Log 23: Sydney, Australia!

January 19^th came quickly and before we knew it we were off to Sydney to see what we could of the city before heading off to Asia.  We arrived and found the train into the city and got settled into our very busy and loud hostel dorm. After settling in, we headed out to explore our new surroundings. I realized during my last few days in New Zealand why my feet had been so itchy to travel again, I hadn’t left New Zealand for 8 months and for the past 6 years, every 6mo I had left the US and I guess I can apply that to any country I reside in for a long period of time now. After walking for a few hours we stopped at a café bar and had our first Australian beer.  Even Percy got a picture with our first beer!  After sitting for a bit we spotted a book store and went in for a browse as I was in desperate need of a book for the road.  We hit our mark as it was a fantasy book store and sure enough they had the next book in the crazy Wheel of Time series that I started years ago!  Book 10, only 4 more to go!!

Later in the day we tried out the train system and headed up to the Quays to meet my dad’s cousins that just happened to be in Sydney!  They were on a mission for two years with their church and had only been in the city a few months but we walked around the botanical gardens together and caught up, then they took us out to dinner, which we had to take a ferry across the harbor to get to, then we walked around the Sydney version of Coney Island and took crazy pictures.  

That night we learned we may have become old and less tolerant of the other ‘kids’ in our hostel room. We returned from exploring to find five of the British boys sharing our dorm and a random girl partying it up in our room, wine spilled all over the floor, stumbling and slurring already evident, so we made ourselves scarce for a few hours until they left for the clubs. At some point in the early morning hours, they all came back and were turning lights on, laughing, joking, and quite drunk telling stories of their attempts at hooking up. I tried to nicely tell them to hush but that was met with complaints so I just gave up. At one point the random girl came back and made a good attempt at ‘joining’ one of the boys in their bed, much to their irritation.  ‘That Essex bird’ was told to f*** off more times than I can count and I’m pretty sure she was still there on the floor in the morning when we woke up in the morning. We headed to reception and asked to change rooms right away and found a much quieter room with more Brits and a few Americans all just out of college or traveling during their gap year (before starting college) They were much more considerate, and there’s nothing worse than not being able to sleep when you are traveling.  Oh hostel life. 

We spent our days going to museums of natural history and contemporary art, and the botanical gardens in the morning, seeing all the tropical plants that they have housed there and also the resident population of giant fruit bats that were living in the trees. They are starting to kill the trees, so the city is trying humane ways of trying to get them to leave but so far their efforst haven’t worked.  By the harbor bridge, we just stared at the Opera House, in awe that it was right there in front of us. But we were equally in awe of the crazy buskers. There were a few different groups of aborigine groups playing didgeridoos to techno beats, painted up and selling boomarangs to passer-bys, as well as street performers on unicycles, and jugglers of fire.  Our favorite was the little Argentinean man and his dancing doll.  Playing salsa music from a boombox, this guy had a giant cloth doll in a dancing uniform, whose feet were sewn to the end of his shoes and then he held the rest of her while dancing.  Somehow you had to laugh at him but you couldn’t help watching him too!  He was the happiest looking street performer I’d seen in a long time, truly enjoying his craft.   

In the afternoon we took a ferry over to Manly beach to check out these great Sydney beaches.  It was fairly busy but it was great to next to the sea again. Matt went for a dip but I just waded around in the surf.  I wasn’t quite comfortable with my pink bikini yet.  The oldies song, ‘itsy bitsy teeny weeny, yellow polka-dot bikini’ came to mind and even though I felt ridiculous it was hard to ignore all the beautifully tan fit bodies running around.  I realized while in New Zealand that all I had was a sports suit for doing laps, and that I had it left back at my apartment while we were traveling around. I decided that a bikini was needed since we were going to SE Asia and some amazing beaches, plus we needed swimwear for white water rafting so off to the Warehouse we went and the only one that fit happened to be a shade of purple that was more pink than anything. For anyone that knows me, pink is a forbidden color, but in desperation I decided to not look at the color. Maybe it was time for me to embrace the girl color of pink.

Back in Sydney proper, we decided to check out the Sydeny Festival that was happening. It was a series of live shows all over the city at different times of the day with feature shows at night. Taking a chance we tried to go see one of the freature shows in the botanical gardens but it was sold out so we just had beers outside the venue and listened from the tables next to the bars that were set up. Just as we decided to head out and find a real bar to go to, it started pouring rain . After waiting it out for 45min to see if it would stop we decided just to wing it and walk back to the train station to get back to the hostel. As fate would have it as soon as we left it started pouring again so we rain all the way to the train station only to find it closed for the night. Already soaking wet we figured we couldn’t get any wetter so we walked/ran the rest of the way back to the hostel. We had to wring out our cloths in the bathrooms when we finally made it back. Hilarious!

