1) Go to the rock gym 3-4 times a week so I can actually start building the muscles and getting good at climbing.
2) Fly my R/C airplane as much as I can so I'll be really comfortable with it for clinic flight testing next semester.
3) Read several of the books I brought home. Ones I'm particularly looking forward to: 30 Seconds over Tokyo (about the Doolittle Raid), Hiroshima (about the atomic bomb attack), and Animal Farm.
4) Finish up my MATLAB GUI for the GPS reciever :-P yes, I am a horrible nerd, but I've actually enjoyed working on it quite a bit so far (you know, doing that instead of STS finals and stuff...). I really like working in matlab!
5) Not waste so much time in front of the TV/random internet surfing! There's so much more out there!
Showing posts with label Holidays. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Holidays. Show all posts
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Top of the South Island!
Yay! I'm done with school and now I'm all set to go on an awesome trip up to the North Island! My last two finals....ehhh... not the best. I'm fairly certain I passed all of them, but the real question is whether I got a B or better in Heat & Mass Transfer, because I need that to get Mudd credit.... and that final (80% of the final mark!!) was not a fun exam. I'm just hoping everyone else did poorly too, and brings the curve down. Yay.
But enough of that, now its on to fun vacation! The day after my last final, Erin and I woke up at the crack of dawn to get down to the train station. I nearly missed it too, we had to catch the first Orbiter bus of the day to make it to the station on time, so I went out to the bus stop a couple minutes before the timetable said the bus would come through, but it was early! It turned down the road running past my flat, so I was at least able to wave him down, and he was nice so he let me get on.
From the train station, we rode the TranzCoastal train up from Christchurch along the coast, past Kaikoura up to Blenheim. The ride was pretty cool, although nothing spectacular. They did have one train car that you could walk out too that was open to the air, so that was pretty cool to stand out there and watch. So we got to Blenheim, a small, rather boring little town with 30 min or so until the Intercity bus came that would take us along the northern edge of the South Island to Nelson. It was about lunch time, so we walked across the street to a BP and got some lunch. I picked up a bacon and egg pie. For those of you that don't know, New Zealand has a very interesting type of fast food called a meat pie. It is just what it sounds like, a small (5-7 cm diameter) pie crust filled with a type of meat (like steak, or mince AKA ground meat). It can be tasty at some times, but like all fast food, too much and it gets kinda nasty.
So the Intercity bus to Nelson came, and we took off. The bus driver told a little bit about some of the things in the region. We arrived in Nelson about 2 in the afternoon and took a walk through town to our hostel on Trafalgar Square. Turned out in the middle of Trafalgar Square was a large cathedral on top of a hill, ironically called Christ Church Cathedral. After we had settled in a little bit we took a walk through the city to see what else was around, and walked around the Cathedral and took some pictures up there too. That night we made dinner (only time so far actually...), then took some time to read before going to bed. Its turned out to be a pretty good trip for doing reading. If i avoid the TV and the computer, turns out I have a lot of time to read!
The next morning we woke up waaaaaaaayyy too early to meet an Abel Tasman Coachlines bus out by our hostel at 6 AM. After some loops around the city picking up people at other hostels and places, we were on our way around the Tasman Bay to Abel Tasman National Park! It was interesting to see the effect of the tides, the combination of very level ground and a tide of 3-4 meters makes for a really big, impressive estuary. At low tide, there was hundreds of meters of exposed land with maybe millimetres of water extending out into the bay. The driver pointed out how on that land, people had gone out at low tide and left messages made with rocks. These messages would be covered up with the tide, only visible at low tide.
We made it out at last to Motueka, the last reasonably-sized town before the national park. We did sea kayaking with a company based there. We had originally booked a trip where we paddled out from Marahau to Anchorage, then take a water taxi back, but we were the only people booked on that trip, so they bumped us up to a bigger trip, that took us to Anchorage by water taxi, then we paddled up further to Onetahuti Beach, to take another water taxi ride back to Marahau. It was quite an exciting trip, I don't think I've ever been sea kayaking before. It was the whole deal with neoprene skirts that we had to wear that went over the hole for the seat. Since they were sea kayaks, they were pretty large and were fitted with a rudder I controlled from the rear seat. At one point we paddled into a river inlet that was only available at high tide, and went up the river a bit to see a swingbridge that was part of the Abel Tasman Coastal Walk. We stopped for lunch at Bark Bay and enjoyed some beautiful weather out in the sun. After a little while hanging out there and eating cake the guides brought, we got all set in the kayaks again and went up toward Onetahuti beach, going around Tonga Island and its seal colony on the way. On the way from Tonga Island to the final beach, it got to be a little less fun because the wind started picking up and making a rough sea. Erin and I made it to the beach a pretty long way ahead of everyone else, I'm sure because we were ready to get out of those waves. It was a good trip though, must have been about 6 hrs of paddling total. We're gonna get buff from all this exercise we're doing!
When we got back to Nelson that night, we were both exhausted and didn't want to cook dinner, so we walked down to Little India and got some delicious Indian food for takeaway. Someone has to let me know if there are any good Indian food places around back home, because thats one thing they have a LOT of everywhere in New Zealand. After dinner I watched this British show on this short guy (~5 ft) trying to deal with life as a short person, and talking with other short people having difficulties. It was pretty funny, even if some of it was a little ridiculous. So in one part, he's saying that he has trouble sometimes using a urinal. He goes to talk to a guy in the urinal business, who then goes on to describe a design for a urinal that uses an infrared beam to sense height, and a movable urinal to adjust to the necessary height for the user....OR.... put the urinal lower on the wall. Which sounds like the more reasonable solution to you?
Thursday was a day mostly of traveling. We woke up early (again!) to catch the Intercity bus to Picton, north of Blenheim. In Picton, we had about 2 hrs free until the ferry left, so we wandered around a little bit, and stopped for brunch at the Dutch Bakkerij. Highly rated!! Great sandwiches and awesome desserts too. Then in the early afternoon we got on the Interislander ferry that took us from Picton, through Queen Charlotte Sound, across the Cook Strait, then up into Wellington! Yay, I'm in the North Island, and not just in Auckland Airport waiting for my connecting flight!
But enough of that, now its on to fun vacation! The day after my last final, Erin and I woke up at the crack of dawn to get down to the train station. I nearly missed it too, we had to catch the first Orbiter bus of the day to make it to the station on time, so I went out to the bus stop a couple minutes before the timetable said the bus would come through, but it was early! It turned down the road running past my flat, so I was at least able to wave him down, and he was nice so he let me get on.
