DOLPHINS

So here we sit in Nelson (nope, not BC), in THE BUG backpackers, which is AWESOME, looking at pics from yesterday of swimming with the dolphins.

If any of you ever get the chance, jump at it, run after it, whatever, but TAKE IT. Probably the best money we have spent yet. Wet suits and all we were dumped into the ocen into the middle of a pod of Dusky Dolphins. We have a boatload of pics, none of which we can upload until we get wireless and can use our computer instead of the one provided. Also, Ryan used the underwater camera we bought, so when we are in one place long enough to develop film we will see if any of those turned out. Ryan was probably the most entertaining swimmer. You are supposed to do weird things and make noise and such to attract the dolphins attention (we are their entertainment, not the other way around!) and Ryan was a total goof. Well, it worked. At one point he was circling with about 6 or 8 dolphins. They swim around you and you try to keep up with them. Diving down also works, brings to mind the voice of Bill Engval, "Hey waya doin?" I'm sure that our home and the homes of our friends will be covered in huge photos of dolphins once you see some of the stuff we got. Oh, and video footage galore, so we should be able to make a DVD and try and get some stills from that too. TEASER... Lots of aerobatics, a foot shot, and a mom and baby...

Today we are off to Golden Bay, spend a couple days kayaking or horse trekking or hiking or sumthing, then back through here (too bad the bug is booked, the shower is to die for...) before we head to Picton, where we catch the ferry to Wellingon. From there on in we'll north island it up for awhile, ending up in Auckland for the 10th/11th/12th.

Thanks to everyone for the party invites, it makes it easier to be excited about coming home when everyone we know is so excited to see us. You guys are the best. Oh, and I may need a place in Calgary to live for Jan - April for school, so keep your ears to the ground for me guys.
Thanks for reading, post comments so we know you guys are alive! It's no fun to check up and have nothing to read!!

The Adventure Continues

Hello all out there. Sorry again for the delay in posting times. We are currently on the road travelling our way to the North Island of New Zealand. We are staying a few days in a place called KaiKoura. It's on the East Coast of the South Island north of Christchurch. We are going to be going swimming with dolphins on monday hopefully if the weather is good. So if we can get some pics we will post them at that time. Once were gone from here were heading to a place called golden bay on the North West tip of the South Island as far as you can go. It's really secluded but it should be amazing. I would post some pictures for all of you but we are currently on a backpacker outfit computer with a timed internet and no USB connection to upload the pics. Needless to say everything is still just amazing and we are loving it. The people here are amazingly nice and we stayed a few days with some quick friends in Christchurch. We have also been offered a place to stayin Wellington from a couple that we met in a local cafe. It's really quite amazing. Once we get a few more stories and pics from here and a less timed internet I promise that we'll get some pics and stuff up. We love you all and miss you tons and we'll see you all for the holidays.

Love Ryan and Britt

Hello to all the avid readers out there wondering what is going on in the places at the bottom of the World. Well to start off with due to unforseen shortcomings of the company we were working for, we got the dreaded" we have to let you go speech". Needless to say we were a little bit upset. Well mad really is a better way to put it. To have come so far for so little seems a little bit ridiculous. Or so we thought anyway. After spending a week down in a beautiful little place called the Fjordland ( little as in 1.6 million ish square km's of national park.) We toured two of the places that are open to the public called milford sound and doubtful sound ( both are actually fjords) What is the difference some may ask. A Sound is a valley carved from a river or stream that opens to the ocean and a Fjord is a glacial valley. The early European settlers didn't really know the difference was the excuse for the misleading names.

I will post a few pictures but they pale in comparison to the real thing. Taking a trip to New Zealand and missing the Fjordland area would be a huge mistake. This little area makes the whole trip worthwhile.

So what is up for the future. A couple more days in Omarama, hoping to hire a glider and instructor and go for a huge wave flight. And then onto Christchurch to hire a car and spend the next couple of weeks doing the Tourist thing spend lots of money and take a lot more pictures to add to the already large pile of around 800-1000 that we've already taken. We will have to be in Auckland for the 12th of December as we fly out at 7:40 in the evening and we arrive strangely enough to LA on the 12th of December at 11:00 in the morning. How's that for time travel.

So we will find as many places as we can with internet access to post more pictures of our adventures around the Kiwiland and keep your comments coming on the posts as it's really good to hear news from home.

And this last picture is from a bar in Queenstown called Minus 5. It's made entirely from ice. Including your drink cups. Very cool.

So for now I will leave you with some pictures and a recipe from the awesome little cafe down here for some great muffins. A taste of home from so far away

Muffins by Dagmar

Dry mix

1 cup white flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 cup sugar

add and kind of fruit or chocolate or whatever ( apples and chocolate chips are recommended)

Wet mix

3/4 cup oil

3/4 cup milk

2 eggs

mix all together and bake for 30-40 min @ 180 degrees Celcius

Dunedin = Chocolate, Beer and Castles

(Quick note on photos: If you click on them they should open up in a new window at full size)

