Reinaker's Guest Post - New Zealand Adventures

Matt Reinaker becomes our first guest blogger as he highlights his time in NZ:

Eric and Dana were kind enough not only to let me guest-post but to play host and tour guide (exceptionally!) for my entire two week visit to New Zealand. So I want to begin by thanking both of them for their hospitality. You guys made the trip for me and I can’t thank you enough for it. If anyone is considering a visit, you will not be disappointed! Plus, I literally paid for not one thing while I was there, such is the extent of their generosity.

Eric already detailed some of the trip but here are a few more highlights:

1) Mountain biking on Queen Charlotte Track. I was relatively (read: completely) new to mountain biking so this was a real baptism by fire for me. Twenty miles through some steep climbs and very technical terrain. I admit, the ride definitely stopped being fun at a few points, but as with all experiences that take you outside of your comfort zone, it was well worth the effort. Plus, I was rewarded with a few stops at beautiful, tranquil beaches and some spectacular views along the way, which helped keep my mind off the fact that I was close to being killed at any given moment. At no point, however, was I closer than when I actually mountain-biked off the mountain and into a tree, which was the only thing preventing me from plummeting into the lake below. Hines saved my life at this point by heroically pulling me to safety. (In actuality, I really just slipped off the track but we still celebrated my survival afterwards with several Monteith’s apiece!) And to show my thanks I beat him severely at darts that evening.



The cow was blocking the path and snorting at us. Take that cow.

2) Hiking the Franz Josef Glacier. Overall, we completely lucked out with the weather in New Zealand. We dodged the rain all four days of the Milford Track Hike, for example, and even the guides commented on how rare an occurrence that was. At Franz Josef, however, New Zealand’s infamous rain finally caught up to us. The entire area was bathed in a dense fog and heavy drizzle, which pelted us throughout the hike. But even this added to the experience as the fog slowly revealed the glacier, giving it an aura of mystery as we approached. The hike took us along a river and our tour guide joked that if any of us fell in, he wasn’t coming to save us. We thought it was a joke, at least, until we got a closer look – the water was moving so fast, any rescue attempt would have been pointless. He also gave us some interesting facts about the area, including one little nugget that the area experiences an 8.0 or higher magnitude earthquake every 200 years. The last one? Mid-1700s. He also noted that seismic activity in the area has been pretty minimal recently, indicating tension is building and a powerful quake could be occurring in the near future.

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The density of the compacted ice gave it this impressive blue color

3) Hoodoos on the River – On one of our driving days, we went through the Haast Pass that had about 15 scenic points along the way. We stopped at a few to check out the sights and one of them surprised us with scores of these little rock stackings called “hoodoos”. Stacking them is a meditation exercise and, as you can see, many of their creators obviously had very clear minds.

4) Climbing Mt. Tongariro - having already conquered earth (Milford hike), water (Franz Josef) and air (bungy jump) we figured the trip wouldn't be complete without conquering fire, as well. And what better way to conquer fire than climbing Mt. Doom? (Technically, Mt. Tongariro is only NEXT TO the mountain used as Mt. Doom in the Lord of the Rings movies, but for some reason everyone referred to it as the one.) Eric and I quickly learned that fire would be the last thing that mountain represented as the conditions at the top were so cold and windy, the guides were giving hypothermia warnings. Intense fog also severely restricted our visibility - clearly "fire" was giving us a good fight! But we soldiered on, made it through steep and rocky terrain, and enjoyed beautiful scenery on our way down. Fire challenge complete.