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11/02/2010
Arriving back it sunny Queenstown and delighted to be back again, our first stop was the Kawaura Bridge bungy so that Andy, Vince, Will and a few others could start their thrillogy of bungy jumps. Then we set off for the town centre and to meet up with Darren again. He picked us up on his way home from work and we dumped our stuff in the spare room and went to the supermarket for a few bits and a crate of beer. Having bought a big bag of veg earlier in the day at our stop in Cromwell I decided to cook everyone a stirfry. Stomachs full and dressed to kill we made our way into town to watch Darren's friend play in his band in one of the pubs and meet the rest of the gang from the Kiwi bus. A beer or two later watching the band play we went next door to the backpackers bar, Altitude to meet the others. It was a good night with everyone ending up in World bar drinking cocktails out of teapots.
The next morning Darren had to be up for work at 7am which he struggled with but made a point of waking us up too. After a nice lay in and a bit of breakfast Steph and I walked down the hill into town to have a wonder around before I went off and did the Nevus bungy. Nervous and excited the time came for me, Andy, the two Wills, Boris and Vince (all from the Kiwi bus) to meet at the Nevis bungy shop to be taken to the jump site. The drive up there was the most nerve-racking part. Everyone was trying to take there minds off it until after a steep and treturous journey into the valley the bungy cable car appeared. It looked so high and having got off the bus and watched someone jump they were just a little speck plummeting to the ground in the huge valley. Putting our nerves aside we were given our harnesses and our weight was taken for a 3rd time. Then we made our way to the viewpoint where the cable car picks you up from to take you to the jump platform in the middle of the valley. It works on weight order so I had a good 7 or 8 people in front of me before I jumped. Once inside the jump platform cable car it has a glass bottom so you cannot avoid seeing how high up you are which was nice of them. Everyone in there was sh*tting their pants, haha. I was nervous too but having watched a few people before me jump the nerves subsided and the excitement took over. Then after a good wait it was my turn to jump. I was called over to 'the chair' where they sit you down, fix the bungy to your harness and leg straps and give you a short briefing. All the gear safely inplace and me securely strapped in I got to my feet and shuffled over to the ledge. The ledge you have to jump off is like the plank, a small rectangular shelf that sticks out from the cable car about 1 foot wide. Shuffling to the end of here was pretty hairy, with the rocks and the river 134 metres below. A big deep breathe in and a 3,2,1 countdown and I lept. I managed to dive up and away from the platform with my arms spread and then shot towards the ground head first at 160kph. I was surprised how smooth it was at I neared the ground and the bungy took the slack. There was a massive rush of blood to the head as I then got shot back up again. On the second bounce up I was told to pull the red cord around my legs to release a pin that would flip me upright into the seated position so that i wouldn't have to stay upside down while they dragged me up. I pulled it and flipped over. Then it was just a case of get my breathe back, relax and enjoy the scenery as they towed me back up to the cable car. Awesome!!!
Having to wait for everyone to finish jumping and buy their photos etc, we didnt end up getting back into town until about 6:30pm so my estimated meet time for steph and Darren of 4:30pm was to ambitious. I managed to find Steph who had been sitting and waiting for me for hours, bless her, then we headed to Fergburger to get some dinner. We bought Darren one too and he picked us up and took us back to his house.
Whilst we were in Nelson Steph won a free bar crawl for her and her friends so that night we arranged with everyone to do that. Darren had a little snooze to catch up on lost sleep from the night before then we headed to the first bar - Buffalo Bar, to start the pub crawl. We ended up visiting 6 bars, finishing off in Buffalo bar again. It was such a funny night out, and just like old times with Darren.
The next day was pretty chilled with everyone pretty tired from the last couple of days. So we popped into town for some breakfast and Steph and Jaz had a wonder around the shops. That evening we decided drinking wasn't a good idea so sat infront of the TV eating pizza and veged out. The following morning Emma managed to get all 6 of us onto a canyoning trip... for FREE!! which was amazing as it normally costs $195 per person as its an all day trip up in Glenorchy. We needed to meet up in Glenorchy at 10:30am so we got our stuff together then Darren and I popped to the petrol station to get petrol before setting off, slightly behind time. Despite that, we managed to arrive just as the bus was pulling away so we followed it offroad to the starting point. We parked up and were given all our gear... thick wetsuits, socks, wetsuit shoes, lifejackets, harnesses and helmets before making the 30minute hike upstream to where we would enter the Canyon.
To get us used to the icey waters (honestly it was soooo cold even with the thick wetsuits on) we had a short swim in a pool under a waterfall. Then it was time to start. The first activity was a natural water slide, only we had to do it backwards. Everyone was a little nervous as it was the first thing but it was great fun and everyone gave it a go. Next was a 3 metre rock jump. And the following 2 hours consisted of more rock jumps and slides, zip wires and abseiling our way down to the bottom of the gorge. It was so much fun and the walk back to the car was amazing with outstanding scenery. Having changed out of the wetsuits we popped into a cafe on our way back to Queenstown to try and warm ourselves up.
That evening, with it being Valentines day - and our last night, we all decided to go out for a posh slap up meal. Luckily we managed to get a table at an italian restaurant in town called Luciano's. It was by far the best meal we had eaten so far. A starter, huge main and plenty of beers later we headed back to Millsy's place as the others all had work tomorrow and we had to catch our 8 hour bus up to Christchurch.
It was amazing spending time with Millsy and all his friends. We were both sad to be leaving but hoping that one day we would come back and see them all again.
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