From the train station, we rode the TranzCoastal train up from Christchurch along the coast, past Kaikoura up to Blenheim. The ride was pretty cool, although nothing spectacular. They did have one train car that you could walk out too that was open to the air, so that was pretty cool to stand out there and watch. So we got to Blenheim, a small, rather boring little town with 30 min or so until the Intercity bus came that would take us along the northern edge of the South Island to Nelson. It was about lunch time, so we walked across the street to a BP and got some lunch. I picked up a bacon and egg pie. For those of you that don't know, New Zealand has a very interesting type of fast food called a meat pie. It is just what it sounds like, a small (5-7 cm diameter) pie crust filled with a type of meat (like steak, or mince AKA ground meat). It can be tasty at some times, but like all fast food, too much and it gets kinda nasty.
So the Intercity bus to Nelson came, and we took off. The bus driver told a little bit about some of the things in the region. We arrived in Nelson about 2 in the afternoon and took a walk through town to our hostel on Trafalgar Square. Turned out in the middle of Trafalgar Square was a large cathedral on top of a hill, ironically called Christ Church Cathedral. After we had settled in a little bit we took a walk through the city to see what else was around, and walked around the Cathedral and took some pictures up there too. That night we made dinner (only time so far actually...), then took some time to read before going to bed. Its turned out to be a pretty good trip for doing reading. If i avoid the TV and the computer, turns out I have a lot of time to read!
The next morning we woke up waaaaaaaayyy too early to meet an Abel Tasman Coachlines bus out by our hostel at 6 AM. After some loops around the city picking up people at other hostels and places, we were on our way around the Tasman Bay to Abel Tasman National Park! It was interesting to see the effect of the tides, the combination of very level ground and a tide of 3-4 meters makes for a really big, impressive estuary. At low tide, there was hundreds of meters of exposed land with maybe millimetres of water extending out into the bay. The driver pointed out how on that land, people had gone out at low tide and left messages made with rocks. These messages would be covered up with the tide, only visible at low tide.
We made it out at last to Motueka, the last reasonably-sized town before the national park. We did sea kayaking with a company based there. We had originally booked a trip where we paddled out from Marahau to Anchorage, then take a water taxi back, but we were the only people booked on that trip, so they bumped us up to a bigger trip, that took us to Anchorage by water taxi, then we paddled up further to Onetahuti Beach, to take another water taxi ride back to Marahau. It was quite an exciting trip, I don't think I've ever been sea kayaking before. It was the whole deal with neoprene skirts that we had to wear that went over the hole for the seat. Since they were sea kayaks, they were pretty large and were fitted with a rudder I controlled from the rear seat. At one point we paddled into a river inlet that was only available at high tide, and went up the river a bit to see a swingbridge that was part of the Abel Tasman Coastal Walk. We stopped for lunch at Bark Bay and enjoyed some beautiful weather out in the sun. After a little while hanging out there and eating cake the guides brought, we got all set in the kayaks again and went up toward Onetahuti beach, going around Tonga Island and its seal colony on the way. On the way from Tonga Island to the final beach, it got to be a little less fun because the wind started picking up and making a rough sea. Erin and I made it to the beach a pretty long way ahead of everyone else, I'm sure because we were ready to get out of those waves. It was a good trip though, must have been about 6 hrs of paddling total. We're gonna get buff from all this exercise we're doing!
When we got back to Nelson that night, we were both exhausted and didn't want to cook dinner, so we walked down to Little India and got some delicious Indian food for takeaway. Someone has to let me know if there are any good Indian food places around back home, because thats one thing they have a LOT of everywhere in New Zealand. After dinner I watched this British show on this short guy (~5 ft) trying to deal with life as a short person, and talking with other short people having difficulties. It was pretty funny, even if some of it was a little ridiculous. So in one part, he's saying that he has trouble sometimes using a urinal. He goes to talk to a guy in the urinal business, who then goes on to describe a design for a urinal that uses an infrared beam to sense height, and a movable urinal to adjust to the necessary height for the user....OR.... put the urinal lower on the wall. Which sounds like the more reasonable solution to you?
Thursday was a day mostly of traveling. We woke up early (again!) to catch the Intercity bus to Picton, north of Blenheim. In Picton, we had about 2 hrs free until the ferry left, so we wandered around a little bit, and stopped for brunch at the Dutch Bakkerij. Highly rated!! Great sandwiches and awesome desserts too. Then in the early afternoon we got on the Interislander ferry that took us from Picton, through Queen Charlotte Sound, across the Cook Strait, then up into Wellington! Yay, I'm in the North Island, and not just in Auckland Airport waiting for my connecting flight!
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Spring Break: Kiwi Style!!
It's just getting to be spring here, and we had a 2 week break from school
from 25 Aug to 9 Sept. Yea, I had some work for classes to do, but who am I to waste time with silly stuff like homework when I'm in New Zealand!
You can follow the pictures that go along with this story on my Picasa web albums http://picasaweb.google.com/gherschler
For the first half of the break, My friend Erin (from Boise, goes to Uni of Portland) and I rented a car out of Christchurch. We got a nice white Toyota Corolla. Now, New Zealand, England, and a lot of the other Commonwealth nations drive on the left hand side of the road, so the driver's seat is in the right side of the car. This was the first time either of us had driven on the other side of the road, so it was bound to be an adventure, especially since I had to drive out of the city centre and back to the university. We got packed in and got on the road by about 1, and started up the coast to Kaikoura.
It was interesting to see the "motorways" of New Zealand. Much of the way to Kaikoura we drove along a 2 lane highway with occasional passing lanes. Very different to the Interstates in the US. It was kind of like a minor state highway, where it was fairly high speed (national speed limit on open road 100 kph ~ 60 mph, 50 kph in cities). It was a cool drive though. Not a whole lot to see along the way (I was driving after all, I was looking at the road!) but it was exciting. When we were almost to Kaikoura, the road jumped over the short coastal range, and then had to drop a couple hundred metres down to the coast below, which was a little unnerving driving down. We could see the whole Kaikoura peninsula from along that road though. We were so close to the water, Erin commented that if there happened to be a big wave, it could easily spill over into the road!
