DAY SIX

(Or day sex I should say, seeing as that’s how they pronounce it in New Zealand!)

Today we went to a little suburb I suppose you could call it, of Queenstown. It was called Arrowtown and was sort of a town within Queenstown that was very pretty. It had a big English influence on it and had many pretty English cottages with big green trees and little rose gardens. It was Senior Band’s turn not to perform so while the other bands were performing, Neville and I went around and bought souvenirs in all of the little shops. Our group was actually written about in the newspaper, but because Neville and I didn’t know it was happening, we weren’t in the group photo :(

After the performances in Arrowtown, we went into the main part of Queenstown to go on a cruise on the lake. That was very beautiful because today the sun was out and shining and the water looked so pretty and so blue! It was very nice to watch the water go by as the sun shined. We got off on the other side of the lake, about 45 minutes away and went on a tour around a farm there. That was ok I guess, but I sort of found it a little boring compared to the conversations I was having with the guys.. hahaha good times :P

As far as I can remember nothing much else happened that day. We got home to our accommodation and had a wonderful dinner as usual. This time I could appreciate the view that our accommodation had because I wasn’t totally out of it. And it was such an amazing view! Because Queenstown is on a hill pretty much every house has a fantastic view because there are no houses in front of them. Our accommodation was on the side of the lake which had less houses, which meant that we got a wonderful view of the bigger part of Queenstown framed by the huge snow-capped mountains behind. The sight was even prettier as the sun was going down because all of the lights were turned on and the whole city glowed. It really was beautiful. And we got to wake up to that every morning!

Oh and I just think you should all know, when I’m older I’m going to be living in Queenstown! It’s so perfect and peaceful and I really noticed it when we got back to Brisbane because I was so used to the clear blue air of Queenstown. When you compare that to what we have in Brisbane, you almost gag with the uncleanliness of the air. Brisbane really isn’t a very nice place to be, so I’m moving to Queenstown as soon as possible because it’s so much nicer!

DAY FIVE

Another long bus trip, but this time through the mountains on the west coast to the sea and to see a place called Millford Sound. That bus trip was also absolutely stunning. This really was through Hobbit land. The scenery was pretty much exactly as in The Lord of the Rings and we even passed a few spots where it was actually filmed. Everything was so green and wet and lush, so vibrant with colour! And then we got to the mountains. Through those huge mountains that are nothing like we have in Australia. We don’t have anything that large here! They come out of nowhere to loom above you, looking dangerous and strangely beautiful at the same time. We got very close to the snow/ice here and we actually stopped at a slab of ice that came down to the edge of the road. Unfortunately though I had woken up feeling quite sick, after my sore throat had decided to migrate to my lungs, stomach and head, causing me to feel quite queasy. But I refused to let it ruin my tour and so I tried my best to ignore it. I managed to keep the contents of my stomach down for the entire trip which was a pretty good effort.

We got to Millford Sound in what seemed like a short amount of time, but then again I was just glad to be off the bus. We then got on a boat to go cruising around the magnificent inlet. Millford Sound is where the mountains meet the sea, literally. Those huge mountains just fall straight into the sea. And the sight is amazing. Funnily enough the moment I got on the boat I felt heaps better. The tables only sat six and I was last on the boat so that meant that I couldn’t fit at a table with my friends. So instead I made even more friends and sat at a table with Declan who I had briefly talked to, and Isaac, Coxy and Duncan, who I hadn’t talked to before. The waiter actually came up to us and said to me “How did you end up with all the guys?” to which I replied “I just got lucky I guess!”. They all laughed. Anyway, I took about 100 photos again of Millford Sound because it really is breathtaking. The way that it goes straight from those sharp, high snow peaks, to the green, green trees and then straight into that perfectly clear aqua water. How can anything be so perfect and picturesque?

