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Right so I realise I have been slacking a bit- I've actually had to make notes in my flight diary so I remember what I've done. So Here's a little catch up...
From Franz Josef we went to Wanaka- the scenery started to get more and more incredible- they'd just had 2 days of snow on the top iof the mountains so the drive was actually pretty cool with all the snow capped mountains and gergeous blue lakes everywhere (the lakes are a strange sort of transluscent turquoise colour made from 'glacial powder' or something like that... cant actually remember what it's called so I shouldnt have quoted it) and are just stunning. When our daily activity clipboard went round with a sign up sheet for activities in Wanaka (having just watched a video of our driver Jed doing a not too scary looking skydive), I actually startedto get tempted to throw myself out of a plane simply to see the scenery better. I've never really been one for cooing over fields and hills and stuff, but I think I'm turning! Anyway, Laura decided she'd do hers there and then Vicki said she'd do it too despite being scared of heights (which I'm not sure is true, having watch her find it easy!) and Mike said he would too- amazing what a little peer pressure when you're already on the fence can do. A couple of hours later (spent totally calm and unbothered by my impending suicide) and we were sat in the skydive centre (starting to look like an alcoholic just coming off the bottle!) waiting for our turn. Calm decended again on the plane ride up, despite my /instructor?/ person thinking it was hilarious to teasde me by pretending it was his first day, saying how he hoped it wouldnt end badly like the last one, pretending he had no idea how to do up the harness and making it loose so it kept falling off my shoulders etc. I think the panic set in when I noticed Vicki had fallen out of the plane! I was third out and when he shuffled me to the edge, my instincts took over and despite having been told to ignore the fact that I was hanging out of a plane at 15000 feet and hold on to my harness, my arm had other ideas and I was unable to stop it from trying to save me from death by grabbing hold of the plane. Apparently that was a bad thing to do and the man yelled at me. After that there wasnt much I could do and I spent the first few seconds of freefall attempting to work out how to breathe and trying to get my ears to pop! By the end of the freefall I was actually smiling and enjoying the scenery, though in ridiculous amounts of pain in my ears (maybe not a great idea to skydive with a cold?) and I would even go so far as to say the parachute ride at the end was very relaxed and enjoyable. It was totally worth it, we had the most amazing weather and the scenery was, I think, the best in the whole of New Zealand. All in all, so proud of myself for being able to conquer a massive fear (I've since climbed a few more mountains etc without any jelly legged wobbles at all! Woop woop!)
The evening was spent feeling invincible, sat by the lake watching the sun set with Mike, Lydia, Sam and Rebecca. Such beautiful scenery- I'd have loved to stay here longer, but the rest of the world was calling :).
On to Queenstown the next day, which I'd expected to be more like a city with high rise buildings and stuff (like Aukland), but it was basically Wanaka all over again, with a few more shops and cafes. I would happily live there! Our 3 days in Queenstown were spent catching up with Katherine and Steph who we'd lost from our bus a few days earlier and all their stories of our driver Flea's exploits (funny but gross) and gossip about our lost bus group. We experienced coctail shots poured from terapots in World Bar- not sure what that was all about, but it makes you buy drinks I guess! We spend one day doing the Milford Sound day trip- that was really nice as Lydia, Steph, Katherine, Mike, Vivki, Nicole D etc all came with on the same day so we had a nice little reunion day out. It rained (standard now) but it actually seemed to add to the atmosphere, as it made all the hills (or mountains?) look really eerie and mysterious with clouds covering the middle sections and making it look like there were mountains appearing out of the sky. Also, the rain created lots of extra waterfalls which were really pretty. We were fed like kings (though Nicole F was seasick so couldnt eat it, poor thing!) All in all a fun day with more of NZ's amazing scenery. The next day was beautiful and we catually had some really warm weather (totally unprepared, all dressed in jeans and trainers etc) so Me, Laura, Katherine and Lydia went for a potter about around the lake and the gardens (really beautiful) whilst the crazier people went to do canyon swings (massive well done to Mike, Nicole and Nicole) and Steph did her skydive (inspired by my being a wuss and still managing, yay!). We found a little market and there was a jazz festival with live music, so we all met back up in the afternoon and napped on the grass listening to live music- really nice day :) (obviously finished with more teapot shots- a slow starting night, but it ended up being pretty good fun with everyone at the start, then me, Lydia, Klas and Calum boggying until the small hours- Klas having dance offs with some gangsters in world bar, navy boy being told to go away by pretty much everyone and finally getting the message; and Calum pulling Sinead (may have spelt that wrong)... oh and a devil burger :) ).
