Jet boat

Jet boating was a sport invented in New Zealand which consists of a boat that can go in very shallow water at high speeds up rivers and in some cases up rapids. A jet boat can get going up to 90kmph which roughly translates to just under 60mph. Not the craziest of adventures but when your going up through a rain forest it can be kind of awesome.

Franz Joseph

New Zealand has some of the most extreme landscapes on the planet for example a rain forest next to a glacier. The Franz Joseph glacier is the fastest moving glacier in the world. Unlike the North island which was mainly created through volcanic activity the South island was carved out by glaciers. Since it is so fast moving the glacier is on average receding a meter a day where as most will move centimeters in a year. This makes it very unstable and difficult to find routes up as the guides must create a new trail every day using double sided ice axes. The Franz Joseph glacier is part of a world heritage site which is like a national park but even more protected examples of other world heritage sites are the Grand Canyon and the Great Barrier reef.

Me in front of the glacier

 

Glacier

Crevasse 

Insane

Horse back riding in Rivendale a.k.a. River Valley once again spiting Gabe

Our trip has taken us deep into the heart of the Northern island through the steep hills that fill the land. It is truly beautiful country. We stayed at a lodge which was right on the river deep in one of the valleys where cell phone reception was a joke and there were more sheep then people.

 This a small piece of the trail that lead up one side of the valley of Rivendale the trail was pretty dang steep and very dangerous but well worth the views.

 Rico and I. This was the first time I ever rode a horse. Rico and I got along great and in the three hour tour I reached a trot.

Luge(random activity)

Maori

In our journey we have now met the native Maori people. They hosted us as guests but we had to abide by their customs which included them selecting four Chief's out of the 200 guests and then one of the chiefs has to accept the peace offering and act as leader of the guests and yes you guessed it I was chosen. The culture is curious clearly they hold true to their original customs well still up holding a busy tourist attraction.

 Chief Allen

 Selection

 Peace Offering

 Warrior's

 entering the village with the Brits yelling "we'd die for you Chief Allen" not realizing I wasn't Ray Allen.

 Their Chief

  Carvings

Oh just to spite Gabe

yes that is Gollum

Day 1-3

Little late posting but internet is hard to come by here without paying an arm and a leg. No doubt this is truly a land of absolute night and day by that I mean ether spectacular and beautiful or awful no in between. I have met very few actual Kiwis as it is most of the population this time of year is tourists. In the first two days I spent time in the city of Auckland it is no doubt one of the strangest cities in the world with the most diverse culture I have ever seen in one place. I walked past a closed down army surplus store which had Japanese uniforms right next to American Uniforms. Truly interesting how the south Pacific is mainly British an Island of nearly equal size on the opposite side of the planet.

The room day 1-2

 The Sky Tower Auckland NZ tallest building in southern hemisphere

 Weird Bus

 Train Station

 Laziness

 Awesome Tree

 hmmm Harry Potter?

 Sky Tower view

 Me on the edge of a volcano crater 

 me on cathedral beach

 The cathedral beach caves

 The cat at the second hostile

 gold mining valley for the rest