The next day we decided to take a train trip out to the Blue Mountains near the town of Katoomba. Arriving at the town instead of taking the tourist busses around we just decided to talk to the bluff overlooking the valley where The Three Sisters rock formation was. After that we took a walk through the bush forest that took you down hundreds of very steep slippery steps to the bottom of the valley then you climb back up the other side to get back to the main road. We celebrated our long walk with a lemon popsicle at the train station while we waited for the next train back to the city.

The next day we had a lie in and then went to another festival event that we were able to view. It was called Live and it was a motion picture art project where well known folk artists were filmed ‘performing’ a song against a white background so that the audience could really focus on the art of a live performance. The instrumentation, the lyrics, as well as the passion the musicians display while performing their art.  Although I knew only 2 of the 20 artists, it was a great to really watch up close all the subtle things that each person did.  After that we made our way to the Taronga Zoo that we had heard so much about. When we arrived we realized we only had 2 hours to see the whole zoo so we booked it to the Australia area to try and see the duck-billed platypus, and koalas.  The little buggers were nowhere to be seen though but we did get up close to a koala.  We are such animal nerds, but I guess that’s expected with both our professions and the fact that there are weird and different animals in all the places that we were going to visit.

That night we booked tickets to see The Greatest Hits of Opera at the Sydney Opera House, because if you are able you should go see a show IN the greatest opera house in the world right!?  Not knowing my opera very well, Matt informed me that I’d probably recognize most of the songs from Looney Tunes. When they opened with Figaro from The Barber of Seville I had to agree. Although I had the Tim Allen version from Home Improvement in my head, “I gotta bad haircut, I gotta bad haircut, ohhh, he cut off my bangs!  You should have used conditioner, you should have used conditioner, ahh haaa!!” 

 The day we were to fly to Bali, we had most of the day to waste so we spent the morning in the park reading our books under the canopy of trees, found an ice cream shop then went down to Darling Harbour to the city Aquarium. Here we finally viewed the duck-billed platypus in action and fulfilld Matt’s requirement of Australia. We also saw a Dugong, a cousin to the manatee and the extinct sea cow. I was intrigued right away! They had some amazing exhibits of sharks, sea turtles, and sting rays, but the real winner was the platypus in our minds.

We gathered our stuff from the hostel and said goodbye to Sydney and could barely wait to be on our real adventure in Asia, where everything was at least going to be cheaper and more affordable for our budget!

Log 22: Matt comes to New Zealand!

Ok folks, I’m at it again, my good friend Matt Doyle and I are off on ‘The Great Australasian Jaunt’ starting first in Sydney, Australia for 5 days then onwards to Asia starting in Indonesia.  When Matt arrived in New Zealand we decided our trip needed a title or theme.  While still in the US, Matt came up with J.A.U.N.T. Journey’s of An Unemployed Traveler so it kinda stuck. 

Like all my visitors, I like to get them right into the adventures, so after getting Matt from the airport started off at a Wilbank Wildlife Reserve just north of Christchurch with the objective to see a kiwi. Our original plan to go down to Stewart Island to see a kiwi in the wild was quelled because of time and expense.  We indeed saw lots of native and introduced species of birds and small mammals, as well as a kiwi in the ‘Nighthouse’, because they are nocturnal. I think the one we saw was a bit neurologic because he kept running the same pattern between a tree, a tussock, and the fence.  Even the insane Kiwi’s need a home!  We drove out to the Banks Peninsula and had an ice cream in Diamond Harbour then headed down to Ashbuton for dinner and drinks with my friends from the vet clinic. I think Matt was a bit tired by that point but we had a great time!! 

The next day was a bit gloomy and cloudy but we headed up to Arthur’s Pass and stopped at Castle Hill for a climb on the rocks and some lunch on top of a big boulder. In Arthur’s pass we walked up to a waterfall instead of going up the track we had planned on due to time and the weather being dodgy. Matt got his first glimpse of the cheeky kea bird, as one climbed all around the porch of the café as well as the campervan and my car looking for any morsel of food that he could con off a person. Back in Ashburton we had been invited to dinner by Jenny and Kate, the mother and daughter that I stayed with for the first few weeks I was in New Zealand. Jenny has a Dexter cow and calf that she raised and had recently butchered one named Mary because she kept jumping out of the fence. So we had Roast Mary and she tasted GREAT!