By the time we got to our new accommodation at Queenstown I wasn’t feeling too good at all. I hated being sick. I barely made it through dinner and by the time it was eight o’clock I knew that I just had to go to bed. So I missed out on dessert (something I never do!) and was in bed asleep by 8:15pm. That meant that, added to the two hours sleep I got on the bus, I ended up getting 13hrs sleep that day. I spent more time asleep than awake! But it did the job because the next morning I was totally better! Well I had no voice, a totally blocked nose and a pretty annoying cough but at least my stomach had stopped churning and my head had stopped pounding! I could deal with the rest.

DAY FOUR

THE BUS TRIP!

Today was the eleven hour bus trip from Christchurch to Te Anau. I think a few people were dreading it a bit, spending that amount of time in a bus. I wasn’t worried though because I can sit still for long periods of time without too much hassle. Unfortunately though, I woke that morning with an incredibly sore throat. I bought some absolutely amazing sour throat lozenges which I haven’t seen in Australia but which work brilliantly. So I didn’t let my sore throat bother me too much.

That bus trip was so fun. It was the grade eleven and twelves up the back of the bus and when you’re on a bus for eleven hours, you have an awful amount of time to talk. That means getting to know each other. I’d say that day was the day where everyone really became good friends. I was already talking to quite a few grade twelves but that particular trip I became pretty good friends with Alex Borg who was sitting across the aisle from me. He is such a nice boy! He’s one of those guys who has no pretence whatsoever and is who he wants to be. That makes him come across as a bit in touch with his feminine side but it also makes him incredibly easy to talk to! I had been in the band for two years with Borg but funny enough I had never talked to him in my life. I found him really fun to be around and I ended up spending a bit of my tour time with him, which was fun.

Anyway, talking about the scenery we saw.
OH.
MY.
GOD.

I have never seen anything so beautiful! If you have watched The Lord of the Rings then you would know what I was seeing. At first it was beautiful countryside. It was still raining and seeing everything wet and green was just amazing, nothing like we have in Australia. New Zealand is much more.. extreme than Australia is. Their grass is greener, their hills are bigger, their mountains are prettier, their flowers are more colourful, their water is clearer. It’s hard to describe but it really is magic. Duncan described it perfectly actually. He said “New Zealand is like cordial. Everywhere else has its own fair share of picturesque places. But in New Zealand it’s like the cordial hasn’t been diluted with water because everywhere in New Zealand is picturesque!” That pretty much sums up how beautiful it was. Because it was still raining the clouds were low and quite often covered the tops of the hills. That made beautiful pictures. We stopped at one particular lake, I can’t actually remember what it was called, but seriously, it was natural to be that blue! Or that perfect! The water literally looked like something had been put in it because it was so unnaturally blue! And with the snow capped mountains as a background and hundreds of purple flowers growing in the foreground, it made the perfect picture. The photos that I took really don’t do it justice because it was seriously breathtaking.

We left there and started to go inland a bit. When we were inland it stopped being so overcast and started to clear up a bit. In the distance were these huge mountains that looked so majestic with their snow on the peaks. It was difficult to take photos but I don’t think I could forget how beautiful it was. The further we went, the less overcast it got until we got to Queenstown area. Here was where we started following the river in between the hills. That river would have to be the most beautiful thing. I know I keep using the word beautiful but really, everything in New Zealand can be described as being beautiful! That river was so blue! If you have seen The Lord of the Rings then picture the river at the end of the first movie and how blue and perfect it is. That’s what we were following except through different countryside, which made the river slightly thinner than what it is in the movie. But still the same colour blue. That amazing, bright, aqua sort of blue that really does look fake. But no, its real, something to do with how clear the water is which reflects the light quite a lot creating the blue colour or something like that.

We continued on through that country until we reached Te Anau late in the afternoon. By that time I was feeling quite sick from my sore throat and needed to have my own space, something which I hadn’t had all tour, always being around people all the time. So I went off for a walk around the campground which we were staying in. I found this lovely clearing in the pine trees which helped me to relax and really calm down. I got back and had a rushed dinner. Then it was off to visit the glow worm caves. They were spectacular. We got on a boat to travel across the lake and onto the other side which was the start of the caves systems. Those caves were amazing. The water gushing through them was so loud that it was impossible to hear anything. Then we got into a small boat and travelled a bit into the calmer parts to see the glow worms. They were very pretty, those blue lights just twinkling overhead. We had to be dead silent and absolutely no artificial light was allowed. So it was pitch black with nothing but the glow worms’ light.