Kaikoura
We got into Kaikoura around 3:30, spent a little time getting our bearings, and watched the last 2 minutes of some community rugby game at a school field. Then we looked around for a hostel to set up camp in, had some indecisive moments, and finally settled on a pretty large place (as hostels go), the Dusky Lodge. The hostel was really nice, the rooms were nothing spectacular, but they had some really well-equipped kitchens, 3 social rooms with great wood stoves, and another with couches, a TV, and a great selection of movies. Erin and I went to a pizza place down the street (they have some very interesting pizza variations here...one at this place had rabbit meat!) and we played chess while we waited and then while we ate. I'm not a huge chess person myself, but Erin hadn't played in so long I had to reteach her how the pieces could move, so luckily I could at least beat her. The rest of that night was pretty relaxed, we just hung out in the lounges, played cards for a while, and read. Since I made sure not to bring my computer (*gasp!*) I brought several books to keep me company. It turned out to be a good trip for reading. I brought Ian Fleming's Casino Royale (first Bond book) and got through that pretty quickly, then I also read part of The Coldest War, about Korea. Later on that night we went into the TV room and joined a bunch of other travelers to watch Jurassic Park.
Sunday morning we got up and went out to the edge of the peninsula to go on the coastline hiking trail. We had to start fairly early in the morning because the first leg of the trail was along the base of the cliffs, on the rocks that made up the shoreline at low tide. It was pretty slow going, looking back and seeing we hadn't really gone all that far. We were really walking for most of it on rocks that are submerged at high tide, so they could be kind of slippery, and there were tide pools everywhere between the rocks too. We took our time along that bottom path, and even ventured out towards the ocean on some of the more craggy rock formations to get a closer look at the seals. There was a protected seal colony on the edge of the peninsula where we must have seen a couple hundred huge seals sunning themselves on the rocks.
As we walked on, we crossed a couple fences around farmer's property and saw some sheep (OMG sheep in New Zealand! No way!). At one point right before climbing a trail to get to the top of the cliffs, there was about a 30 m high hill on the shoreline that obviously, I had to climb. We got up there and took some pictures, and soaked in the view, and then came the fun part that neither of us had thought of - getting down this steep hill with an eroding path with no good hand or foot holds. I figured out a pretty good way though: kind of sit down on the heel of one foot and use it as a "sled", and use the other foot to guide yourself, and just slowly slide down the hill. Then we headed up to the top of the cliffs where we could get great views of the hillside, the Kaikoura mountain range, and the coastline. Toward the end of the hike there were some displays talking about the history of the Kaikoura peninsula, one about the geology and one about the Maori pa (fortified village) on the peninsula.
On the way back to the hostel we stopped at the dairy and got some quick groceries for lunch, then ate it on the back deck of the hostel. The weather was great, and we had some amazing views of the land behind us (farmland) and the mountains. After lunch, we went to the Kaikoura Winery just outside town. We got a quick tour of how they make the wine (they dont actually make it on site there. They used to, but now they just grow the grapes and send them off to another location of the winery for production), the wine cellar (which can actually hold affairs like weddings and such), and then we went back inside to do the wine tasting. We took our time, enjoying it and looking through photo albums they had of the construction and the workings of the winery. The winery was up on the edge of the cliff overlooking the road and the ocean, so we had some amazing views out over the ocean.
Now one reason Kaikoura is a popular destination is because of the wildlife (dolphin, whale tours), and the reason there is a lot of wildlife is because of the undersea geography. Just off the coast there is a mile-deep trench, so minerals and nutrients from the deep ocean get pushed up into the coastal waters and attract all sorts of marine life there. Its cool because you can actually see a pretty distinct line in the water where the trench begins. That night after dinner we hung out around the hostel some more, and tried to watch Die Hard, but someone had taped over the last 10 minutes of the movie, so Erin didn't get to see how it ended! After the abrupt interruption of the movie, we talked with this Canadian guy (originally from China) who was on one of the tours of the country after spending some time in Australia
Monday morning, we headed out to go on another hike, this one inland at the base of the mountains. The Mt. Fyffe-Palmer track took us partway up the mountain, through a calf paddock of a farm, then up into the coolest looking forest I have ever seen! It looked like a jungle! It was thick, so we couldn't see much of anything beyond the trees surrounding us until we got to the top, where, if we stood on a bench, we could get a glimpse of the Kaikoura peninsula through a gap in the trees. It was very funny to see the differences in thought patterns between Erin (the English major) and me (the engineering major): Erin thought the jungly surroundings reminded her of the setting of a book she read; I thought it reminded me of the area sniper schools are held in (there could have been a guy 5 feet from us and we wouldn't have known!) We went back to the hostel and made some lunch, then took it out and ate on the shore on the south end of the peninsula. We took books out to read, but it was pretty windy out there, plus we had to sit on tiny rocks that were small enough to shift around easily, but big enough to be annoying, so we didn't stay all that long out there. That night we got Indian food from this place down the street for dinner, and ate it by one of the wood stoves. Mmmm so nice and warm.
The next morning was our last time in Kaikoura, we took a short tour of the Maori Leap caves, which is a sea-formed limestone cave in the base of the cliffs. The story of how they found it was pretty cool. Years back, a company was mining the cliffside, and one of their dynamite blasts opened a hole in the ground, so some guys rappelled down inside and saw the cave. Then, since tour groups obviously couldn't come easily through a hole in the ceiling, an outer passageway was cut. We could see a piece of sheet metal covering the hole in the ceiling from the inside. Our tour guide, an older guy named Frank, was really cool. He showed us all sorts of different formations from the dripping mineral water. We had to "use our imaginations" and see the Statue of Liberty, a sheep, an owl, ET, and other things. After that tour we were on our way up the inland road to Hanmer Springs.
Hanmer Springs
Hanmer was a tiny little town with not a whole lot going on, but cool nonetheless. It was very much and outdoorsy town set up for people who want to come in and go tramping or skiing in the mountains. We got a place to stay at a small backpackers on the edge of town. I guess after all of the 2 hostel's ive stayed at (rather larger ones), I was surprised to see one that was tiny. The Dusky Lodge must have had rooms for 150-200 people, wheras the Hanmer Backpackers could fit like...11. We hung out in the lounge area that night. I read some from my book, Erin read some of her book, I did some engineering homework, I tried to teach engineering to the cat that decided to be my friend. My mom told us I could treat us to a moderately fancy dinner, so we went to this Asian and Indian food place and got some great food plus a glass of wine each.
The next morning we got up, checked out, and then headed up towards the hills on a dirt road, about 5-6 km from the town. We hiked up a trail up to the 41 m Dog Stream waterfall. Along the way, we saw some trees that had this weird black parasite growing on it. It looked like it would grow into thick clumps on the trunk of the tree, and then fall off in chunks, so the ground and any plants underneath the infected tree were covered in what looked like black soot. Creepy. The trail for the most part followed the stream up the hill all the way to the waterfall, with a couple switchbacks crossing the stream. It turned out to be a ridiculously steep trail, so much that on some parts, someone actually had to haul up tools and lumber to build several stairways! Right before we got to the 2nd stairway we just had to stop and take a break because the constant climbing was exhausting us. Luckily the waterfall was only a couple minutes hike from the top of the 2nd stairway.
