The Ride of the Rings

4/28/11     Te Anau -> Queenstown

The four of us in the tent happily rose for the day around 7 or so.  I think I was the only one in the tent who slept reasonably well.  Poor Kaleb was probably close to getting frostbite on his toes and only slept for around 30 minutes.  Nora was also super cold and didn’t get much sleep.  Tony was fine until his nose stuffed up midway through the night and he couldn’t breathe properly.  I was plenty warm, thanks to Nic’s sweet as sleeping bag.  I did get some pretty intense leg cramps at one point, but that was all.  Jess and Travis slept in the van and they seemed to be fine.

For once on our trip we were on schedule.  We left exactly when we wanted to, somewhere between 8 and 8:30.  We stopped for a quick breakfast then began our drive.  Due to our spectacular timing we ended up taking a detour to Arrowtown before going to Queenstown.  Arrowtown is a cute little town.  They filmed some of the Rivendell locations for LOTR here.  I don’t think that we went to any spot where they actually filmed, but it was easy to see.  Take a look for yourself…

We spent about an hour in Arrowtown before once again heading to Queenstown.  Upon arrival we checked Travis and Jess into their hostel, found some parking, food, and bathrooms.  A quick lunch later had us splitting up once again.  Kaleb, Nora, and I headed to ‘The Station.’  Here Kaleb and I were picked up for our horse ride and Nora was picked up to go do the Nevis Bungy, the largest in the world at 134 meters (440 ft).

Kaleb and I jumped onto the shuttle and rode 40 minutes out around Lake Wakatipu to their base in Glenorchy.  There we paid for our rides, dropped off our bags, and received riding gear in the form of helmets and boots.  Those of us going on the Ride of the Rings tour then got back on the bus and rode another 20 minutes to where we began our ride.  I was paired with a horse named Cort and Kaleb was placed with Bob, the biggest horse there.As there were 16 riders we were split into two groups of eight, each with two guides.  Our group was off first.  The horses quickly formed a single file line, with very little instruction from us.  And we were off, exiting the paddock at a nice, sedate walk.

Pacific Polar Plunge

4/27/11     Bluff -> Milford Sound -> Te Anau

Our poor planning once again affected our day.  We awoke around 8 or so, donned our togs (bathing suits) and headed for the coast.  It was time for our version of a polar plunge.  We were hoping to find some sort of dock or pier for total, immediate immersion, but we couldn’t.  Instead we found a spot to climb down to the beach and run in.  We were split evenly as a group, 3 diving and 3 spectating.  Travis, Kaleb, and I were the brave ones jumping in.  So we shed our clothes, handed away our cameras and went for it.  We waded in and dove under a wave.  We were off the coast of one of the southernmost locations of the South Island, in April, at 8:30 in the morning.  Basically, it was really cold.

After that first submersion it actually wasn’t too bad.  However, knowing how cold it actually was, I walked back out almost immediately.  What a way to start the day!

Our delusions that we were doing well on time lasted about another hour before shattering.  After showering off the salt water and packing up the van once more we were quickly informed by Bertha (the GPS) that we had a 4.5 hour drive to reach Milford Sound, which we needed to be at in 4.5 hours to catch our boat.  This led to the decision to skip the viewing of Stirling Point, a location I really wanted to go to.  Why, you ask?  Because Stirling Point has one of those posts with signs and distances pointing to locations all over the world, including the South Pole.  Sadly it was a no go.