. Sometimes especially on the south Island there are large distances between Petrol Stations so you should always try to keep your tank as full as possible. I realised this fact while driving from Nelson to Punekaiki as my fuel tank went dangerously low. I tried to save on fuel by constantly putting the drive stick into neutral while going down any steep hills. It was working very well too until I mistakenly put the drive stick too far – into the reverse gear! It made a very strange noise and then stalled. It would have been ok if I stalled on level ground but I was still motoring along at 60kph down windy roads only without my power steering or my servo brakes! I eventually got the thing to stop at a lay-by and decided not to try that again! I got to a petrol station with fuel to spare in the end.

3. In order to save money the New Zealand road authority have come up with a novel idea – only have one lane on their bridges. It seems that over half the bridges in the country only allow travel one way at a time. Luckily the people here have pretty good road manners so it is is never really a problem. I can just imagine them trying that in Ireland – you would have people driving their cars into the middle of bridges and then refusing to reverse as another car comes in the opposite direction. Sometimes its not just cars you have to share the bridge with – they also have instances of trains using them as well:


Combination Lefthand drive, Righthand Drive, Railtrack Bridge!

4. Another novel thing they have in New Zealand is that if you are turning left at a crossroads and the driver opposite is turning right into the same road you are then you have to give way – not the other way around. I am sure I have buggered this up at several crossroads.

Of course the best thing about driving in New Zealand is the scenery which, because you are actually driving the car rather than dozing on a bus you actually get to see. I have been on mountain drives that have been breathtaking and coastal drives that are every bit as good as the great ocean road in Australia.

Glossary update:
K:
Kaikoura: (sorry Forgot this from my last post)Maouri Place name: Means – Meal of Crayfish (its very famous for them)
My first attempts at it consisted of things like Kinkykara, Kockykia, and KickyKocky

W
Windy: English Adjective. I said the roads in New Zealand were Windy to a German who had not heard of the word so asked me to spell it which I duly did. Of course this confused him even further as it is the same spelling as Windy as in the weather is very windy today! Trying to explain English to other people is very hard!

Nelson, New Zealand

25th - 27th Jan
At Noon on Sunday I picked up my hire car which I would be using for the next 32 days. It turned out to be a small Mazda Masio. It was a funny looking thing which looked sort of like a miniature people carrier. It had lots of stone chippings at the front which was good – I would rather have a beat up hire car than a brand new one. This one was anything but brand new – it had 160,000 km on the clock and it was also an automatic (they all seem to be automatics here).

I went back to the backpackers and put all my stuff in, said goodbye to Brecht and I was on my way.

My first stop was supposed to be Kaikoura (see glossary update) but instead I decided to drive all the way to Nelson to meet up with my Friends Lloyd and Deirdre. It was a Long journey – over 400k and I had to stop every now and then for food and naps but I finally made it at around 7pm that night. I had been in touch with Lloyd about where they were staying which was supposed to be the Paradiso so I phoned them up and booked in for two nights. However, when I got there I discovered they had moved to another backpacker place in town because they did not like the Paradiso (the kitchen was a mess and it was too rowdy the previous night) As I had already booked in before I knew this I had to stay there for the next two nights!

After checking in to my rather small 4 bed dorm (top bunk of course!) I went to Lloyd and Deirdre’s far better hostel to meet them. It was good to finally meet somebody I knew from back home. After some food and beer I said goodbye to them and headed back to my noisy hostel. The next day we would be wine tasting!

Raymond and Lloyd's Wine Tasting tour:



With special guests Taz and DM

Deirdre had very kindly volunteered to do the driving while myself and Lloyd (who is from Belfast too) sampled the wines:

Our first winery was supposed to be ‘The Grape Escape’ but it was no longer doing tastings – not a good start.

So our first proper tasting was at a place called Seigfried’s which was owned by an Austrian family. We paid $6 each for about 6 wine tastings which was refunded if you bought a wine – which Lloyd did – so he got his money back. I decided that it would be a very expensive day if I bought a bottle of plonk at each winery.

Stop two was at a place called Kaimira.


From the outside it looked as if the place was a just a warehouse but when we got in it had all these funky looking pictures and furniture – very original. Our taste master (or what ever they are called!) turned out to be a very nice English girl who gave us both big measures to taste of each wine – and they were free! In the end we both bought a bottle of wine each.


