We walked back, woke everyone up and checked out of the motel and headed down to a cool place we spotted earlier…which was now strangely completely overcrowded with people. We ordered and it was gonna take 25mins to be served which wouldn’t have been so bad but we had to sit outside due to all the friggin people….luckily they had “soup sized” coffee which kept us going.

As it was only about 10:30 and we didn’t have to be in Christchuch til 1pm we drove down to the 1 of 4 mini golf centre’s for a quick round of 18. It was very cold, completely outdoors and I may have had to take a 5 shot penalty on almost every hole….and that’s all I have to say about that!

_B

After a sleepy hour or so in the car we had a little navigation issue but all was returned when we switched seats

We arrived in ‘Hamner Springs’ at about 2ish for a much needed bathe in the Thermal Pools.
They were a lot busier then I imagined, in fact they were packed….old people everywhere. We quickly got changed and ran to the closest pool, Em moved over to a hotter pool and us boys stuck it out in the 35 degree pool, lucky we had Damo to keep away the oldies
Em finally got us to move to the hot pool and I am glad we did because by that time it had dropped another 3-4 degree’s outside.

All in all it was a really good experience only downsides would be the foul smelling sulfur coming from the pools and the old naked man in the change room drying his DT’s.

After that we headed back to our hotel, had beers got changed and headed back to the pub for some dinner, we would have stayed except Australia was playing New Zealand in the Rugby Union and the place was packed full of ‘All Black’ supports as you could imagine. So we got 3 packs of Apple Schnapps (poor take-away choice from the pub) and headed back for a night in getting drunk and watching ‘Dante’s Peak’ on VHS.

_B

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As Matt’s knee was still playing up he decided to sit today out and stayed back at the hotel…I can only imagine it was like my sick day on Wednesday.
Once we got to the peak it was back to the beginners run to get some training in before Damo and I headed up the chair lifts with my camera for some snow filed happy snaps.

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The day went really well with Bryce helping Em out and Damo and I going on the next one up…..still miles from anything hard tho, however a few to many falls and a previous tailbone injury calling the end for Emily and Bryce as they jumped on the 4pm bus back to QT.

Damo and I stayed on for some night boarding, express ski lift queues, icy cold beers and pumping tunes as we took advantage of our ‘Twilight Lift Passes’.

Dinner was at an awesome Mexican restaurant hidden in the Queenstown Mall, we all had a great meal and got suck into the drinks, Em and I had my favourite…Sangria.

 _B

My first full day on the mountain, and time to walk the walk.

A late breakfast almost caused us to miss the bus up the mountain but luckily there were too many people so they called a second bus for us. The trip is was quite quick as I was overjoyed with actually feeling good and about to spend a full day on the slopes….ahem I mean the mountains {your such a raciest Damien}

It was freakin busy when we got there…people were everywhere.  Finally got on the powder and we all headed for the ‘magic carpet ride’, it’s like an escalator built into the snow to take you up the slight slope they built for first timers (or just really shit skiers).

Quite a few hours of getting back use to it all and frustration and bruises for the others we retreated for some lunch.

Matt and Em left on the early bus at 2:30 because Matt had fallen and hurt his bung knee, the boys and I stayed on and took a level 3 lesson on boarding so Friday would be a little more enjoyable. The picture explaining the level seemed right (imagine toilet symbols snowboarding)….it turned out to be a little harder then first thought for Damo and Bryce but by then end we were all pretty happy with our new skills.

Once home we sauced up again and headed out to the Pig and Whistle for some much needed hearty food, Damo and I ordered the prime rib and Matt got some crazy ass big chicken burger….everyone seemed much happier.

After dinner we decided to check out the ice bar “Minus 5″, Damo wasn’t really feeling it so he stayed home.

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We had to book in for a 30min session, $25 with a free cocktail. The bar was pretty cool…get it “cool” and the drinks were awesome.

_B

I ended up spending the entire day in the hotel room watching Sky TV, sipping water and eating dry toast…..very EXTREME!

The guys all got home at about 4pm all a little tired, sore and exhausted so we ducked out for some take-away pasta and had a quiet night in to recover.

_B

 As our ‘Shotover Jet’ ride was cancelled yesterday due to bad weather it was scheduled again for today at 11am…..however more extremely cold temps meant that they again would not be running the boats so we cancelled and decieded to have a relaxing day in QT instead.

First stop was lunch at ‘Speight’s Ale House’, a flashy pub with from what I was told “excellent food” and great beer.

I didn’t eat because I was feeling a little crappy because it turns out that Damo snores just as much as Matt does and I got zero sleep, I moved upstairs onto the couch at like 2am but an hour or so later woke up with an excuciating pain in my back, took me quite some time to actually get tired enough so that I could head back downstairs and ignore the snoring.

After lunch we managed to find a cheap place that could do all our gear and clothing hire as well as ski passes and bus tickets so not only did we save money we got everything from the one place.

Anyhow after we got all our gear we split up; Em, Matt & Bryce deceided to go ice skating and Damo and I went off for a drive around town.  I was feeling better around 2pm and got me some good ol english style ‘fish n chips’ from a place in town….and I tell you it tasted great.

