It's Grand Out There

The adventure is not over. Far from it.

2010-05-16T23:48:00.001+02:00

Originally posted on April 12th

I finally bought a motorbike! It's a Suzuki SV 650 in a brazen orange colour. I haven't decided on a name yet :) It's a lot easier getting up in the morning when I have a bike-ride to look forward to!

Here's some grainy pictures of the beauty:

I spent easter in Spain climbing the area known as Siurana. It was awesome and I'm falling in love with sportsclimbing. Looks like I'll have to spend some more money on gear!

All photos by my good friend and climbing partner Andreas Skielboe:

The valley. This was our playground every day for a week!

Andreas coming down

Victory!

I wish I could take credit for this climb, but this was Gustavo. Awesome!

on another note, I'm trying out ads on the site. I want them to be unobtrusive and related to the content of the blog so I'll give 'em a few weeks trial. if they misbehave or learn bad manners they're out.

On another, much more important note: Check out my brother's awesome blog!

Phobos

2010-05-15T00:42:00.000+02:00

Written on March 4th, 2010

I have many dreams I want to live. Passions I want to nurture and grow into projects. For a long time I've felt that I haven't done enough to nurture them. Yesterday, I decided to start realizing one such passion project. The world was mine for the taking and I knew it.

This morning however, I was greeted by a huge monster standing next to my bed. It woke me up early. Way earlier than comfort dictated. It was ugly. It was huge. It made me sick.

All day it followed me around. I couldn't see it. I couldn't get a hold of it. But I knew it was there. From the way it made my stomach hurt. From how it made my head spin. I could hear it. A whisper, but a penetrating one. The contrast from the day before, when everything seemed possible, was shattering. I'm here again and I hate it.

That's when I realized. I had indeed been here before. I'd seen this abomination before. I knew its name. It was Phobos. Fear. And this time I wouldn't let it win.

It took me hours and I wanted to run several times, but I kept working on my project. Trying to reclaim that feeling I'd felt the day before. I could not let it win. Not again. Not this time.

I gradually realized that this particular one and I go way back. Every time I've tried to really go for something, this guy shows up. What was it about living my dreams that scared me so much? Living my dreams! What could possibly be horrible about that?!?

Suddenly I realized. This is my fear:

If I decide to realize one of my dreams I'll close off access to every other passion I've ever dreamed of living. I put everything in one basket and nothing else will ever come to fruition. If this one thing fails, I will be doomed to a life of shame and regret I will never be able to look another person in the eye.

But I see you, Phobos. I am looking you in the eye. I have you by the throat. I will show you no mercy. You will die. Now.

I Did It!

2010-05-12T00:18:00.000+02:00

Wow. I can't believe I finished it! I've been writing this blog for two years now, and looking back on some of those first posts makes me realize how much of an achievement this adventure has been for me. It's really opened up new doors.

Let me just say this right off the bat - I'm not done blogging. I've finished the first major 'story arc', but it won't be the last. After being frustrated about not being able to blog about now for a while, I started another blog. Now that this one is freed from the past though, I think I'll just merge those posts into this one and continue writing this blog.

Also, over the summer I hope to write a few "appendix" chapters related to my travels. I have a video or two I'd like to put up, and a load of practical and technical experience on travelling (essentials to pack, how to save money, that sort of thing) that I'd like to share.

Apart from my own huge satisfaction at wrapping up this big project, there's been a couple of other happy surprises. First, David's comment on the previous post was really encouraging. Here's a rough translation:

Wonderful ending. Good luck with the documentary. If you tell it as well in pictures as you do in words, it can't hardly go wrong ;)

David

Second, Hedda wrote me a long mail after seeing my post, and I'll be going to Oslo to visit her some time during the next couple of months. She seems very happy with her new boyfriend, which I'm very pleased to hear.

At the moment I'm wrapped up in exams, so for the next month I probably won't have a lot of interesting to write about except musings on exams, math and physics. If you didn't read my other blog though, those posts will be coming here in a slightly edited (read: improved) version.

I'm back, baby!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PS: I did something heretical and changed the title of the previous post. I'm quoting a Jan Guillou epilogue, but I just couldn't help myself.

PPS: My favourite blog at the moment is written by a girl my age who is absolutely hilarious. Check it out at http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/ and if you don't feel like reading the whole thing in one go (and you might be tempted!), you should at least read How a Fish Almost Destroyed My Childhood.

The End of The Beginning

2010-05-04T02:46:00.004+02:00

Alright, it's time to wrap this up.

It's been too long now to cover the rest of the trip in as many details as I'd planned, so what I'll give you instead is a highlights version of the last two months. Unfortunately my computer and phone was stolen in Cairns, which meant every photo from Byron Bay to Cairns was lost.

I arrived in Sydney early one morning after a 13 hour bus ride. Waiting for me there was Adam.

I'd met Adam about five years prior, working as a stage-hand in Copenhagen. I think we did two shifts together, and as far as I recall we didn't get to know each other that well. Still, for some reason I kept in touch - though mails were sometimes years apart. When my plans for Australia started to take shape I sent him a mail saying I was coming his way, and I'd love to meet him again. He told me he'd moved from Melbourne to Sydney, so before I left Grant and Kristen's place, I called him up and arranged for a meeting.

Adam was heading for work as I arrived at the bus-station, but he came to say hello and give me the keys to his flat. That came as a complete surprise, although you'd think that by now I'd be used to this sort of legendary hospitality.

I spent a glorious week at his place. In the daytime I'd go sightseeing, and the evenings were spent talking to Adam and Mishi, his wonderful fiancée.
I went and saw the compulsory sights - the opera house which was designed by one of my countrymen, the harbour bridge (or coathanger, as they call it), but I liked the botanical gardens the best. For some reason I'd always thought that parrots existed only in the tropics, far from civilization, but here they were in huge numbers, right in the middle of the city, rubbing shoulders with flying dogs! (that's a type of bat, by the way, not canines with wings. They're huge though.)

Those are bats, not fruits.

Adam and I talked about many things during the week. Passion, following your dreams, and especially music.
I remember one conversation in particular. He used to play in a punk band, and from what I could gather they were quite succesful. He played me some folk-songs on his 12-string and sang his lungs out. I remember him explaining to me that a great performance didn't come from skill, but from presence. "Just pour you heart into it and I tell you, people will stop and listen!"
And man did he live it. So much so that the hairs on my arms stood up when he sang.

Adam had a cousin who was visiting. She was from Denmark originally, and it turns out she knew my dad! She was the second random encounter on this trip who knew my father. Small world indeed!

From Sydney I went on a day trip inland to the beautiful Blue Mountains. I saw the Three Sisters and went for a walk down the longest staircase I've ever seen (I pity the people going the other way), and along the cliffsides in the bush.

The Three Sisters.

Proof that I wasn't the first dane visiting Australia, and that those first danes made a big impression on the locals!
(man, I've been waiting more than a year to tell that joke!)

Bush-turkeys!

While the days in Sydney slowly unfolded, the business with the broken motorbike was resolved. Soon I'd have to make a decision about how I'd continue my travels. After a bit of research I settled on buying a ticket with a company called Oz Experience.
Oz Experience is basically a bus-tour catering to backpackers. They have a couple of stops up along the east-coast, and you just hop on and off where ever you see fit. Too easy!
As a matter of fact, it was just that. Too easy. It just didn't live up to my idea of a good adventure. Everything had been sorted for you. Like a chartered trip in a backpacker framework. Felt a bit phony. Besides, it was what everybody did. I wanted my own adventure! What's the fun in doing what everybody else does! I spent a lot of energy trying to 'break free' of the Oz-Ex plan. Finding my own hostels. Doing what I could to meet locals. Trying to create my own adventures. I think I succeeded, but I spent some time moping and never enjoyed the bus-rides. Except this one driver called hoops. She was awesome.

Here's a few pictures of Adam and Mishi. For some reason I didn't think of taking any photos during my time with them in Sydney, so I stole some off his Facebook profile (with permission, of course):

Cooking for Adam and Mishi

The day I left Sydney I had a burger. Big mistake. Second foodpoisoning of the trip. It was with me all the way to Byron Bay.

Byron Bay was a cool place to stay. At the wonderful YHA (the one closest to the coast if you're planning on going) I met Sarah Heary from Ireland and Kirsten, or Kiki, from germany. Great company both! One early morning we went and saw the sunrise from a nearby lighthouse. I don't know if I've ever done that before. In itself, a sunrise is a splendid and majestic thing. When you can see dolphins in the water below, it is unrivalled.

I went kayaking with dolphins in Byron. They came pretty close.
When we left the shelter of the bay the sea showed its teeth. What a blast! At the start of my trip I'd bought a pair of aviators. I never pay more than 15,- AUD for sunnies since, knowing myself, I expect them to get lost or broken within a few weeks, but to my surprise I still had them when leaving New Zealand. Sadly though, I lost them that day.

And diving! Some of the best diving I've ever done was done from Byron Bay
Just off the coast, you can see it easily from shore, is a little group of islands called Julian Rocks. They had everything I'd ever wanted from a dive. I'll never forget the first dive I did there. Cuddlefish, big groupers, sting-rays, eagle rays, swim-throughs, all that jazz. But one experience in particular will always remain with me.
At the end of the dive while heading for the surface, one of the others suddenly got excited and started pointing at something behind me. I turned around and gliding serenely through the water was this big manta-ray. 3-meters fin-tip to fin-tip. Not a care in the world. I had to get closer! I've always been absolutely captivated by the angels of the deep. He didn't mind one bit. I never realized how powerful these things are, and while he looked very much at ease, I was kicking with all my strength to keep up. He was awe-inspiring in all his glorious serenity. Of all the pictures and videos I lost, this one stings the most. I thought about having a manta-tattoo somewhere. We'll see, but man! They're beautiful!

I developed quite a rapport with the owner of Sundive and his girlfriend (who worked as a receptionist in the hostel I was staying). So much so that he offered me the third dive for half the price and gave me a VIP-card for use with ProDive in Cairns. In return I gave him my card and told him to look me up if he ever found himself in scandinavia.
Friendship aside, if you ever find yourself in Byron Bay and have just the slightest interest in diving, go talk to Sundive. I'm very cautious about who I dive with, but these guys were just awesome from beginning to end. And very fair prices too!

One of the last things I did in Byron was learning how to surf. I loved it! Unfortunately those three hours were all the surfing I'd do in Australia as the weather turned sour for the next couple of days and surfing further north is impossible because of the reef.

Up until Byron, Australia hadn't really been that grand adventure New Zealand was. It felt bogged down with obstacles, but mainly, it hadn't been any lack of eventful days, I just hadn't really been 'present' in the same way I was in New Zealand. In NZ all my senses were at full alert all the time, and I had to really think about taking care of myself. That third busted motorbike coupled with the bad decision of joining the oz-experience had a dampening effect on the rest of the trip that never truly lifted. Don't ever settle for the easy way. Go for the adventure, no matter what.

I spent one horrible night in a Base hostel in Brisbane. I'd been warned about them, and this would be my last and only night in one. A group of people decided to have a shouting competition in the kitchen around midnight, right next to my room. I got up and asked them to be quiet or piss off into town as I had to be up and about in five hours. When they learned I didn't work there they ignored me. I fetched the receptionist and had 4 hours and 55 minutes of sleep before catching the bus out of Brisbane.
That same morning, litterally hours after I left, Brisbane was submerged in huge floods. I have to admit I was a little bit sad about missing it. Coming from a tiny, safe country myself, it would have been quite something to see!

I went quickly through Surfers Paradise. Casinos, theme-parks, huge hotels, that sort of place. A bunch of genius entrepreneurs had built so many huge hotels that the beach was in shade half the day.

A couple of days later I found myself in a bus headed for Hervey Bay in the company of three Irish girls I'd met twice before. Once at the Tongariro crossing in New Zealand, and again at the Three Sisters in Blue Mountains here in Australia. Good company those.

Hervey Bay had one and only one function for us. It was the gateway to Fraser Island. Fraser Island is off-limits to any car that's not 4WD, and the rental companies are having a ball. We found one that seemed ok and booked a two night trip. Now that was an adventure! Nine people with no off-roading experience whatsoever crammed in a 4WD on a sandy island with no roads. Dingos in the woods, tigersharks in the sea, crystal clear lakes, a rusting ship-wreck on the shore, offroading, great company, grand adventure!

That first night on Fraser a storm made it impossible to camp so we were staying at a beach-side hotel. I love storms so I got myself slightly drunk and went to the beach alone. It was pitch-black. I could hear the ocean long before I could see it. I passed some people, but they did not notice me go by and I kept walking until I couldn't hear them any more.
I stood alone at the water's edge. The surf broke maybe 50 meters out. The smell of the sea was homely. The wind, terrifying.
Standing still for a long while I started to feel like I was standing on the edge of a great chasm. I looked around. Above me, stars. Eternity in space. In front, ocean. Eternity in water. Behind me was safety. Friends. Home. Family. It was time to leave those for a while. To throw my spirit to the abyss and the void and see who would answer.
The void was not empty. The abyss was not chaos. The ocean had its own life. A violent but fulfilled life. The heavens were animated too, but by a different spirit. Patient and calm, but eternally optimistic. I reached out to the sea with my soul. I felt it immediately. There, in front of me. After a short while full contact was created. The surf came in harder than before, touching my ankles. Rushing forward to meet me. Show me its strength. When I stood my ground it decided to test my resolve. A single wave came crashing in. It was terrifying to hear its charge. Enough to make my knees go weak, it sounded like a mountain caving in. The wind added to the crescendo and I wanted to turn and run back up the coast. But I had decided to communicate, and I knew now that it was not going to be on my terms. I decided to stand, and I spread out my arms to accept whatever terms were offered. A huge wave came in. The water reached my toes with tremendous speed and I felt sure it would soak me through. "Tigersharks" I thought. The water went to my knees and abrubtly stopped. The sand underneath my feet had been blown away and I staggered. I'd realized I was defenseless against such a force of nature, and I was surprised when the water swirled around my knees for an instant before receding. The message had been sent. When dealing with Poseidon I could not speak. Only listen.
There in the water He offered me an agreement. I would respect and honor the ocean, and in return the ocean would always take care of me and keep me safe. In the presence of a Deity, how could I do anything but accept?

