Category — New Zealand Adventures

This past weekend was much like the one before minus the rain. I’ve had paper after paper due these past few weeks. I had another wind surf class on Saturday. Once again it took up most of the day along with the commute. Sunday was spent inside writing papers all day. That’s it. Nothing new from NZ folks!

I have decided to continue taking windsurfing lessons in hopes of getting into it once I get back to the states. Two days later I’m still sore from Saturday. We moved to a smaller, faster board and a bigger sail. It took a lot more work to stay balanced, but the pay-off was noticeable in that it was more responsive and overall faster.

Nothing big this past weekend. Saturday, I had my first windsurfing class. I had always wanted to take a class on this, but had trouble finding help in the states. I signed up through the rec. centre here at the university. It’s with an outside company, but I got a deal through the university. The morning was an adventure in itself. They don’t provide pick up in the city, so I had to get to the lesson on my own accord. Knowing the bus system here is terrible, I headed to the Britomart (Auckland city train and bus station) two hours before my lesson. I stopped at the farmers market that runs once a week in the morning to pick up some more honey and veggies. Once I figured out what bus I needed, I hopped on. The lesson was in a suburb north of Auckland in a town called Milford. I hopped off in the town centre in hopes of asking someone where the lake was. After about 45 minutes of being sent in all sorts of different directions, I finally figured it out. Apparently, no one else from the university signed up. WOOT! private lessons! I spoke with the owner and he agreed to give me 4 hours of private lessons rather than 6 in a group. 2 hours this week and 2 next. Long story short, I love this sport! I picked up in 2 hours what most people accomplish in 6. I’m learning so fast, that the instructor agreed to start teaching me some freestyle riding next week.

After the lesson, I couldn’t find a bus station that would take me back to Auckland. I was told that I could catch a bus in the next town over. So off I was on foot to the next town. The walk was pleasant, and I was in a good mood from the lesson. I eventually got home to Auckland later in the afternoon in time for dinner.

Sunday was a lazy, rainy day. Breakfast in the am, then spent the rest of the day on campus writing a research paper. Exciting. Oh well, I’d rather it be a rainy day outside if I’m going to be stuck inside writing a paper all day. If I cant go out and enjoy the weather than no one can! HA!

This past weekend, four of us rented a car and headed south in the north island for a long weekend adventure. We had Friday classes off for Anzac day and decided to make the best of it. NZ has some Great Walks, that are well maintained and the most famous tramps in the country. One of these is on water. Its a 5 day canoe trip along the Wanganui River for 145km. Since we didn’t have five days, we did a shorter 3 day version of the most scenic part of the river.

We got to our destination Thursday night so that we could get an early start on Friday morning. Since we had tents we just set up camp in the front yard of the car park at the canoe rental shop. It was a cooooold night. At about 7 the next morning we started getting ready and packing our food and gear into watertight canisters, which were provided by the canoe rental shop along with the two canoes. They loaded us along with 4 other groups of people into a bus with canoes in tow and drove us down to Wades Landing in Whakahoro (‘wh’ in Maori makes an ‘f’ sound pronounced FAK – A – WHOR’O say it out loud). The weather was beautiful all weekend. Not too hot, but not cold enough for warm clothes. The camp sites were spaced apart about every two hours. This is the best way to navigate time, since there are few landmarks on the river that appear on a map. We arrived at our destination John Coull camp that evening at about 5pm after 6 hours on the river with a break for lunch. When I planned this trip, I didn’t realize that Anzac weekend was such a busy time for tramping/canoeing. The hut was overflowing with people and our tents were packed into the camp site like sardines. That night we made a pretty big dinner with my camp stove. Pasta, sausages, and home fries. One of the advantages of a canoe trip is that you can over pack since you don’t have to carry anything on your back. I can’t ever imagine taking a sack of potatoes on a tramping trip. That night was warm compared to the previous night and all of us slept like rocks.

The next morning, by the time we got up, all 80+ people at the camp site were gone. I guess they wanted to make it farther that day to prevent crowded campsites. Oh well, we took our time and make pancakes for breakfast. We got on the river at around 9:30. It was a nice day. We had a few rapids that day, but nothing more than just moving water. Everyone claimed that they saw a dead sheep in the river, but I am still sceptical. The day was much like the day before, with a 6 hour paddle and lunch in the middle somewhere. Towards dusk, we saw some mountain goats grazing along the river’s edge. We set up camp that night at Tieke Marae. It was much less crowded than the previous night and much warmer. After some star gazing, we all fell asleep pretty early with full stomachs and sore muscles.

The last day’s journey was much shorter than the previous days, but we got an early start. The bus was to pick us up at Pipriki at 2:30. The day was to have some rain and large rapids, so we were prepared to get wet. Luckily the weather held up until we finally got into the bus. About 2.5 hours into the day, we came across the first set of big rapids. a lot of canoes were docked and watching as people came through. Every other canoe that went through tipped due to the size of the waves. The canoes would just get filled with water and couldn’t be controlled. Katie and I tipped, naturally. The water was cold and numbing. We managed to swim the boat to the edge and recover all of our belongings. I lost a pack towel and Katie lost a sandal (which was recovered 100m downstream). Natalie and Tom managed to make it through the rapid soaked, but right side up. Luckily the sun came out from behind the clouds to dry us up. The rest of the day we just cruised with the moving water and ended with smiles, appetites and a 5 hour drive back to Auckland.