Greetings from New Zealand Am having some serious adventures! The climate here is very different to that at home and a bit of a shock to the system after the scorchio weather in Asia. Its cold and in Queenstown today we\'ve had snow! Which is perfect timing as it is their first \'dump\' and it means we\'re going skiing for the next 3 days which I am very excited about. We\'ve been very busy here, have hired a car and been exploring both islands for the last 3 weeks. Its pretty expensive with all the tempting adventure activities on offer so the budget is suffering big time! Not helped by our rather healthy appetite for a good time and lots of wine and good food. Not doing the backpacker thing very well (still) - we like the good things in life too much but hey ho. New Zealand is a fabulous and beautiful country. Even in the winter the sky has been blue most days and the sun shining. We just have to wrap up very warm and unfortunately the suntans are all but gone! We\'re considering buying fake tan for our arrival in Sydney on the 25th June! I have gone bonkers on dare devil activites. The maddest has got to be jumping 12,000 feet out of a plane the other day. Very scary and a massive adrenaline rush. We were freefalling 7,000 feet in 45 seconds and it felt like a very long time rushing headlong to the ground! The picture on the card is where I did the jump at Fox Glacier. The scenery was spectacular, diving over the glacier and with Mount Cook in the background. Big tick in the box for pushing the boundaries... We\'ve also done a 100m abseil into a cave at Waitomo in the North Island. So we did the abseil and then went caving looking at glowworms which was really cool. The absolute scariest bit was at the end when we had to climb a vertical metal ladder 30ft out of the cave! I was shaking from head to toe by the time I reached the top, very frightening indeed climbing on the wet and muddy rungs without gloves. A truly amazing once in a lifetime experience was swimming with wild dolphins at Kaikora in the South Island. We were so lucky that a pod of 300 were playing just off the shore on the afternoon we went out. Kitted out in very sexy wetsuits, gloves and hat (!) we diving into the most freezing 1000m deep sea water (bloody middle of winter - crazy!) I felt like I was hyperventilating to start with the whole experience just took my breath away. 300 dolphins swimming right up in front of your face and all around you. Very funny we were encouraged to sing / make noises to entertain the dolphins - they are completely wild and not encouraged by food or other means to swim with us, its their choice - so I was making some very strange sounds to get them interested. I think they appreciated my singing voice more than most! We\'ve also been whale watching which was quite a breathtaking experience - we saw 3 humpback whales which again was quite lucky as they usually only see one on an outing. So if you get the opportunity - NZ is an absolute must. In Queenstown they have an adventure sport for every day of the year! These Kiwis are mad - and they are also thrashing us (again) at the rugby so I am keeping away from the bars for a change tonight! The craziest thing I think they have on offer is a Para - bungy which involves being towed in the air on a parachute by boat and then bungying off the parachute! Don\'t think I will try that one.... Dee x