Sorted!

After a stop off for some pics of St Michaels Anglican church we headed to our third winery at Woolaston Estates.


Church

Stop number 3


This place was very unusual – owned by a rich American and you could tell from the layout. It had an art gallery exhibiting VERY expensive modern art paintings. After our tasting (again free) we bought some more wine and decided to have our lunch in the picnic area outside. Deirdre had brought a all sorts of goodies to make sandwiches and nibbles out of while we slurped away at a bottle of Reisling from the winary. I have to say that if it had been me preparing the lunch it would have consisted of bread, ham and mayo and nothing else – that’s the difference between men and women (or is just between everyone else and me!).


As I was saying


The lines look straight to me!


$18,000 for this!


Sophisticated lunch

Back to the tasting!

Stop 4 was at a place called Neudorf which had more art work to admire (or abuse!)



Hey look at me!


More wine buying

Our final winery was at sunset valley which we got to just in time as he was about to close up. More wine purchases! I had 3 bottles by this stage and Lloyd and Deirdre must have had about 5 or 6!

Stop number 5


After the wineries we made one last stop before heading back to Nelson – A brewery! Here we could also pay for a tasting of their ales – fantastic!


I am doing my homer simpson drooling impersonation!


corrr!


Stop number 6


That's stop number 6


Did I say it say stop number 6?



Our Driver Deirdre is feeling the pace!



Deirdre - best wine tour driver ever!


Then finally it was back to Nelson – slightly drunk. After a minor walkabout the cathedral area while waiting for Lloyd and Deirdre to refresh we all went to a local establishment for some final drinks before parting company for the night.


Ah - paradise!

Before I left to continue on my journey I met up with Lloyd one last time to climb up to the ‘centre of New Zealand’ monument. After 20 knackering minutes of hiking up a hill we came to the rather sorry looking monument. This apparently marks the exact middle of New Zealand from North to South and East to West. Still the view was nice.


Centre of New Zealand - big deal!

I said my goodbyes to Lloyd and Deirdre and then I was on my way for another long journey back to Punikeiki of all places!

Facebook pics

Busker World Festival Christchurch, New Zealand

23rd-24th Jan

Once I had booked into Base for 2 nights and done some internet time at the library I was ready for a nice relaxing weekend in Christchurch which was holding the world busker festival that week.

Myself and Brecht headed to one of the main venues for the performers – the Arts Centre where we paid a $2 cover charge to get in. By the time we got there the first couple of acts had already finished but we were just in time to see another act start – the goldfish bowl man!

The goldfish bowl man did a quite funny performance involving juggling, balancing and unicycling. He got various members of the audience to help him out with his act.

His final trick was to flip a plastic goldfish from his feet into a bowl on his head – while on a unicycle – which he performed at the second attempt.

The next act was an American woman who hula hoped. Although she was very good at what she did she did not really get the audience going with her chat and tricks. I think there is only so much you can do with hula hoops – even if you are able to twirl 70 hula hoops.

The last act was the most spectacular and consisted of two guys and a girl – all from Canada – doing acrobatics using a ‘Russian pole’ - basically a large beam the two fellas used to fling the girl up in the air so she could do acrobatic tumbles. After some tumbling one of the guys did a juggling routine which included doing 5 batons at once – something the fish man was unable to do. They finished off with a finale of another acrobatic tumble.

All in all a nice change from the usual and we thought for only $2 until the show finished and they all came round with buckets to try to gleam more money out of everybody. They were all buskers after all.

The busking show finished at about 8:30 which meant that for a Friday night it was still pretty early and I needed more entertainment (drink).

So we headed out looking for a band and found one in the local Irish bar of O’Sullivans. Here we seen an Irish band called ‘Black Velvet Band’ who did a really good set of Irish music interspersed with some country (yuck) and rock music. Brecht ended up buying one of their cd’s. I resisted the temptation – especially when I seen that they had only actually performed 1 song of the cd – the one from OH Brother where Art thou. Still it was a good performance which had a lot of Kiwis and other drunk people up on the rather small dance floor. I was too busy drinking to bother with that!

