A Star-Studded Outing

On the weekend of October 3rd I went to Mackenzie Basin with some friends from church.  Katherine lived in the area, so she drove us down and showed us around.  Thomas, Dan, and Becca came, too.  We got a late start but had a pleasant ride down, with lots of singing, story-telling, and muffin-munching.  When it got dark I was glued to the window to catch the first glimpse of the stars--the Mackenzie Basin is an International Dark Sky Reserve, home to some impressive stargazing.

We arrived late at night and set up our tents quickly in the dark before making pizza in the kitchen.  We ended up staying awake quite late enjoying waffles, nutella, German coffee, and good company.  At last we each took our hot water bottles to our tents and braved the first chilly night.

The following day was filled with amazing views from start to finish.  First thing in the morning we walked down by Lake Tekapo and took in the sights.  Then we drove up to Lake Pukaki, a brilliant turquoise lake with fantastic views of the mountains, especially Aoraki, or Mt. Cook, the tallest mountain in New Zealand.  There was hardly a cloud in the sky.  Even Aoraki, which is usually shrouded, had cast off his cloak for us on that fine day.

We drove up to the Hermitage at Mt. Cook village, glimpsing some snowflakes on the way.  The weather was nice when we arrived, but we put on a few layers too keep warm and partook of some Cadbury chocolate to keep our strength up, just in case.  We needn't have worried.  The trail was sunny and warm, not to mention gorgeous!  Snowy mountain peaks surrounded us as we crossed soaring bridges over seafoam-green glacial rivers.  The vegetation was bright and festive, and Aoraki stood tall in front of us almost the entire way.  We had a lot of fun on the way up.  We sang Frozen, scaled rocks, and visited a little cabin with a great view.  We finally reached the end of the trail and were greeted by a lake adorned with icebergs and stopped up on the far end by a glacier.  We tossed rocks onto some of the closer ice bergs, then just relaxed in the sun.  Eventually we headed back, tired but joyful.

We struggled to stay awake during evening Mass in the cozy, warm church, but somehow we managed.  We headed back to Lake Tekapo for some stargazing: there was a free event and a clear night waiting for us.  We took our sleeping bags and wandered out into a field, arranging ourselves in the shape of a star and looking up.  The moon was huge and bright and round like a silver sun.  Its light dimmed the stars, but we could still see a decent number.  We talked about God and creation, about the cosmos and life.  We glimpsed some shooting stars.  It was lovely.  On the way out we said goodbye to the Jedi and snagged some cake.

The next day, Sunday, we started with a trip to the monument to the working dogs of New Zealand and the Church of the Good Shepherd, taking in some lovely views of Lake Tekapo while we did.  Afterward, we climbed Mt. John.  We were still exhausted, but we eventually made it up in one piece.  There was a cafe at the observatory on top, which was a welcome stop!  The views around us were amazing.  We half expected the armies of Mordor to come spilling out onto the plains.

By the end we were utterly exhausted, but we had such a good time.  It was really a great time with friends, just doing something amazing together.  What a great trip!

Wildlife at Willowbank

The time is going by so fast now!

On Sat, Sept 27th, I joined Becca and a couple of her friends on a trip to the farmers' market (which was lots of fun) and Willowbank Wildife Reserve.  The reserve is set up kind of like a zoo, and you follow a trail around the different parts to see the animals.  We started out with the eels, then wandered through, seeing all sorts of animals.  There were some very interesting birds, including a black swan, a pukeko and a golden pheasant:

The pheasant was running around on its own, so it seemed to have escaped.  It also looked like it was trying to get into one of the cages!

We saw plenty of non-native critters, including wallabies, peacocks, and ridiculously soft bunnies.  

Of course I was excited to see some native birds!  The kea had a lot of personality.  They were friendly and a little cheeky--one kept going after the bows on someone's shoes!  Then they appeared to have a meeting where they gathered and shouted at each other.

Finally, I got so see my first kiwi bird!  We went into a nocturnal enclosure, and while our eyes adjusted, we listened carefully.  I heard some rustling off the path to our left, and stared at the spot until I saw a fluffy little kiwi sifting through the leaves.  A kiwi is about the size of a big chicken with shaggy brown feathers and a long beak.  It was so neat to see!

Verso L'alto: Adventure at Lewis Pass

Hello, all.  I know I haven't been doing a great job of keeping up with the blog since spring break, but fear not--updates are coming!  My adventures have certainly continued since then.

On September 13th Becca and I met up with the Catholic tramping club in the St. Teresa's carpark.  We drove up to Lewis Pass to hike to the Ada Pass hut, hoping that the sun would come out!
We were an international group,with members from New Zealand, the US, France, England, and Germany.  The hike up was pretty wet, but nice.  The trees were coated in moss.  We crossed a number of little mountain streams, but most of the views were concealed by clouds.

