Finally something actually worth blogging about

I don't mean to imply that I haven't been doing heaps of great things every day, but this weekend I actually did something that has motivated me to blog for the first time in a while, the Routeburn Track. Travis, Carl and I decided last minute we would take on the track and basically made no plans other than booking 1 camp site even though we needed 2. We rented a car (we will buy one soon) and drove to Queenstown to see how to get to the trail head. Turns out we were 4 hours late for the last shuttle, but no worries, we're in NZ so hitching is an option. After making a sign taped with bandaids with 'Glenorchy' written in my chicken scratch bubble letters we threw our thumbs out and hoped for the best. 30 min later, after some German girls got our hopes up then smashed them once we learned they had no idea where they were going, we got picked up by...can you guess...yes, a nice American couple. Should of guessed, you are hard pressed to find a Kiwi in Queenstown. Anyways, after a pleasent conversation with the Americans during our 44km trip, we were in Glenorchy (small moutain town with a school the size of a Mcdonalds play place). We had just 28 km to the trail head left, but little hope of finding a ride. After discovering you can not camp for free, we began dragging our feet to the camp site resigned to the fact that we would have to pay to camp...I think thats a sin. Lucky for us a far from sober Kiwi named 'Kiwi' popped his head over a fence and inquired as to our intentions. After some discussion we were offered a ride for 1/3 the price we would have payed for the shuttle the next morning, with a catch of course. We had to ride with 2 drunk Kiwis for 28 km and had no idea as to there intentions...we were in the middle of nowhere and thought of murder crossed my mind more than twice. Luckily they turned out to be very nice, but continued to drink (the driver Whiskey and Coke and Kiwi some beer, as we went a 100 down the dirt road to the trail head. All was good and we started the track.

I suppose I could go into great detail about the track, but it isn't nearly as interesting as our trip there. Let me just say that our first camping spot was the coolest place I have ever pitched a tent and the track was absolutely the most beautiful walk I have ever done. 3 days of mountain views and mysterious NZ bush. We met some beautiful Danish girls and enjoyed cigars and Crown Royal each night.

The trip back to QT wasn't nearly as interesting. Though we didn't make a booking we got super lucky that there were 3 spots left on the shuttle, so 2 bus rides and a 3 our car ride back to Dunedin to my bedroom that was colder than the tent and here I am, on a computer, happy to be clean, but wishing I were back on the track...this time with all of you.

Missing my friends but loving it here.

Dan