Well our apologies for the long gap between posts. We had an excellent weekend trip down to a place called Dunedin. Which is about a 3hr. trip south east of Omarama. Dunedin is home to Cadbury Chocolate shop and the Speights Brewery.
We stopped at the Botanical Gardens when we first got into town and walked around for about a half-hour. Saw some awesome parrots who chatted with us about everything from wanting a cup o' tea to saying hi to Polly. Just gorgeous animals.
11am was our Cadburys tour which, well you have to see it to believe it. Huge factory, chocolate EVERYWHERE and one ton of chocolate falling through the "waterfall" they have set up in one of the big towers. We got splattered, the walls got splattered, and it was super cool. 10% off in the shop because we were also doing the Brewery tour, and we bought some christmas presents (won't be chocolate, we can't mail that...) and a bunch of sugary sweetness.Next to the Speights pub for the best lunch I think I have ever had, seriously. Awesome service and a great meal all around, GO THERE if you are ever in Dunedin. It is at the bottom of the street from the tour/factory. (When I say "bottom" of the street, I mean pack your hiking shoes, this town in insane.)
Toured the factory and sampled about 6 different kinds of beer... as much as you can drink while the guy is talking... and learned all about, well, beer. Watched the Southern Man commercials (these should be on the Worlds Best Commercials, they are great, try and download them) and drank some more.After the tour we drove up to Larnach Castle, put our stuff in our room and had a nap. GORGEOUS ROOM. Booked dinner in the castle dining room, and it was great. 6 people ate with us, all around the big table as if we were family. A couple from England, a couple from Ireland, and a mother and daughter from England. They were quite impressed by our jobs, and our car.
Watched fireworks out the window for about an hour (from 930 to 1030), a day early for Guy Fawkes, but awesome all the same.We woke up and spent a couple hours touring the castle, mostly in the rain, and then headed downtown to shop. Fireworks, food and shampoo was pretty much the list, although we also picked up an alarm clock... pity we have one plug in our room and the heater also plugs in! Just prior to leaving town we stopped at Baldwin St. in Dunedin which is in the Guiness book of World Records as the steepest street in the world. After a hike up the steps. The burning in our legs told us that Guiness was probably right. The steepest part of the street had a 1:2.64 ratio. Meaning for every foot it travelled up it only went 2.64 ft fwd. So very near a 45 degree climb. For anyone who has experienced a winch launch imagine near that angle in your car driving up or down.On the drive home we stopped at the Moeraki Boulders on the coast. Of Which no one is really sure where they come from, and then the Elephant rocks further inland. Which are from old river beds of limestone that partially eroded away and the rest have remained, weird is really the only description for them.Got home to the town being under a blanket of cloud that stayed for about two days. This morning is the first time we've seen the sun since saturday (it's Wed) and it is fantastic. However the rain was also very nice. Now that we have some sun we'll actually be able to fire off our fireworks for the much celebrated Guy Fawkes Day. For those of you wondering who that is. A man in England rented out the cellars of the English Parliament buildings and loaded them with TNT trying to blow up the parliament building and the king of england. IF you'd like more you can google him or watch the movie V for Vendetta. which has a bit of history and is a great movie. So remember remember the fifth of November.

Cheers for now,

Ryan and Britt

Cloud Busting... Omarama Style

After a few days of doing not much but answering the occasional phone call, which trust me, becomes exciting, Chris pops up with "Hey Brittany, we could do a flight this afternoon" at about 3:00. Little did I know this "pretend it's a half hour tourist ride" would turn into busting clouds, 2 and a half hours, and 10200 feet later.
After a gorgeous takeoff, away we went to "The Nursery", which is a range right beside us. It is usually the starting point for most flights as it is fairly reliable and a close tow, so away we went.
What I worked hard for, Chris seemed to find with ease, and we thermalled our way up enough to push out across the valley. After thermalling a bit on another range, Magic Mountain, we tried for the wave in the middle of the valley. We just tickled the bottom, but in the meantime found a very nice line of convergence. This is where wind going one direction (say east) crashes into wind going the other direction (west) and has nowhere to go but up. It was a matter of staying on the right side of the clouds, and getting as close to the clouds as you can (which is very close, let me tell you) and still be able to see.
This is where I tell you that clouds are sneaky creatures. They form out of nothingness and disapear just as fast, they move along the ground sometimes opposite to what you think because they are going opposite to the cloud near them... SNEAKY. They are also just like ridges in that you want to get very close to them, but not into them, for the best lift.

Other than the flying, things here are nice. I'm making pies and trying to figure out what I have to do to the shells to get them to work here... it is very very dry... and bringing them, in to work every couple of days. The crew here don't mind that they are my test subjects. They don't mind at all. Also, we have New Zealand bank accounts. It's odd, but we do, so now we can use EFTPOS (their debit) in stores... but at 60 cents a transaction, we will try just to take out some cash and leave it at that.
This weekend we are planning a trip to the city of Dunedin. We are already booked at the stables at the castle for the stay saturday night, as well as the cadbury tour and the Speights (as in New Zealands south island beer) tour. Looks like it is going to be a nice weekend, and the flights here are picking up... it's 10 and Ryan has already been in the air for about 15 minuntes.
The weather has been pretty nice the last couple days due to a nice high sitting above us... seeing this whole island without isobars on it yesterday was almost a bit scary... AH WHERE'D THEY GO!?... as it is very odd to not have this tiny island just covered in them. Chicago? Windy City? They've got nothing on us...
Love you all, some post cards are in the mail, but apparently they may be slower than we first thought!
Pictures to follow when Chris gets his camera hooked up... another crazy Canadian at 10000 feet with shorts on!