When the ocean went back out I looked down and noticed a plethora of little bio-luminescent organisms blinking up at me like green stars in the sand. Parting gifts. I stood there for a while longer. At last I turned back towards my home, my family and my friends.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After Frasier I travelled north up the east coast for about another month. I went cruising the Whitsunday Islands on a two-masted sailing ship. I visited a croc farm and Steve Irwin's Australian Zoo. I learned to lasso and crack a whip, and shoot a shotgun well enough to hit 7 out of 10 clay pigeons at medium range. I spent a wonderful week in Mission Beach, fishing in croc-filled waters. I went bushwalking, spotted a Cassowary (an endangered ostrich-like bird), got covered in some twenty leaches, shaved them off with my knife, and carried my female hiking-partner across a river to safety, feeling very manly throughout. I went croc-spotting on a river boat. I went white-water rafting on the Tully river. Twice. I went camping in the bush with four wonderful Aussie doctors at the ethereal Laura aboriginal dance festival. I learned how to catch and eat green ants. I went diving on the great barrier reef along with turtles, fish and reef-sharks. At night.

One morning I was on my way to Cape Tribulation and found myself bathing in a creek not long after sunrise. I swam to the other side and went a short distance into the jungle. I was marveling at all the things I'd done during the last six months. At how much I'd changed. It had all gone so fast, but at the same time it felt as if I'd been gone forever. How could I ever go back to an everyday life in boring old Denmark? I'd tasted adventure, and as all-consuming as it had seemed, I knew that I'd only scratched the surface. There were moment's where I really, truly felt like Indiana Jones. Sitting there in the jungle in my board-shorts I just could not imagine myself functioning in Denmark ever again. I was terrified.

This is where I'll leave you.

A year has gone by since I touched down in Copenhagen. I remember being so used to friendly, smiling people that it came as quite the shock when my smile was met with averted eyes and discomfort.
I was weeping when I saw my family. I hadn't even realized how much I'd missed them.

I started courses not long after and started planning for university starting the next (this) summer. After three months, with winter approaching, I couldn't sit still anymore and went driving around Ireland for 10 wonderful days. Cliffs! Castles! Wind! Irish people! Guinness! Nature!

Nature. The one thing I miss the most is pure, unharnessed nature.

Christmas came and went, and along with it came the first batch of exams. Top scores all-round. Winter was long and cold, and we had more snow than anyone could remember. I got my first tattoo, a mark to remind me of the Spartans and how they didn't let themselves be motivated by fear. I tried ice-diving and came within twenty seconds of drowning. I finally found a place to live. The sun started peeking out and I started looking around for a motorcycle. I spent a glorious week climbing in Spain. I found and bought a motorbike. That was little more than a month ago. A real beauty. I was freaking out that it might break down like the others, but so far it's still with me and running smoothly.

But I miss it. I miss travelling. I miss not knowing what the day, let alone the week, will hold. What kind of people I'll meet. What kind of adventures I'll be having. What dangers I'll be facing next.

Good things have happened, they definitely have, but looking back on the year that's passed I realize that, although I've learned a lot, I don't have many stories to tell. Not compared to the six months that came before. I want a full life. I want to live my dreams. I want to turn my passions into reality. It is possible. I know it is. There are many things on the way I fear, but most of all I fear dying with regrets.

For a few weeks I've felt disheartened. I allowed myself to take other people's expectations of life seriously, and not long ago I realized that I'm letting other people's expectations of me take control. But then, not long ago, a thought occurred to me:
What do I care what other people expect!
If people expect me to start a career down a well trodden path - make this much money, have that much success, and so on - and I don't deliver, it's not my failure, it's their mistake! I have no responsibility to live up to what other people think I ought to accomplish. I have no responsibility to be like they expect me to be! It's their mistake, not my failing.

For a long time I was planning to start uni this year, but suddenly I'm not so sure. I've been bitten by the travel-bug and there's no denying it. Maybe traveling is that passion I've been looking for for so long. I've thought of ways to make a living off of it. I could write books, do inspirational lectures, or even make travel-documentaries. In fact, I'm working out something tv-oriented with my brother and a friend and we'll be making a pilot this summer. I'm very psyched about this.

I have a long life to live. I'd better get started.

I love this shot.

The guy standing up was our guide, Fish. He'd lost his teeth to an oar, his finger to a crocodile,
and his sanity to the river.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

PS: Since I've arrived home and re-established contact with the internet, I've rediscovered Dresden Codak. I know I've linked to him before, but he creates things of beauty in his drawings. They remind me of dreams I have. Uncanny.
http://dresdencodak.com/2009/12/16/lantern-season/

The Melbourne Nadir

2009-09-20T22:12:00.001+02:00

How do I pick up after such a long hiatus?

It's been a long break. In my last post I explained why I wouldn't write for a while, but said I'd pick it up soon after coming home. So why didn't I write sooner? Well, in many ways coming home to Denmark was a lot scarier than than I'd thought. Scarier even than leaving, which surprised me. Second, I've been reluctant to write about Melbourne, as I don't like thinking about it. But here, at long last, is the next chapter of my story.

Now where was I. Ahh. Melbourne. What was it about Melbourne that was so horrible that it took me three full months to gather enough courage to write about it? What was it that broke this otherwise infallible and god-like man of steel? Did his heart get broken? Well, almost. It was a motorbike. Again. But let me start where I left off.

In tasmania I'd been thinking a lot about the Roskilde festival, and how sad I was to miss it. Eventually I took the decision to cut my trip short so I could get home in time for the event. Renée knew I'd do it long before I knew. She's clever like that.

I figured I could do without the ten days in Singapore easily enogh, and the fourteen days I'd lose in Australia wasn't much when balanced against such a perfect opportunity to ease back into Denmark, averting the worst of the inevitable culture shock. So I changed my ticket.

However, one night in Melbourne - while trying to sleep - I almost panicked. It was an odd, out-of-place sensation. A real, horrifying, end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it kind of panic. I panicked about Hedda, and whether she'd be expecting something from me when we met again. About going home. About meeting that girl from that other festival again, and what would happen when I did. By then I didn't think of her as often as I used to, but she was still poking around in my thoughts sometimes. I panicked about whether I'd miss great experiences in Australia, and trade it for something mundane.

I suppose I was just scared shitless that I'd miss out on stuff or regret my decision. I spent some time focusing on how much fun I'd have still in Australia. All the adventures. All the fun I'd had on the festival before. All the fun I'd have with my friends back home. At last, I fell asleep knowing that everything would be alright.

Diary entry:
Tuesday the 28th of April '09. Melbourne, Australia

I'm on my way to Epping to fetch the motorbike I've bought. A Honda XR 600R. It seems to be in good condition, so I think it'll go the distance. After getting burned twice I'm a little apprehensive about buying a new bike. We'll see.

I've stayed with Grant and Kristen since I arrived in Melbourne. They're two very friendly metal-heads. They're both gamers, and I've sated my hunger for Fallout 3 for now. I've gotten a helluva lot of blogging done which feels really good. I went to town with Grant and Kirsten a couple of nights, and they have some hot friends who's unfortunately all spoken for.

Friday night one of the clubs had a viking theme going, and everybody dressed as a viking got in for free. I showed them my passport and said "hey, I AM a viking!". The doorman didn't buy it, but the bartender did.

I met Grant and Kristen through CouchSurfing. Great people both. they were planning a trip to Europe and wanted to go through Denmark up to Norway (I think), which means I'll be able to return the favor next year. Yay! They were awesome hosts, and theirs is the comfiest couch I've ever slept on.

At 600cc, this XR was the most powerful bike I've ridden to date (you can stop laughing now), but on my way back from Epping it stalled. My breath stopped, fearing another 3000,- AUD out the window. I quickly realized what was wrong though. I'd accidentally pulled the decompression lever while engaging the clutch. The two were mounted curiously close together. I made a mental note to mind my finger placement and carried on home.

Originally, my plan was to start the Australian leg of the journey in Adelaide as I had a thing or two I wanted to do there: 1) Drive the Great Ocean Road and 2) dive with Great White Sharks. But since I found myself in Melbourne already and didn't care to drive all the way to adelaide and back just for the sharks (a journey of almost 1000km each way. Besides, cage-diving was outrageously expensive), I decided to drive up the Great Ocean Road as far as Port Campbell, see the twelve apostles, spend the night, and drive back the next morning.

...In case you were wondering.

The XR600. Notice how I didn't melt any plastic on it...

If mars had water, this is what it'd look like.

I used my sunglasses as a filter. People were looking at me funny, but I think it worked out pretty well.

That sunset was one of the best I've ever seen.

Driving to Port Campbell I had the setting sun directly in my eyes and couldn't see a thing. Scary!

There's a place there called the Shipwreck coast which I was very excited about. My imagination was swimming with images of sandy, rotting and rusting shipwrecks, all exposed at low tide, old pirate treasures waiting to be plundered. Dissapointingly, it's just a name. No wrecks.

The whole trip, I was a bit paranoid about the sound of the bike. I thought it sounded clangy, but reminded myself that I had to get to know it. Still, I couldn't shake a feeling of doom. Well back in Melbourne I had it checked through by a mechanic for the compulsory road-worthiness checkout, and he told me it wasn't road-legal due to several shortcomings, including a worn out rear tyre and a weird sound from the engine.
I was devastated. I had been an utter fool going 800kms on it before getting it checked. Now there was no way of telling whether the fault was mine or the sellers. The repairs could be anything between 500 and 1500 AUD, and at the time I was sure I'd been sold a shitty bike. So I called up the seller.

I'm none too proud of the things I said, or the way I handled the matter. I tried to hold him responsible as I was terrified of facing such a loss. I knew I had a weak case, and I had no idea how I could get it off my hands in a short time. Being stuck with a busted bike in a city I'd rather have left behind days ago made me act like a dickhead. The magnitude of my selfishness hit me a week later in Sydney when the mechanic called me and asked whether I'd ever pulled the decompression lever while the engine was running. I had. Thrice. It had busted up the exhaust valves.

The fault was mine, and I'd tried blaming it on the seller, eventually getting half the price back and handing the bike back to him by using all my pathos to convince him, even though I could feel he wasn't at all happy with the deal. I felt really shitty about how I'd treated him and how stupid I'd been. I had bought the bike even as my gut feeling was screaming at me to say no and buy a bus ticket instead. I was blinded by the dream of that Big Motorcycle Adventure, and felt I had to get a bike quickly if I was going to make it all the way to Cairns. I had let my dream get in the way of reality.
By then I had no inclination to go looking for another bike. Even if I'd had the money.

I went back to Grant and Kirsten's place, cooked them dinner (a pasta salad which was making me quite famous through the south pacific), and bought a Greyhound ticket for Sydney for that evening. It would be a thirteen hour drive and I had nothing I wanted to see between Melbourne and Sydney. Maybe I felt the east coast had something in store for me. Maybe I felt time pressing (I'd been in Melbourne for more than a week. Maybe I just wanted to distance myself from the guilt. Either way, the next morning I found myself in Sydney, reunited with an old friend.

Oh my god, he's blogging in real-time!

2009-06-09T04:55:00.000+02:00

Disclaimer: By reading this post through, you agree to complete the homework assignment put forth at the end of this post. No excuses! It isn't dangerous. You have the time. Your life will be richer for it. You'll have a story for your grandchildren. And no peeking!

Country-men, foreigners. Dignitaries, royals and usurpers. Priests and paupers. Ladies and gentlemen. Friends.

It is to you I now speak. For behold, I am blogging! 'Nay!', I hear you cry, 'it cannot be!' But I say to you; believe it. It is so.

It'll only be a short one though. The last post covered the first ten days in Australia. I've been here for two months. I'm slightly behind schedule. I have two weeks left in this beautiful country, and honestly, I'd rather spend them diving, river rafting, swimming, and a whole swathe of other ways than in front of a computer to keep up the blog.
So: Don't expect new posts for the next two weeks. In fact, make that 3-4 weeks, as the Roskilde festival will consume me mere hours after I touch down in Copenhagen.After that, however, I promise you inspired, witty, poignant, personal, honest and regular updates, covering these last two months of my trip. Followed by thoughts on coming home, and concluded with hilarious appendixes like packing lists, bank statements, and the like.

The bright side: Since my blog won't sate your appetite for adventure for the next couple of weeks, you'll have to go do some adventuring for yourself. Do something unexpected. Surprise people. Surprise yourself!

Which leads me to the homework: Before you read my next post, you will create an adventure for yourself. The rules are as follows:
You will want to make a day where you go to sleep in a place you didn't expect to be when you woke up that same morning. (it can't be the same residence)
You have to CREATE that day, don't just expect it to happen.
You are not allowed to plan where you sleep until two hours after leaving the place you woke up.
You are not allowed to plan ahead! Be spontaneous!

You know when you are cheating. Don't cheat yourself.
If you dare, get out of town!

tips:
pack a day-pack.
Bring a sleeping bag.
Safety first. Use your common sense.
The further you go, the better! Stretch beyond what you thought possible.
It's okay to be afraid, in fact, that's great! But do it anyway. That's what being courageous is all about! In that respect, it's not much different to sky-diving!

A wise man once said: It's dangerous stepping out your front door. If you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you'll be swept off to!

Tasmania and a Friendly Face

2009-05-30T09:16:00.001+02:00

Covering April 12th to 23rd

Before I went to bed sunday, I checked my ticket to find out what time I needed to be at the airport monday. My blood froze. The ticket was for saturday the 11th, not monday the thirteenth. I hadn't looked at it for three months, but remembered having planned to be in New Zealand for three months exactly. Turns out I'd calculated three months from the date of departure from Denmark, Not the arrival in NZ!
All I could do was buy a new ticket for monday. The cheapest one available was 400$, bitter money, but it could be worse. I was unsure whether my visa had run out, which scared the shit out of me. What would the consequences be? The airport staff didn't mention it, so I assume it hadn't expired.

Arriving in Melbourne I checked in to what turned out to be an expensive and crowded hostel. In New Zealand I'd been spoiled for choice of awesome, cheap, homely hostels and I'd expected the same from Australia. Unfortunately, this doesn't seem to be the case. Not in the cities anyway.

