hello all!

am in queenstown having taken the bus from te anau after fininshing the keplar track!

was beautiful. first day hard up hill for adges through woods then suddenly they dissappeard and we were on top of an alpine ridge. soon got to luxmore hut. 2 story building with toilets and sinks and gas cookers and a light in the comunal area which went off at 10.30 and a huge bunkroom sleeping 40, some on four people bunks (which we used as there were four of us) amazing views from up there. sat on deck in eveing and watched moon and clounds and valley and mountains and lake.

realise you proabably have no idea who seb and chisa are. seb (sebastien) is from paris and chisa is a girl from osaka and they were both staying at kiwi house (seb was in our doorm and snores) anyway they were going to walk the keplar and then remembered we were too so rand us in dunedin and we decided to go together. was great fun, played lots of cards in evening (not much else to do)

next morning were went and explore somenearby caves which were deeper than we thought but with interesting rock formations. then we shouldered our packs and set off. we were walking the alpine ridge with stunning views and we met some kias on the way. kias are very inquisitive green mountain parrots who, if you leave a shoe or camera unatended are likely to try to fix it for you, whether it needed it or not. some hard uphill bits again but very worth it for views. towards end of day, just before decending in to valley and after reaching summit of mt luxmore we came to a view point, so we discarded our bags and headed out to the end of an, hmmmm, how to describe, ridge? outthrust? foothill? something like that. any way was quite stupidly beautiful view and got to see where we would be walking next day. after that we deseceded 87 zigzags downhill to the next hut through fairytale like beach forest. seb did his knee in and spent the next 2 days limping.

that evening we were plagued by sanflies. lie mosquitos but bigger, though not so itchy bites. excesively anoying all the same. emma and seb were their favourite meal leaing chisa and me relatively unscathed.

next day was mostly flat and sameish woodland. at one point did walk in clearing caused by a bit slip that happend about 20 years ago (a bit of the side of the valley slid to the bottom in heavy rain). spent that night in hut by lake, went to see sunset there and was ridiculously stunning and jaw droppingly beautiful. honestly, i didn't think places like this existed on earth. needless to say have lots of veiw photos which you will all find very dull but which i shall plaster my bedroom wall with.

last day going fairly flat through more red beach forest. older this time and bigger and made you feel very small and the world very big. as were way ahead of scedual stopped for lunch for about 1hr 1/2. ah bliss.

when staggard back into te anau seb and chisa checked into the backpackers they were going to be staying in and then let us in to go have showers and change our cloths (i'd been wearing the same top for 3 days) and shower before getting the bus to queens town. tonite for tea we had ferburgers.mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm i had a bambi burger. hehehe.

in the fiordland it usually rains. however the only rain we had was for 1/2 hr this morning when we were under the trees anyway. i cannot beging to describe how unlikely it is for there to be 4 days of lovely sunny weather whith no clouds obscurrimng mountains or getting everyone wet and miserable. emma and i really are very well looked after.   

we also wrote a song, which though i've just seen emma typing the same on her journal i shall too narate.

The 12 days in New Zealand. (will only write out the last verse, i'm sure you can figure out the rest)

On the 12th Day in New Zealand a Kiwi gave to me:

12 Billion Sheep,

11 Burly all Blacks,

10 triffic tim tams,

9 fine fergburgers,

8 'mazing mountains,

7 swarms of sanflies,

6 super scones, (emma would get scons from work)

5 Possum Pies,

4 hairy Hobbits,

3 Maori's

2 Kiwi Birds

and a portion of Fush and Chups.

:o)

love and hugs to you all.