The journey back to Christchurch was LONG but I managed to bag myself the front 2 seats and spread out for a nice long snooze. I think it was something like 8 hours or so on the bus... never fun. We had another sunny day in Christchurch waiting to fly back to Aukland, spent reading and chilling in the garden. We lost another day again travelling back to Aukland and had a fairly early night after a drink in Nomads bar (Barman- 'what can I do for you' Laura- 'now there's an offer'- HAHAHAHA I think we were all as shocked as each other, but it was very entertaining). I managed to get a few more visits the next day to my new favourite shop, Cotton On, where I visited the changing rooms so many times that the guy thought I was coming back for him and started chatting me up (hmm no dear, I just want some jeans!) so I actually feel like I have a pair of trousers with me now that I actually like and would want to wear!!! Always good! Had a bit of a mission hunting for new trainers for Laura as she'd left her walking boots on the ferry between Wellington and Picton (turned out to be a right little mission, the lost property people at the ferry station are not exactly what you'd call helpful). We bumped into Vicki in Aukland, as she's made a last minute decisiont o ditch the Kiwi bus and fly to the city to find a job. A long battle with the 10 second time limited hair dryers later and we skipped dinner (a big mistake) in favour of a trip to the bar to meet Vicki. Had a few drinks there and met up with Loic and Pieter who we'd met in Fiji, which was really nice. It's strange being able to meet people in one country and catch up again in another, but everyone seems to be doing similar routes which is really nice. Quite a few more drinks and no sleep later and it was time to leave for the airport. My acting skills were put to the text as I attempted to quickly sober up enough to get on the plane- sorry parents!- (don't worry, I fooled them all!)
After we got to Sydney and my hangover had started to kick in, we were greeted by a ridiculously long queue to get through customs and the most unhelpful airport lady in the history of airport ladies. She basically told us she wouldnt help us get through the queue faster, despite the fect that missing the next flight would void our entire round the world ticket, and that we would definately miss our connecting flight. We rushed through the queue and the kind lady at customs rished for us, telling us where to go next and that we should probably start running. So we did. Hangover + Heavy bags + no sleep + Running= Not fun! Thankfully, Nicole's Aus passport had got her through her queue faster and she was waiting with our bags on a trolley (nope, they dont connect your bags onto the next plane for you... psh), so we ran with bags on our fronts and backs, Laura with the trolley shouting 'move!' to people as they literally jumped out of our way. We caught the train to the domestic terminal to save time getting through traffic on the free shuttle and managed to check our bags in to the next flight (the people there looked at us like we were crazy for running as we had a whole 10 minutes spare... 10 minutes? What were we thinking- should've stopped for a bite to eat on the way :S). We made our way through to the departure gate to meet Nicole's mum, drenched in sweat and out of breath (nice!) and generally in a bit of a state. We relaxed for a bit, knowing we'd made it in time, until we had to board, where they scanned the boarding passes we'd been given in Aukland. The light flashed red and made a 'no' beeping noise, so they asked us to go and see the lady at the desk. Apparently it had put as through as babies (?) which turned out to be because they'd presumed we'd not make it, taken us off the flight and changed our tickets for babies so they could give away our seats. Thanks Qantas! Another rude lady later and we had lost our original seats all together, but had new seats on the plane at least... but no promise that our bags had been loaded... Anyway, a long story short and we made it to Alice Springs where our bags were in fact waiting (very good thing- desert heat + dressed in clothes you were wearing out the night before and have just run through an airport in+ no spare clothes= nightmare!)
The next day we were picked up at 6.30am to begin yet another bus tour, to Uluru/ Kata Tjuta/ Kings Canyon. I'll tell you about this in detail next time as I've been online for ages and lunch is calling me!
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