Later in the arvo once we were all back home the drinking stated again {we had a lot of Duty Free to get through } and went for Pizza and Pool at a place in town. Damo wanted to stay back, have a shower and a few more drinks so I stuck around…anyway we headed off about half an hour later and then couldn’t get in touch with the others and spent ages walking around town before eventually finding the little place tucked in the back of a alleyway.

Some food and quite a few local NZ “drinks” later and we were all smashed and at a Kareoke bar watching Damo and Matt take home prize after prize.

I decieded to head home because I wasn’t feeling to well and ended up throwing up….prolly drank too much again :-S

_B

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Waking at the crack of dawn is bad enough but try it at like minus 6!

So yeah, we were up early and out and about in the cold waiting for our adventure tours to start…very exciting I must say.
Eventually the info center opened and we begun the weigh-ins , turns out there were about 15 people doing the Bungy which was first up, so the bus was full and off we went. Damo being the biggest person got shotgun up the front with the driver and started his usual life story to strangers bit…which we all found hilarious up the back of the bus. We arrived at the bungy 30mins later, harnessed up and jumped in the little cart over to the main jumping cable cart shaking with 50/50 fear and chills from the extreme cold. We had to jump in order of weight so Damo got the lucky ticket of first jumper for the day , he did quite well considering. Bryce followed with his usual poker face however I think the words “I don’t want to freak you out guys, but that was the scariest fucking thing I have done in my life” comment from Damo once they pulled him back up may have pushed our next jumper “Matty” over the edge and into what he likes to call his pre-jump panic attack.

So without going into to much detail and embarrassing the little guy 10mins or so later, a little droll and a lot of convincing from the English dude strapping us in….Matt took the plunge! I followed with my Jesus dive as promised and all was went well…agreeing with Damo however, without a doubt the most scariest thing I have ever done.
Our little Emily being on the very other end of the weight list was almost the last jumper for the day and from the looks on the other boys faces they wanted off that cable car ASAP so I decided to stick around and keep Em company while she waited to jump. After what seemed like an eternity {prolly about an hour} it was Em’s turn and she threw herself of the edge like a Pro….well done.
 

Back to QT for a quick change and a spot of KFC and we were off to the ‘White Water Rafting’ and ‘Shotover Jet’ via helicopter…which sadly due to the extremely cold conditions was without the Shotover.

All I can say about the wetsuits is I never want to see man camel toe ever again….I am scared for life. Once “suited” up we all took a brief bus ride over to the air field and jumped into the Helicopter, truly an awesome experience….especially with our pilot as he effortlessly wound the little craft up the mountains and down through the valleys for about 10mins before dropping us (all 5 of us) down at the rafting launch point.
The rafting was great fun, a little more laid back then we expected (they moved us to the alternate river due to the cold) but it was quite an experience. The scenery was amazing, the rafting was fun and the water was fucking freezing!

We headed back via shuttle bus for a warm shower {which us boys skipped due to the strange sausage-fest in the change rooms} and a bite to eat before catching another bus back to Queenstown at about 5:30pm……quite a day.

Once home, dried and a little sauced we hit the town for some delicious Thai food and a brief spot of pool at the local ‘Pig & Whistle’.
 

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 It was a cold start to what would end up being an extremely freezing trip, the taxi arrived on-time and we managed to get to the Airport on time….even Bryce who hadn’t slept all night as he was out partying.

I managed to experience my first bomb screening at the Brisbane International, I was freaking out when they first pulled me into the little room as I thought there was a reason why they picked me :-S but as soon as the chick said it was random I was all like “yeah no worries”. They spot tested my clothes and my bag and ran it though some sort of chemical analyzer and then the dude patted me down {yeh for me}.

The 3hr flight over was a breeze as Matt, Damo and I downed a couple of Johnnie Walker’s…they were $7 each which is shit because they should have been free on our International Flight but it was JetStar so who can blame them.

The highlight of the Day would have been going to the Thrify Car Hire counter and having the chick there say “your black Ford Territory is waiting for you in the last bay” ….WOOO,  I couldn’t believe my luck. I have been thinking about buying one of these for some time now and got the chance to test drive it for a whole week.

Our first stop was “Burger King” and I must say the service at Cineplex has nothing on these guys….it was like they hired an entire special school. Their crazy “FLASH” ingredients did intrigue me however and I opted for a “Hell Raiser Meal”.

The drive was long and kinda boring to begin with but got a little more exciting once we got to the mountains.
Every kilometer or so there were litle piramids of rocks on the side of the road, I don’t know who, when or how these little things were being made but frankly it was begining to freak me out. A little later we came across a car on the side of the road with it’s hazards on…not being a big fan of my NZ trip turning out like ‘Wolf Creek’ we kept driving. Just up a bit there was a second car pulled over so as we came up onto it i rolled down my window and put my head out to ask if he was ok however Damo must have got to close to his car and paniced because no sooner as I started to say “Hey” he swerved back away and sped off, the poor dude must have thought I was abusing him.
Turns out there was cattle all over the road up ahead and you are meant to pull over, put your hazzards on and warn upcoming traffic. :-S

It was about 9:30ish by the time we got to Queenstown so we quickly checked in and popped down to the local Subway for a nutritious dinner.

We grabbed a couple of beers on the way home and settled in for a early night because tomorrow was to be our big “Awesome Foursome” adventure day.

_B