The next day I woke up to find that a solid fever had taken up residence in my body. It'd probably been stowing away there since the airplane the day before. I was already in a rotten mood because of the hostel and leaving beautiful NZ, but as I went to the library to blog I called up Renée from Tasmania. Turns out she had a few weeks off work, and I booked a plane ticket for tasmania leaving that same afternoon. It's funny how, with some people, it feels like you've known them forever the first time you meet. That's what it felt like with Renée. After my introduction in Dunedin some three months prior, Renée forever referred to me as Socks. I countered by naming her Thunder. I would tell you why, but she'd kill me with that big machete of hers.

You call that a knife?

I spent around 10 days in Tasmania, laughing all the way. Renée showed me Devonport, the Cradle Mountain, and Triwunna Wildlife park where we fed kangaroos.

I'm gonna try and jam my thumb into its butthole, that should really piss him off!

mmmmmmmmm!

Returning to Launceston (where Renée lives) the fever was clearing. I felt drugged and infinitely happy about the state of things. The road home was beautiful, but I took no pictures as Kings of Leon were on the stereo and I couldn't stop air-drumming.

Saturday, after a little walk around Launceston, we started out on a two day roadtrip. First stop was Hobart where we got uncharmingly drunk and slept in the car.

Renée was driving, so I never really bothered getting out of bed.

Renée's endless fascination with seaweed

I never figured out what this was. I think it was alive. That sounds like a job for, dundunDUNNN. Biophysics!

The next day we went to Port Arthur.

Port arthur is a sobering experience. It's the restorated ruins of an old prison, way out on a peninsula. There's heaps of stories about how bad prison life was, but the worst was about two young boys in the boy's prison. Both aged 12, they were best of friends. One day, when out chopping wood, only one came back. He wouldn't tell where the other had gone. Three days later, a guard found the boy leaning against a tree. His head had been bashed in with a rock, and in his neck was a knife, four inches deep. Now, the blade of said knife was only three inches long, but it had been thrust with such force that one inch of handle had embedded itself too. His mouth was full of maggots, but the worst part is that he was still alive. He was taken back to the infirmary where he only had strength to name his killer before he died. His friend was tried as an adult (as was british custom at the time) and hung by the neck until death.

More than a thousand people, most of them prisoners, were buried on this tiny island.

I don't believe in ghosts so I took this picture in mock terror. Funny thing is, I have no idea what that white smear in the corner is...

That evening we parked the car in a graveyard and slept. It was a bit cold, but otherwise surprisingly comfortable to sleep in the car.
Since the Port Arthur ticket was valid for two days, we went back the next morning to see some of the things we'd missed. As if the whole having-been-a-horrible-prison thing wasn't enough, the old cafeteria had been hit by a killing spree just a decade back, with dousins of people shot dead. My lonely planet book adviced us not to ask the staff about the incident.

Around midday, we arrived at the Freycinet peninsula where we took a swim. The water must have been less than ten degrees, but it was the closest thing to a bath we'd had for days. We took a look at the Grampians, but didn't feel like hiking so we drove back to Launceston.

milliseconds later, this kid was soaked. Nyah nyah nyah hahah!

Armand, the only dog I've ever loved. Looks possessed doesn't he? Well, that's what you get for naming your dog after a vampire!

The next evening Renée had some friends over, which resulted in heavy drinking and sleeping most of the next day away.

Thursday I was bound for Melbourne. Before I left though, we took a walk up the Gorge in Launceston. What a quaint old place that was! It felt a century removed and even in the bleak weather it was very beautiful.

What do you say at goodbyes? I guess Armand got it right. There's nothing to do but stare into the water and maybe chase some geese.

Renée drove me to the airport, and well back in Melbourne I hooked up with some couchsurfers I'd made an appointment with. I'd decided to buy another motorbike, but that's a different story and will have to wait until next time.

Four dives, one parrot, and a life changing toilet.

2009-05-16T11:40:00.004+02:00

Covering april 5th to april 12th

Northland offers a couple of awesome dive-sites. One of them is the Rainbow Warrior, the greenpeace flagship that was bombed by the french government. This is probably the best dive I've done so far in my life. Visibility was 20-25m, the wreck was at a depth of 25 meters, and the wreck itself is out of this world.

Poking my head through the bomb hole I was greeted with the most beautiful sight I've ever seen on a dive as the engine room was lit by a hole in the deck, and in the shadows, thousands and thousands of fish were swimming about.

We followed up with a reef dive. On descend, we were right on top of two big eagle rays, one of which were pregnant. If I'd hit the bottom I would have been standing on them. Beautiful! There were heaps of surge, which caused me to use more air than usual, but it made for a fun dive. Again, the place was teeming with life, and we were constantly being followed by big curious fish. They'd even let us pet them if we were quick enough. We caught a crayfish which they cooked for me afterwards.

I took the crayfish back home to the hostel where I shared it with Kelly who I'd met two nights previous. It tasted good, but I had a hard time getting over the whole snapping off of limbs and sucking out the meat thing. I guess I'm still a city slicker. Besides, it was staring at me.
I filled out my log-book with Kelly besides me and taught her all there is to know about diving in the process. Honest!

The next day I spent chilling in Paihia with Kelly. We had a good breakfast and I checked in at the Pickled Parrot where she was staying.

Meet Rocky!

Meet Kelly! Rocky goes for the throat.

Cautiously getting to know each other.

The first scare turned into an uneasy truce, and eventually, mutual respect. I quicly learned not to wear shirts, necklaces, or anything else he could bite.

I spent another two days chilling and booked my diving at the Poor Knight's Island for friday, spending thursday night in Tutukaka.

The Poor Knight's, according to Jaques Cousteau who has a thing or two to say on the matter, is one of the top ten dive sites in the world. My day here wasn't the best conditions, but we had two good dives none-the-less.

My first buddy only had 11 dives and it'd been 1½ years since his last so he went through his air twice as fast as I did. We'd agreed on a max depth of 25m, but he didn't look at his depth-gauge so I had to fish him up from 27m. There wasn't any danger, but I didn't care to spend my second dive looking after him (that's not what I pay for) and I'd like to spend all my air in the water so I hitched onto another pair.

The second dive was far more interesting, with a small cave-chamber, an arch, rays, and depths to make you dizzy. We didn't exceed 28m, but even at that depth I could see rays on the bottom 15-20 meters below me. That's when you need to keep a close eye on the depth gauge!
One of my buddies on this dive, a girl called Gayle, was just as inexperienced as my former buddy, but far more secure and skilled. All three of us emerged with 50bars on the tank. Perfect!

Inside the cave:

One of the other divers was driving back to Auckland and gave me a ride. All the way we were talking about diving and, in particular, irresponsible instructors. We had a very enlightening chat about the differences between PADI and CMAS certifications. She was very knowledgeable and had very healthy attitudes towards diving and teaching. If you ever feel like taking a PADI certificate in NZ, she'd be the one to look up!
She is: Bianca Stevens at www.divecentre.co.nz

That night was the first time I called my parents since I left home. It was good to hear their voices again. I hadn't even realized three months had gone by!

The first night in Auckland I stayed in a backpackers, and saturday I had to kill some time until Bojana got off work. Normally, I like to have my breakfeast before turning hookers down, but this morning I had to brush them off as soon as I got out on the street. Did I really look that desperate?

Sunday I spent at Bojana's place. A funny thing happened when I was on the toilet. For years I've been wondering what I wanted to do with my life, but there, on the can in Auckland, everything became clear. Perhaps it was the high ceiling, that loo had room for ambition!

I've long been fascinated with science, but physics and biology have always stood out. There's something about studying life, and there's something about studying the structure of our cosmos. At the same time I've been afraid of starting to study either. Mostly, I couldn't decide if I'd rather play music for a living, if physics would be too hard (and abstract. Visualization is important for my enjoyment of physics, and enjoyment is the deciding factor in wether I'll be any good in my field), and if biology would be too boring (I couldn't see myself staying awake through lecture after lecture on memorizing bones and muscle names).

All morning I'd been surfing Wikipedia. It went something like this: The Sun => Planet => Natural satellite => Europa (moon) => Possibility of life on Europa => Life => Entropy => Entropy of life
All are very interesting articles and definitely worth a read, even if you don't catch it all (entropy, I thought, was a mind-boggling subject and I never got more than a fuzzy idea about it - even with the less technical articles available (look near the top)).
I'm intrigued of how nobody can really agree on how to define life. 'It has DNA' one person says. 'Then how about viruses' says another 'That's just a molecule, yet it adapts to its environment'. 'Life has negative entropy' says a third. 'Yes, but isn't that a bit too abstract?' came the answer.

The universe is a unity. Physics and biology are not two separate phenomena, just terms we concocted to split the universe into smaller, easier-to-understand chunks. Life is not a "mystical force", but an entirely natural consecuence of the physical laws. I want to study, in particular, that specific "event horizon" where "dead matter" turns to "life". I want to study... dundunDUN! Biophysics!

Now that I have something like this to look forward to, I'm no longer afraid of coming home. This adventure doesn't stop when I leave Australia. It's my life!

'But what about music?'
Good question my young padawan. I'll continue to make music, but I'll emphasize having fun with it. Just like with my studies. If that means that nobody but me cares for it, then so be it!

So, next time you feel a rumble in your tummy, be sure you seat yourself comfortably. It might change your life!

Editor's note: Many years later, when Jophiel had been awarded a combined nobel prize for physics and biology (they threw in chemistry and peace as well for good measure), Bojana started renting out the lavatorial facilities of her Auckland home. Before long, when rumors of the miracle powers of the "Auck-loo" were circled on the internet, Bojana became the world's most wealthy woman.

Diving and Driving

2009-05-05T06:43:00.001+02:00

Covering april 3rd to 5th

Friday dawned bright and early and - for the first time in six months - I was going diving.
Destination: HMNZS Canterbury, a 113m long Leander class frigate scuttled after decomision to serve as a divesite and artificial reef.
Depth, bottom: 38m
Depth, tower: 12m

This dive was AWESOME! It didn't feel as deep as it was because of an excellent visibility of ca 20m, which means that heaps of light made it to the bottom. You could even see the tower from the boat before going in the water!
This dive was my first penetration dive and I was a bit nervous about it. We went in through the hangar and exited shortly after, swam up to the prow, back to the bridge and entered there as well before we started the ascent.

in the deep, all cats are greenish blue.

It's been ages since I've dived in a wetsuit, and I'd forgotten how comfortable and agile they are compared to drysuits. Three very experienced divers were diving in drysuits. 'How come you wear them on this dive? Don't you have wetsuits?' I asked. 'Yeah, but it gets quite chilly down there' came the reply. 'What temperatures are we looking at on the bottom?' I asked, fearing I might get cold in my wetsuit. 'Around 20 degrees celsius' he said in a serious voice. I couldn't stop laughing.

The second dive was even better than the first one. Conditions were just as good as on the first descend, but this time we penetrated just below decks and swam the length of the ship inside. I was very excited all the way through and couldn't stop cackling in my mouthpiece. If anyone had heard, they'd have thought I was narc'd.

In the creek by the dive center, eight huge eels hung out. They took an instant interest in my camera.

After the dive I got a ride to Paihia were the Canterbury's screw stood.

This house is so cool!

Not too far from Paihia there's a mangrove forest.

Saturday I went to the pub with a bloke from the hostel to watch a rugby match. I've never been much for sports (except for underwater rugby), but when I saw my first rugby match it was love at first sight. It's best described as american football for men. There's no protection, bloody tackles, and nary a timeout in a game. They don't even stop the game to treat the wounded, they just play around them as the medics examine them. For real!
Rugby is everything a real ballgame should be. It's fast-paced, fluent, brutal, and extremely entertaining.
After the game I quickly got tired of the pooltable. Instead, I went partying and almost got into a fight on two seperate occasions. Fortunately, I'm a good diplomat, even when extremely drunk, so none turned into anything. Don't go out in Paihia when the locals are drunk!

Sunday morning at 7:15 I boarded a bus-tour headed to Cape Reinga. I wasn't hung over. I was still drunk! This tour turned out to be the best tours I've ever done in a bus. The ninety mile beach is a beautiful stretch flat sand which is legally a highway with 100km/h speed limits.
Technically, it's only 55 miles long, but that doesn't seem to bother the kiwis. Australia has an 80 mile beach, and the kiwis are not about to be upstaged by the west-islanders, so the name stuck.

Turning off the beach we passed my favourite warning sign so far:

WARNING!
SOFT SANDS
SPEED UP

This was where the fun began.
Remember back when I was young, naive, and still thought that off-roading in a nissan bluebird was a death-defying act? Well, that's for pussies.
Now, off-roading in a fully packed tour bus is a different matter entirely! Full on!

Our guide, Spike, had recently escaped from the madhouse and kept us entertained with an endless rant about birds, bush and Maori culture, interspersed with music by kiwi bands. He made an already good trip heaps more entertaining.
Stopping on the ninety mile beach he showed us how to catch Pipi, a shellfish, and taught us how to open and eat them. The texture was like raw chicken, and the taste was very salty, but it was fun to try.

Next up was sandboarding, where you climb to the top of a dune, throw yourself on a board and try to control your mad plunge down the slope. Doing a running start was great for getting extra speed, but difficult due to the natural fear of having one's teeth knocked out. I did it, and ended up halfway through the stream at the foot of the dune. Hell yeah!

The cape was beautiful, spectacular, and all that jazz, but another highlight was bathing in the pacific on the way home. That's two seas in one day, the first being the Tasman sea at ninety mile beach. The waves in the pacific were sick as, and several times I was knocked straight off my feet. Mad fun though!

Cape Reinga. We were dodging rainclouds all day.