Things I have Learnt:
Not everybody immediately associates Celtic football club with Ireland. I had to explain to Brecht that even though Celtic were in fact a Scottish team that quite a lot of Irish people supported them and that was why they had a Celtic top displayed amongst the memorabilia in the pub. I said that because all the actual Irish teams were crap that they had to support one team that was at least partly successful. To be honest I think it’s a bit daft myself but then I support an English team myself because all the Irish League teams are shite.

On Saturday I had to sort out what I was doing about the rest of my time in New Zealand. During my volunteer time I had decided on 2 things:

1. I needed more time in New Zealand in order to do everything I could and
2. I needed to hire a car rather than go on one of the buses. This would give me more freedom to go where I wanted to in the time available.

As far as the buses were concerned my mind was made up on Friday when I seen upwards of 40 people get out of a KIWI bus and queue up to book into the Base Hostel. It looked like a conveyor belt – not my scene at all.

When I phoned the Quantas office I got some good news and some bad news. The good news was I was able to extend my time in New Zealand – by just over 1 week. The bad news was that I also wanted to extend my time in South America but unfortunately because of problems between BA and Iberia airlines I was not able to do it – so I am definitely back in April (god help you all!)(

For the second task I managed to hunt down a car company which would hire a small car to me for $25 a day – I would pick it up at noon the following day.

Once I had accomplished all that I went to join Brecht who had been watching some more of the busker entertainment out at the park round the corner.

I arrived just in time to see Bendy Em do her routine. Bendy Em turned out to be A contortionist. It made a change from all the juggling. Her pieste de resistance was placing herself into a 18inch box after which she sent round the money bucket at which time we legged it!

That night we went to another busker session – this time it was more of an adult theme.

The first act was the Rubber Band Man (where do they come up with these names!) Basically he was a comedian who put lots of rubber bands on his face as part of his routine. He was actually quite funny – I am not painting a very good picture (No photos I am afraid as the hall was too big – didn’t have my camera with me anyway!)

Two Jokes he told (which you have probably heard)

A blond is standing at the side of a river when she sees another blond across on the other side. She shouts over to her. ‘Excuse me can you tell me how I can get to the other side of the river?’ The other blond looks up and down the river then says: ‘You are on the other side!’ Well I laughed!

Two pregnant women are sitting knitting outfits for their future kids. One says ‘I hope my baby is a boy because I am knitting my outfit in blue’ The other one says ‘I hope my baby is spastic because I have fucked up the arms!’ Hey he said it not me – come back!!!

The next act was very weird – A Japanese clown who used a duck quacker to make sounds. Again he did a lot of physical comical work some of which was very skilful – like standing on 3 chairs balanced one on another.

The next two acts were simply stand up comics – one a famous Kiwi who talked so fast I couldn’t understand hardly anything he said. I thought it was just me until I talked to some other Kiwis who couldn’t understand him either. The next act was better – an Aussi from Adelaide. Can’t remember any of his jokes probably because of the last act who turned out to be a sword swallower. The swallowing of swords I could handle it was the last thing he did for his act that was a bit much to take. He pulled the host on a skateboard using nothing but fishing line with the hooks attached to the inside of his eyelids! YUCK!

After the sword swallower the show ended and the money buckets came out – that was our cue to leave! We ended up back in O’Sullivans bar where the Same band was doing much the same routine as the previous night – except that it was full of even drunker people – most of which, like us, had come from the busker venue just up the road.

Busker Pics

Unsung Hero - Sam Rye

Unlike most of the other volunteer coordinators I have met on my travels Sam from CVNZ did not originally start out in conservation. Instead he got a degree in Business and Marketing and started his career in that line of business.

At some point he decided that he had had enough of this sort of lifestyle and changed his career to become a full time conservationist.

It must have taken a lot of guts to do it but from what I can see he is enjoying every minute of his new life.

I am still unsure if I will go down the conservation route myself when I return home to Ireland but Sam has shown me it can be done – I will wait and see!

Dinosaur sweets

Proposed letter to the Natural Confectionary Company.

Dear Sir/Madam

I would just like to point out a discrepancy with your Dinosaur sweets. From looking at the way you have your dinosaurs standing I can only assume that you are not aware of the today’s accepted view of dinosaur stance.

Rather than having their tails trailing along the ground as you have with your sweets I think you will find that dinosaurs held their tails off the ground as a stiff counterbalance to their head and neck.