The following day we headed off on our tiki tour of the south island, but before we left I taught Matt how to drive my manual car and we drove quite successfully down to the Waukanui beach and back.  We headed to the Mt. John Observatory near Lake Tekapo for a look around and a coffee, then drove to Mount Cook and camped at Hooker valley campground, making our first dinner with my camp stove and the mess set my parents gave me for Christmas! Thanks Mom and Dad!!  It worked bloody great! We hiked out to Hooker Lake which is made from the glacial melt from the Mt. Cook area. Two hours, two swing bridges, and a lot of silly behavior, we made it there and saw the ice chunks in the sooty lake and river that flowed through to the Hooker Valley.

 

From there we headed to Queenstown where we found a campsite on Moke Lake, a secluded campsite 11km up a dirt road back into a station with lots of sheep. The next day we went white water rafting and had a blast! The water level was down so we didn’t have any class 5’s but there was still plenty of excitement to keep us smiling and hooting! Afterward we made our way down to the Catlins and camped at a very wind campsite in a flax field on the coast.  We saw some yellow eyed penguins and some seals before the weather rolled in. With a southerly blowing down and the coastly weather coming off the sea we were hard pressed to cook our dinner on the wee stove. We found a pavilion on the coast that was partly protected but I still nestled close to the stove to keep the wind from blowing it out while we cooked our rice and veggies, with curried lamb chunks. That night it rained quite a bit and we woke up to a lot of water in our tent so instead of sticking around we showered in the coin showers, and pulled up the tent and stuck it in the trunk.  We made our way to Dunedin and went to the art museum and the Cadbury chocolate factory where they gave us lots of chocolate as well as a giant chocolate Easter egg! 

After our night in the rain we decided we were done with the camping and got a hostel for the night, amazing what a mattress can do for your demeanor after a week of camping! We headed out to the Otago peninsula the next day to try and find some wildlife, more penguins and seals were found but the weather still be dodgy we went on our way. Outside Dunedin we stopped at the Moeraki boulders and took some crazy pictures on the rocks and being giddy in the water and just enjoying being silly, then stopped for some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches from the boot of the car somewhere around Timaru.  I had forgotten about the greatness of peanut butter and jelly!  Every other nationality I meet thinks I’m crazy for combining those two condiments!   

Back in Ashburton we did our last load of laundry and had tea with Barb and Ross.  BBQ chops and spuds, with salad, so simple yet SO tastey!  Then it was full on packing and getting everything I owned into a backpack for Asia or a suitcase to store at Amy and Alex’s until I return in August. Amazing how much you accumulate even when you are not trying to accumulate. 

The day we left I missed Barb to say goodbye officially, but she left me a little gift. Some compressed NZ towels, perfect for traveling and a little possum finger puppet!  It was decided that it would become our traveling mascot and Percy the Possum was going to travel around Asia and we’d document his route.  I have Garth, a friend now living on the north island of NZ to blame for this as he suggested everyone should have a traveling mascot

Log 21: Last week, Leaving Do, Recovery and an attempt at Fishing

My last week of work started with a visit to John Tanner’s, a dairy client that I had come to quite enjoy visiting. Even though nothing was done very speedy or efficiently, we had a great time and he’d quiz me about all the gossip and the news around Canterbury. John thought my fiddle playing skill was a bit weird and took the piss out of me all the time for it but I think he was secretly impressed. My nickname was Bluegrass since I was in a bluegrass band, and everyone else in the clinic had a nickname as well, but out of respect of them I won’t mention them here.  This day I looked at a sick cow, then checked some cows for pregnancy and caught up on the last of the gossip before I left. He also informed me that he was going to start the Bring Kat Back campaign, starting with painting that phrase on the roof of Vetlife as well as gather other clients I worked with to threaten going to the competing practice unless they gave me my job back in August. I was quite flattered, and Craig our other very friendly client was informed of the plan and was already on board. I figured I’d leave it to those two to figure it out. 

Monday and Tuesday night was my last session with the Irish groups so I headed up to Christchurch to say my goodbyes to the great people I had been playing tunes with for months, but it felt like years. Jeremy and Sophia were sad to see me go as well as Russell, who always made me play Catharsis every week that I showed up. It was his hands down favorite tune and Gm to boot. At the end of the night Jeremy invited me out salmon fishing the following weekend and since I hadn’t been fishing in many years I was gonna try to make it up to go.