In the bus I met an irish girl whose name I forget, and Caroline from Frederiksberg, Denmark. We struck up a conversation and she asked me for advice on what to see in NZ as she'd only just started her trip. The three of us agreed to meet that evening to plan her trip. I remember specifically telling her to try the Green Glow caving, the Queenstown Fergburger, and remember to buy insect repellant. Sandflys is New Zealands best kept secret.
As my New Zealand trip was coming to a close, passing on my experiences was a great way to round the whole thing off. For the last couple of nights I'd had nightmares about coming back to Denmark, my big adventure being over, and they'd left me feeling really sad in the mornings. I hadn't realized I was so afraid of it. I'm looking forward to seeing friends and family of course, but getting back into that old tedium... Horrible! That night, however, I felt a real sense of completion about my New Zealand trip.

Haka, Beaches, Spa, Tedium, and dirt-biking.

2009-05-03T04:14:00.001+02:00

Covering march 26th to April 2nd

My strongest memory of Rotorua is the smell. The entire town smells like rotten eggs. Geo-thermal activity and all that. I didn't spend more than two nights there, and I decided against going to see the geysers. Instead, I went to a Haangi, a Maori culture re-enactment and feast. The Haka is the Maori war-dance and it is a fearsome sight, even when performed as a re-enactment.

Having grown sick of hitch-hiking, I took a bus up to the Coromandel peninsula. This was much easier, but I was still frustrated with my lack of freedom in my movements. I was considering how to get to the hot water beach and cathedral cove when I met Caren from Holland who had a car. Perfect!
First stop was Cathedral Cove, a beautiful and remote, but very popular beach.

Somebody where getting married just off shore and my trusty tele-lens was put to use once again. Rounds of applause rose up from the beach when they snogged.

Then, when low tide came, we headed to Hot Water Beach.
At low tides on Hot Water Beach it's possible to dig a hole with a shovel and create for yourself a nice, hot pool. And when I say hot, I mean HOT! The water is heated by geo-thermal activity and is scalding in places. We found a sweet spot though.

In the evening we went to a nearby spa who had a backpackers offer, including a meal, of 35$. Awesome!
When darkness came they turned on the pool lights, which made Caren look mesmerizing.

The 29th of march was a sunday. The backpackers we were staying at had free kayaks and Caren and I took one for a paddle out to a nearby cove, lounged there for one or two hours, and then paddled back. I was happy to learn that Caren was going to Auckland that evening and would give me a ride. First though, I had to pick up my camera at the police station where some kind soul had left it after finding it at the beach where I'd forgotten it the night before. A tense morning that was.

Celebrating my regained camera.

In Auckland, I hooked up with a girl I'd met on my last visit to Christchurch as she had a couch I could stay on. Bojana studies psychology, and I vividly recall one animated discussion we had about whether psychology is a science. We agreed that it wasn't a science in the true sense of the word, and Bojana felt that the field would move forward much quicker if it didn't try to masquerade as such. I could go off on a long and digressive tale of why psychology ain't a science, but I shall resist. Suffice to say that it's practically impossible to do empirical experiments on the human mind, and advances in psychology are made via more philosophical means in my opinion.

Bojana's mind is engaged in Deep Thought. Something it does well.

I only stayed in Auckland for one night as I wanted to explore northland thoroughly before going to Australia. Big cities hold no allure for me anyway, especially when I'm relying on public transportation, so after a nice game of chess I caught the bus to Whangarei. This was were disaster struck. I lost my diary. Thinking back, I must have put it on the ground when getting out of Bojana's car and left it there. When travelling like I do, I carry a minimum of stuff. The downside is that everything i carry is dear to me, and losing that diary was like loosing 2½ months of memories. I will allow myself a big, public, FUCK!!! on that account

In Whangarei I stayed at a nice backpackers/homestay. I had two huge, awesome lamb steaks for dinner, accompanied by salad, and went to bed. Yes. Food is important to me.
In the morning I tried booking a dive at the Poor Knights Island for the next day. Regrettably, the weather forecast wasn't bright and I decided to head north instead and do the dive on my way back down. So, I decided, I would accept the offer of a lift north to The Farm, a wonderful backpackers with heaps of opportunities to kill time in fun ways. I planned some horseback riding and dirt-biking for the next day, but when dawn came the weather had conspired against me again. I spent that entire day waiting. waiting. waiting.
It's remarkable how quick mood-changes come about when travelling. You can wake up in the morning feeling great, and by mid-day, with all your plans shattered and nothing to do, you feel like kicking someone. Then, by afternoon, having made new plans, everything is rainbows and bunny-rabbits again. Apparantly, this is common for most of the backpackers i've met. The good thing is that I'm starting to learn that whatever shit I'm in right now won't last, and tomorrow the sun will rise again. Maybe behind a grazing horse.

Thursday before I left the, I went dirt-biking. Was it Hair-raising? yes. Difficult? extremely. Dangerous? definitely. Fun? Hell yes! We started out with rounding up horses and then went roaring through the landscape to their dirt-bike track. Getting airborne on a motorbike made me reconsider my sanity.

As it turned out I didn't end up going very far that day at all. In fact, I spent the night just one k from the farm with the good people of Northland Dive who I was going diving with the next day.

Remember the wetas I told you about?

That's all for now!

Hiking, fever and caving

2009-05-01T02:39:00.001+02:00

Covering March 20th to 25th

Friday I got up early and took a bus out to the Tongariro National Park to do the Tongaririo Crossing - a one day hike through a volcanic landscape, passing Mt. Ngauruhoe, famous for portraying Mt. Doom in the Lord of the Rings movies. I met up with the canadians and after a brisk few hours we arrived at the foot of Mt Ngauruhoe and decided to start the ascend. We knew we'd be pressed for time. The climb was extremely taxing but who could resist climbing Mt Doom?
The further hike wound through landscapes ranging from mordor to mars with a huge range of colours in between.

It was windy at the crater

Some people wanted to feel more... liberated. Who am I to judge.

Trying to look peaceful on a ledge like that was not easy.

I'd been struggling with a slight fever all day keeping it down with painkillers, but about two hours before the end of the track it came back full force. It literally knocked me off my legs.

My canadian companions went ahead to catch their bus and I found myself sitting alone on a rock wondering how the hell I'd ever get myself to the end of the track. This time I didn't hear no guardian angels, and despair crept into my thoughts. I hated myself for not being able to complete the track, and I wondered what I'd do if I didn't make it to the bus.

Eventually, a group passed me and asked if I was ok. I explained my situation and they said that, if all else failed, they could take me in their car. I followed them on as my last painkillers had set in, and just having someone in front of me at a steady pace was so much easier than walking alone. As it turned out I caught the last bus, and in the evening the canadians drove me to Te Kuiti. When we arrived I was sweating with fever and all my strength had left me. With no-one there to look after me (the canadians drove on), fever hallucinations was not something I cared for. Who knew what I might do!
I didn't care for a dorm in my state. I wanted to be alone. I wanted a fortress. A place where I could make my stand against the fever.
I spent four days battling what turned out to be a foodpoisoning. I was on three different prescription drugs, each designed to deal with a different aspect of the ungodly things my body was doing. I shan't trouble you with them here, but they were nasty! The self-prescribed painkillers I'd been taking the first day turned out to be a big mistake, as the doctor told me they'd probably made it worse. Sleep was hard to come by which made the whole experience much harder to cope with.
Sunday morning, I realized to my dismay that my brother's birthday was the day before.

The owner of the backpackers took me to town whenever I needed to see the doctor or buy food, which was very kind of him. It was always offered and never expected.
Each evening I had myself a divine barbeque and I was treated to four majestic sunsets. New Zealand lamb is some of the best I've ever tasted, and it was very cheap too. On the fourth night, two american girls arrived and their company lifted my spirits somewhat.

The night between tuesday and wednesday I had my first untroubled sleep and woke up as healthy as ever. Literally overnight. A strange feeling of accomplishment came over me, and I wondered at it as I couldn't really think of anything I'd done to kill the fever except take my pills, rest and wait. I realized that this was the first time in my life I'd taken care of myself completely without help from my family, and yet I survived. To my body at least, I'm a decent mechanic.

It felt like the disease had given me tabula rasa - a clean slate. I'd had so much time to think and relax that I felt like a new person. Suddently the thought struck me that I could now replace a lot of the good advice I'd been offered with my own experience.

Feeling completely fresh I did what I came to Waitomo to do. I went caving. The Waitomo area is renowned for its caves and there are many tours available. I wanted to do an adventurous one, but I didn't feel like getting wet in icy water right after my feverish ordeal, so I skipped out of the one I'd originally settled for. Instead, I booked a tour with a guy who called his company Green Glow . That turned out to be a real find. This man had just started out his caving tours. In fact, it was so new that I was only the seventh group. Best thing of all? The only person in the "group" was me! The caves he's using were laid out in a way that gave complete freedom of choice for what to do. Instead of doing a preset trek, it was completely up to me what I wanted to do. We started out doing 3½ hours of rockclimbing, then two 30 meter abseils, and then we went into the caves. Even though his flyer said 'tours up to six hours', we were having so much fun that he decided he'd show me the whole thing. We ended up spending close to 8 hours.

The sexy caving look. How could you possibly improve it?

...By adding a helmet of course!

I half expected Gollum to be hiding somewhere around here.

Whenever I've booked a tour in NZ, I've had that nagging feeling that if only I'd had more time I would have done differently. I would have hooked up with a group of locals going to the glacier, or found a fellow dive enthusiast, or met up with a group of rockclimbers. This was the first tour that really felt intimate. Here I had an enthusiastic kiwi who was showing me his backyard. That feeling alone was half the trip, and for 100$ this tour gave infinitely more bang for the buck than any other tour in the area. If you want to see caves in New Zealand, this is where you should do it!

Deja Vú

2009-04-28T04:18:00.001+02:00

Covering March 13th to March 19th

My plan for friday was to go to the Te Papa museum, but when I got on the bike I couldn't bear the thought of only riding for five minutes so instead I made my way along the coast for half the day.
In the evening I met up with two canadian girls I'd met in the Abel Tasman. They lived in an apartment in Wellington and they let me stay there for the weekend, which was awesome. Very nice people they were, and Joanna and I share a passion for poetry. Hers is very good.

Saturday they went to a music festival by the harbour, and I went to the Te Papa museum. The museum is quite big, but it's a big mishmash of exhibitions and it seems like it doesn't really know what it wants to be. One thing I'd really been looking forward to though, and that was their Colossal Squid specimen. Squid fascinate me, especially the giant and colossal species, and this is the only specimen of the latter on display in the world. Unfortunately, they were doing some work on it and I couldn't get up close to it.

The squid is in the tank in the middle

I stayed in Wellington for one more day, and monday I set off for New Plymouth on the long straight boring roads of the north island. I had no less than three breakdowns on the way. The first happened some distance south of Bulls. I was surprised at how calm I was. I removed the luggaged, opened the seat and took off the tank. I went through all the connections and checked for a spark. No spark, so either the sparkplug needed replacing, or it was a loose connection. I gave up, gathered my things, put the bike back together, and lifted my oil and petrol stained thumb to the road.

As it turned out, the driver who pulled over had a big trailer and we got the motorbike on there before heading north. In Bull, the mechanics thought they'd found the fault; a rusty connector. I think it generates some respect that I'm doing this trip on such an old machine. They didn't want any money for their help.

The friendly mechanics from Bull

Just 8 kilometers later it went dead again. I took the bike apart again, frustrated. I fiddled around with the electronics for a while as by now I knew it wasn't the sparkplug, but couldn't find the fault. When I put it all back together however, the problem had disappeared. This was not an uncommon occurence, and happened a third time before I arrived in New Plymouth.
As I turned off on highway 3, the sun had already set and it was getting dark. In hilly terrain, the bike did an average of 65-70km/h and I still had some distance to go. I had the lonely, beautiful Mt Egmont on my left, and it looked its best in those last rays of the sun, but I did not enjoy the prospect of riding in the dark. Kiwi's are, unfortunately, infamous for their drunk drivers, and I had no lights in the speedometer. The only thing I could see was the faulty rev counter. My only estimate for how fast I was going was from listening to the sound of the engine. When I passed a town with streetlights I'd check to confirm my guess. It worked out ok, and most times I was spot on.

The stately Mt Egmont

That night in the backpackers was very cold, and I found out in the morning that it was because my roomie slept in his sleeping bag and had his window wide open. The bastard. I was awoken by carpenters with nailguns in the hallway. Bad start to a day, and my mood was sullen. I couldn't have known it was gonna get worse. I went south the way I'd come, and turned east on the 43 in Stratford. The road was beautiful and winding, and I was practically alone. I've never seen grass so green as the grass on those beautiful dramatic hills.

Before long though, the bike stopped dead again. I sent a silent prayer to the god of machines, and a loud curse to the bike. This time, no matter what I did, the bike refused to start. I could have gone looking for a mechanic, but I knew the nearest one would be far away, and I was getting frustrated with these breakdowns. I eventually decided that it was taking up too much of my time. I parked it in the lawn of the nearest farm and went looking for the owners. They weren't home. I wrote them a note explaining why there was a wreck in their front yard, and then set off hitchhiking. My deal with Gary was that, since we both knew that chances were it'd break somewhere along the way, all I had to do if it happened was to leave it somewhere safe and he'd arrange for it to be picked up.
I hoped to get all the way to Turangi, but traffic was very slim and I only got as far as Taumanurui by evening. Just as I was loosing hope and considering sleeping under one of the gas pumps, the owner of the station invited me in for some food and water. I gladly accepted, and asked him whether he knew of any backpackers places. He said he'd seen a sign just up the road, and he offered to drive me there.
What I found wasn't really a backpackers, but a guy who had a bed in a dirty room in his yard. His last guest had been seven days ago, and he hadn't gotten around to cleaning the room yet. He still charged me 20$ though. I was in a rotten mood.

This was the kitchen. The plates were covered in cobwebs.

I'm sick and tired about hitchhiking and not being able to decide for myself when I go where. Especially because the things I want to see are a bit outside of town, and I hate having to rely on the odd chance that someone will drive me.

Wednesday morning I called the owner of the farm where I left my bike. He was ok with keeping it, and he said he'd get someone to put it somewhere safer. I also got a hold of Gary and told him where to pick it up. Then I set out for Turangi and checked in to the Extreme Backpackers. The allure was a climbing wall, as I hadn't been climbing for upwards of three months. Climbing with ropes is entirely different than bouldering (which is all I'd done so far), and I had great fun learning the ropes (haha, get it? Climbing with... ropes?) The vertigo literally saps your strength!