Almost to the waterfall, we thought we heard something that sounded like somebody screaming, but we couldn't tell. When we got to the waterfall, we figured it out. There was a couple resting up near the waterfall and the woman had just ran underneath the water and screamed because it was so cold! Neither Erin or I really wanted to test it. For the way back down, we took a separate track that took us up to the bushline for some great views of the valley below, and then we went back down the hill towards the carpark. Part of the forest we walked through I think was planted in some project, because all the trees were aligned...and there was no underbrush...so it looked rather ominous. We made our way through the creepy forest and back to the carpark....and thats where the fun really began. (Glennis, Shannon, and Joanne, you may begin making fun of me now) So we got back to the car and I went to unlock it. The car has power locks so that when I unlock the driver's door with the key, all doors unlock. This time, however, they did not. I got in the car only to discover.... YES! I left the headlights on (a sign said to turn them on while driving on mountain roads) and now the battery was dead. Goooooood job me. Here are my stated excuses:
1) It was bright and sunny out, so I couldn't tell instantly that the headlights were still on.
2) The car did not "beep! beep!" at me when I took the keys out (like all cars should do).
3) My car at home, the one I'm used to driving, has pop-up headlights, making it really easy to see if you may have left them on.
4) My car has dumb, downward facing headlights so I keep the highbeams on (turning them into regular headlights!) so I have a nice blue light on the dashboard reminding me at all times that they are on.
The engineer in me is very upset at these clear design flaws of the Toyota Corolla car. My internal engineer was also thinking of various ways to try and get the car to start (inspired by conversation about Apollo 13). I thought we could maybe push the car starting down the road (it was slightly downhill) and seeing if that charged the batteries enough to turn over the engine, but I wasn't sure if the alternator drew its power directly from the engine or the wheels. My next idea was to use a series of batteries (8 AA?) to provide 12 V across the terminals, but of course that current flowing through a couple small batteries is potentially dangerous, so I didn't try it. So we started hiking again, this time down the road back towards town to see if we could find someone to give us a jump, or at least a lift.
We walked 3 km to the main road, and luckily, a nice Kiwi couple turned down the road (headed for the same hike we did, ironically). They didn't have jumper cables, but they took us to the service station in town, where we got a guy to bring out a jumper system, and the car started right up. We also learned from him that people accidentally leaving their headlights on happens on a regular basis up there, clearly a moneymaker for them....
With that ordeal over, we drove back into town and headed for the best part of post-hike relaxing: the Hanmer Hot Springs! Total relaxation (even if the pools did smell like sulphur...). After a while of that we got back on the road to head to Christchurch. Erin got to drive back to school. It took an interesting turn when she accidentally took a road that took us toward the city centre, not the university, so she worried a little bit about driving in city traffic while I got the map out and directed her back to our flats. We got back all in one piece though.
All in all, a very successful road trip! And we have 2 more planned, one at the end of October, after classes end (but before finals) down to Queenstown, Milford Sound, and then back up the west coast before coming back to Christchurch, and then another after finals up in the N Island.
from 25 Aug to 9 Sept. Yea, I had some work for classes to do, but who am I to waste time with silly stuff like homework when I'm in New Zealand!
You can follow the pictures that go along with this story on my Picasa web albums http://picasaweb.google.com
For the first half of the break, My friend Erin (from Boise, goes to Uni of Portland) and I rented a car out of Christchurch. We got a nice white Toyota Corolla. Now, New Zealand, England, and a lot of the other Commonwealth nations drive on the left hand side of the road, so the driver's seat is in the right side of the car. This was the first time either of us had driven on the other side of the road, so it was bound to be an adventure, especially since I had to drive out of the city centre and back to the university. We got packed in and got on the road by about 1, and started up the coast to Kaikoura.
It was interesting to see the "motorways" of New Zealand. Much of the way to Kaikoura we drove along a 2 lane highway with occasional passing lanes. Very different to the Interstates in the US. It was kind of like a minor state highway, where it was fairly high speed (national speed limit on open road 100 kph ~ 60 mph, 50 kph in cities). It was a cool drive though. Not a whole lot to see along the way (I was driving after all, I was looking at the road!) but it was exciting. When we were almost to Kaikoura, the road jumped over the short coastal range, and then had to drop a couple hundred metres down to the coast below, which was a little unnerving driving down. We could see the whole Kaikoura peninsula from along that road though. We were so close to the water, Erin commented that if there happened to be a big wave, it could easily spill over into the road!
Kaikoura
We got into Kaikoura around 3:30, spent a little time getting our bearings, and watched the last 2 minutes of some community rugby game at a school field. Then we looked around for a hostel to set up camp in, had some indecisive moments, and finally settled on a pretty large place (as hostels go), the Dusky Lodge. The hostel was really nice, the rooms were nothing spectacular, but they had some really well-equipped kitchens, 3 social rooms with great wood stoves, and another with couches, a TV, and a great selection of movies. Erin and I went to a pizza place down the street (they have some very interesting pizza variations here...one at this place had rabbit meat!) and we played chess while we waited and then while we ate. I'm not a huge chess person myself, but Erin hadn't played in so long I had to reteach her how the pieces could move, so luckily I could at least beat her. The rest of that night was pretty relaxed, we just hung out in the lounges, played cards for a while, and read. Since I made sure not to bring my computer (*gasp!*) I brought several books to keep me company. It turned out to be a good trip for reading. I brought Ian Fleming's Casino Royale (first Bond book) and got through that pretty quickly, then I also read part of The Coldest War, about Korea. Later on that night we went into the TV room and joined a bunch of other travelers to watch Jurassic Park.
Sunday morning we got up and went out to the edge of the peninsula to go on the coastline hiking trail. We had to start fairly early in the morning because the first leg of the trail was along the base of the cliffs, on the rocks that made up the shoreline at low tide. It was pretty slow going, looking back and seeing we hadn't really gone all that far. We were really walking for most of it on rocks that are submerged at high tide, so they could be kind of slippery, and there were tide pools everywhere between the rocks too. We took our time along that bottom path, and even ventured out towards the ocean on some of the more craggy rock formations to get a closer look at the seals. There was a protected seal colony on the edge of the peninsula where we must have seen a couple hundred huge seals sunning themselves on the rocks.
