Bungy! and Happy Birthday Melissa!

My Heart is in my throat this morning. I am up early while Eddie and Melissa are sleeping. I couldn't sleep at all last night, because in 3 hours from now, I will be throwing myself off of a 440 foot ledge from a cable car for a 8.5 second free fall. Yesterday we watched another bungy jump in Queenstown, only 43 feet and I felt sick as anything just watching. Maybe we should have watched before we bought our $210 non-refundable bookings. Word of advice for next people! Anyways, so I can't really enjoy this morning, because I am thinking about what my thoughts will be on the way down. Check it out. This is known as the "Worlds Wildest Bungy". The Bungy is named in USA extreme-sport magazine 'Headrush' as the 2nd most out-there extreme activity in the world. At the time, we thought that we might as well Go Big or Go Home! Now I realize that was nothing other than stupid.

This is what I will be jumping from: (and Eddie even paid $45 to come on the ride out to the platform to snap our pictures. He is scared of the ride....and standing on this thing...)

This is what I will see if the tears aren't blocking my view:





So to fill you in on the past few days...we are in Queenstown now and will be staying here for the rest of our trip. The place that we are staying is called the Alpine Lodge, and is right in the heart of Queenstown. It has free internet. Unbelievable. But like now, you have to get up super early or stay up super late to be able to get on it becuase its so busy. It surprises me here how many people hang out around the lodge during the days, they are not out enjoying every minute of the day like we are. It saddens me.

We spent our last day in Dunedin on Tuesday on the Otago Peninsula, with a car that we rented. We drove to Sandymount and to Sandfly Bay. This is not my picture-ours our way better, but at least you can see something...Here we saw sea lions and seals. And towards the end of the day we waited and waited for the yellow-eyed penguins to come ashore we never saw them, but Melissa wanted to hang in there and wait longer. Me and Eddie went for a walk on the beach, the sun was setting and it was just amazing, Melissa came down and found us and told us that she had run into a tour guide who told her that some of the penguins had alreay come ashore in a restricted area and that they were not visible from where the public hide was (a camo building constructed for people to view the penguins from so that they cant see you-b/c they are scared of us and wont come in). So he took her and showed her, then she came and got us and showed us. It was cool, but more cool b/c only a few people could get to see them. Then we made our way out of the Sandfly Bay, which was quite the challenge. The way down onto thebeach was pretty much running and tumbling down very steep sand dunes. You couldn't walk down if you tried it was so steep. And very very deep sand. We didn't think about the way out at the time. It was so hard, I think we had to stop a few times for water and to get that feeling of what it is like to breath back. That is why I figure most of the places that are spectatcular to see are almost always empty of people. The most amazing places to see are the ones that are very taxing on the body to get to and require great fitness levels (not that we have that...but we manage because we understand the rewards). We are so glad that Eddie is here to attest to all of the complaining about the walking and hiking and food down here. He is needing to buy new shoes b/c he has worn his out to the core in just a few days and is complaining of foot pain often. And any of you that know him know that he would eat anything, absolutely anything. And even he, yesterday said thathe understood us when we said that there is nothing to eat in this country. Even if you are starving, and would spend any amount of money, you still cant find anything that you want to eat. So you can only imagine for us picky eaters.