The Canadians and I had agreed to meet up that evening so we could do the Tongaririo Crossing the next day. They ended up postponing the trip because of the weather forecast and I decided to wait for them, so I spent the whole next day blogging. Good for you guys, but I got more and more frustrated from sitting still all day, and I hated the thought of being dependent on other people. Especially as I hadn't heard from them all day. So in the evening (with no decisive word from them still), I decided to stop that dependency and book the bus for the next day, with or without them. It felt good making the decision and taking matters into my own hands, but before I could get to the reception the canadians showed up. Everything worked out in the end and I had learned an important lesson.

In Wellington, my thoughts strayed back to that girl I screwed things up with before I left. All the time I've been travelling I've hoped that she might be single when I get back. The thought has been hidden way back in my mind, but it was always there, ready to peep out. 'Maybe' I thought 'even if she isn't single, she could still fall for me.' I've played out my 'homecoming' in a hundred different ways in my head, trying to figure out how best to woo her. But always, the thought was accompanied with the knowledge that she might equally well have no interest in me at all. Would it even work with the age difference? Do I even know enough of her to know she's the one I want? Am I wasting my time?
In Wellington however, I felt a change in my feelings towards coming home. Do I even want to come home for her? To come home and feel depressed, overcome, unseen and vanquished? Do I want to spring right back into that old role I so happily left? No. Nay! NEVER! I would rather come home a new man, and see the world and the people I know with new eyes. Meet new people. Meet a beautiful woman, fall for her completely, and then find the courage and passion to ask her to be mine. My passion is my greatest strength, and if I can't bring that out when I meet that girl I left (and I can't because my heart sinks whenever I see her), there's no way I have a chance with her anyway. Might as well focus on something that has a future.

One thing that struck me as odd is how often the sirens go off in New Zealand. In Denmark, they only go off in case of attack or disaster (neither has happened since WWII I think), so I was a bit worried when I first heard them. I asked a kiwi woman about it, though, and she told me that the purpose was to summon the volunteer fire-brigade. "Don't worry, if there's a volcanic eruption they won't stop blaring". Coming from Denmark, that remark put me off slightly. The danish underground doesn't have what you'd call a flaring temper.

Back on a Bike

2009-04-26T13:17:00.001+02:00

Covering from March 10th to March 12th

Above me, the white puffs turned to big gun-metal coloured rainclouds as I lowered my eyes to the horizon. It looked like rain, but, never-the-less, a smile was starting to form in my helmet. I couldn't care less about the weather. Between my legs, an old single-cylinder four-stroke was pounding along merrily. It was almost as old as me, but looked far worse. Like something scavenged from Chernobyl. Nevertheless, the engine seemed to be running smoothly. There was a slight rattle sometimes, but I didn't ask for the cause and the bike didn't tell. Gary'd told me to ignore it. Reminding the old girl of her flaws might annoy her. I didn't want to risk it. Not when she was taking so good care of me.

It was two nights after the Abel Tasman, and I was on a daytrip to the Golden Bay.
She was an old Kawasaki I'd borrowed off of Gary, the guy who sold me the Honda. I was staying with him and his family in Nelson again. Apart from some coaxing and persuasion when starting, the old girl ran easily and I was falling in love. Gary saw this and generously agreed to lend me the bike for my four week tour of the north island. Or however long she'd run before setting out. The bike drew nice compliments from other bikers, and exclamations like "Oh, Jesus!" and "you drove uphill on this!?!" became a natural part of the trip. One phonecall to a backpackers stands out. It went like this:
- What bike is it?
- Kawasaki 200
- You mean 250
- no, it's a 200
- There's no such thing. Kawasaki only makes 250's
- Well, it says right here, Kawasaki Z200
- Wow, it MUST be old then!

The next day, Gary taught me how to change the rear wheel, remove the tank, check for spark, and how to recognize a bad sparkplug. All the easy little maintenance tasks I might run into, and I was glad to get to know 'em.

As I set off to Picton to catch the wellington ferry, I felt a lot more confident. only twenty minutes outside of Nelson though, the bike gave out. Gary came by and fiddled with the electronics for a bit, and it sprang back to life. I thanked him and set off again, this time in a hurry. The ferry wouldn't be waiting and the ticket was not cheap and not refundable. Two minutes later the same thing happened, and as the bike rolled to a standstill I was shouting curses. I tried fidgeting with the connectors, but with no result. Gary came back, this time worried. After some looking around we found the cause. Turned out I'd forgotten to open the fuel valve. I felt very stupid. All that new mechanical knowledge and I'd let stress get to me and overlooked the simplest of things.

Back in the saddle, I held a steady pace to avoid further breakdowns. Halfway through the ride I decided to stop worrying about the departure. I was doing all I could, and worrying wasn't useful. The road there was beautiful, and enjoying it proved much more fun. I arrived withing minutes of departure and was rushed into the ferry. I felt excstatic. I'd made it, and I had a bike for the north island.

Hours later, I find myself sitting on the deck of the ferry watching and photographing the majestic sunset. Finishing the south island was the first big leg, and it's been two wonderful months. Before me lies another wonderful month on the north island, followed by three more on the west island (as the kiwis call Australia). The bike I'm now riding is the best one I've ever had. Watching it, I feel like Indiana Jones. I could outrun a Panzer on that one. In my imagination anyway.
Starting this second leg feels quite different from the first one. Is it the bike? I don't think so. I think it's because of me. I've changed. I can feel it in the way I walk. In the way I tackle problems. I see it every day in the way I interact with people.
I'm far more open and outgoing, but at the same time I've become more stubborn in defending my values. I'm not as naïve as when I started, but I still have my heart in the right place. And I believe without a doubt that the world is a good place, filled with good opportunities and good people. And that's it's a place for limitless growth, abundant in it's ressources.
Here we go. We're now leaving the Marlborough Sounds and I can feel a definite difference in the sea. I think we're in for it tonight. On each side, the mountains of the sounds rise up like the Argonath before Rauros. The moon has appeared behind the clouds, making a halo of light. It's not cold, in spite of a brisk sea breeze. Not yet anyway.
The Cook strait is opening up in front of me, and I can hear the first real waves against the hull. It's taken more than an hour to get through the sounds.
I think it'll be good for me having my "apprenticeship" on a bike like that.
It's twilight now, and it's starting to get hard to write my diary. I don't want to go inside yet, but I'll put my book down.
I feel like thanking someone for two wonderful months in New Zealand, but I don't know who. Thank you, whoever you are, you who helped make my life what it is today. I love you for it. I love you all.
Here comes the first big waves.

Abel Tasman National Park

2009-04-21T08:35:00.000+02:00

Covering March 7th to March 9th

Using the underwater-casing for the camera for the first time.

you don't know moonlight until you've seen it bathe the beaches of the Abel Tasman in silver.

This national park, along with the Milford sound and the Fox Glacier, is some of the most spectacular scenery I've seen in New Zealand. The two days of kayaking I had here (followed by one hiking) were spectacular, and our guide Kim, though young, were very competent.

She taught me to roll a kayak upright after capsizing it, and I got it right in the third try. She was impressed, and I was very proud.

The good life!

Kim. Our guide.

After rolling the kayak for a couple of times my skull was filled with salty water. I had to hang like this to get it out. On the bright side, my sinuses were cleaned thoroughly.

The first night she took us to some cramped glow-worm caves not far from the camp-site. After we'd had our fill, she told us to turn on our torches and look up. The ceiling was crawling with Wetas, no more than half a metre above our heads.

You know how you open your mouth automatically when looking up? I shut mine promptly.

A Weta is a family of insects indiginous to New Zealand. They grow to different sizes, but the cave weta is one of the biggest, reaching 20cms in overall length. They are disgusting, and easily look like something out of a monster flick.

The next day we paddled out to a sea-lion nursery. The babys got quite qurious and came out swimming around the kayaks. One allowed me quite close.

At four o' clock, the others went back home on a water taxi, taking the kayaks with them. I started walking south to the Bark Bay hut, an easy walk of about one and a half hours. Just before the hut there was a tidal crossing. The tide was out, but plenty of crabs were roaming about, eating what they could find and scurrying back into their holes at my approach.

The tidal crossing

At the hut, a pair of paradise ducks had taken up residence.

Another gorgeous sunset.

Monday, I walked further south to Anchorage where a water-taxi would pick me up at three. On the way I met two czheck girls. After giggling secretively for a time, they told me that I reminded them of the guy from the movie Into the Wild. I didn't know wether to take it as a compliment as I haven't seen it, so I asked them how come. 'He does crazy things like you'. This was just after I'd attempted a shortcut resulting in me falling and sliding down a muddy slope on my bum. Not my proudest moment. 'Is he good looking?' I ventured. 'Very', came the reply.

Some lazy kayakers brought out sails.

The inlet in the background is the tidal crossing at Anchorage. The tide was still in.

There was another tidal crossing before anchorage, and we arrived before the tide had gone out. I wanted to attempt it anyway, so I repacked my pack to be waterproof. As I took out my diary, one of the girls (the other was changing) got very excited. "Oh, you keep a diary? Very good! Just like him! That way people will know what you've done even if you die of berries!"
As I set off, however, I found that the water went to my knees at the deepest place. Not the kind of "adventurous watercrossing" I'd imagined.

One of the girls 'ventured' the crossing with me.

Pounamu, planes, fundamentalists, and more planes.

2009-03-24T00:03:00.001+01:00

Covering february 25th to march 6th

Wednesday, the day after my Glacier walk, the germans gave me a ride up to Hokitika. We stopped on the way to see the Franz Joseph glacier, and after letting me off they drove further north to Greymouth. By then I'd somehow had enough of their company, and I think it was mutual. Unfortunately, I forgot a merino shirt and my knife in their car. They left it for me in a hostel on the north island. I hope I won't miss it too much before then.

Homesickness kicks in easily when feeling down, and ever since the glacier walk I'd been slightly depressed. The hostel was practically empty, so it was hard to think of something else. I felt like doing nothing, but luckily I didn't follow that impulse.

I came to Hokitika for one purpose: Pounamu caving (pounamu is NZ Jade, or greenstone). Pounamu has been sacred to the Maori for centuries, and I liked the idea of carving my own piece instead of buying some off-the-shelf pendant just to show I've been travelling. The owner of the shop turned out to be a very amiable, pleasant, and very patient guy from the Solomon Islands.
I started out designing my piece. I had no clear idea of what I wanted, but after browsing through some pictures for inspiration, I settled on designing a variation of the traditional Hei Matau, or fishhook.
The owner, Steve, was very impressed with my design, and during the carving process, whenever he had me refer to it, he exclaimed "That's good! I like this!" with great joy. It took me two days and upwards of 13 work hours to complete my Taonga, and what I now wear around my neck has so much the greater meaning to me because of the effort and love I put into it. I designed it, carved it and polished it. I broke seven drills, and Steve broke two while helping me out with the holes.

The results of the first day's work:

Steve is showing me a new technique

The finished pendant

Friday afternoon, after finishing my piece, I headed for Christchurch again. I'd thought about staying the night in Arthur's Pass, but after consulting my Lonely Planet guidebook I shortened my stay to a 15 minute one.

On the way to christchurch, we passed the Castle Hills. Man, Andreas is gonna kill me for not climbing these!

Once in Christchurch, I hooked up with Mike Hodgkinson again and stayed in town for a couple of days.
It was a weird sense of homecoming, since Christchurch was the first familiar sight I'd seen in six weeks. Would Christchurch recognize me?
As it happened, Sarah, of Invercargill and Queenstown fame, happened to be in Christchurch, and we went to see the Banks Peninsula, visit a museum dedicated to Ernest Rutherford, and on a spur decided to go see the RNZAF museum.
I've always been crazy about warplanes, and finding myself in a hall filled with old fighter planes, including two of my favourite beauties, made me completely unable to contain my glee!

Glad I brought my sunglasses!

I had a geek-gasm right there. The P-51D Mustang in all it's glory

I had a big beautiful model of this one when I was a kid

If I was in world war two they'd call me Spitfire!

- Sarah, can I drive back to Christchurch?
- sure, why?
- I gotta pilot something right now!

Sarah headed back home that evening, and I went to a couchsurfer event at a restaurant in Christchurch. It was very interesting to see how tight a community couchsurfing really is.

My lift out of Christchurch is worth a rant. It was a two hour drive to Kaikoura, and from our conversation I quickly gathered that he was a religious man.
About one hour into the drive darkness settled and he seemed to gather his nerve and ask me what'd apparantly been on his mind all the time. "Have anyone ever told you of the light of Jesus Christ?" I felt a paralyzing panic run through my body. Fuck, He's about to start preaching. Get me out! Turns out he was a fundamentalist creationist. One of those people who not only doesn't believe in what they called "the religion of science", but believes it is the work of Satan meant to distort our view of "god's truth". He felt it his mission to try and convert me, and his arguments were the most ridiculous ones I've ever heard. I've read about these people, but meeting one made me realize how mind-numbingly stupid and narrow-minded they really are. He tried to point to obscure "holes" in science (evolution in particular, and the fact that the earth was older than the 6-7000 years stated in the bible), and whenever I countered them (which I managed quite well considering my panicked state) he changed the subject into something even more obscure until he found something I didn't know enough about. When I told him that evolution is not a theory but an observed fact, he replied with "well, have you seen it?" How do you argue with a guy like that!
He ended up being plain rude. I'm very hard to insult, but his comments about how he felt sorry that I was so ignorant and "taking other people's lies for fact" managed it. 'Look who's talking' I thought, but I didn't say it. I was more than offended. I was angry. For some reason I didn't stop him or ask to be set off. I felt I had to be polite since he'd given me the ride, however obnoxious he might be. The next day I was still angry, and I decided that if someone insults me like that again I'll ask to be set off immediately. Darkness or no.
It made me realize that I'm too polite. I'm letting people step on me without complaint and I've had enough of that. It's fine if someone doesn't agree with me, but I won't take the kind of disrespect he was pouring on me. Never again.