As we walked on, we crossed a couple fences around farmer's property and saw some sheep (OMG sheep in New Zealand! No way!). At one point right before climbing a trail to get to the top of the cliffs, there was about a 30 m high hill on the shoreline that obviously, I had to climb. We got up there and took some pictures, and soaked in the view, and then came the fun part that neither of us had thought of - getting down this steep hill with an eroding path with no good hand or foot holds. I figured out a pretty good way though: kind of sit down on the heel of one foot and use it as a "sled", and use the other foot to guide yourself, and just slowly slide down the hill. Then we headed up to the top of the cliffs where we could get great views of the hillside, the Kaikoura mountain range, and the coastline. Toward the end of the hike there were some displays talking about the history of the Kaikoura peninsula, one about the geology and one about the Maori pa (fortified village) on the peninsula.
On the way back to the hostel we stopped at the dairy and got some quick groceries for lunch, then ate it on the back deck of the hostel. The weather was great, and we had some amazing views of the land behind us (farmland) and the mountains. After lunch, we went to the Kaikoura Winery just outside town. We got a quick tour of how they make the wine (they dont actually make it on site there. They used to, but now they just grow the grapes and send them off to another location of the winery for production), the wine cellar (which can actually hold affairs like weddings and such), and then we went back inside to do the wine tasting. We took our time, enjoying it and looking through photo albums they had of the construction and the workings of the winery. The winery was up on the edge of the cliff overlooking the road and the ocean, so we had some amazing views out over the ocean.
Now one reason Kaikoura is a popular destination is because of the wildlife (dolphin, whale tours), and the reason there is a lot of wildlife is because of the undersea geography. Just off the coast there is a mile-deep trench, so minerals and nutrients from the deep ocean get pushed up into the coastal waters and attract all sorts of marine life there. Its cool because you can actually see a pretty distinct line in the water where the trench begins. That night after dinner we hung out around the hostel some more, and tried to watch Die Hard, but someone had taped over the last 10 minutes of the movie, so Erin didn't get to see how it ended! After the abrupt interruption of the movie, we talked with this Canadian guy (originally from China) who was on one of the tours of the country after spending some time in Australia
Monday morning, we headed out to go on another hike, this one inland at the base of the mountains. The Mt. Fyffe-Palmer track took us partway up the mountain, through a calf paddock of a farm, then up into the coolest looking forest I have ever seen! It looked like a jungle! It was thick, so we couldn't see much of anything beyond the trees surrounding us until we got to the top, where, if we stood on a bench, we could get a glimpse of the Kaikoura peninsula through a gap in the trees. It was very funny to see the differences in thought patterns between Erin (the English major) and me (the engineering major): Erin thought the jungly surroundings reminded her of the setting of a book she read; I thought it reminded me of the area sniper schools are held in (there could have been a guy 5 feet from us and we wouldn't have known!) We went back to the hostel and made some lunch, then took it out and ate on the shore on the south end of the peninsula. We took books out to read, but it was pretty windy out there, plus we had to sit on tiny rocks that were small enough to shift around easily, but big enough to be annoying, so we didn't stay all that long out there. That night we got Indian food from this place down the street for dinner, and ate it by one of the wood stoves. Mmmm so nice and warm.
The next morning was our last time in Kaikoura, we took a short tour of the Maori Leap caves, which is a sea-formed limestone cave in the base of the cliffs. The story of how they found it was pretty cool. Years back, a company was mining the cliffside, and one of their dynamite blasts opened a hole in the ground, so some guys rappelled down inside and saw the cave. Then, since tour groups obviously couldn't come easily through a hole in the ceiling, an outer passageway was cut. We could see a piece of sheet metal covering the hole in the ceiling from the inside. Our tour guide, an older guy named Frank, was really cool. He showed us all sorts of different formations from the dripping mineral water. We had to "use our imaginations" and see the Statue of Liberty, a sheep, an owl, ET, and other things. After that tour we were on our way up the inland road to Hanmer Springs.
Hanmer Springs
Hanmer was a tiny little town with not a whole lot going on, but cool nonetheless. It was very much and outdoorsy town set up for people who want to come in and go tramping or skiing in the mountains. We got a place to stay at a small backpackers on the edge of town. I guess after all of the 2 hostel's ive stayed at (rather larger ones), I was surprised to see one that was tiny. The Dusky Lodge must have had rooms for 150-200 people, wheras the Hanmer Backpackers could fit like...11. We hung out in the lounge area that night. I read some from my book, Erin read some of her book, I did some engineering homework, I tried to teach engineering to the cat that decided to be my friend. My mom told us I could treat us to a moderately fancy dinner, so we went to this Asian and Indian food place and got some great food plus a glass of wine each.
The next morning we got up, checked out, and then headed up towards the hills on a dirt road, about 5-6 km from the town. We hiked up a trail up to the 41 m Dog Stream waterfall. Along the way, we saw some trees that had this weird black parasite growing on it. It looked like it would grow into thick clumps on the trunk of the tree, and then fall off in chunks, so the ground and any plants underneath the infected tree were covered in what looked like black soot. Creepy. The trail for the most part followed the stream up the hill all the way to the waterfall, with a couple switchbacks crossing the stream. It turned out to be a ridiculously steep trail, so much that on some parts, someone actually had to haul up tools and lumber to build several stairways! Right before we got to the 2nd stairway we just had to stop and take a break because the constant climbing was exhausting us. Luckily the waterfall was only a couple minutes hike from the top of the 2nd stairway.
Almost to the waterfall, we thought we heard something that sounded like somebody screaming, but we couldn't tell. When we got to the waterfall, we figured it out. There was a couple resting up near the waterfall and the woman had just ran underneath the water and screamed because it was so cold! Neither Erin or I really wanted to test it. For the way back down, we took a separate track that took us up to the bushline for some great views of the valley below, and then we went back down the hill towards the carpark. Part of the forest we walked through I think was planted in some project, because all the trees were aligned...and there was no underbrush...so it looked rather ominous. We made our way through the creepy forest and back to the carpark....and thats where the fun really began. (Glennis, Shannon, and Joanne, you may begin making fun of me now) So we got back to the car and I went to unlock it. The car has power locks so that when I unlock the driver's door with the key, all doors unlock. This time, however, they did not. I got in the car only to discover.... YES! I left the headlights on (a sign said to turn them on while driving on mountain roads) and now the battery was dead. Goooooood job me. Here are my stated excuses:
1) It was bright and sunny out, so I couldn't tell instantly that the headlights were still on.
