Cheryl and Mike’s Adventure

Well, we got a big update for everyone tonight. We apologize for the lengthy time between posts, but that’s how it goes. We’ve got a bunch of good pics below to get everyone caught up on (actually, we were hoping to do a post this past weekend, but didn’t get around to it, so we’ve got some other recent good ones from the last few days, which we’ll put up in the next batch. We have a big event/picture activity tomorrow, so we’re going to do one afterwards hopefully). The pics you’ll see below begin in Queenstown, where we re-joined our friendsToni & Brese (shameless plug: they’re doing a whirlwind tour themselves, and here’s a link to their blog
http://breezy13.travellerspoint.com/7/
…their latest post is “Killed the Routeburn”), and upon our reunion we decided to go out on the(Queens)town, with style. You’ll see some early pics of our high spirits below, and since it had been so long since any of us had been out on the ‘scene’, it ended up being a late night (and a slightly painful next day).

Next, we all met up with Cheryl’s parents, who had been of doing some traveling around the South Island on their own for a bit. We all then set off on a three day/two night backpacking exodus called the Routeburn Trek, one of New Zealand’s most popular and famous tramps. Most of the pictures below are actually taken on the first and last day…unfortunately, the weather wasn’t so great on the tramp, and the second day it was pretty rainy/nasty the whole day through. Overall, it was a great tramp, and we all had a good time, despite the clouds. The only major downside of the trip came afterwards, when upon our return to the carpark, we discovered Frank (our car) had been broken into. We lost some valuables (iPods the biggest causality), but, undaunted, we’ve taken the proper steps and moved forward (funny, of ALL the countries we’ve been too the last several months, the one we get ripped off in is New Zealand). We were kind of upset at the time, but it could have been a lot worse, and fortunately we stored most of our belongings at the front desk of the Holiday Park we were staying at prior to the trip.

After the Routeburn, we headed back to Queenstown, we’re Toni and Brese set off on their respective way (and future journeys), and we had a few more days w/Cheryls’ parents. Doug (Cheryl’s dad), Cheryl, and Mike decided that since we were in Queenstown (which is like the classic New Zealand adventure/adrenaline/activity capital). we had to do something big. What we settled on was something called the Fly By Wire
http://www.flybywire-queenstown.co.nz/
which is hard to describe, other than we drove out about a half hour outside Queenstown, into an Eviel Kenieval-esque canyon, where you are strapped (on your stomach) into this small rocket-jet sort of apparatus, all attached by a wire (think of a big half-pipe with a kind of pendulum swinging through it), where you’re free to fly about for about 5 minutes of thrill. There’s some pics below, and we got some really good video which we’ll show everyone at home.

After saying goodbye to Cheryl’s parents, as well as Toni & Brese (we had a great time with all of them!), we quickly moved on to our next partners in (travel) crime, our friends Courtney and Ben (Cheryl’s best friend since childhood and her husband). They are over here for about 9 days, doing their own mini-tour of New Zealand, and we met up with them last Friday. They currently are doing their own tramp (the Keplar Track), and we are meeting up with them tomorrow AM to head off on a boat trip up to the Milford Sound (in the Fiordland National Park), which has been known to be the most famous tourist site in all of New Zealand. We’re leaving out of a town called Te Anu, where we are right now:

http://www3.nationalgeographic.com/places/gallery/newzealand_milford-sound.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milford_Sound

Whew…so that’s where we’re at. We had a nice drive along the southern coast of the South Island (and to those who have seen how far ‘down under’ we are here in New Zealand, it was really really southern. The closest we’ll probably ever be to the South Pole). We got some good pics the last couple of days, and we’ll add those to the (hopefully) good pics we get from the Milford tomorrow. We hope to hear from everyone and as always look forward to your comments. Hard to believe, it’s March already, and we’ve got (almost exactly) one month left here!

Queenstown Sunset

Good Times, Breezy, Toni, Cheryl & Mike

More Good Times

On the way to the Routeburn Tramp

The Routeburn Gang: Cheryl, Mike, Breezy, Toni, Doug, & Donna

Routeburn Tramp Pictures, lots of waterfalls

Mike & Donna

Fly by Wire, Cheryl getting ready to go

Mike Flying

Doug ready to go…

Doug Flying

Victorious after flying

Rainbow at Wanaka

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