Wellington to queenstown.

Alright peeps,

How is everyone, trust your still enjoying hot weather. I am not.

Another early start, 7. 15 departure for the ferry to the South Island. One whole rooms worth of people missed the bus as they over slept, they caught us up at the ferry. We get on board the ferry for the 3 hr journey, it was going to be a long 3 hrs, we were all knackered. The scenery of the edge of the island was stunning, very mountainy and green. I will get some more pictures on the return leg of the trip when I should be feeling more awake. We arrive in the South Island where we join our bus and a whole load of new people. We departed Picton and went through the Marlborough region famous for its wine. From here we went to Nelson to drop and few people off. The scenery again stunning and becoming more and more Alpine as we head south, it feels a bit Christmassy even through we are in July!

After an amazing nights sleep, no doubt helped by the couple of lovely glasses of red last night, we get up early and go for a little walk around Kaiteriteri. The sun had just come up and was reflecting off the calm blue sea. We tried to head up to a lookout but the bridge had been taken out so that was a no go. We set off along the beach and found another tiny beach tucked away of the road, this was even more lovely than the first beach. The sky a blue I've not seen before, and not a cloud in the sky, breathtaking really! Bit of a sucker for sun rises and nice beaches is me, even when it's cold. We departed at 10 am to make the journey to Nelson Lake, which was surrounded by huge mountains and pine trees, absolutely beautiful until the view changed to 3 very hairy blokes backsides - yeah the boys had stripped and were in the lake - good luck to them, it was sssssssooooooooo cold. A shame we didn't have time to visit Abel Tasmin, but you can't do everything.

We arrived in Westport in the late afternoon, the next morning it was time for paddle boarding, not convinced this is the best idea with a cold but we will see how we go. The boards are huge, so hopefully I won't fall in, fingers crossed! They were actually surprisingly stable that was until we ended up in the wavy bit of the beach which was interesting. I managed to get myself back to the beach without getting wet, by this point I had lost all feeling in my finger and toes! Sooooo cold! I was really glad we got out there and did something as the ice climb at Franz Josef is likely to be cancelled as the weather has been crappy all week :(. We then rejoined the coach to Franz Josef as soon as we arrived we located the hot pool and stayed in that for as long as we could, it was boiling, but soooo nice. On route we stopped at the pancake rocks, a large number of limestone rock formations formed over thousands of years, they weren't quite what I was expecting, I thought they would be a lot more jaggerdy. We continued for a couple more hours past more snow capped mountain, beautiful clear rocky rivers and pine trees. We stopped at grey mouth to pick up more people,I was also able to earn more points for the bus competition, the prize being a free canyon swing, not sure I really want to win this, but you have to do these mad activities in queenstown!

The alarm goes off early and I'm able to the join the 60th wedding anniversary celebrations for my nan and grandad courtesy of skype, which was a lovely suprise :) we spent the morning walking between the lodge and ice climb place waiting for updates on the weather, after 4 hrs of waiting around it's all called off for the day. The whole group is gutted, we had been so excited about this. Oh well not much we could do about it. Rather than sit about doing nothing one group went paintballing and some of us went kayaking at echo lake. This was great fun but hard work especially when the wind got up and waves got bigger! The lake was lovely and calm to start of with, then that all changed until we turned the corner into the rain forest bit, the water here was Iike a mirror and completely still. We headed back and then it was time to head to the monsoon bar. We had a really fun night and I got even more points for the competition.

We departed Franz Josef the next day, even more gutted to find out the trips all ran the day we left - Sod's law! Today we were off to Wanaka, very excited as after one more sleep we get to Queenstown! On route we were able to go via the fox glacier so at least we were able to see a glacier from the distance. The weather was beginning to get worse and the snow beginning to come down,,we had to get going as if the hast road was shut we had a 12 hr detour to contend with. Luckily the road was clear so we made it to Wanaka. The Wanaka lake was stunning, surrounded by mountains, it was so cold, the temperature difference in the South is pretty evident. There was an opportunity to earn more points by skinny dipping in Wanaka lake - but way way way too cold for that! Even the boys weren't tempted at this one!

We left in the morning for Queenstown, I also found out I had won. Excellent, another opportunity to scare myself stupid with a canyon swing! It's not quite a bungy jump, but still bloody scary having watched the videos! On route to queenstown it really started to snow, so we watch a few people bungy jump in the snow which was pretty cool. I won't be doing a bungy jump! A sky dive is enough for me, and that's not filling me with joy thinking about it, I feel sick. Once we arrive and unpack a bit it's time for the bus night out, this always had potential for being a big night out and didn't disappoint, at about 1am I left got myself a fergpie and went to bed.

The next day we were all horribly hungover and didn't do much, expect for washing!

Arrrrgggghhhhhh it's skydive day, I feel physically sick. I get there hoping it's cancelled, but no it's not. I sign my life away on the all the forms and before you know it we are in the bus to the drop zone! Now I'm feeling sick and shaking! Who's stupid idea was this! Anyway I get kitted out and we are in the plane, weirdly once in the air I not feeling scared now, the Ariel views of queenstown are fab. Having had my harness checked and double checked and triple checked, I'm being hung out the plane. That's it, we are out and hurtling through the sky, eventually I catch my breath, not even able to scream ( well I don't think I did I was a bit concerned about the language that might have come out my mouth because of the video, but it was all I could do to breathe) AND I kept my eyes open the whole time!! My god it's the most terrifying thing I've ever down, the relief that swept over me when the parachute opened was incredible. Then I could enjoy the view, it was really weird as we started off above cloud and then went through it and emerged underneath of it, my first view of the ground. Kinda pleased I couldn't see it when we jumped. We then started to turn to slow into the decent, this is when I then began to feel really really sick! We land, a perfect landing I have to say, it was all I could do to stay standing, and my ears, oh my god they hurt! So so so pleased I did it but I have to say never ever again! I'll try to get the video uploaded when I get more bandwidth. Having landed I legged it to the loos to be sick! A great experience! Another one off the list!

More soon......

Take it easy

Lou (this body ain't made for scary sports) wood

Xx