Time for a catch up!

Hey everybody!

Sorry I have been so terrible with the blogging as of late. It has been CRAZY busy here in New Zealand and I often find it much easier to just post pictures up on facebook considering internet is SO SLOW here in the land "Down Under" and it takes the blog AGES to load any pics.

Anyway, a quick catch up...I've completely recovered from the ski accident and was cleared by neurology last week for all activities!

I've been in Queenstown, New Zealand with my friends Dan and Emily prior to their departure back to the US. Then I was in Sydney, Australia a month ago presenting at the Australian Physiotherapy Association Conference week, went on a day hike near Wanaka, New Zealand last weekend, and today spent some time out at Tunnel Beach which is about a 10 minute drive from home....absolutely gorgeous!

Here are a few pics and I'll try to be better! Got a lot of things going on this month including another trip to Queenstown, then hiking the Milford Sound Track, followed by a dolphin swim!

Enjoy!

Once again, Queenstown, NZ...one of my favorite places!

Sydney, Australia...the Opera House and city skyline!

Brewster Hut Track near Wanaka, New Zealand

And here are some from Tunnel Beach. Just a 10 minute drive from home! :) Not a bad place to live!

Back in New Zealand - Land of Penguins!

Hello all!! It has been a long time since my last blog and most of you who read this know I had a bit of a fall on the ski slopes here in late June and needed some time to recover. Anyway, I'm back here in New Zealand and about a week ago went out with my good friends Dan and Emily to see some NZ penguins up close and personal! This place is amazing! You can be within 10-15 feet of these guys and they don't move! We also saw some seals out there! Hope you enjoy these guys!

All Blacks!

Just a few pictures from the All Blacks game we attended last weekend. They lost to France 27-22 but was still a lot of fun. For those of you who don't know, the All Blacks are New Zealand's national rugby team!

Flying Solo North and Central New Zealand

Ok, so following Shannon's departure I had a few extra days to get back down to Dunedin from the Northern part of the South Island so I decided to do a bit of extra sightseeing on my own to some places that I've heard a lot of things about but haven't quite seen yet.

I started by driving 2 hours from Nelson down to Buller Gorge and visited New Zealand's longest swingbridge.

I walked around the park there for a bit on a beautiful afternoon. I stayed in a hostel that night known as the Lazy Cow! LOVED IT! :) I woke up the next morning for another adventure! Before I left the States I was given a National Geographic that had an excerpt on New Zealand. One of the things in the magazine that looked really interesting was this "cave rafting". I was intrigued. Well I noticed that the place that did this sort of thing was going to be on my drive down the West Coast so I hooked it up!! Basically, you arrive and are given a wetsuit, a helmet with a light, and an intertube. You start by taking this little train back into the Paparoa National park and walk across the river, up 120 steps and enter this enormous cave! It was absolutely amazing!! The limestone formations and things you can see in there were beautiful and b/c New Zealand is AWESOME, we don't have any bats here!

So you walk through this cave for about an hour until you reach some water where you sit back in your tube, make a train with the others in your group, turn off your lights and you are in complete darkness!! You literally cannot see your hand if you put it in front of your face and they say within 2 hours you can start hallucinating and going mad!! So you lean back in your tube, paddle your way back a bit and on the ceiling of the cave is what is known as "glowworms" and they look like a million tiny stars lining the ceiling.

Eventually you exit the cave and it spits you into the river where you ride down maybe a little under a mile in grade 1/2 rapids in an intertube! Hilarious and so fun!!

Following the cave rafting I drove down to Punakaiki which is a big attraction in New Zealand for it's Pancake Rocks. These are again limestone formations that line the beach and are quite spectacular.

I slept at a hostel right on the beach and had a beautiful sunset!

The next morning I woke up, drove to Arthur's Pass National Park which is in Central New Zealand and enjoyed a 4 hour hike that nearly killed my legs as you basically walk straight up for 2 hours! I enjoyed lunch at the top and had some amazing views!

Leaving Arthur's pass you come across something known as Castle Hill. Again, limestone formations but these sit smack in the middle of the country and farmland and you really can't appreciate how large they are until you are up close!

And finally, on the drive home that evening just an hour outside of Dunedin I stopped at the Moeraki Boulders. I'm amazed I hadn't been here yet to see them as they are so close but anyway, it made for some great pictures on a beautiful beach!

I'm back in Dunedin now and back to work! The plan is to get some work done for a bit and then maybe consider another hike in a few weeks and I'm also getting my scuba certification in May so lots to look forward to!

Hope everyone is well back home!

love,
lex

Last days of Shannon's trip Down Under

So days 7 & 8 marked the end of Shannon's trip in New Zealand and so we ended with a 2 day hike in the Abel Tasman National Park.

Can we say Golden Beaches and I mean GOLDEN!! BEAUTIFUL!!

We walked what is known as the Abel Tasman Coast Track and is considered one of New Zealand's "Great Walks". We ended up with a few tidal crossings which I will explain later! :)

We started off from Kaiteriteri where we boarded another jet boat out to Anchorage. We made a quick stop at Split Apple Rock which is a crazy limestone formation that over the years has simply cracked down the middle. From Anchorage, we walked to Torrent Bay and then stopped at Bark Bay for the evening. We had a short side trip to Cleopatra's pool where one of the rivers forms a pool of water and had lunch. Beautiful spot.

We stayed in one of the huts at Bark Bay where we had bunks and cooked up some pasta. We also collected some great shells and spotted a little starfish!

The next morning we woke up and hiked to Awaroa Beach which was just gorgeous once again!

So this here is Onetahuni beach where Shannon and I had to do a tidal crossing...well...apparently we were a bit early and so we had to cross it while the tide was still in a bit so that we could make our water taxi later. This is Shannon here AFTER the cross...we were in it up over our knees and WOW it was cold!! :)

Finally we boarded a water taxi back to Kaiteriteri, drove back to Nelson, had a dinner out and went to sleep.

We woke up the last day in Nelson on Good Friday where Shannon and I grabbed some breakfast and then headed to the beach for a few hours before taking Shannon to the airport for her trip home.

We had a wonderful trip and I was sad to see her go! Thanks for the memories, Shannon!!