Ok, so who out there isn’t on skype yet? Get yo ass in gear! Has been great recently, more and more friends are getting onto Skype daily (plus it’s super cheap to call people). The latest two who I managed to chat to this week – were Brian O’Donovan in Japan, and an engineering friend – Andrew Quin (in Sweden). It’s just magic – especially when so far from home. And then it’s only 1.7cent (euro cent) to call a landline – so had a nice catch up with my savage-climber-friend Eliza Sprecher (in Nice at the moment)… trying to… encourage her to visit NZ… I’m quite sure my flatmate Till would enjoy doing some 8a’s and b’s.

Other fun things just in. This link to the Top 10 things – What have the Brits ever done for us is, while pretty south-parky and rude, funny too…

If you’re into some excellent (though a little old now) political satire – Andrew gave me this link to www.thedossier.ukonline.co.uk. If you have real player then click on the ‘video’ link on thedossier site, and watch ‘Between Iraq and a hard place’. Makes for telling viewing really.

So Friday night was slightly random.. My friend Susan who was here a couple of months ago – when she was up in Wellington gave my phone number to an American – Benjamin, to look up when he got to ChCh (she said he hadn’t met too many people over here). So at 4:30pm I got a call from Benjamin (who I’d quite forgotten might call – it has been 2 months..) and anyway, was wondering about hanging out.. There was a table quiz on in work – and so brought him along to it. Nice enough guy, though agrees with Bush’s decision to get out of Kyoto ‘cos it’s not fair that the Chinese aren’t bound in the same way. I said a few things along the lines of ‘well %age wise there are quite a few more of them..’ and ‘at least it’s a start’ and other things.. but it did all seem to come back to ‘Them and Us’ a lot. I did try to say something about ‘actually we all have to live on this planet…’ hmmm, anyway, what can you do.

The weekend itself was fun, the otehake hot pools. A trip I heard about when I first got to ChCh, and have wanted to do for a long time. A pretty cruisey 4 1/2 hour (leisurely – twas a biggish group) walk in. Quite a few river crossings etc.. and then soaking in hot pools..

having wine + cheese etc. Excellent place though, could smell them from a mile away (though Jonathan said it was just Daves’ caving wellies he’d walked in with!) There’s a lovely campsite on an island in the middle of the river. There’s cold river water running down one side, and thermal water on the other, so it’s easy to regulate the temperature of the pools.

My new flatmate (Till – German – climbs 8a+) came along, good fun guy.. and then when I got back to ChCh – two college friends (Anna McHugh + Jackie Foster) arrived.. hardly seen them since I left college.. they’re staying for a couple of days :)

The world really has gone mental.. or perhaps I spend too much time reading about global warming and other things.

My cousin Thomas (who I can’t wait to see in 2 weeks time) sent me a link to The Presidential Prayer Team I honestly thought it was just a clever skit site – until I found this site Honestly.. it’s a mad place. Then again, from reading the Irish Times online, as I do, it seems our dear leaders could do with some prayer. They’re putting a motorway through one of the most ancient Celtic landscapes our country has (one of my favourite places which I always try to take visitors when they come to Ireland). Madness.

Sigh.

Still, it’s good to see New Zealand still has it’s head firmly screwed on. They fined an Oscar winning actress (who tried to say she was just tired) for bringing one apple and one orange into the country. Let that be a warning to anyone planning on coming to NZ… don’t mess with the quarantine laws!

Anyway – enough ramblings.. see I don’t just think about what the next trip is going to be ;)

However, the next trip is going to be one I’ve wanted to do for a long time. And it’s going to be nice and lazy too. On Sat morning we’ll head to the Otahake hot pools. In our rucksacks will be many bottles of wine, candles, and good food to eat (it’s a short – 4 hour – easy walk in). Then we’ll make our pools in the river, and generally just laze about. It’s going to be magic.

This lake (Kaurapataka) is on the way.. photo by Jonathan Carr

And then all too soon the week was over and it was time to head back to ChCh (Mick heads on to Oz for 2 weeks now). It’s a long drive – 9 hours ish – from Te Anau back to ChCh. We broke it nicely along the way with lunch at a vineyard (and then a couple of tastings).

I’ve found that I’m a heathen. While I do like Pinot Noir (the more expensive and difficult grape to grow), I’m still quite partial to a nice Merlot. Good times though.

I was sorry to see Mick go (esp at 04:30) it was an absolutely excellent trip with Glynn and him. There’s a slideshow here with quite a few more pics on it.

So we had a rest day on the Saturday (well – the rest of the trip) and headed to Milford Sound.

Now here’s an interesting thing. Ish. Milford Sound isn’t a sound at all. By rights it should be called Milford Fjord (which just doesn’t run off the tongue so well), as it’s a glaciated feature covered by the sea – not an alluvial one (happy Thomas?).

Either way it’s damn purty. So had a cruise through there. We met one of the girls from the Kepler – Rachel – and she came along too.

So twas quite the party. So much so that a pod of dolphins came out and played on the bow-wave of our boat. It’s the second time I’ve been close – last time was swimming with them on the coast of Ireland about 5 years ago with my friend Katie (between Doolin and Fanore).

(picture by Glynn)

They’re just the best creatures ever! I’d forgotten how happy they make you feel! If there’s such a thing as reincarnation – then I wanna be a dolphin. For sure.

We also went to the underwater observatory there. It’s quite a unique place (as is pretty much everything in NZ). There’s so much rain in this part of the S.Island – that the Fjord has a freshwater layer on top of the salty sea water. This has the effect of darkening the water. Which in turn means that it’s one of the shallowest (if not the shallowest) places that Black Coral can grow.

(picture by Glynn)

Yes, I know it looks white – but the stem is black. And when it dies all the pollips (the white living bits!) die off – and it all turns black.

Anyway – all in all it was a great day out. Totally majestic scenery. I knew it was one of the places that I had to get to. But now I really know it!