So we left Dunedin on Wednesday and came back to Queenstown for the night. Thursday morning we rented a car and drove up to Franz Josef Glacier. The drive normally takes 5.5 hours, it took us 11. There were so many places to stop on the way including many hikes that we did in the Mount Aspiring National Park. It is interesting all the parks here call their trails "walks" but really they are sweaty, hikes, all on what seems to be 45 degree plus inclines the whole way up. But it is always worth it. You just get to the top and can't believe what is before your eyes in every single case. The views are to die for. (as I am sure they will be from the 440 foot cable car this morning...). Eddie was able to fish in some rivers as me and Melissa climbed some waterfalls. The wtaer that he is fishing on is just incredible. It is so clear all the way through and at any depth. No fish this day. We got to Franz Josef late at night and checked into the YHA backpackers lodge. Well Eddie and I did, Melissa chose to sleep in the car. We found her a pretty safe spot close to our window and I guess she didn't mind it. We got up early, Eddie dropped us off in the Franz Josef township and he headed off for a day of fishing on some lakes that he spent quite some time mapping out. It was POURING hard this morning, but he made the most of it. Me and Melissa booked our half day guided glacier walk. It wasn't at all what I was expecting. I was expecting to be ontop of the ice, checking out the views. But the whole walk was climbing the glacier, up and down, up and down, very hard work. AT the bottom we had to remove all of our clothes and were in tank tops, at the top, I was wearing 3 layers and a jacket they provided and mitts and a tuque and big boots and was freezing cold numb. The climb was pretty incredible, the ice was a sparkling blue and was melting fast, there was water running down in heaps. So amazing to be standing on it. But if I would offer anyone advice, the half day is enough, as with the full day you just walk higher onto the glacier (where you do get to see more clean ice). Some of the parts that we climbed were covered in rock b/c the pressure of the ice on the surrounding valley rocks cause it to break of and fall onto the ice, but there still were some really clear parts. You just get so cold fast , even with all the gear on, b/c you get wet. Especially your hands holding onto the ropes for some of the steep spots. And wet and cold is never a good time. So we were really glad that we chose to do this, it was truly a unique experience. The guide made fun of us b/c he said that the glaciers that we have in Canada are even more spectacular than this one. But we told him that its more expensive to get to those than to these. And besides, everything is better in NZ...Eddie came back from fishing from La Fontaine Creek and still no fish. But not for lack of trying.

In the afternoon, we started the drive back to Queenstown, but again, lots to do along the way. We took our time b/c we had no place booked to stay this night and were planning on sleeping in the car, all of us. Guess we should have thought of that when we asked for the cheapest car available, a small hatchback...We stopped at Lake Matheson, which we had been excited for since day 1 in NZ. There are posters of this lake everywhere as it is known for its spectacular reflective views of Mount Cook and Mount Tasman, the highest peaks in New Zealand. Well, this is the one place that we were dissapointed with on our trip. WE walked along the 1.5 hour trail around the lake, searching of rthe infamous spot where these photos are taken from. There were only 2 viewing spots. The first one was like a little wharf that overlooked what we thought to be a pond, until we walked closer and read the sign indicating that it was infact Lake Matheson. We were heartbroken, we were expecting the biggest lake we have ever seen. We took a picture here, just incase this was the only spot, but trekked on hoping that we would still get to see the "bigger part of the lake" that we had faith was still out there. It wasn't. I guess that it is just one of those places that you have to be there on the most perfect of days to see the effects. On this day, the clouds were low, and covered the snow peaks of the mountains and the water on the lake was rippling. But in all honesty, still beautiful. The lake is about as big as you see oin this shot. And again, the snow peaks were not visible to us.

We also drove up to Fox Glacier, the 2nd of the only 2 glaciers in NZ. Not much differemt from Franz Josef, but we drove right up and hiked a bit so Eddie could see this one up close. Then we drove back. It got dark about 1/2 way back and we had to drive extra slow. Well...Eddie had to, he refused to let me drive for any part of it. He finally let me once he started to doze off with 0.5 hours to go. It was either taht or sleep in a parking lot, so he let me drive. So I drove back to Queenstown and we still slept in a parking lot, but a well lit one, right across the street from our lodge that we coudn't check into for another 12 hours. I slept ok, Melisa slept good, and well, Eddie hardly slept. His legs are too long. We woke up at 6am and drove to get gas to fill it up, then parked it at the top of a hill ontop of the the town and slept some more. We woke again at 8 and returned the car, went for a walk in the Queenstown Gardens (along the lake) and to two of the local weekend markets until 12 when we could finally check in. We all slept for a few hours, then hiked up a mountain for an hour+, instead of paying 10 dollars for a gondola ride to the top. We needed to get up this mountain to get to the Luge Track. Exhausted when we got there, the views were amazing. We all went luging, Eddie and Melissa twice so I could get their pictures. Then we watched bungy jumps at the "Ledge" bungy, not the one that we are doing today, but still scary to watch. Then me and Eddie got the Gondola ride down the mountain and met Melissa at "Hell" for supper (the pizza place).

And here I am now, only 2 hours to go now.

I hope to talk to you all again! And I hope I actually didn't chicken out. I have to make it to Milford Sound tomorrow...maybe we should have done that yesterday!