On the trail we befriended a little robin named Pierre.  It was a long hike in the drizzle, but it was excellent company, so we were all chipper when we arrived at the hut.  We could finally see some mountains through the misty clouds.  We changed and heated up some water for tea, then had a beautiful Mass before dinner.  Evening activities included training in "the Cup Song," a ridiculously fun version of charades that culminated in "a community of dentists imitating a haka," and a possum named Barnabas.  Long before bed we were all best friends with each other.

The following morning we were up with the sun and had a lovely morning Mass.  The clouds had all cleared away, leaving azure skies and mountains lightly rimmed with the last of the morning fog.   We washed up in a clear mountain stream, took a group photo, and headed back across Billy Goat's Gruff bridge towards civilization and the ice cream that waited for us there.

 We said a Rosary on the way back, enjoying the nicer weather.  It did end up getting a little chillier as we went along, though, which was nice for our speedy pace!

 We made it back really quickly and made plans to reunite at the next event, our Frozen Unfrozen night.  All in all, a wonderful weekend with friends.  So much fun!

Father, Cathy, Patrick, Dan, Hillary, me, Becca, Bianca, Thomas

North on Holiday

Hello, everyone!
Last week we were on holiday, so Alexis and I trekked up to the North Island and had some grand adventures!

Our first stop was Wellington, where we were greeted in the airport by Gandalf swooping overhead on an eagle.  Shortly thereafter we dragged my rolling suitcase all the way to the Weta Caves.  That's where they make all the props for all sorts of movies, including Lord of the Rings.  There were some people still working in the shop when we got our tour.  It was really cool!  They even have a master swordsmith who forges the swords.  And they have to make about four or five of each prop for different uses in the movies,  all to the same level of intense detail.

After that, we got a great bus ride from this very nice bus driver, who took us right to our stop instead of having us catch a connection.  There we met up with our friend Leah, who's studying in Wellington.  She took us around the city, and it looks like a happening place!  We had dinner on Cuba Street, then strolled along the waterfront for their Lux festival of lights.  It was lovely.

 

The next day (Sunday) we were up with the sun.  We ran quickly to church, then sauntered over to the bus stop for our long ride to Tongariro National Park.  The weather was beautiful.  When we arrived, we ran into Becca, our friend from UC!  It was pretty late, so we just bought some wifi time and relaxed.  It's winter and not very busy, so we had our own room at the hostel.

The following morning we headed out to Whakapapa Village and the start of some hiking trails.  It was cold and drizzly, but it actually turned out to be quite pleasant for hiking.  The forest around the base of the volcanoes was great.  It was super green and mossy, and there was a racket of birdsong everywhere we went.  We even saw a type of owl called a morepork.  I kind of freaked out with excitement over all the cool plants.  When we got up into the shrubbier altitudes, the views were so pretty!  Even though it was cloudy, you could see all three volcanoes (including Mt. Doom) clearly.  Between hikes we had a warm meal at the cafe.  It turned out to be a great day.
The next day was sunny and warm again.  Go figure!

Next we bused up to Hamilton.  That was our home base for our next adventure, which was Matamata and Hobbiton!  The Hobbit village was lovely.  It was quaint and comfortable.  The level of detail that went into that entire set was amazing.  They even wired leaves onto the trees so they would look like native English trees rather than NZ flora.  At the end, we got complimentary ginger beer (non-alcoholic, in our case) at the Green Dragon Inn.  It was really good.  We said hello to Pickles, the cat, on our way out, and the entire bus ride back I watched the little knock-kneed lambs that were frolicking in the fields.



Our final adventure was to the Waitomo Glow-worm Caves.  We signed up for a tour, and right away you could tell it was a very nice cave.  It was big and open with lots of cool formations.  The coolest part of all, though, was the glow-worms.  A silent boat ride carried us down the underground river.  The only sound was the echoing drips of water.  Up above, thousands of glow-worms were scattered as little blue points of light across the black cave ceiling.  It was like a dense, bright milky-way of stars arching overhead.  It was so pretty!

Then came a long day in the airport, then some long days of finishing my homework, and here I am, back in the swing of things at Uni.

Kaikoura: Seals, Shells, and Spouts

 Hello!  Spring Break has brought a whole host of adventures!  Halfway through the first week, I left for Kaikoura for a field trip.  It was a lovely place with a beautiful view.  We are studying conservation and the co-management of resources, so we visited the field station and rahui there.  A rahui is a temporary restriction that is often used to allow a resource to replenish itself.  We worked with paua, or abalone, but more on that later.

