Hello Everyone,

I hope you are well! We have had a very busy and active week. We got the ferry over to the South Island on Monday morning. We stayed for one night in Nelson and one night in Greymouth enroute to Franz Joesph. On the way we saw sea lions and the famous Pancake Rocks and we went panning for gold in a small town called Ross.

We both had a fantastic time in Franz Joesph and experienced different activities! It was snowing when we arrived and we had to dig out our scarfs, gloves and hats from Peru! Brrrrrrrrrr.

Gayle's Heli Hike: I went up in a helicopter which was pretty amazing in itself! The views over the Franz Joesph Glacier were spectacular. Mr Forsyth I hope you find the pictures I have taken useful in your Georgraphy lessons. The helicopter took us up to a section near the top of the Glacier where we were given the opportunity to walk around the Glacier with guides for two hours. I felt like I was in a scene from a movie because the sights were so amazing, like nothing I have ever seen before as you can probably tell from the photos. We also walked through ice caves. It was definately one of my highlights of the trip so far.

Rachel's Ice Climb: Wow, What a fantastic experience! I tried Ice climbing at the Indoor centre at Kinlochleven in summer (a must visit place, its so cool!) so was keen to give it a try on real ice so what better place than a real glacier! We had to walk quite far up the glacier which was quite tiring but worth the effort. Our guide said I took to it quite naturally and wants me to become a guide too! We got 5 climbs, up some very high steep walls, not for the faint hearted. The most challenging was the last one, it had a very steep face and my hands were frozen, at one point I fell off but managed to stick one axe on the way down which the guide said looked really cool from the bottom (don't worry Mum I was harnessed in!). It was very hard but I persisted and it paid off when I reached the top. I had a great day and will definitely be trying it again!

We left Franz Joesph on Friday morning and made our way to Queenstown. We had numerous stops along the way on the Magic Bus. We stopped at Lake Matheson to capture the view of Mount Cook in the Reflective Lake! We hope you are impressed with our pictures. Our second stop was Lake Wanaka, the South Island has definately more spectacular views than the North Island. We have come accross many of the Lord of the Rings movie scenes. Our third stop was just outside Queenstown where we watched members of the bus jump off the original Bungy Bridge, brave people.

Rachel's Bungy Jumps: Well, Saturday morning was the most scared I have ever been in my life! I have wanted to do a Bungy all my life but was finding that as it approached reality started to hit and I was terrified! I managed to stay quite calm first thing and went to the Bungy centre to meet the other two girls I knew who were doing it too. The whole process was very drawn-out, we had to be checked-in and weighed and then had to sit and wait while we watched videos of Bungy jumps, not exactly filling us with confidence. We eventually boarded the bus with our driver Roddy (Mr Hall is making quite an appearance this week, spooky!) and took the 40 minute drive (mostly in silence!) up to the jump site. When we got there it made me even more scared than I anticipated. The Platform is suspended 134m above a valley with 2 mountains on either side (The Nevis Bungy is the 3rd highest in the world, eek!) and has to be reached by cable car. Unfortunately for us, they jump people from heaviest to lightest so we were carted over last. The cable car journey was terrifying enough, with a wire floor and an open top. The platform was equally freaky and was swaying in the wind. Watching 7 people jump before me was terrible, and the worst was none of them looked as if they particularly enjoyed it so I was wondering if I had made a terrible mistake. It was really nice to have the otehr two girls with me though (Erin and Miriam) and we had a great laugh as I was hyper due to nerves and wouldn't shut up or stand still. Eventually my name was called...time to get ankle cuffs (attached while I sat on a see-through glass panel!) and then the dreaded walk through to the other side of the platform, time to jump. I sat in the chair to get attached to the bungy cord and felt quite calm,...for about 2 seconds until the reality of what I was about to do hit and I felt the most insane fear rush through me. I wanted to cry, be sick, back out but I knew I couldn't. It seemed to take forever to get hooked up and then I had to shuffle slowly 9as I had a big bungy cord attached to my feet) to the edge. I really was close to tears and was overwhelmed with terror! I had decided I HAD to jump on the first count of 3 so once I was there it was 3,2,1....and I dived off to feel the BEST sensation ever!!! The first few seconds was stomach-churning (the freefall lasted 8.5 seconds in total) but then I felt like I was flying towards the ground, and all fear disappeared to be replaced with total elation and pride that I had finally achieved my dream! It felt so amazing, and the scenery around was perfect. After a couple of bounces I had to reach up, unclip my ankles and let them drop so that i could be winched back up, really enjoyed that part too as it was quite slow and let me take in the scenery! I was soooo hyper afterwards, it was AMAZING!!! Anyway, to cut a long story short I had such a fab time that I decided I had to do it again...so later in the day we walked up the hill in Queenstown to bungy "The Ledge" a piece of cake at onnly 43m high, however it gives the illusion that you are higher as you can see the whole of Queenstown underneath you. the other big difference is tha you are attached by the waist and you run off instead of diving off! I decided that I wanted to somersault, so I ran off and tumbled in the air...the official pictures look great! Hopefully I will be able to upload them soon. The DVDs of both jumps are spectacualr and really capture the fear I felt. i will be using the somersault one as a model performance in Gymnastics Mr Laing! All in all a tremendous day! I'm addicted!

Gayle is waiting to do her adreniline activity in OZ! She is doing a skydive over the Yarra Valley with Andy when he arrives in Melbourne at the start of December. Not a total wimp but too much of a wimp to do a Bungie Jump in New Zealand! She found it scary enough going down in the gondala in Queenstown yesterday. Ahhhhhhh!

Today we took a day trip to Milford Sound, it is meant to be one of the most beautiful places in the world, however, once again the weather has failed us! The views on the bus on the way there were beautiful but would have been appreciated more if there were no clouds and heavy rainfall. once we got to Milford Sound we went on a boat trip around some of the mountains and we saw dolphins, penguins and sealions. Blue bear had a most enjoyable day!

We are both loving Queenstown however we are due to depart for Dunedin on Tuesday morning, where we will stock up on more Irn Bru! YUM! Cant believe we have less than 2 weeks left in New Zealand!

Missing you all greatly!

Love Gayle and Rachel x x x