Just turned twenty-five and realized I have so much to see. I Looked into an around the world ticket... hoping to leave in August 2007.
South of the South
NEW ZEALAND | Wednesday, 17 October 2007 | Views [118]
These were our detox days.... I was about 5 minutes late getting on the bus and Jaymie was telling me that he was going to leave without me. I made it on and met our driver, Veno...aka Damien. This guy. He used to be a truck driver... a real mans man... i guess. We stayed in Tutapere that night... there was really nothing there... besides the lodge. We picked up a few more people. Ken, a lovely irish guy and Brian an interesting american from DC... a lawyer. There were about 25 seniors there as well. The showed up after a three day hike in the mountains and were a rowdy bunch. I seriously felt lame... half of us went to bed early and the three of us that remained awake just goofed off, but were seriously considering asking the seniors to keep it down. In queenstown I accidently packed a friends hat w/my bags. This hat was really never off him unless he was sleeping... so telling him i had it was hard... and scary haha. I texted him from Vicky's phone that I would have it back to him when we ended up in Qtown again, but in the meantime I decided it would be funny to have random people pose w/it on and then I'd send him the pics one by one...good times.
We then headed to Stuart Island.. it's an island off the southernmost part of the South island. Soooo amazing and beautiful here. The boat ride was a bit scary... it was soo bumpy we were literally getting air. They said it was a clam day in the water.. pshh. As soon as we got off the boat we ran into Anna... yey. I missed that girl. A few of us decided to go fishing and the others rented a car and toured the island. This was down right fishing w/twine. This boat was... sketchy, but we survived. The day started out sunny and then mild rain... there were giant albatross following the boat... They must have been three feet in length. All I could think of is the movie birds. Steve caught two blue cods and Veno caught bait.. when Vicky and I gave it a go it started to hail... yep. we caught nada. Brian got seasick and Steph and John were stoned and keeping warm in the mini cabin. The fisherman caught 8 or more crayfish, which cost about $25 each. He gave us five for dinner and all the fish they caught too. We went back rested up and made plans for dinner. Irish Clare (will explain later) and I were in charge of stir fry. We boiled the rice via microwave because of the lack of a powerful stove... and then she did the veggies and I did the crayfish and we mixed it all up and it ended up more as a risotto....but it was sooooooo yummy! Phew. Culd you imagine if I had ruined $50 worth of fish. They boiled the others and then veno made a breading for the cod. The best feast I had in NZ. We sat around and watched Top Model because of a thunderstorm. They made bets on who would win since I already had seen the season I was the revealer. We slept wonderfully that night.
Next we headed to Dunedin... thank goodness the storm had passed the night before. Our ferry ride was nice and calm. In Dunedin we stayed at the Leviathon, which is apparently a haunted hotel. It was definitely a place with character. I was still on my detox mission, let me tell you it was hard with team ireland travlling with us. Four Irish gals and an Irish Lad. We decided to head to the Octagon that night. A part of town that is literally an octagon of bars and clubs. We did a hop...Veno stayed in that night so that he could get up early to watch NZ in rugby. I was doing fine until we hit the club. The music was great, but it was hard not to drink... so I went home w/English Clare and Jay and Irish Clare. The next morning the girls and Ken decided to stay in Dunedin and so did Anna... we left half the bus =( Veno was about 15 late.. he was surfing... NZ lost the game. We got on the bus and the first thing he says is 'if anyone mentions the game i'm going to have to let you off the bus'. Nice wake up. I was a bit sad we couldn't spend more time there... it seemed like a great place.
Next. Oh Shit. Back to Queenstown.
Tags: Sightseeing
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