RWC season was amazing - with all of the South Island matches played in either Dunedin or Invercargill since CHC was no longer a viable option, we got real busy as the de facto hub of RWC activity down here. Queenstown was heaving with supporters, players, media and general revelry. I went down to Dunners for the Ireland v Italy match; we made a full weekend of it. Vicky was over from home and half of QT tripped it down for the craic.
In December, I went on my first tramp. Being completely under prepared and woefully hungover, a group of us took on the Routeburn track from the Divide to the Glenorchy end. It was truly stunning, an experience that I would recommend to anyone. We were lucky enough with the weather to see the breathtaking scenery over the Harris saddle at its blue-sky best after having pretty much waded our way up the key summit on our first day in what ranged from mizzle to torrential downpour. The whole weekend was just incredible, a real one off with a brilliant bunch of friends.
That got us all fired up for some more outdoorsy NZ stuff - in February Becky, Louise Stevens, Ed and I headed up to Abel Tasman to do a three day kayaking/camping trip. This is definitely around the top of my "Amazing Shit I Have Done in NZ" list - the coast up there is stunning, and paddling into the tidal lagoons like Shag Harbour, finding rocks to jump off and colonies of seals to pester was great fun. I'm definitely going to go back and walk the coastal track at some point - we did a little evening hike up to the Cleopatra Pools where the rocks, moss and waterfalls from a natural water slide. The whole track is full of gems like that - well keen to get back and do it all.
The last few months have been difficult in a way, as quite a lot of my close friends have left Queenstown. I know that this is the nature of the place, being a resort, but you are never really fully prepared for how fast these departures come around. This time I lost Becky, Ed, Craig, Mary, Vicky, Rich and there are a few more on the cards now too. Moving out of Cote du Lac was so hard but probably the only thing that made this easier - I really miss living with Maebh but if we had stayed in that house and had next door empty, I think I'd have been stuck on the fact that they were gone. I've now moved on to Maxwell Place with Jens and Laura, and I honestly feel really properly settled here. It's a good house with good people and a cat. I fully LOVE having a pet around again.
Apart from that, I'm trying crazy hard to save money - I'm doing May completely dry as it's shoulder season and nothing happens anyway. Also just about to pay the final installment of this year's ski pass - roll on early snow and a good winter!
Other things of note:
- I've been pretty inspired recently by two things to be more motivated. One by example and one through work training, of all places.
- Thought I had it bad before? I was wrong. This was HARD.
- Plan = 1 more year sponsored and then I'm going for it. RESIDENCE :)
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