WEEK TWENTY TWO, WASTED, BLACKOUT, BLACKING OUT
Trip Start
Mar 14, 2007
1
22
44
Trip End
Jan 16, 2008
Wanaka,
New Zealand
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Day two of the Burton Open and I head up alone as Claire is ill. It is the slope style event today which I am really nervous about as my camera doesn't have a great range on it and I end up not getting very good shots today, but I still had fun doing it! And I discover the media room and the free food and all the free Mountain Dew I can drink! Mountain Dew is a citrus flavoured Cola drink, well that's what it says on the tin, but it just tastes like sugar water to me!
The next day I head back up to the competition to try and get better shots today, which I did, thank God! Then I went for a snowboard with my mate Trev, but then the bad weather sets in and he goes home, so I stay for the prize giving ceremony and then hitch a ride back down to the town which is being pelted with horrible rain! Then an electrical storm comes in an the whole county is without power!
Next morning it's still raining and I had just hitched to the bottom of the mountain and was waiting to hitch a ride to the top of the mountain when all the cars turned around and went the other way! It was so windy that the competition had been cancelled for the day! So I hitched back to town and was given a lift my the coaches of the Austrian Olympic Ski Team! It's so cool the people you meet when hitch hiking!
The town was like a ghost town as there was still now power so everywhere was shut, no atm's were working and the only place open was the supermarket which was running on a generator! And everybody, every single member of Wanaka was in the shop stocking up on food and candles cause nobody knew when we would have power again! It was so funny! It was like the end of the world was coming or being in a war. People were panic buying and running around flinging things into their trolley! My rations to get me through the blackout? A bag of gummy teddies on offer for 99 cent! I'm always the practical one!
Anyways, the power came back on about 2 hours later, which was a good thing cause my rationing skills are not highly developed and I had no gummy teddies left and I was beginning to wonder where my next meal was coming from!! That night was to be one of the biggest nights in Wanaka. It was the end of the Burton Open and New Zealand band the Shapeshifters where playing a gig in the Arts Centre and tickets had sold out weeks ago. There was also an after party in the outlet from midnight to 8am! It was to be a huge outdoor rave! However, as usual, with me, I had a bit too much to drink and ended up ruining my night, by not remembering much and missing the best night of season! Will I ever learn my lesson? I really bloody hope so! It was a disaster and so was the next day at the finals of the Burton Open! I was too hungover and ill to do anything so I had to come home and go to bed! Why oh why do I do it?
I make up for my wasted weekend on the slopes and have another fantastic snowboard lesson and try my first jump, which I bailed out on and attempted the half pipe, which I manage to do both regular and switch! I'm so impressed! Soon people will be taking photos of me in competitions!!