The end of the week and my last day of work was celebrated by my leaving do that I held in the famous sleep-out garage. We had a BBQ and a version of the pot luck in the US. Even the Possum’s came down for the event and we all played some tunes for the Ashburton folks. It was sad to hear all the goodbye’s from the client’s and all the great people I worked with everyday but I was determined to come back to New Zealand, even if I wasn’t based in Ashburton again.  Craig and Dave had decided a whiskey tasting was in order, since our plans of a formal one never went through. They were big into their good whiskies and I had never really been able to tell the difference. They, one way or another, gonna show me the difference that night. They brought along 3 different whiskies, of which I had to try all 3. The Possum’s also brought along a bottle of Old Crow for old time’s sake from the Harbour Light gig that went all wrong because of it. After a glass of the good stuff, I could definitely tell that the Old Crow was murderous and never should have been drunk. After the BBQ and the Possum’s mini show, it was Craig Hickman’s turn. Craig was famous for his poems about the poor vets that stepped on his farm, and had decided to write me a farewell poem, which I was a bit nervous about. The crowd gathered around and drinks were freshly poured in preparation for the narration. It was actually just to the edge of being embarrassing but at the same time very sentimental and there was much applause for his skill afterward.  The night continued, and because I was now officially on holiday for 8 months with no job and all the adventuring I could muster ahead of me, I fully embraced the night and accepted the beers, the whiskies and the shots that came later. After most of the gathering had gone off home to bed, the few left behind, Charlotte, Craig, Dave, the other Craig, and Johnno from the band, and I all decided to head into town to go to ‘the night club’ in Ashburton called The Shed! Known for its overplaying of Lady Gaga.  But hey, when it’s a group of good friends already high on life, it becomes the best dance club on earth!  Shots of tequila were poured, beers washed them down and we all boogied out on the dance floor, even Craig who had a late pass from his wife!  We closed down the club and headed back to our respective homes via the courtesy van.  It was a great night out!!! 

The next day was recovery and clean-up of the garage. I found bottles left in nooks and crannies I never really thought about before. But all the food was gone so I was content with that.  That night I headed up to Kaiapoi to have dinner and stay the night with Jeremy and Sophia the couple from the Irish session and Jeremy was going to take me fishing the next day. Although I felt recovered, I knew I wasn’t totally there yet by the time I got to their house. I felt bad I wasn’t a more engaging visitor but their kids Alex 5, and Tom 3, were the cutest little hooligans and they had conned me into reading them their bedtime story by the end of the evening.  Sophia and I stayed up talking till late and played a few tunes, she demonstrated on her accordion the set for the upcoming show her and Jeremy were doing with some other players. I’m really sad I missed the show as it was combining all different styles of traditional music with classical music with two fiddles, an accordion, a guitar, lute, and harp.

The fishing expedition the next day more relaxing than it was fishing, as it really wasn’t peak season for salmon in their river, but Jeremy had a great time just having adult conversation about music and teaching and fishing. We chatted with the other old men that were fishing on the bank as well, learning all the gossip of who caught fish and who hadn’t, and how to interpret the fishing rules and regulations and who had violated those rules.  Later Sophia brought Alex and Tom down and they ‘helped’ us fish by gathering stones to throw at the cormorant birds that would dive down and steal the pilchard fish that were used as bait on the hooks. They made more noise than anything but they were still quite interested in helping the fisherman and praised the old men when they caught a herring and ran to check it out while it flopped on the shore.  After fishing I said my goodbyes and went to meet Eilis in town for dinner.

My year in New Zealand has officially coming to an end with work finished and Matt arriving in a few days.  It has been an amazing experience living here and the place has definitely grown on me and I can’t wait to come back and do more of the multi-day walks and tramps around the country as well as keep learning the systems and unique challenges of the vet world here. Hopefully next year I can venture into more species and broaden my horizons a bit more. 

Where to next? Well the plan will be to be back in New Zealand August of 2011, till June of 2012, then who knows where I’ll end up. That’s too far ahead for my kind of life planning. I’m quite enjoying the nomadic life I’ve started living so anything could happen!  

Log 20: Recording a CD, Christmas and New Year!

December was finally upon us and I was quickly starting to realize my time in New Zealand was limited. I had since decided that I wanted to come back for another season but I needed to go off traveling for a bit and have a few months at home. So much to my boss’s dislike, I planned to leave just before scanning season and it is yet to be determined if I can come back for calving season next year.  There’s still so much to learn about the New Zealand system and I’ve met so many great people so why not come back for another season if they’ll have me?

