Abisko Lodge Methven

... were closed because of the north westerly) i conkered the hard slope and came down with out falling and any torn ligaments. Sein of course did no damage he is partically a professional snowboarder so while i was learning to stand up straight he was learning to do 360 degrees turns whilst coming down the hill backwards. Anyway fun was had and there was no broken bones, so its onwards and upwards, well actually downwards, we're heading down South so stay tuned.

... early that day due to back visibility then a Huge storm hit the next day dropping 90 cm of snow and causing an avalanche blocking the road up the mountain. It took the crew over 12 hours to clean the place up to allow traffic to get up safely. Everyone was saying that the mountain would be open in the morning. It was. In the morning it was still dark when we got up but the backpackers was bustling with people getting ready to hit the slopes. After 2 days ...

... instead the inner voice and the shagging penguins!! ha ha The drive was great as it was as much of a buzz getting there as the thought of doing the training weekend its self; the roads are long and scenic with plenty of opertunity to add another lead weight to the right foot! smokin. Once i had got through the christchurch traffic trying to remember the differences in NZ road rules, i was on a one way ticket to mountain land with just an hour of open road ...

... van de vorige bekende persoon...) haha ik ken geen bekende personen, maar met wat hulp van Kevin (ten minste 1 van de deelnemers moet de bekendheid kennen) lukt het aardig. En geef toe: er zijn vast bekende personen in Nederland die 'Bas Dijkhuizen' , Ria de Vries, Truus Pietersen, Johan Janssen, enz heten hahahaha Anyway, na dit spelletje (je had er bij moeten zijn) gingen we rondrijden om de kerstverlichte huizen in het dorp (sorry DE ...

... compared to the mountains surrounding it. We drive closer to it but the entrance to Mt Sunday was closed so we were unable to walk up it. We went further up the road and found a spot adjacent to Mt Sunday and had lunch. So far, Lake Clearwater and the Rangitata Valley (where Mt Sunday is) has to be the best scenery we have seen so far in New Zealand.

... Unser Van hat jedesmal gewackelt...) 15.07.07 Wir waren zwar nicht die Ersten am Bahnsteig (Gregor die Schlafmuetze ;-) ), aber der Zug war ohnehin spaet dran, oder neuseelaendisch ein bisschen langsamer. Mit Homer und Bart ging es dann rueber zur Gemeindewiese - oder Bowlinggreen wie die Springfielder es liebevoll nennen. Die Attraktionsstaende wurden erst aufgebaut - neuseelaendisch gemuetlich eben - also sind ...

... much like a checkerboard. And every time we took a wrong turn Tara would squeeze the squeeky toy on us and we would have to back tract (correctly) and try again. The maze took our team 23 minutes to do. When we finished the maze we ate some sandwiches for lunch. The fed us a lot! We needed all the energy we could get though so it was good for us. After eating we started our hike up the hill We walked to this place and we saw a ...

... Well worth the dust.


Today it is raining at last so hopefully the car will get a wash off.tomorrow it is on to Arthurs Pass for five nights, in the hope of at least some good weather, and then it is time to return to Christchurch and find a new home for our faithful four wheeled friend.


All good things...hope to see you all soon - we don't know our date for going to Greece yet but think we'll be in the UK for about three weeks.