I found myself back in the car waking up next to a butcher shop fan buzzing to keep the meat in the freezer cold and I smoothly wiped the condensation off the windows before heading out to a place called by some people Jurassic park or a simpler version called a Fiord. A Fiord is a long valley full of tall sheer mountains that have been carved out by a giant glacier and at the very end of the valley is a shallow deposit of the remains of rocks that were sheered off if you didn't know. The car cruise there was pretty mellow and there wasn't any cars on the road which felt very nice to be alone out in the middle of nowhere I've been before. If you ever get a chance to come to this amazing spot of the world you'll find yourself traveling through a kilometer long tunnel through a mountain that spits you out to the side where Milford Sound is and it is creepy cool. When I arrived at the Sound it was freezing around 2 degrees Celsius and I shivered from the car park 300m to the cruise center before walking on to the Jucy cruise. The cruise itself lasts about an hour and a half long and the captain announces some fun facts along the way as well. I would recommend coming here in the winter time or on a heavy rain day to see the waterfalls in full affect because right now, end of summer, there is only three going slowly. After the amazingly beautiful time in the Fiord I bolted back to Queenstown ready to ride a mountain bike down some crazy downhill tracks and give my pituitary gland a squeeze. When I got into town I went to Vertigo bikes and they situated me with a full suspension bike, elbow and knee pads, and a helmet of course. I then finally made my way up to the top after a nice gondola ride and rode out ready to trench down some black diamonds. After a few fun runs down then up the nice gondola and a couple front flips into bushes with some slide outs in between I finally got most of the place down. My hands where so sore from clenching the brakes at times that I thought I was going to have to strap a crowbar to my back in case i needed to open them. After the adrenaline rush and bruised back I took some photos of the view and set back down the hill to drop of the bike while getting some grub at a grocery as well. I then headed out to a YHA in use of a kitchen and stumbled a conversation upon some English girls that sat down to have dinner with me. The two were Rachael and Allison and they told me where they've been traveling with the where's and don't go here stories. While we where finishing up our meals two others sitting next us, Will, Asian kid who was at the same bungee jump as me, and Rena, New Brunswick Canadian girl, jumped in the crazy open conversation. At the end I offered them all a chance to skip the Magic one stop not going where you want to go bus and just hitch with me up the coast seeing loads. The two English girls didn't really want to sleep in a car, Will I think left, and Rena was like that sounds like a plan. After that strike of luck to split some gas money and not being bored by myself on the road we set up a time for the next day to meet. I then headed for a sneak shower after saying goodbye with the exchange of emails and set off for a nice place to sleep up the hill with a view over the city lights.
Bye for now...
Some thoughts:
You'll find me sitting at the very end of a boat forgetting about the cold and allowing my mind to drift into the outstanding scenery. I feel as if I am lost in the trees outstanding beauty of colors that rush into my eyes opening my mind to think nothing and that I have forgotten what it means to be human. What does it mean to be human? Who are we? Where are we? What are we doing? How are we going to survive on this planet when all we do is fight, argue, kill each other, make waste higher than our eyeballs, and care about currency more than the places we live?
I hope you find that I'm not the only one thinking these things and that you converse with others about what we can do to make this place habitable or for our generations to see what we have seen.
Some of my new YouTube videos of this day:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELJ_Y6-ASdo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8lR4SWrrys
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbneT5G5AkU
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