The first weekend was the big cd recording with the band so all of Saturday was spent intensely going through each song putting down tracks and then overdubbing solos, and voice tracks.  I stayed at Sean’s that night and we continued on Sunday for most of the day.  By the end of the day we had gotten just about all that we needed.  Almost all the tracks are originals that Sean and Keith wrote and one that Bryz wrote, so I think the cd will come together really well, ready for the tour in July through the US! They guys upon hearing that I’d be back in the states by then went through with their plans to put together a tour from Texas to Tennessee next July!  Sean is a machine at planning and pushing and pulling strings, and before I knew it gigs were confirmed and dates set.  I couldn’t believe it!  So if anyone is going to be in Nashville, TN around the end of July, you can come see the Johnny Possum Band play if want!

Plans for Asia were finally set as well!  My friend Matt put in his notice at work, we had our Vietnam and Chinese visas back, and our flights were booked!  The plan is to start in NZ so Matt can see it, fly to Sydney for a week, then Bali, Indonesia, from there see Komodo and Borneo, then go up to Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Laos, into China, and Hong Kong then make our way up to Beijing to fly back to the US on April 7^th.  3 months almost to the day of traveling from the time Matt gets to NZ.  My Mom brought me over a travel fiddle so I can take one with me and try to share some music with travelers but I’m still not sure how that’s going to work out as its Asia and not, say, Europe, or the US.  Its going to be a GREAT trip regardless and I can’t wait to be traveling again!!!  I might be jobless and penniless when I get back to the US but with any luck I’ll get my job back with Vetlife for another seaon or its safe to say I’ll be able to find another job in the south island no problem. 

The next weekend was the clinic BBQ! The drug reps had won some money from a drug company and we decided to put a big BBQ together for us and the surrounding Vetlife clinics in our area. Afterwards we decided to make a night of it and our first stop was Jess, our new small animal vet, and her partner Richard’s house.  Much wine was drunk, Jess got out her fire poi, and Amy entertained us all with her antics before passing out.  The 4 of us remaining were going to make an attempt to go into town but I quickly decided that if I went into town shots were going to be given to me and that was needed so I stayed behind at Jess and Richards place. From the stories I heard on Monday I’d say I probably chose wisely. 

Before I knew it Christmas was here and I was still trying to come to grips with it being HOT at Christmas. Decorations were going up, lights were on trees and houses, presents were being wrapped, stores were having sale ads everywhere and to excess, but it still just didn’t really feel like Christmas. It felt more like the 4^th of July if anything.  I bought myself a battery operated Christmas tree with little lights on it and made a paper start for the top. I needed something to remind of me home!  On Christmas Eve, I told Barb I was going to the midnight service at one of the churches I found in town. I hadn’t gone to church the entire time I’d been in New Zealand, its not a very religious country and even with about eight churches in my town, no one really seemed to GO to church.  It was more for the sake of tradition that made me want to sing Christmas carols while holding a candle at a church for Christmas Eve to get me in the spirit.  Barb, having never been to church except for funerals, said she’d go with me. GREAT!  We take our naps and then be ready to get Christmasy by 11pm.  The church I had picked had advertized a carol singing service in the paper and they had all the words for the songs in the paper too. I thought, great! This is going to be a great event, full of people and lots of singing.  First off when we came through town it looked like a ghost town, no one was out. When we pulled up to the church there were finally some cars out so it wasn’t totally deserted, but when we stepped into the Anglican church there was only about 15 people in the pews. The carols started but they weren’t any that Barb or I knew, and if it was a song we knew it was to a different tune or strange words.  We had planned on leaving before the real service started because Barb wasn’t interested in staying so we sat in the very back pew.  But the priest and the offering takers all lined up behind us and we were all but trapped.  The service continued ina  very dark manner, and a screen showing cosmic photos, and religious symbols flashed in the front. The lady priest spoke very slow and with a deep mystic voice, and I felt like I was at a cult ceremony rather than a Christmas service. Right after the offertory, before the offering takers came back to the back of the church, Barb and I managed to slip out and make a run for the car.  I didn’t feel Christmasy and I’m pretty sure that Barb will never go to another church service as long as she lives. 