Wednesday dawned as blue as can be, and I went and did what I came to Kaikoura to do. Fulfilling a childhood dream:

I! Flew! An! Airplane!
With an instructor by my side, I:
- took off from the ground
- flew the plane for the better part of an hour
- made the approach between mountains
- landed the plane
- taxied to parking

FUCK YEAH!
I did it, and it was easy as!
(note, Easy As is kiwi slang meaning very easy)

Remember what I said about hitchhiking in the video? I was proven wrong trying to hitch to Nelson. Every single pick-up that day took more than an hour to land.

Arriving in Nelson, I had a real hard time finding a hostel, and seriously considered sleeping in the park. I opted out of it though, as I didn't want to attempt it in the middle of the city. I was surprised at how calm I was. Surely a night with no place to sleep should be a panick-inducing prospect! Soon, I found the reason for my calm. It was rooted in a certain october night in Scotland about 8 years ago.
I was hitch-hiking through Europe on my own, and back then my 16-year old mind thought it would be cool to do something so uncomfortable that I'd always be able to say that 'I've had worse'. This quest culminated with me trying to sleep outside a gas-station in the middle of nowhere. It was october, it was the highlands, it was cold as hell, somehow the bugs weren't dead yet, I was hungry, and occasional drips from above made it miserable. It took me three hours to realize the stupidity of what I was doing, and ever since I've looked back on that night with a shudder of embarassment. That night in Nelson, however, it all made sense. I was so calm about it because, no matter what the night would bring, I'd survived worse! The night in Scotland ended with a scottish family taking me in , and the night in Nelson ended with me stumbling upon a backpackers with beds available.

The One Ring used in the movies was made in Nelson. By a guy from Denmark no less. His shop is now run by his son, as Jens Hansen himself passed away. I put it on, but resisted the urge for plunder and genocide. The ring has no power over me.

This whopper was used for special effects shots and closeups of the ring.

Fox pictures

2009-03-18T23:48:00.000+01:00

Yesterday, my blogging was cut short due to internet problems and I couldn't put up the pictures of Fox Glacier. This has now been remedied as more pictures have been added to my last post.

On canyoning, skydiving, puzzles, kayaking, car-sickness and glaciers

2009-03-18T09:44:00.002+01:00

Covering february 18th to february 24th

a full day of canyoning condensed into 1:20 for your viewing pleasure. The green (again, unbearably sexy) helmet is perched precariously on the presomtuous pumpkin of yours truly (i.e. green = me)

The next morning I had a first-hand experience of how rude kiwis can be as one of them pushed me out of a perfectly good airplane. I was horrified to find that I wasn't wearing a parachute! Fortunately, the guy strapped to my back had brought his and it was big enough for two so we shared his. I gotta learn to remember these things.

That evening I went to the lake with three aussies, a guitar, and a bottle of whisky. All of them good company.

The next morning it was raining. There were four of us in the car. A german guy, a german girl, a danish girl, and a danish me. All of us strangers. We'd set out on a spontaneous Lord of the Rings location hunt. The german girl had a car, the german guy had a LotR guidebook, I had binoculars, and Linda (the danish girl) had the idea. We were foiled by the weather, but a good time is defined by the company and the attitude, not the circumstances. We had a very good time.

Also, Linda taught me some Salsa. Fun!

The forecast said heavy rains for the entire weekend so I chose to hole up in wanaka, waiting for the weather to clear. A full day glacier walk didn't seem very appealing in pouring rain, and I didn't want to wait it out in Fox Glacier township as there's nothing to do there. This meant I had another couple of days to kill in Wanaka.

If you ever go to Wanaka, you HAVE to check out their cinema. I've never been in one like it. I don't think it even matters what movie is showing, it's just the whole experience! Everybody was sitting in sofas or comfy chairs, and one (un?)lucky couple got to sit in an old car. The film for the night was 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button'. Nice movie, and Brad Pitt is always awesome.
Anyways. Before the movie started i'd ordered a Pizza, and by the half-way break a table had been made ready for me in the foyer with one steaming pizza waiting for me. Awesome!

Puzzleworld is also quite something. It's not that big, but it has some quite impressive illusions and the maze itself will keep you occupied for an hour at least (unless you're as skilled as me and Linda, in which case you'll zip through it in 45 minutes ;) ). I didn't have my camera since it was a very spontaneous thing, so these were taken with my phone.

Linda is not very tall

Or is she?

When I went kayaking on Wanaka lake I forgot my camera again. Sorry. Pictures wouldn't have done it justice anyway though, as the weather wasn't too good. The trip however, was awesome and completely spontaneous! I was paddling with a californian bloke, and in another kayak were two german girls (Christiane and Nadine). We sailed out to a little island (Ruby island I think) and went for a walk.

Monday, the forecast said the weather would be clearing. Nadine and Christiane was going to Fox Glacier too and offered me a lift in their tiny little car. Wonderful! Christiane was driving. Horrible! I never get carsick, but she made me feel queazy.

The road up the west coast was one I'd really been looking forward to, and sitting cramped on the backseat of a car with no view wasn't exactly the great motorcycle adventure I'd been dreaming of. To top it off, I slept most of the way to stave off the car-sickness. They thought I was suffering from sleeping sickness. I was too polite to tell them that it stemmed from survival instinct. I miss being on a bike. I checked the used bike market again, but to no avail.

Arriving at Fox, I had no reservations for a backpackers place or the glacier walk. Backpackers went ok, but the glacier walk was fully booked. I was gutted. I was already behind schedule, and didn't feel like wasting any more time in Fox.
The town of fox is beautiful and nestled in rainforest, but I found it hard to enjoy, being worried about spending too much time here. I only had two weeks left before the north island, if I were to stick to my plan. Then it struck me that the only person telling me to stick to my plan was me, and if I wanted to change it I could. This made me relax a bit.
After one night of worrying, I got up early and went to see if there'd been any cancellaions on the day trip. there had! It's funny how my worries seem to vaporize the closer I get to them.

The backpackers here in Fox is covered with those cheasy motivational posters. They're tacky, but this one caught my eye:
What we hope to do with ease, we must first do with hard work and perseverance.

This area is called the Gunbarrels. Notice the huge boulder in the foreground. Just five days earlier it'd come thundering down all the way from the top of that mountain!

I smirk in the face of danger!

I was quite inept at using that pick, and almost took off my foot. Looks good in pictures though.

Ice caves rock!

The Fox Glacier, together with the Milford Sound, is some of the most stunning scenery I've ever known. It's nestled in a valley with rainforest covering both sides, and it's a very weird feeling walking through rainforest to get to a glacier! Standing on the ice, you can see down the entire valley, see the hills in the distance, and behind them, a vast and sparkling sea. Once again, I was overcome by a sense of immense wonder at the natural forces at work in this place. This entire valley had been carved by a grinding river of ice, and I was witnessing its slow but deliberate push towards the ocean. Soon, this sense of wonder grew in scope and once again I found myself marvelling at the planet we're on. Just like on the Kepler track, I realized how insignificant we are in the greater scheme of things. Nothing we can do can stop this planet, or even stop life. We can kill ourselves, easy! And we can take other species with us, but wipe out the planet? All life on it? That is only a boast we do to seem important to ourselves.

Some people think that scientific explanations takes away the beauty of things. Somehow they think that, if they know too much about something they'll be unable to appreciate it. I find the opposite to be true. The glacier itself is beautiful to the eye, nothing can ever take that away, but knowing about the processes going on hundreds of meters below me, imagining the sheer weight required for the glacier generate enough pressure to grind the mountain into a pulp, seeing it all happen in my minds eye. Suddenly the beauty goes much further than the eye.

Carl Sagan said something humbling while pondering this picture of earth, taken by Voyager 1 in 1990.

Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

Puts it all in perspective doesn't it?

All Roads Lead to Queenstown

2009-03-15T05:40:00.001+01:00

Covering february 9th to february 17th

After the Kepler track I took a day off to rest my feet and get my bearings. I didn't want to sit idle for too long as I felt I was behind schedule, so I booked a kayaking trip on the Milford Sound for the next day. I figured it would be a good way to be active and still be able to rest my legs. I was a bit concerned about the weather as it'd been quite bad all day. The weather in the Fjordlands is very temperamental however, and the next day was as beautiful as anyone could've hoped.

I was in a double kayak with Tiphaine, or San, as she prefers. San is french. Very french. Passing a waterfall on the way to Milford, everyone went "ooh, ooh!" and pulled out their cameras, except San, who nonchalantly took the cigarette from her mouth and exclaimed "Iz o.k."
She dresses like a pirate, a very beautiful pirate mind you, and she is great fun being around and a marvel to study. Fortunately she has a great sense of humour and doesn't take herself too seriously. We coordinated our double-kayak very well, but then again, that's what you'd expect from two people whose names mean stuff like "Divine Apparition" and "Beauty of God" isn't it? ;)

The kayaking was amazing and generally very relaxing. Unlike the cruise boats, we got right up to the cliffs and we were only meters from the NZ fur-seals resting there. The waterfalls were magnificent too, and we got as the kayaks could go.

The road from Te Anau to Milford is studded with a plethora of sights which were as varied as they were beautiful.

The next day San and I went horseback riding. It was ok, but honestly I was a bit disappointed that we didn't get to gallop. I understand the safety issues, but what's the fun in trotting? Besides, galloping is far easier. And we wore helmets.

Fuck yeah. Helmets!

That same afternoon I hitch-hiked for the first time in NZ. Hitch-hiking is extremely easy in New Zealand. Anywhere I stood, I didn't wait for more than 20 minutes for a ride.

That evening as I left the hostel I'd chosen, the town revealed its true identity to me. I was standing on a hillside with mountains on three sides. Beyond the town in front of me, I could see jetboats zipping around cruise-ships and steam-boats on the lake. Above me, hang-gliders were looping and the screams of para-gliders reached me even as I stood wondering at their madness. Before my feet lay the thundering adventure metropolis of the world, Queenstown. She had something to offer!

It's hard to describe what Queenstown feels like. It reminds me of Don Rosa's rendition of Klondike at the height of the gold rush days in his "The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck". There's a fortune being made here for the people running the adventure businesses, and a fortune to be spent by everybody else. The key to my backpacker's room had the allure of 2 for 1 prices at two different bars in town, which resulted in five consecutive nights of drinking. Every bar has a theme for each night of the week, and thursday was Wet T-shirt contest at the Buffalo. Madness I tell you. Madness!

My infamous and insatiable hunger eventually led me to Fergburger, which just so happens to have the best burgers I've ever tasted. Whoever thought of making a burger of such quality and then put bacon and blue-cheese in it surely deserves the nobel prize! (note: said burger goes well with a pinot noir.) This town could easily make me a very poor man!

I decided to go for some adrenaline, and I thought about doing the Shotover Canyon Swing . In a flurry of quick decisions I ended up booking it for that afternoon and fear started churning in my stomach right away. Fortunately, I'm fairly well versed in that particular anticipatory kind of fear, and I was able to put it out of my head for most of the day. Remember what I said about worrying? I'd made a decision.
Of course. I am not as perfect as I sometimes lead myself to believe, and a tingling sense of panic had me itching all day, whether I cared to admit it or not. I showed up at the meeting point way too early and found it very hard to speak. The team I was going with had around ten people, and my fears that I was the only nervous one were quickly abolished as I looked around the bus. Someone piped up, asking the driver what it was like. "Oh, I haven't tried it. No way! I've seen what happens to those people!" He was joking of course. The bastard.

They led us up a narrow dirt track and after around 300 meters we came to the all-too-shabby looking building we'd be jumping from. Looking down that valley, it hit me what I was doing.

I have a motto: It's okay to be scared, as long as I do it anyway.

Me: There's no way I'm doing this!
Jumpmaster: okay, cool. If you just put on this harness.
I put on the harness.
M: There's no way I'm doing this!
JM: What's your name?
M: Jophiel
JM: Hello Garfield. Is there any physical handicaps we should be aware of?
M: I'm from Denmark
JM: Well, apart from the obvious ones I meant. Just walk this way. Look, this is where you'll be jumping.
What! the! hell! am! I! doing!
JM: We'll just check if your harness is secure. Wait is this supposed to be loose?
Assistant: I don't know, it'll probably be alright. This looks wrong though. Nevermind, just let him do it.
They mess with your mind like that. They are not good people.
M: There's no way I'm doing this!
JM: Do you see the camera? Give it a smile.
I made the weakest attempt at a smile ever.

I knew how to do this. All I had to do was to wait for that milisecond where my mind wasn't thinking about where I was, jump, and worry about the rest on the way down. I found it, I jumped, I panicked.
But I knew immediately that this was the best, most intense thing I'd ever done! I did two jumps in all, the second one hanging upside down.

That evening Sarah (from Invercargill) came to Queenstown, and the next day I took her to paradise. Paradise, however, turned out to be overrated. Far too many sandflies. The road there was gorgeous, but fairly tough, and offroading in a Nissan Bluebird is a death-defying act.

This afternoon I arrived in Wanaka. Wanaka has much the same offering of adrenaline pumping activities, but it's a smaller, quieter town, and a welcome contrast to the kind of "hyper-life" I lived in Queenstown. Despite this, I've already booked a full-day canyoning trip for tomorrow, and a voluntary ejection from an airplane in flight for the day after. Awesome!

The Kepler Track

2009-03-10T08:28:00.000+01:00

Covering february 6th to february 8th

I appologize in advance for the sappiness of this post.

A part of myself was lost on that mountain.

Part of me left and now lives somewhere on the slopes of Mt Luxmore. I saw it today, from Te Anau. It was making rainbows.

What am I talking about? I'm talking about my hike on the Kepler track. I did a huge amount of video blogging, which I edited down to these three. Notice how cocky I am to begin with? It didn't last long...

And I know the hat is stupid, but it was all I had!

According to my Lord of the Rings location guide, this river was used as part of the Anduin.

As I was hiking, I was painfully aware that other people did this track easily. It was never meant to be a test of stamina for me, and I felt like an amateur for being so exhausted. As the trail wound along however, I stopped comparing myself to others and just took it as an opportunity to show myself what I was really capable of. That I was capable of stretching myself out beyond what I previously found possible. Who cares what others can do - this is about what I can do! In that light, the hike was a tremendous success.

The first victory: Reaching the ridge!