2) The car did not "beep! beep!" at me when I took the keys out (like all cars should do).
3) My car at home, the one I'm used to driving, has pop-up headlights, making it really easy to see if you may have left them on.
4) My car has dumb, downward facing headlights so I keep the highbeams on (turning them into regular headlights!) so I have a nice blue light on the dashboard reminding me at all times that they are on.
The engineer in me is very upset at these clear design flaws of the Toyota Corolla car. My internal engineer was also thinking of various ways to try and get the car to start (inspired by conversation about Apollo 13). I thought we could maybe push the car starting down the road (it was slightly downhill) and seeing if that charged the batteries enough to turn over the engine, but I wasn't sure if the alternator drew its power directly from the engine or the wheels. My next idea was to use a series of batteries (8 AA?) to provide 12 V across the terminals, but of course that current flowing through a couple small batteries is potentially dangerous, so I didn't try it. So we started hiking again, this time down the road back towards town to see if we could find someone to give us a jump, or at least a lift.
We walked 3 km to the main road, and luckily, a nice Kiwi couple turned down the road (headed for the same hike we did, ironically). They didn't have jumper cables, but they took us to the service station in town, where we got a guy to bring out a jumper system, and the car started right up. We also learned from him that people accidentally leaving their headlights on happens on a regular basis up there, clearly a moneymaker for them....
With that ordeal over, we drove back into town and headed for the best part of post-hike relaxing: the Hanmer Hot Springs! Total relaxation (even if the pools did smell like sulphur...). After a while of that we got back on the road to head to Christchurch. Erin got to drive back to school. It took an interesting turn when she accidentally took a road that took us toward the city centre, not the university, so she worried a little bit about driving in city traffic while I got the map out and directed her back to our flats. We got back all in one piece though.
All in all, a very successful road trip! And we have 2 more planned, one at the end of October, after classes end (but before finals) down to Queenstown, Milford Sound, and then back up the west coast before coming back to Christchurch, and then another after finals up in the N Island.
Sunday, July 15, 2007
First Week in New Zealand!
I flew out of LAX friday evening on an insanely long 13 hr flight to Auckland on the north island. It wasn't a bad trip though. I got a window seat (yes!) on the right side of the plane, just where the back edge of the main wing attaches to the fuselage. Some people might think thats a terrible seat, cause the wing cuts out all your view, but this was a night flight, so there wasnt much of a view to see. And I got to see the flaps, ailerons, and airbrakes, so I was happy.
I sat next to these two girls from the University of Denver who were also studying abroad, but in Auckland. We chatted some throughout the night, between TV shows and movies. One really cool thing is that the Air New Zealand 747-400 we flew on was equipped with personal entertainment centers, 8-inch screens in the back of the seat in front of us, controlled with the remote/phone attached. So I watched an episode of Arrested Development, CSI Miami, and some movies. They brought us out dinner (mmm airline food...) and to my suprise, they had an open bar aboard the airplane. Yes, thats right, free alcoholic drinks. So the two girls and I had a glass of wine with dinner. I watched another movie before I fell asleep. They also had a section that showed stats about the flight, like where we were on a google earth-like thing, groundspeed, current time, ETA, outside temp (it got as cold as like -50 C at 37,000 ft). I woke up at what to me i guess was about 7 am, but in NZ time thats about 2 AM. So I had still several hours before we were to land in Auckland at 5:15 AM local time. Had breakfast, I started watching Letters from Iwo Jima, but I only got like halfway through before we started to descend and they turned the entertainment system off.
We were late getting into Auckland, and I was worried cause I thought that to catch my flight to Christchuch in less than an hour, I had to go through the terminal, get my bags, go through customs, get to the domestic terminal, go through security and then get on the plane, but they had a nice setup where the flight to Christchurch left from the International terminal. For some reason, we had to go through security again, although we just got off the plane...oh well. Had a nice short hop to Christchurch, got to see some awesome views of the mountains in the southern island as we flew over.
Day 1 - Sunday
Landed in Christchurch, met some of the IES students waiting for the taxi. The first day, we couldn't go to our university housing yet, so we stayed in a motel right across the street from the engineering dept. Of course, the first task of the day was to get some FOOD!! It was only about 10 AM, but most of us hadn't eaten since breakfast on the plane at 3 AM local time. Our IES coordinator, Eunice, took three of us guys to the grocery store. The whole time we were driving there I couldn't help but think, as we made turns "Ahhh!! there's someone in our lane coming right at us!!" I'm getting a little better about getting used to driving on the left side, but it was definitely weird the first day. Then after we ate, everyone who had showed up so far went on a little touring walk of the university campus.
I was surprised to see how close together it was compared to what I initially thought. The entire academic campus is probably covering an area approximately the same as the 5Cs, but most of the academic buildings are 5+ stories, so a lot more can fit. I was worried initially, before I came, that my flat would be kinda far from class, but its actually like a 5-10 minute walk to anywhere on campus. Granted, its nowhere as close as everything was at Mudd, but closer than I expected. So we walked around a little bit around campus, and then went up the road toward the supermarket we got food at earlier to find lunch. We found a small place that had an interesting combination of asian food, fish and chips, and burgers, and had lunch.
Random NZ observations: a lot of houses have a 6-7 ft "privacy fence" around it. Ketchup is known as tomato sauce. Eggs in the supermarket are not in a refrigerated section. Identical products, from the same manufacturer, can have different names: Rice Krispies -> Rice Bubbles. No stop signs, just traffic lights and "Give way". Really cold!! First couple nights there was frost on car windows. British words and spelling: elevator -> lift, center -> centre, z ("zee") -> "zed".
We hung out for a little bit back at the motel before dinner that night, and then hung out some more that night. I was surprised that with 18 people total in the IES group, I got to know the majority of them that night, and had their names down cold the next day. One weird thing I noticed was that since it was in the middle of winter, and we're so far south, the sun never comes up more than about 45 deg above the horizon, so all day, it seemed to me like it was about 5 pm from what I was used to. Because of the flight, the time change, and the being in a new place, that first day was one of the longest days I can remember.
Day 2 - Monday
Woke up and got all our stuff together. We took most of the stuff except for what we needed for orientation to our flats, and then got back on the bus. For the IES orientation, we went up to the foothills of the southern alps. It took a couple hours to get there, and we stopped for lunch in the city where we'd spend the night, Springfield. That afternoon, we went up into the mountains, and hiked around for about 2 hrs at Castle Hill, which was a series of hills with a collection of enormous boulders all along the hillside. But because it had been snowy and in general very wet, the hillside was pretty muddy and difficult to climb. Once I got to the top however, I got some amazing views and pictures of the mountains and the valley below us. Once back in the bus, we continued on a little bit to this place where the final battle scene of Narnia was filmed. We couldn't go down there, but we got to see the entrance to a cave/tunnel that traveled all the way through the bedrock that was the parking lot (or car park) to the area.
