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What a weekend!
My birthday started off with cards from home and prezzies from Caroline - which I opened whilst still wrapped in my duvet in the campervan. Thanks very much for the cards and to Caroline for my awesome gifts - a ‘Sweet As’ New Zealand t-shirt, a Fat Freddy’s CD (iconic New Zealand jam band and inspiration for Freddy the camper’s artwork), and a keyring which I’m not quite sure how to describe politely, but the text went along the lines of the classic Welsh people/sheep jokes (but in this case New Zealanders/sheep)! In need of caffeine and free internet, we headed off to McDonalds for caramel lattes, smoothies and muffins (I told you McDonalds is way better over here).
After that, it was time to bungy! I paid for my jump, was weighed and then had a bit of a wait before I headed out onto the platform which overlooks the stunning Waikato river - 7-12 metres deep, 10 degrees in temperature, and crystal clear. The weather was slightly undecided - it looked as if I was about to do a very drizzly, breezy jump, but the clouds cleared as I was having my harness and ankle attachments put on, giving the water a stunning turquoise appearance. I was only feeling slightly nervous up until the point where I had to stand up and move out onto the platform, where the weight of the bungee cord pulling on my legs got pretty unnerving! A quick pose for the camera and I was jumping (from the photos, which I decided not to buy, I looked like a drunken frog as I was going over the edge). The falling sensation was pretty cool, and then I looked up (down) and saw the water coming closer and closer - the jump staff had calibrated perfectly, and I had a very sedate touch of the water without getting my sleeves wet! A few more bounces on the rope and it was time to be lowered into the boat - which took a while as I was pretty dizzy and very giggly and was struggling to focus on the staff member in the boat! What an adrenaline rush that was!
After a quick shower and change, it was time to go for lunch at Hukka Prawn Park! Time was a bit short for catching our own prawns, so we opted for a tour of the hatchery instead, discovering that prawns are actually pretty creepy little creatures - I made way more of a fuss about putting my hand in a tank of baby prawns (they were maybe 2-3 inches from head to tail) to feed them than I did about my bungy jump! We had a yummy prawn platter in the restaurant, and then a bit of a stroll along the adventure trail at the park - I got soaked once by Caroline’s peddle-operated water jet (pictures coming up) and then again running the prawn gauntlet (there’s a video for that one) before soaking my feet in a thermal pool. I managed to break my sunglasses trying to swing upside down from Shawn the Prawn - a sign that one glass of bubbly with lunch is too much!
Then, it was down to Ohakune ready to hit the slopes at Turoa ski field! Tired after our two hour drive, we found ourselves a pub with a fire and stuffed ourselves with nachos and spare ribs - until I was surprised with a birthday chocolate torte - thanks again Caroline! It was looking pretty touch and go as to whether we would get a chance to hit the slopes at all - too much snow and some heavy winds. However, when we woke up on Saturday morning, there was some good news - the beginners area of the other ski field on Mt Ruapehu; Whakapapa (about an hour’s drive away) was open - so off we went in search of the snow! We had a pretty hilarious lesson, trying to concentrate on out instructor between hail showers and fits of laughter - I think I managed a snowboard roly-poly at one point - there’s a trick you don’t see very often on the terrain parks! We were very lucky in that there was only Caroline, myself and another girl in our group, and our instructor managed to convince us that we’d made pretty rapid progress. The winds were picking up, so accepting that that might have been the only snowboarding we would get, we headed back to the hostel to get ready for a night out. After a very civilised meal at a restaurant, we went back to where we had been the night before - the legendary Powderkeg - for hot chocolates spiked with Bailey’s and settled down to watch the Reds vs. the Crusaders rugby match. Deciding we were getting sleepy, we decided to hit the Red Bull - and that’s where things started to go downhill... At 3am we were still throwing shapes on the dancefloor of the Suitcase and wondering why everyone had gone home! The partygoers were mainly resort staff (the weather’s been bad for a while and no snow before that so not a lot of tourists around) who have probably seen a lot of each other recently while waiting for the season (and therefore work) to start, so that might explain the ‘early’ night!
Speaking to an instructor, there’s a well known snow season phenomenon; Closure Roulette, where staff go out on the lash, taking the chance that the ski fields will be closed the next day and they won’t have to work with hangovers. Caroline and I lost miserably - we were still in bed at midday, assuming Whakapapa was closed and that there was no chance Turoa was about to open any time this week (misinformed by a certain Aussie snowboard instructor who I had been interrogating the night before). I finally plucked up the energy to climb down off my bunk (Caroline and I have a whole 4 bed dorm to ourselves, why I decided last night to sleep up above I cannot say) and check the internet, only to discover that Turoa had been open all morning! We quickly got into our gear and made out way up the 16km mountain road - Freddy handled it very well under Caroline’s expert guidance, and we were soon having another snowboarding lesson. The antics were more extreme this time - we developed a new branch of snowsports, Synchronised Snowboarding, as I went flying into Caroline and we continued down the hill intertwined (on our feet for an impressive distance), with our instructor watching either bemusedly or disgustedly (as I’m writing this, Caroline is asking why I’m tittering to myself). Both beginners’ areas have carpet lifts - like a conveyor belt - which are supposedly easier to use than other lifts. I managed to get on the lift with one foot attached to my snowboard, but as I was moving upwards, I heard Caroline, our instructor and the lift supervisor shouting and laughing - she was carrying her snowboard and was doing the moonwalk off the slope onto the conveyor belt while the lift supervisor was trying to hold her up! Possibly one of those ‘you had to be there’ moments... I’m pretty sure Mat, our instructor was glad to see the back of us - we’d turned up saying we’d done pretty well yesterday with Simon, our previous instructor, before proceeding to make total clowns of ourselves! Simon advised us to ask for him if having another lesson at Whakapapa - but we had no such offer from poor Mat!
We’ve had a nice quiet night in, cooking pasta in the communal kitchen and saving our energy for a full day on the slopes tomorrow - assuming either Whakapapa or Turoa will be open. Absolutely loving it here - It’s lucky I have work experience booked and graduation to look forward to, or I’d be looking for a job and a place to live and planning to stay out here for the season!
- comments
chris sounds brilliant Ceri. weather here doing it's usual - RAIN and we are planning to shear tomorrow -not! Carwyn gone to wakestock and no news hopefully means he's OK