A sleepy Kea

At some point after the second day's first shelter along the ridge, I sat down against a mound and laid back on my pack. I closed my eyes as a heavy drowsiness took me, but was awoken from half-sleep as I heard voices approaching. I thought it odd since I'd expected to be the last one on the track. I opened my eyes and found that I was all alone. Trick of the brain I though, and closed them again. I drifted off again, and again I heard them, this time accommpanied by approaching footsteps. As I drifted back to consciousness I thought I saw human shapes, but as I came fully awake I realized that, as before, there was no-one there. Was it ghosts I had seen? Or maybe the spirits of the mountain? I rested a while longer and then set off again.

As I arrived at the second shelter, I saw a hiker coming towards me in the opposite direction. I waited for him at the shelter, and of all people it turned out to be Matthis, a french guy I'd met on two previous occasions. He (like all other french people) turned out to be crazy. Obviously, we make good companions. He'd chosen to do the track in two days, doing the first two parts in one go. On top of that, all he had was his jeans, shirt and hoodie, a tent, a fairly light backpack, and a pair of 30$ sneakers. We shared a rest at the shelter, and then set off again in opposite directions.

About an hour after ascending Mt Luxmore peak, I crossed a small stream. i sat down by it, marvelling at the changes of mood I'd gone through since starting the hike. Physically, I was completely smashed. Mentally and emotionally however, I found myself in a strange, empty, comfortable and calm state. It was as if a part of me had torn itself free. The part that focuses on problems and worries about everything it can think of. I was left feeling completely at peace, and completely accepting of my place. I was right here. Right now. And loving it!

- 'I feel at home here' he said. He that had torn away from me. He was now sitting beside me at the stream.
- 'I think I'll stay, if you don't mind' he added. He felt so incredibly far removed from me that I found it hard to believe that we'd been one and the same just moments earlier.
- 'I don't mind one bit', I answered, happy to see him content.
He smiled and looked around, taking in the landscape.
- 'I don't suppose we'll ever see each other again.' he said, sharing my relief.
- 'I suppose not'
We sat there for a while. Waiting. Enjoying our last moments together. At last I got up. I picked up my pack and adjusted the straps.
- 'goodbye' I said, smiling a half-sad smile. He didn't answer, but smiled as he splashed his feet in the cold water of the stream. I turned my back and started out on the day's last stretch. I never looked back.

On the last little slope before the hut, I heard the voices again. I turned around and stood listening intently in silence. I thought I heard footsteps, but as I waited no-one came. I know that it was most likely one of a hundred perfectly reasonable explanations, but still I like to think that there was someone there with me looking after me. Spirits? Who knows!

That night I went caving in a tight cavesystem close to the Luxmore hut. I went with an aussie called Luke. The caves extended quite far, and we must have gone on for maybe a kilometer or so. In some places we had to squeeze through sideways, in others, we were on our hands and knees crawling through shallow water, and in still others we'd be climbing over huge boulders, dropping feet first into the unknown blackness.

this is Luke, my impromptu caving buddy.

My first aid kit:

Relieving sore feet:

Being there

2009-03-03T01:02:00.008+01:00

I've heard some people claim that, soon, with Google Maps, Earth and Streetview, there'd be no reason left to travel. You could just log on to the net and see every sight in highly defined detail. Every view of every shore will be captured. Every tiny detail on the Notre Dame in Paris can be browsed from home. Better photographers than you have already captured the most beautiful sunsets and posted them conveniently on Google Earth. Why not save the money and just buy a new computer instead?

well, because that's not being there.

Being there is riding through rain and storm, falling over and having my motorbike break down in the middle of nowhere.
Being there is discovering the hidden reserves within me that enables me to overcome such obstacles.
Being there is seeing those picture-perfect sunsets, and knowing that this particular one is mine alone.
Being there is not just seeing that sunset, but enjoying it with a good bottle of wine and a meal shared with that new friend with the funny accent and a million stories.
Being there is feeling the wind on my face, the cool rocks against my bare feet, and facing the rain with songs at the top of my lungs.

Being there makes me feel alive.

Now, drink with me, to friendship and love. For everything else is just tin.

Leave me a comment if you like this post, and please share one of your travel stories.

Breakdown

2009-02-21T09:18:00.003+01:00

I left Dunedin after buying a new sleeping bag. Finally! I drove south towards Nugget Point, the first thing I wanted to see, and what a sight that was! A great little walk ending up at a lighthouse set on a dramatic dropoff into the ocean. All along the coast, fur-seals, sea-lions, and elephant seals lay basking on the beach or frolicking around in the waves.

I found out I can use my binoculars as a zoom lens. The results are less than stellar though.

The next destination for the day was Cannibal Bay, but on the way there I passed a sign saying "Tunnel Hill Road", which I thought sounded interesting. The road was gravel, and I was going too fast for the turn I attempted, which resulted in the back wheel skidding out from under the bike and me and the bike ending up in the vegetation on the side of the road.

I went on to Cannibal Bay where the only interesting feature was this dying seal in the carpark

Not long after, I arrived in Owaka, thinking I might carry on into the Catlins if I could find accomodation there. The information booth was closed when I arrived however, so I stayed in Owaka for the night. Owaka is really... REALLY small. Much smaller and it wouldn't even qualify as a town. There was one gas station and two pubs. The school serving all the children in the Catlins area is located in Owaka as well. That's about it.
At the backpackers I stayed I met a great guy from Wales named Colin. We instantly clicked and had some good laughs that evening.

We decided to go see Jacks Blowhole. We went in Colin's car, and when we got out we followed the only road we could see. Not long after we came upon this sign:

We had a good laugh about how blunt the kiwis are, and we both thought it was brilliant. None of us thought the sign was meant for us. After all, this was the only road to Jack's Blowhole! As we went further up we came to a house, and the path ended in a field. We were very confused. Had we missed a turn? For a moment I thought this was it, so I took a picture.

On the way down we spotted another path. Only problem was that we'd have to cut across a field to get to it. We had a go at it, and to our surprise we ended up at Jack's Blowhole. On the way down, we were discussing how we could possibly have missed that road and we thought it was very weird that no signs were posted. When we got back down however, we found a huge sign saying 'Jack's Blowhole this way', and another by the road we entered saying 'Private road, keep off!' I still don't know how we missed both those signs, went up the wrong road, and thought nothing of the 'piss off!' sign! We're the saddest sods on the south island.

Thursday I took off for the Catlins. They'd promised light rain, but I thought I'd brave it. There's a lot of sights there, including a couple of waterfalls (some of which are shown in the video below), and the Cathedral Caves which are only reachable at low tide. Since I've never really been in caves before, this was quite something for me. When I arrived there, I felt a primal fear crawl into my spine. In front of me it was pitch black, and I started wondering what kinds of abominations might live in there. Sure, the guidebook said there's no monsters in New Zealand, but what if that's only because no one's ever returned to tell the tale? I steeled myself and ventured inside.

Yup. City-folk are afraid of the dark.

Two british ladies came in behind me. They were joking and laughing loudly, not caring what they'd wake up. Go ahead! Get yourself eaten!

I arrived in Invercargill and found Sarah's place without too much trouble. Sarah was a really pleasant host and made me feel at home instantly. She is very active in the couchsurfing community, and already had another couchsurfer staying with her (Tina from the US. Make sure to visit her blog! ). I stayed there for three nights waiting for the weather to clear up a bit. There's not much to see in Invercargill, but I took the opportunity to catch up on some blogging, among other things (I know, I'm very bad at keeping up). Sarah studies music, and both friday and saturday we went out on the town, listening to bands she knew. In the end, Sarah ended up being my guardian angel, as you'll see very soon.

Sunday afternoon I was in a hurry to leave invercargill since the rain had stopped. I was thinking that a little wind shouldn't stop me.

Once I got out of the city, the wind turned really vicious, and I was fighting to keep to my lane. What had I gotten myself into! I felt like such a fool for putting myself in so much danger, and I was seriously thinking about pulling up to a house asking for shelter for the night. Problem was, there wasn't any houses around!

Suddently, I heard a loud clatter from the engine and the bike went dead. I pulled over and tried to start it. No use. Obviously something had gone wrong inside it.

Sarah came and picked me up, and that afternoon her aunt's husband (John) took me in his pick-up to pick up the bike. After a bit of fidgeting we thought the problem was solved and the next morning I set off again. after ten kilometers, it made the same noise and died. This time the gears were stuck as well. John came and picked me up again, and we took the bike to a mechanic. He said he'd have a look at it and let me know the condition in the morning. The next day Sarah and I went back to the shop and he showed me the disassembled engine. It was carnage. The piston, as I'd guessed, was broken. The piston chamber was cracked. The gearbox was screwed. The valves were bent. Unsalvagable. My only option was to buy a new engine or sell it to the mechanic for use as spare parts. I soon found out that engines for XR250's are very hard to come by. The mechanic payed me 400$.

The next day Sarah was kind enough to drive me to Te Anau. She and her family have been extremely kind and helpful, and I really don't know what I would have done if it hadn't been for them. Thanks guys!

The broken piston. I kept it as a souvenir

the cracked cylinder.

This is Sarah with the remains of the bike.

A closer look.

I was quite frustrated for a couple of days about not having a bike. It seems like I'll be hitchhiking for a while. There are a few options for new bikes available, but 3000$ up in smoke was a huge cut in my budget, so I'm hesitant about buying a new one. I guess I'll just see what happens. At least people tell me that bikes in Australia are pretty cheap, so I'll probably get one there.

Who knows, maybe this might go down in history as the longest motorcycle trip without a motorcycle! One thing's for certain; I won't let it get me down anymore. I'm on an adventure here, bike or no, and I'm gonna enjoy every bit of it!
I can plan all I want, but when the planning breaks down, that's when the real adventure starts.

I don't know what the future will bring, but I'm sure the best is yet to come.

Towels

2009-02-17T11:19:00.000+01:00

Since I'm now a hitchhiker, I have a whole new set of worries. Towels. And, in particular, where I left them.

The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy has a few things to say on the subject of towels:

A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitch hiker can have. Partly it has great practical value - you can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapours; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a mini raft down the slow heavy river Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (a mindboggingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can't see it, it can't see you - daft as a brush, but very very ravenous); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.

More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitch hiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc, etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitch hiker might accidentally have "lost". What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with.

Currently, I am not a man to be reckoned with.

Not only did I forget to bring one, I've managed to loose the one I bought three times. Fortunately, I've recovered it twice.

Quickie

2009-02-17T08:09:00.000+01:00

Hi all

Just a quick post to let you know I'm still alive. I'm in Wanaka, and I have 2 posts ready for posting and another half finished. The problem is finding a fast/cheap internet connection in this net-forsaken country, and it doesn't seem like I'll find one here in Wanaka. I'll be here for a couple of days, so it'll be at least as long before I get anything up. Maybe longer though!

As some of you know, my bike is dead and gone. The details will all be covered in the first of my finished posts. Stay tuned!

Thanks for your patience :)

your man in the field
Jophiel

Time to get the hell out of Dodge

2009-01-30T03:18:00.015+01:00

Or; how I swam with sea-lions, met Renée, fucked up my schedule, and ended up having a great time anyway!

Written on Tuesday, january 27th, 2009

I've been feeling slightly cut off on my motorcycle. It was a deliberate and conscious choice to travel alone and with no attachments to home, but that doesn't mean there weren't sacrifices, both before I left and while I'm travelling.
Firstly, before I left I rejected every chance of starting a serious romantic relationship, and this came back and bit me in the arse as I realized I hadn't been honest with myself. I had a huge and tough learning experience when a girl i'd fallen for (without admitting it to myself) slipped through my fingers.
From this I learned (as I think I described earlier) to take every chance of adventure, friendship and love that comes my way, and not worry one bit about what the future brings. As it happens, when the future does show up, it always ends up bringing gifts instead of the poison I'm worried about. So I like to think that I've learned not to worry. Honestly though, It's still a work in progress.

Another big challenge is that, by travelling alone, it's quite easy to get lonely. This means that I have to put that much more of an effort into meeting new people and making new acquaintances. This can be tough, but I'm learning fast and It's very rewarding.
I think Mark Twain once said that the best way to test how much you like a person is to go travelling with them. I went travelling with myself and I'm testing how well I like the person I am. I'm steadily finding out what parts of me are working well, and what needs to be changed. It's a great, but sometimes painful journey of discovery.

one thing that needs to change is my willingness to attempt to be someone I'm not in order to get people to like me. This stands in the way of one of my key assets, which is Honesty.
Also, if I'm not being myself, there's a chance people will like me for someone I'm not, which would muck things up even more.
I've had relationships lasting years being loved for someone I'm not, and I've vowed to change that for my next one.

I think that a note on my route is in order. From home, I'd planned to go directly to Dunedin, thinking there was nothing to see on the way. One of Mike's friends suggested the detour to Lake Tekapo and Mt Cook, and what a great idea that was! As it turned out, two weeks after my arrival i'm not even past Dunedin! I'm updating my google maps with links to my blog posts, so you (and I, when I get back) can easily look up the different chapters, related to where I've been staying. I love you Google. You make me feel fuzzy inside.

The road from Oamaru to Dunedin was ok, without anything too interesting except the Oamaru boulders which I went to see. It was a 300 meter walk from the carpark, and as I walked along the beach I ran into the dutch couple from Lake Tekapo! I could see the boulders not far off, and they didn't look that spectacular so I turned around and followed them to Dunedin. The girl, Lianna, offered to take my bags in their car. Excellent! The guy (Jeroen) had banned Lianna from driving since she'd busted two of the gears, including the reverse. Their car only did 70k/h, so I sped ahead and spent some time in Dunedin.

When I arrived at The Octagon (the center of town), I realized the exhaust had come loose and melted more of the plastic bit. I almost got a parking ticket while considering what to do about it, but I convinced the officer to show me the way to a workshop instead. An hour later and I was back on the road. All it needed was a few bolts that'd come loose. A few very expensive bolts apparantly.

That night we checked in to a backpackers called Stafford Gabels on Stafford street, and later we went out for drinks. Dunedin is a university city, but the students are on their summer break, so nothing much was going on that thursday night, and we ended up at the hostel playing cards.