 Last Wednesday (August 27th) we headed up, and one of the first things we saw was a fluffy cluster of fur seals!  They were supposed to be up a trail by a waterfall, but instead, we found them all curled up on the beach.  Most were snoozing, but some were playing in little pools in the rocks.  They were so cute!

The second day, we tagged paua.  We glued little yellow tags to their shells until we had a layer of superglue over our fingers.  Then we made bags out of kelp, which is the traditional way of releasing the paua.  We turned the kelp inside-out to give the paua some of the nutrients and algae on the outside, then cut slits in the side for them to escape through when they are ready.  We released some of the critters this way, but others we released with the modern method:  we set them on rocks and allowed them to crawl underneath on their own time.

 On the third day we got up early to to whale watching while the other half of the class hiked around to see a Hutton's shearwater colony.  It wasn't too eventful as far as whale watches go, but it was still really cool!  We saw albatross and a lot of fur seals, but the highlight of the trip was a sperm whale that surfaced twice during the tour.

In short, the field trip was lots of fun.  There was great food and lots of fun activities.  I've only mentioned a few of the highlights here, but it was definitely a great experience all around.

The View from (almost) Heaven

On Saturday I joined the Verso L'alto Catholic Tramping Club for a hike up Mt. Richardson.  I was super excited to finally get out into the snow-capped peaks I had only glimpsed from the library windows.  (Seriously, how can you work with a view like that?)



We drove to the base of the mountain and started up the track.  Fr. Clement lead the way.  The trail was quite steep in places, and the wet ground was rather slick, but the weather was beautiful for hiking.  Along the way we heard a great variety of birds, perhaps most notably the tui. A black fungus covered many of the trees, and this was a stark contrast with the pale greens of their leaves and a flowing moss that clung to their branches like cotton.  Soon we reached the snowy top of the mountain, though the weather was still warm and sunny.  With the shorter summit trees, it had the look of an enchanted corridor.  Father started throwing snowballs, but we pressed on until we came out at the very top, above the trees.


 I forgot my camera, so thanks to Becca for the pictures!  The view was breathtaking.  For a long time I just stood in the snow and stared at the snowy peaks around me, smiling into the sunshine.  I took a couple of tiny pictures with my little NZ phone--one is my new background--but mainly I just looked out over the mountains.
We waited for the rest of the group to climb up.  It was really nice, since we had a wide range of tramping skill levels.  Everyone climbed at different rates, and often people moved forward or backward within the group, so I got to chat with almost everyone who came.


 When everyone had gathered we had Mass in the snow at the top of the mountain.  It was heavenly.  Father's homily discussed the purity of the snow on the peak, and how it reflects the sun back even brighter.  In the same way, a pure heart reflects God's light.  It was a wonderful gift to celebrate in the clean air above the world.



After Mass we had lunch (doesn't food always taste better outside?), then hiked along the ridge for a bit.  Father Clement went wild throwing snowballs and singing.  I was pretty caught up in the Lord of the Rings-like scenery all around me!  Hiking through the melting snow, soon my shoes were soaked through, but everything else was so great that I didn't mind at all.  Some of the smaller mountains we hiked around reminded me a bit of the Berkshires.  I only wish I knew more of the trees and birds.  Hopefully I'll acquire that knowledge as I go along!



In short, it was a great day out for a tramp!  I'm really glad I finally got out to see those snow-capped mountains that enchant me from my window!  It was truly a blessing to spend time with the club, and I can't wait for our next outing!

The Art of Maori Bone Carving

On Saturday Alexis and I visited the Bone Dude to learn Maori bone carving.  We picked out our designs, got a quick starter tutorial, and started filing away at a little chunk of bone.  Once we had gotten it down to the right shape, we rounded the edges, then the Bone Dude helped with the finer detail.

We sanded the carving down with finer and finer sandpaper until it was smooth all around.  Then it was polished and we were done!  It was definitely enjoyable to make and the bone was pretty nice to work with, though I got a bit of a tickle in my throat from the bone dust while we were filing!

There's a lot of symbolism in Maori carving.  My design has a little bit of a fish hook, which is a sign of prosperity.  The Koru, or curl, is modeled after an unfurling fern frond, and it symbolizes new life or rebirth.  There are plenty of other symbols as well.  A whale tale symbolizes strength or protection, and a dolphin represents friendship.  A twisted design indicates eternity, and a double or triple twist is two people growing together in love or friendship.

It was definitely a little different from my soap carving last January, but I really enjoyed bone carving and wouldn't mind doing it again some time!