We then headed back down the mountain, back to Springfield and the hostel where we'd spend the night. Had a good dinner there, and then went down the street to hang out at the pub for a while. They had a nice fire going, which felt great. We were there for a while, but they wanted us back at the hostel by 11 (where they also had a nice fire going. See a pattern? It was way cold). We stayed up for a while and hung out. It was actually one of the girls' birthdays the next day, so we sang happy birthday at midnight. I went to bed not much later.
Day 3 - Tuesday
We had breakfast at the hostel before heading out that morning on a pair of 4WD tour buses (aptly nicknamed The Popemobile by our bus driver/4X4 driver/tour guide Jeff). Jeff was quite a character. He was always making us laugh with his little comments about everything. Like when we were getting on the "Popemobile" for that mornings tour, two people were going to get in the cab with him, a guy and a girl. When the guy got in first to sit in the middle, he objected, saying that the outer person was going to have to be able to jump out and open farm fences, and he said he didn't trust the blond girl to do it right, when we all knew it was just because he wanted to sit next to the cute girl.
We went out on the 4X4s through a farm in Springfield. I was surprised to see that one part of the farm, at least, the section that held all the sheep included a very large section of mountainy hillside that the sheep could roam through. We learned a little bit about how the sheep were taken care of, like that only the female sheep born on the farm were kept for breeding purposes. Males were grown to a certain age and then shipped off for meat. To prevent inbreeding, the farm gets its breeding males from a breeding company. The males are let into the female pen for 6 weeks during the winter for breeding. Then, when the baby sheep are born, they're separated and taken to have their tails removed with a hot iron. If they're not removed, they gather dirt and poop and flies, which hurt the sheep and damage its meat and wool. After going through the farm, we went to a farm house of a working (example) farm on the bank of the Waimakariri river. We got to go on a jetboat ride on the river, which was a lot of fun, but so cold!! I was wearing jeans, tshirt, sweatshirt, heavy jacket, splash jacket, life jacket, gloves, and beanie, but my face got so cold on the ride it felt numb as i got off. After the jetboat ride we had a great barbecue lunch, complete with birthday cake for both Maggie, whose birthday was that day, and Mark, whose birthday was Thursday.
After lunch, we went outside to see some of the animals at the farm, and then got to see Tess the sheepdog do her thing. There are two types of sheepdogs, those that go out behind the sheep and bring them to the farmer, and those that drive the sheep toward where the farmer wants. The 2nd one gets it done by barking at the sheep to scare them along, but whats cool about the first is that it gets the sheep to move just by staring them down. The whole time we were there, Tess didn't make a sound, her eyes would just stare at each of the sheep, intimidating them. Then came the really fun part, we went inside to see how they sheared a sheep. Normally, they use what's basically a large pair of hair clippers, driven by a large, mounted motor. After he took most of the wool off with the clippers, he brought out the shears, so each of us got to try cutting off some of the wool with the shears. I have the sample of wool I cut, along with a sample of very soft Merino wool. After this we got back on the bus to head back to Christchurch
That night, to celebrate the birthdays, we took out first visit into town to a Mexican restaurant (Mexican in New Zealand?? I was suspicious too) We had about 25 people total (flatmates joined), so it was a good thing it was Tuesday night, there was enough room for all of us. The food turned out to be pretty good for being so far from Mexico, but where I was really disappointed were the drinks. The food was already expensive enough, but me and 2 other people got a pitcher (3 servings ish) of margaritas for $20. The pitcher was smaller than the pitcher that we got water in. There was enough for 3 tiny, tiny cups. Rather disappointing.
Riding the buses was pretty exciting though. I now have the reputation of knowing where we are and where to go and what bus to take. More than once I've kept us from taking the right bus in the wrong direction out of the main bus exchange in the city centre. The buses are organized so that 90% of them go radially in and out of the city centre, and one, the Orbiter, goes in a continuous loop a couple miles out of downtown. You can get just about everywhere by either riding into the city center and then transferring, or taking the orbiter around if its on the same side of the city so you don't backtrack. Its sort of expensive (i think at least, but I haven't rode the buses anywhere else) at $2.50 a ride, with one transfer within 2 hrs. But you can also get a metrocard so that its $1.90 a ride, free transfers within 2 hrs, and the max you pay a day is $3.80.
Day 4 - Wednesday
There was a University international student orientation for a couple hrs wed morning, which was sorta boring, because it covered a lot of stuff like tips on renting a flat or a house, when everybody already had university housing. OOO and they gave us a couple of very interesting and somewhat disturbing facts about Christchurch: 1) There is a type of spider here, the white tail spider, whose bite is painful but nonfatal. Doesn't sound too bad, right? "Nonfatal" means though, it wont kill you, but it will start eating away at your flesh so that you'll need to get the entire area surrounding the bite excised. Fun! and 2) Christchurch has the nickname "wart valley" due to the absurdly high rate of STDs. Maybe this is exaggerated, but they said 1 in 3 people have had an STD. But they gave us free muffins, so I was happy.
Then I went and ate lunch with several of the girls in the IES group at a place on campus. After lunch, there was a short library tour. The library is pretty massive, at 11 stories, but the top 5 stories have a pretty small footprint, and don't hold many books. I'm pretty sure the Honnold-Mudd library in Claremont is bigger. And you know what is lame? There are fees here for internet use based on usage. Its like 4c per Mb of data transfer. And they charge for printing and stuff, but thats a little more normal. I miss the internet at mudd... ah, the T3 (or is it T1? either way, superfast ethernet), unlimited internet usage, free printing, and all the free stuff you want on the network....
Later that night we had dinner at Maggie's flat. The girls made stir fry vegetables, I ate it. I have to say, its quite a good system. I had been kind of worried about having to make all my own food, cause I know I cant either cook or make up my mind on what to have. So I've gotten to be good friends with a bunch of the girls from IES. They like to have dinner together, and they invite me along, so I get a great meal and good company. Of course I always help them however they need. I always tell them, I can't cook very well, but tell me exactly what to do and I can do that very well.