The next morning saw us headed for the beautiful Otago Peninsula. In particular, a place called Sandfly Bay, which thankfully doesn't live up to its name. Come to think of it, I haven't actually met any of the dreaded buggers. But I digress.
We followed the High Cliff Road, which goes right along the ridge of the peninsula. Beautiful views! They say that everyone underestimates the distances on the peninsula, and we were no exception. Eventually though, we found the bay:

notice the lack of people :)

When we got down to the beach, we realized that we were not alone. Apart from a handful of other people, four sea-lions had taken up residence on the beach, basking in the sands and fooling around. We kept a respectful distance, but I still managed to get some shots.

I was very excited about being so close to a wild animal of that size. I don't think I've tried that before.

I stripped down to my bathers and hit the water. The two others followed quickly after. It was a bit chilly, but I had a viking reputation to keep up, so I stayed in. Besides, the waves were quite big, and I had fun throwing myself against them, seeing if I could remain standing.
After a while, one of the sealions took to the water. We were the only bathers, and it had seemingly taken an interest in us. It swam calmly towards Lianna who kept her distance, and then turned its attention to me. It came right up to me, circling maybe ten centimeters from my leg.If I'd reached out my arm I could easily have touched it. I thought better of it though, thinking there was probably a reason for the name sea-LION. I think it was a female, and she was very qurious, and much larger than I'd anticipated. She swam around me with infinite calm and a pinch of playfulness. She looked right up at me, as if wondering what I was doing so far from home. When the waves came, we'd swim with them together. Me on the surface, her just below. In the breaking wave her body would turn to a distorted blob, and for a minute I got a bit nervous. That old Jaws feeling.

I think she stayed for two minutes, no longer, then swam on down the beach. All three of us were amazed at the experience, and I was just pumping!

I spent the rest of the day running on sand-dunes, feeling like a fremen and getting a savage sunburn (okay, could have been worse, but it's so rare I get to use the word savage).

Lianna and Jeroen; law abiding law students

The netherlanders went back to the hostel and I thought I'd head for the albatross colony at the tip of the peninsula. Like I said, I underestimated the distances, and since I hadn't filled the tank since leaving Oamaru, I ran out of gas and had to switch to the reserve tank. I made it back with two liters left. Later, I calculated that the bike will go 225km on a full tank, including the reserve, but I've yet to put it to the test and I hope I'll never have to.

The day after, Lianna and Jeroen went on through the Catlins, and I had to move to another hostel since the Gables were full for the night. I found a place just a block away called Chalet Backpackers, which is the nicest, comfyest, and friendliest place I've stayed so far (as a plus, there's rumours of a resident ghost).
I'd planned to stay home and look after my sunburn, but three german girls quickly had me convinced to go to Sandfly Bay again. I covered myself up in pants and a long sleeved t-shirt and spent an uneventful day at the beach. (I slept for most of the day, drooling all over. So much for a good first impression.)
I hit the town again that night and latched on to a small group of locals. Went to a couple of bars, all playing shit music but I had fun anyway, and then went home and fell asleep.

On the evening of the next day (which was spent taking care of a severe hangover made worse by the unbearable heat, but miraculously cured by a killer dinner made from all I had left - which included pasta, cashews, pesto and a wonderful cheddar. Here's a picture:- I took another, that's how much I loved it! The setting only made it better...

And by the way, this is probably the biggest parenthesis you'll ever see!), I was sorting out my baggage getting rid of all the stuff I'd found I didn't need when a late arrival slumped herself on the last empty bed in the dorm. I introduced myself with the oft underestimated introduction (and intergalactic peace offering) "would you like a pair of socks?"

That's how I met Renée, the craziest girl you could imagine.

Renée is from tasmania, and recently found out that she's been away more than twice as long as She'd thought (seven weeks in all)
I'd planned to head out of Dunedin by the next morning, but instead I cooked up a hike with Renée to Tunnel Beach. I've never taken such an instant liking to anyone. She's stark-raving barking mad and, quoting her, she should be locked up. Thankfully though, she's not. She posesses an odd mix of inner peace and crazy adventure that I can't help but admire. I'd tell you of her first night in NZ, but that would take up an entire new post, and besides, no-one can tell it like her.

So off we went in the morning, headed for tunnel beach (after I'd switched back to the Gables since the Chalet was full for the night). This is how much I enjoyed the walk on the way out.

That changed on the back home as my feet developed a blister and three sores from sandals I haven't broken in.

All the way we were constantly taking the piss on each other, and she ended up claiming I was worse than her which is of course impossible. I still marvell at how effortlessly we switched from piss-taking to profound and personal conversation, and at how quickly a quite deep friendship developed.

The beach itself was very small, but our reason for visiting was the rock formations.

Meet Renée

The little cove nestled between the cliffs.

Renée tried to take a photo of me, but she made me do weird things, so the only one that turned out decent was this self-portrait

To get to the beach, we had to go through a fairly long, very narrow tunnel.

like I said. Bat-shit crazy.

You couldn't ask for a more beautiful setting for the lunch.

She's headed up to Christchurch to get a flight back to Australia in a few days, but we agreed that she'd show me around tasmania for a few days when I get there. Can't wait!

Since I'd postponed the trip south to the Catlins for a day, I thought today would be the day I'd head out. I sent a big box home, bought a sleeping-bag, and was just about ready to go when the skys opened up. It'd been windy since last night, and with the downpour, I just couldn't see myself enjoying the ride. I booked another night at the Gabels, and around 5 mins later the weather cleared. Great...
Anyway, the weather kept changing through the day, so I'm okay with not leaving until tomorrow. I've spent the day keeping up on my blogging (writing, not posting. Internet connections are slow here, and I'll wait with posting until I find somewhere to do it for free), and I went sightseeing a bit with Renée before her bus left.
I've got a couchsurf set up with a girl my age in Invercargill in a few days, so all that's left before I hit the pillow is do a little planning for the Catlins. I hope the weather turns better tomorrow, but I'm going no matter what. Dunedin's been great, but staying here against my will is a bit frustrating, as you can see in this inspired photo.

Looks like I'm in a hospital or something.

Besides, I'll probably get plenty of rain once I get to the fjordlands, so I might as well just suck it up.

On a side note, I've found that I really miss hitchiking, so I think I'll park the bike sometime in a place I know I'm coming back to, and then ride on my thumb for a while. I'm thinking of doing this in Nelson, hitching up to the Abel Tasman national park and back before taking the ferry to the north island.

That's all for now folks!
Now get me the hell out of Dunedin!

Testing my limits

2009-01-29T22:36:00.054+01:00

Written on Wednesday, January 21st, 2009.

It's a bit of a strain to carry the pack on my back, but I suppose I'll develop better shoulder and back muscles. I'll come home looking like conan no doubt! I've seriously overpacked, and I'll be sending a box home with all the stuff I don't need.

Lake Tekapo was very, very beautiful with a milky, completely turqouise colour from glacial sediment, and just a jewel in sunlight. Unfortunately clouds came before i picked up the camera, and they didn't leave.

This little patch had sun (the lake itself is quite big)

I thought I'd do a picture of home

I stayed at a nice backpackers place where, bizarrely, I ran into a woman from Denmark who's good friends with my father's fiancée! I could hear she was danish, so i started the conversation. She asked me how I'd got here. I said it was my bike parked outside, and she said "you must be Jophiel then!". It's a small world indeed!

I took a one hour walk to the top of Mt John which had beautiful wievs of the landscape and the lake. I tried doing some video diary, bu muggles kept showing up. I did however get some nice pictures:

This one catches the colour of the lake decently

The summit of Mt John looks like something out of Tolkiens Rohan.

This beautiful little church was by the lake shore

I played cards with a german girl and a dutch couple until midnight and then hit the sack. What a pleasure to sleep in a good bed after Ashburton! The next morning, the dutch guy and I took a quick dip in the lake (real quick, it was cold!), and then I followed two german girls up to Mt Cook. They were kind enough to let me put my baggage in their car and I had a great time zipping around unburdened. The ride to Mt Cook was truly beautiful, and it was hard keeping my eyes on the road driving through the magnificent valley. The majestic Mt Cook loomed up ahead, seemingly never coming closer. Suddenly the road was blocked. By sheep!

Me and Mt Cook.

We checked in to a beautiful hut run by the NZ Alpine Club. There was no reception and no staff, except for the hut warden who lived next door. We just claimed a bunk and paid the warden 25$ when he came by.

Katja in the backyard of the hut. What a view!

And if you look in the other direction...

The view from the common room of the hut was just spectacular! The girl half in shadow, and halfway in light (like the rooftops of London) is Samone, the other german girl.

Most of the people staying there were mountaineers, and what a crazy bunch they were! There was a real sense of adventure, and two of the guys left to climb Mt Hood around mid-day. They started their ascent at night, but they had to turn back because of poor conditions. One guy staying there, called Stig, was an Australian who'd done the climb already. He was resting for a few days, tending his sore feet and entertaining us with stories. The two Katja, Samone and I went for a walk up Hooker Valley. A beautiful walk indeed. the girls kept laughing at me for taking so many pictures, but it's all so new to me, and I'm awed by everything I see!

That river was really fast, and that bridge didn't feel solid at all!

The view up Hooker Valley. The clouds obscured the view, but made for an eerie feel.

The girls taught me to take it easy. Up until then I'd been rushing on to get my route started, but they said that two months was more than enough for seeing the south island, so I should just relax and enjoy. I took their advice to heart and the joy of travelling increased immensely.

That afternoon, I went up the Tasman Valley on advice from Stig. He'd told me there was a 4WD track up there which would be great fun riding on my bike. The road there was gravel, and I rode slowly (25-30km/h), testing the bikes handling on the loose surface. I found the track and read the sign besides it:

Warning: Route ahead is not maintained and is subject to periodic flooding. Vehicle travel beyond this point is not advised.

Ball Shelter was a little hut on the glacier they'd dismantled only days before because it'd come dangerously close to the edge of the glacier wall dropoff (or rather, the glacier wall had come dangerously close to it.)

I continued unfazed since Stig said it'd be doable. What I'd forgotten to tell him was that I only had a couple of days of riding experience! The track was made almost entirely of a mix of gravel and big rocks. By no means easy! This was the first place doubt started creeping into my mind:

The sign says "AVALANCHE AREA: no stopping between signs". Rock avalanches that is!

I kept going. I went through three big, deep puddles, which was the second, third and fourth time I doubted the wisdom of my choice. The second avalanche sign was the fifth. I passed a parked Nissan, and I thought "this must be the right route then" and carried on. From here the road turned worse (it had never been less than difficult!) and eventually I couldn't even make out a road anymore!

Yet again I was riding on a prayer, and this time I was scared shitless. Eventually, my good sense came back to me as I thought "this is ridiculous", turned the bike around, and headed for home. This is a view back on the "road" I'd taken:

On the way back, this big puddle next to the parked Nissan almost killed the bike, as the engine started taking in water. I got out of it, but for a second the exhaust blew out a lot of smoke.

I don't know what I would have done if it'd died on me. I don't know how to drain an engine, and I'd probably have been stuck out there. After this ordeal the gravel road held no fear for me, and I sped down it at 50km/h. I'd made it out alive and I was very relieved!

What you see in these eyes is adrenaline and relief.

The valley didn't care one bit about my predicament and still looked mockingly gorgeous.

I think Thunder and lightning would have been more appropriate. The Tasman Valley has no situational awareness, apparantly.

Well back in the hut Stig told me that the parked Nissan marked the end of the track he'd suggested. I'd passed it, going on far into what was considered a tramping track only! I told them vividly of my fear and subsequent triumph, and well back in safety I was able to laugh it off quickly. There's another story for the grandchildren!

A gathering of adventurers

I'm still without a sleeping bag, and that night was quite cold. I slept next to the old iron stove in the common room, but it went out after a few hours. I did manage to get some sleep, but not much.

The morning greeted me like this.

Yesterday morning I took off not long after waking, and by 2pm I found myself in Oamaru (had to look at a map to remember the name - crazy kiwis!) the road here from Mt Cook was 208 kilometres and quite cold, reminding me that I need to get a scarf. On the way I passed these remarkable rock formations:

There was also some Maori rock-art, but it was too worn to be good in pictures. This poem on a nearby plaque, however, touched me.

We are cleansed by the winds of our ancestral mountain Aoraki,
We gaze upon the swift waters of the Waitaki river,
We are here under the cloak of the Ngai Tahu Whania,
Write it in the sky,
Write it in the land,
Write it in the hearts of the people...
Behold! There is life!

Right now I'm in a decent hostel right smack in the center of town. It's pretty cheap, at 23$ per night, and it's quite homely. It's quite close to the sights in town, but of those there aren't many. I went to see yellow-eyed penguins at a nearby beach with an italian couple, but only two birds showed up. Later in the evening would have been better, but rain came, and I didn't care to ride in it.

Just this first week or so, in which I've ridden more than 1000km, has already taught me so much about travelling on a motorbike. Even though I've done some rookie mistakes, I've learned so much from them and feel much better about the whole deal, and much surer of myself to boot. Also, I've learned a lot about what I need and don't need, and I'll surely be able to pack my stuff way more efficiently in the future. As I said, I severely overpacked, and I'm gonna lighten up one way or the other.

Tomorrow I head to Dunedin.

Until next time.

I am still Jophiel.

PS.: A few weeks before I left home, a danish guy, Ulf Foss, (I didn't know him) died in a tragic diving accident in the red sea. The details were sketchy at that point, and it seemed that three divers had agreed to go much deeper than what is safe on normal air. I thought them fools, but today this article was brought to my attention.

http://www.jesmadsen.com/ripulffoss.php

It is a thorough description of how the dive progressed, written by the sole survivor. I don't want to make any judgements, but there's some serious lessons for all divers here. Yes, they are obvious, but apparantly not everyone has taken them to heart yet! Take care who you dive with!

I've promised myself (and my mom) to be very careful when diving with people I don't know. Some people put them selves in unnecessary danger, and without thinking they drag their dive-buddies with them. To any future dive buddies of mine: If you're a fool and put your life in unnecessary danger, I won't risk my life trying to save you.