I hope that you can soon amend this situation so that I can continue to enjoy your sweets while out and about in New Zealand.

Yours sincerely

Raymond Finn


PS I don’t think the colours are right either!

Conservation Volunteers NZ - Week 2, New Zealand

Monday 19th Jan

For our second week of volunteering we were heading back towards Christchurch through Arthur’s Pass to Craigieburn Park. We did a quick stop for provisions in Greymouth and then another stop for some lunch, food (and beer in my case!) in Arthur’s Pass.

Our old friend Long John was still prowling around looking for scraps of food:

Stumpy


For our accommodation we would be staying in an Education Centre used for schools groups. It was right in the middle of a beech forest with some great views of the mountains beyond. It also had some weird occupants inside:



Hey my armpit smells


What do you mean I fly like a girl!


What did I just hit!

When we arrived we were met by another Ray our contact who showed up in a rather unusual car for a ranger - an old VW beetle. Ray showed us around and then took us to where we would be working for most of the week - cutting down and pulling up small pine trees

First a bit of background. At some time in the 50's some twat in the then forestry service had the bright idea of planting some pine trees in areas of Craigieburn forest. They did this to try to stabilise areas of skree which they believed had been unnaturally caused by grazing of introduced animals. By the time they had figured out that the skree was perfectly natural and was supposed to be there the pines had natured and had their seed blown all over the valley below. Even then they did nothing until recently when pine trees started sprouting as much as 17km away for the initial site.


Ray's Beetle - not your usual ranger car.

They have now, finally, decided to try and tackle the problem. That’s were CVNZ come in - we were given the job of tackling a single side of one small valley.

So off we went in a totally haphazard way of cutting, lopping and pulling up any pines we seen - until Ray got us to stop and do it right. In order to catch all the pines - including the tiny seedlings we had to go up the hillside in a line as if we were searching for a body.

It was slow and methodical and pretty darn boring as well but it was the only way to be sure we got every tree.


The valley we were working in - this is where they filmed the Cronicles of Narnia!


Cutting down pines


Get out of the road DM!


DM Helping cut down a pine


Taz proving devils can climb trees




Alpine flowers we will be saving from the pines



Tuesday 20th
We worked all day Tuesday going up and down the valley cutting down any pines we came across. By the end of Tuesday I was ready to hunt down the bastard who planted the trees in the first place (if he was still alive!) and string him up by his short and curlies. Anyway by the end of Tuesday we had completed our first side of one small valley and we could stand back and admire our work.

The only problem with standing back and admiring our small valley was that we could also see the other valleys that stretched back up the mountainside and were all covered in pines! Ray had told us that they had a 3 year plan to eradicate all the pines in the area using various volunteer groups, rambling groups and contractors (for chain-sawing the large trees). I think he is living in wacky-baccy land if he thinks that. In 3 years time the part we were doing would be still sprouting pines from dormant seeds in the ground!


Wednesday 21st Jan

On Wednesday we were given a reprieve from the pines and went checking stoat traps instead. As I have already said stoats are a major problem in New Zealand and Craigieburn was no exception. The traps were placed every 100m just off to the side of one of the way marked tracks in the forest. We split up into 2 groups of 5 - one group taking the odd numbered traps and one taking the even numbered. In my group was me, Lukas, Sam, Karl and Sun. The other group consisted off Karl, Lisa, Sophie, Kate and Brecht.

What we had to do was quite simple.

1. See if there were any stoats caught in the trap
2. Check the trap works by setting it off
3. Check and replace any bait
4. Reset the trap

In practise it was anything but simple. For one thing each box had not one but 2 traps in it (to try to catch a stoat or rat which would come in to feed on the first one caught!) The second thing about these traps are that they are designed to snap a stoats spine in several places and as such are very strong - able to take a misplaced finger off with great ease.

To set the trap you had to pull back the mechanism using your fingers in such a way so that if it sprung by mistake it did not take your fingers with it. It required a lot of strength using your thumbs as leverage on the box. Once the first one was done you had to be doubly careful when doing the second one which was set up to spring in the opposite direction. In our group we each took it in turn to set the traps (except Sun) in order to give the others time to recover the feeling in their fingers from pulling the traps.


