Fonthill, Benjamin Lomond and a really big fire

The other day at work after one of my briefings I was standing around talking to people and answering questions as usual. One of the most asked and most annoying questions is "how cold is it going to be?". After being asked this for like the millionth time I started into a "my definition of cold is probably alot different than yours" speech with a couple aussies. Anyways, after asking where I was from in Canada and a few other questions we found out that a couple years ago while they were on a teaching exchange to our great land that they live like 20 houses down from the first house I lived in. I lived in number 28 and they lived down the street in number 65 or something. CRAZY!! None of us could believe it. We were instantly friends, although I forget their names already.

Yesterday it was that time of the week for a couple days off. I decided to rehike the Ben Lomond peak that I climbed a couple months ago.

The peak right in the middle.

I've been eating healthier and exercising (sort of) so this was a bit of a test to see if I could do it and not almost die like last time. Well, good news, I made it up WAY faster and didn't die. It was super windy on the way up, although the top wasn't which didn't make any sense.


But anyways, when I got up there I noticed someone was burning something on the other side of the lake, no biggie right? Well, by the time I left like 45 min later (after calling home on my cell phone from the top) the fire had grown by like 5x's and we could see flames. We were on the other side of the lake and like 7km? away. Whatever the exact distance, we were really far and if we could see the flames they had to be HUGE.

Turns out that a few days ago some old coal burning tractor or something went by and didn't have a spark filter or something and started a small fire. It kept flaring up for a few days and they had a helicopter in to try to douse it but to no avail.

Those winds must have just fanned the flame and by the time I went to bed last night the grass fire (there aren't really any trees that naturally grow around here) had reached the top of the mountain but was getting smaller. Today there is a MASSIVE black spot on the side of the Remarkables. Thanks lame, old tractor thing.

The view at night from my room.

Oops

While booking my flights I was using an American calendar online and was planning on being home just before the may long weekend. However, the holiday I thought represented Victoria day was Memorial Day. Crap, I'll be exactly one week late. Doesn't really matter in the end I guess.

In other news here is the latest weather forecast for Queenstown. Anyone jealous?


This is out at Queenstown Gardens, I hang out here for lunch sometimes. I guess the view isn't bad.

The Last Leg

After much humming and hawing about what I was going to do on my way home I have decided and booked it. I will be leaving New Zealand on April 30th and head back to Sydney for a couple weeks to visit some friends there and in Wooloongong and hopefully some family in Canberra. I will then fly out of Sydney back to Auckland on May 15 then, crossing the date line, to Apia, Samoa for 5 days. I then fly from there to L.A. for a couple days and head home on the 22nd to Buffalo (lame town but really cheap to fly to). So, May 22nd I'll be home!

After all that my journey will look like this. 15 different flights on 6 different airlines and a lot of bags of peanuts.

Just Another Day at the Office

Today was awesome. As part of my job I tell people about the Milford track which is a 5 day hiking trip in which people walk to Milford sound. I always get asked how many times I've done it or when was the last time I've done it and sadly I always have to answer that despite the appearance that I'm experienced I have never actually hiked it or even seen it. No longer. Today I got to go check out the track via helicopter as I scored an empty seat while one of the track managers went out to pump shit into tanks or something (I wasn't involved in this).

I met Bill before sunrise at work and we headed out to the Queenstown airport. 6 of us squeezed into the 7 seater chopper and started up towards the Routeburn track, another track that we offer as a guided walk. Along the way we saw the sun rise hit the mountain tops and glaciers while zooming over mountains and valleys. Incredible is the only word I can think of. We dropped off 3 guys and then headed out to the Milford track to Glade house, the overnight stop along the track. Here we got a nice cooked breakfast with the guests and then Bill started his thing and I started out with the group and walked with them for a couple hours.

My ride sitting at Glade House.

A detour off the track to check out a bog.

An eel. This thing was at least 3 ft long and it was a "small" one. I'm skeptical.

Crossing the Clinton River.

Glade House looking back from the cable bridge.

When I came back Bill was still working so I went with Rico (the pilot) to deliver some stuff to other lodges from Milford Sound. Flying around was amazing. The pictures I took suck in comparison to what it really looked like.

We hooked this up to the chopper with the rope and flew it down the valley. It had oranges and stuff in it. Some fell out along the way b/c it started spinning alot. Bombs away.

Apparently this is the technique when lifting a "cage" of stuff, stick your head out the door.

The valley.

Sutherland Falls, 1904ft. Wow.

Nice valley.

This is coming up to Iceberg Lake, no icebergs though.

After we had delivered stuff we picked up some of our walkers and flew then to pick up Bill back at Glade House. The walkers pay 450 bones to fly back to Queenstown by chopper. Total cost to me for the day: $0. oh ya.