Day 5 - Thursday
Thursday was enrolment day. Theoretically it should have been nice and simple, since I already selected all my classes and everything in pre-enrolment online. There was one minor hitch, though. We needed to get each class approved by the department. Some of the approvements were already done, but I still had one class, Fluid Mechanics, that had to be approved. I figured it would be a simple task to go over to the mechanical engineering dept, find the guy, and get him to sign off. It would have been pretty simple, had the guy actually been there. I went back to my flat to get some lunch (pb&j!), and then after that I headed back out to see if the guy had gotten back to his office. No such luck. I asked someone in reception where he was, and apparently he was on holiday that day, and this other guy was supposed to sign things off in his place. Only second guy wasn't in his office either. So I couldn't finish enrolment on Thursday. That night Doug had all the IES people over in his flat, along with some other people we knew, for dinner. He made this great breaded chicken, plus baked potatoes and salad. Funny thing was, there weren't nearly enough plates and forks, so we resorted to using whatever we could. I found myself a small frying pan and a spoon. It worked!
Day 6 - Friday
I got up and went back over to the Mech Eng dept to see if either of the two profs were back yet to sign off on my enrolment. Neither were there. I went back down to the main engineering office and asked the receptionist there for help. She took my form back, and in about 10 minutes, it was all set! I didn't even have to go back to enrolment to print out a revised sheet. It turned out that that entire department was on some sort of retreat during this time. What a time to not be in the office!!! In the middle of registration!! So then I was all set with enroling, and i went and got my canterbury card. All set for school!! Scary, it starts monday....
Class Schedule:
Roman Mythologies M Tu Th 2-3
New Zealand History: Since 1940 M W 4-5
Heat and Mass Transfer W F 11-12
Fluid Mechanics M 11-12 Tu 9-10 Th 11-12 F 11-12
Apparently there's a conflict on friday with Heat and mass transfer and Fluid mech....although the syllabus lists a different time for the fluid mech on friday...I guess I'll see later this week.
So later on that afternoon I met up with a bunch of the girls who had had lunch in the city. We saw Harry Potter!! I have to admit, my primary reason for going to see it was because I thought it got out earlier down here than at home, and I was really looking forward to bragging about it to my sister, who is one of those crazed Potter fans. Turns out she saw it a day or 2 ago...oh well, it was still fun. The theater was really interesting too... there was so much room!! At theaters back home, theres not much room between your seat and the one in front, just enough for your legs. At the theater here, i slouched down as much as i could (like, only my upper back still on the seat) and my feet still didnt reach the seat in front of me. It gave me plenty of room to slide off my seat as i groaned in frustration at the Bratz movie. Don't ANYONE ever go see that movie. Its like a really, really bad variation of Mean Girls. At least Mean Girls was pretty decent. We stopped at the supermarket on the way back and got some food for dinner. Tonight's dinner was pasta...... I at first ate it cause I was being polite, but then.....you know.....it wasnt too bad...hmm
Day 7 - Saturday
Saturday I just hung out most of the day, nothing all too exciting, that is until....
RUGBY MATCH!!!! ALL BLACKS VS SOUTH AFRICA!!!!!!!
With the Rugby world cup coming up soon in France, it was pretty likely that the match this saturday was going to be one of the only ones the All Blacks would play in NZ while we were here. We got tickets the night we got back to school from the orientation trip. Such a great NZ cultural experience, we couldn't afford not to go. Rugby is to New Zealand as...well... I'm having trouble making an apt comparison. Maybe South American countries and soccer. Rugby, and more specifically, the NZ national team, the All Blacks, are embedded in the spirit and character of New Zealand. Its kind of like how baseball is that "great American pasttime". Kiwis just love rugby and the All Blacks. There are stores downtown (that I'll totally be going to) that have all All Blacks gear.
Rugby is pretty similar to American football, exept without all those stupid rules, silly breaks between each play, and pansy helmet and pads. The gameplay is nonstop, except for when the ball goes out of play, there is a penalty, or points are scored. It is set up similar to football in that you must carry the ball across a rectangular playing field to cross the endline on the opposite side. You can run the ball up, throw it to a teammate to the side or in back of you (no forward throws), or kick the ball forward. As you run the ball up the field, if you get tackled, there is basically a dogpile of players as each team tries to get the ball out and back to their players, and then they continue to move the ball up the field. Unlike football, however, there are no "downs" or anything silly like that, the play just continues. There are two ways to score. You can either kick it through the uprights (3 pts), or run it pass the endline (5 pts, and have a chance to kick for extra 2 pts). It can get vicious, and I'm really suprised no one got injured at all the entire match (although it looked like one guy pulled a muscle or something minor). If you ever get a chance to watch rugby on fox sports world or something, definitely watch a little of it. I think its one of the most thrilling sports ive ever watched. Baseball is just boring, nothing more. Basketball is too repetitive, back and forth across the court. Football is ok, just so many damn stops in the play. Soccer is a lot of fun to play, but watching it (especially the professionals who are so good, that ironically there is very little of the fun one-on-one action) is kind of boring. Who couldnt love watching rugby? two dozen of the beefiest guys youve seen beating the crap out of one another? But undoubtedly, being in Jade Stadium in Christchurch definitely added to the experience of watching rugby. I've never seen so much spirit in an entire stadium before. The people just love it. And I have to say, I loved it as well. If you ever get the chance to watch a rugby match in New Zealand, do whatever you have to do to get there. I think that's going to be one of the best experiences I'll have here.
Damn it Glennis, why didn't you go to France this semester. The Rugby World Cup is going on all september and october all throughout France. Final Match 20/10/07 in St Denis
And I don't really know if the Wave is a common occurence at rugby matches in New Zealand, but we totally got a couple Waves going that made it all the way around the stadium. That felt pretty amazing as well.
After the match, some people were going to go into the city and hang out at some bars, but i was getting pretty tired, so me and a couple other people went back. I went over and watched an episode of The Office with Erin, and fell asleep right in the middle of it.
So thats been just my first week here, and its been the busiest, most fun ive had in a long time. Where else can you study, go to a farm, ride a jetboat, shear a sheep, fall in mud, visit downtown, see the All Blacks play, all in one week?
Of course, feel free to contact me anytime
or I'll get on AIM soon: bmunichman
my international cell phone +64 21 221 3439 (check on how to call NZ from the US).
Or my US virtual number (US call for you) 1 310 598 1734
Room phone +64 3 341 1500 X52049
Mailing address:
Flat 9 Room 4
Ilam Village
PO Box 6362
Christchurch
Room phone +64 3 341 1500 X52049
Mailing address:
Flat 9 Room 4
Ilam Village
PO Box 6362
Christchurch
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