Checking the Traps


One dead Stoat


Which looks like its been grilled

Halfway through doing the traps we ran out of fresh bait to put in them so could not do any more. Instead we climbed up to the top of helicopter hill to look at the views on the valley below.

After coming back down from the hill we continued to check the traps but did not bother to reset them as we had no fresh bait. By the time we got back to the centre we had found 4 traps with stoats in them out of about 60 checked traps. I am not sure if this is a good or bad tally - but at least the traps are working.

Wednesday night was my turn to cook. This time I decided to make an old Irish recipe - sausages and champ! It was quite weird what happened - I did all the preparation for the champ by peeling the spuds and chopped the spring onions then started boiling the spuds. Sam had volunteered to make his special gravy but had to do a vegetarian version as both Kate and Lisa did not eat meat.

The spuds were half boiled when I started grilling the sausages (Lisa and Kate had veggie burgers). Then I boiled the spring onions in some milk (as per recipe I hunted off the internet!) The spuds were ready to be mashed which I managed to get Brecht to do. In the end I ended up doing nothing! Sam was feverously working on his gravy (which was not ready) and Brecht was frantically mashing the potatoes. All I had to do was watch and turn the sausages - It was great.

The meal went rather well (even though I say so myself) I am not sure what the Koreans made of my champ as they had probably never tasted it before. After dinner two cakes were produced as we celebrated Obama officially becoming President of the USA (rather strange as none of us were actually Americans) I did the usual thing of drinking my beer outside on the porch.


Thursday 22nd Jan
Back to the pines. This time we started on another part of the valley which had a lot more trees in it.

Heres the before and after pictures.


Before


After - only another million or so to go!

The sun was belting down by this stage which made the work all the more tiring. We did manage to get a good bit down however although we did give up quite soon after lunch – it was just too hot!

Friday 23rd Jan
On our last day we tidied up the education centre and once Ray came back to take back the keys we made our way back to Christchurch.

It was there we said our goodbyes. Lisa, Karl, Kate and Sophie were all heading back to the North Island to continue with volunteering. Lukas was heading home to Germany. Me, Brecht, Sun and Karl were all staying in Base that night. Brecht was going to be heading back to Punakeiki on Monday with Sam to continue on that project.

All in all I am really glad I did the volunteering. I learnt a lot about what is happening in New Zealand in terms of conservation and met a lot of great people. The only criticism I would make is that I would have liked to see a proper plan for the pine eradication - I just got the feeling we were like sourcer's apprentices chopping up broomsticks only to see twice as many take their place - it was very disheartening. Still it’s a good reason to come back to New Zealand to see how things have gone.


Things I have learnt:/
Communications

Belgium is a funny country. Its made up of two sets of people who seem to have nothing in common and speak totally different languages and yet seem to get on reasonably well. Brecht is a Flem and can’t speak much French and Sophie is a Walloon and can’t speak hardly any Flemish.

Through out the two weeks when we travelled on the mini bus I sat between them and used my diplomatic powers to mediate between them (ok I stuck my oar in when ever I could – as in telling them about the Belgium sketch on Not the nine o’clock news which nobody knew about – young whippersnappers) I tried looking it up on Facebook but could not find it.

Sophie had problems understanding a word I said anyway (nothing new there).

Eg when I said the word Outside to her she thought I was saying something in Flemish like Ouut-Sede.

Mind you it wasn’t just me she did not understand. While listening to her Shrek 3 sound track she asked me to explain what they were saying in a certain song.

It sounds like ‘She is high’ or ‘Cheesy Buy’ She said – I do not understand.
I had a listen and was soon able to put her right – he is saying ‘It is I’

One intellectual conversation I had with the two Belgium’s (what are they called!) concerned how to say bands which have numbers in their names.

Eg Blink 182 would be said as Blink One-Eight-Two in English

But how would you say in French? Sophie said she called them Blink Cent Quatre-Vingt Deux but I argued that that translates as Blink One-hundred and eighty-two not blink 182. Apparently in Flemish its blink hondert en tween tachtig. Yes intellectual conversations indeed!

Animals I have seen:
Rifleman – Craigieburn 19th Jan
Bellbird – Craigieburn 19th Jan
Tomtit – Craigieburn 20th Jan

Tomtit

Facebook pics