On Christmas Day, Susan and her family had invited me around to their place for lunch and dinner. I was quite excited to be adopted for the day so I headed over there and after lunch we all sat in the garden sun bathing and reading the newspaper. I managed to get sunburnt on my legs as a matter of fact… on Christmas!  Another friend Jenny, who I had stayed with when I first arrived in NZ, asked me over for a drink during the day so I headed over there and met her sister and cousins for a drink.  Back at Susan’s for supper, the rest of their family arrived and we had a massive dinner and all kinds of good family chatter.  Partners, babies, jobs, parenting, silly jokes they had all played on each other, and I was quite happy to be apart of it.  Susan had talked me into bringing my fiddle, and told me she had been telling everyone about my playing!  Oh great!  I played a few tunes and after while I talked Richard into playing Three Blind Mice that he had learned at Thanksgiving. He said he had been practicing his air fiddle for the last month. I was shocked and amazing when first try, he played it perfectly and in tune!  I think there is a budding musician there!

On Boxing day I had planned to meet up with the MacFarlane’s, Chris and his family had looked after me the first weekend I was in NZ.  Chris had recently left the clinic so it was really great to catch up with him and his family.  I headed off to Christchurch for the MacPac sale, a great outdoor shop that has never let me know for great tramping gear. I then made my way over to Sean’s place, from the Possum band, to pick up a fiddle.  Sean is a business consultant that is currently working for the Canterbury school of music and was told about an old man that wanted to donate some violins to the school.  The man’s father had been a luthier and violin maker and the son had inherited all the instruments when he died.  The son was now in his 80’s and was trying to give them away. After the head violin teacher picked out the ones worthy of the school, Sean went over and grabbed a care load more to find homes for.  My friend Eilis the flute player, had been dabbling at the fiddle in Ireland, and so I thought the best gift for a great friend as well as the best place for an old fiddle in need of playing would be at her place.  The instruments hadn’t been played in about 20 years so Sean and I pieced together 2 instruments, he kept one to learn and I took the other one. 

Finally making it to Aokaroa where I was to be meeting Eilis and camping for the next few days, I gave Eilis her Christmas gift of this little fiddle. She’s heading down to Te Anau for work for 4 mo, secluded out in the sounds with lots of time to learn to play the fiddle so she was elated!  I just love getting new instruments as well as sharing music with others so I think I was just as excited as she was!

We spent the next few days walking around the peninsula where we were camping, drinking wine with the other campers, and playing a few tunes for them as well. It was very relaxing and chilled.  One day after a walk we were extremely hot and sweaty and since we were on the coast we decided to jump in the sea for a cool off.  We found the fishing beach which was just a lot of flat rocks with barnacles but we could jump off easily enough. It was getting back out that was going to be tricky.  The edges were covered in massive seaweed plants but quite firmly attached so we thought we could use those to haul ourselves back in.  Just before jumping in I suddenly realized I was jumping into salt water… WHAT!!!  Having grown up around lakes with freshwater, I was thinking to myself I hadn’t been in an OCEAN for almost 10 years!  Then I remembered what lives in the oceans and had another pang of mental warning!  It wasn’t fear so much as just cold realization that gee I could get nibbled on, or have a dolphin swim by me.  Unlikely this close to the coast but still.  Eilis having grown up in Ireland and used to the salty ocean jumped right in and was happy as a fish, while I was flailing about just getting used to the salt and the new buoyancy. My love of the ocean it seems was more of a visual one I think, but now at least I was coming to terms with the actually salt water.  After hoisting ourselves out of the water with the seaweed after many attempts and a lot of laughter we dried off on the barnacle covered rocks and headed back to the campground.

It was also time to leave for another friend I had become close to, Laura H. a vet working for one of the competing practices that we had adopted back in March.  She was heading off traveling as and as she had no one to send her off properly besides a taxi, I decided to take her to the airport and have a good send off lunch together. I wasn’t working anyway so I picked her up from her house and we made her finally journey north to Christchurch airport.  It is so hard to say goodbye to friends that you meet traveling, not just the ones that you know you’ll likely never see again but also the ones that are nomadic like you and seem to make the experience you are living that much more rewarding because of meeting them.  All the more reasons why Facebook has become an invaluable tool these days, as much as I hate to admit that.

New Years was pretty low key, Susan invited us all out to her place and we ended up drinking wine and listening to all the farm stories and tales from Richard’s farm as well watching the guys dare each other to eat the giant beetles that were coming in the house… alive.  Which they did, multiple times.  We rambled back home after midnight I promptly passed out from all the hubbub of the week coming to a close. Welcome 2011, oh what crazy plans I have for you this year!!!!