Afterwards we got back and fell asleep pretty quickly considering that it was 11:30 at night. The glow worms kept us up late!

DAY THREE

This day the buses took us on a tour around the Christchurch area out to the coast and then inland a bit. Once again, it was just so pretty! It was very cold that day, probably the coldest day of the whole tour. And raining still. But it was ok because we were all sort of used to it by then. The coast of New Zealand was nothing like our coasts. It’s basically the sea, then a small beach and then the land goes straight into hills. It’s quite odd to see all of the houses propped up on stilts hanging off the steep cliff-hills. It’s actually really funny because the land is so steep that the houses’ garages must be at the bottom of the hill with the house about 500m up because the cars wouldn’t be able to drive up. This means that the only way to get into your house is to walk up a path on about a 20% gradient hill for half a kilometre! Haha no wonder those New Zealanders are so fit! Not really but still.

After we had gone for a bit along the coast we went inland for a bit. And here was where we saw our first sheep! They were eating grass in the hills, a whole heap of them, all very fluffy. It was very funny because when we all spotted it we got so excited! And then the bus driver made a comment saying “Geese, I thought only New Zealanders got excited when they saw sheep!” Obviously he didn’t realise that we were only excited because finally, in the land of sheep, we had spotted some! And of course we have to get plenty of photos of the sheep in New Zealand!

The scenery in the hills was very nice, especially with the rainy backdrop that really just competed the picture. We then drove back into Christchurch town in time to play a 1pm concert in the Cathedral. That performance really was magical. The sound echoed around the beautiful old building and just filled it up with lovely music. The sound lingered in the air for a few seconds after being played which created a wonderful echoie sound. We then went back to the accommodation and had dinner as usual. All the while everyone is becoming closer friends and meeting those who they hadn’t talked to before. My girls and I tended to hang around with the grade eleven and twelve guys with the occasional grade twelve girl thrown in. But that was a group of about 30 people so we were often in smaller groups. But still, I had hardly talked to any of the people who I was now hanging out with. That’s what I love on tour, how everyone becomes such good friends :)

DAY TWO

We woke up nice and early for breakfast at eight. We were all still sort of on Queensland time so this was actually five in the morning for us. We left about nine to go into the “city” or Christchurch and go around the Museum/Botanical Gardens until our performance at 2pm. This was very nice and it was a good way to be introduced to New Zealand. The place that we went to was an old University that was later converted into a Museum. And for those chemistry nerds out there, that university was the place where Rutherford conducted his experiments using the cathode ray! And we even went into the “den” where he did all of his research! Pretty exciting I know! Anyway, the place was so beautiful (and cold!) and I got plenty of photos. We didn’t really go around the museum much because it kinda wasn’t our thing but we walked around the surrounding streets which were very nice and tried to get used to using the strange New Zealand money which looked fake and could seriously pass as monopoly money! The little stalls were pretty cute and there was a good fudge shop which we all bought some good fudge from. Today was the day where we all started to get to know each other a bit (I’m talking about the people who we didn’t talk to previously i.e the guys in our grade and grade twelve and the other grade twelves. They were the people who we hang out with most of the tour.) After lunch Brooke and I went over to see the Botanical Gardens. My God. They were just so beautiful! Everything was so lush and green and perfect! They had the English style to them which was very nice and made great pictures! I seriously couldn’t get over how lovely that place looked! I swear I took about 100 photos that day.

Our concert went great; we played in a beautiful little courtyard underneath a big green tree to a smallish but welcoming audience. Considering that none of us could actually feel out fingers because it was that cold (and the cold also affects how in tune your instrument is!) and that we were outside compared to normally being inside, we played pretty well. As far as I remember there was no huge mishaps and I think the crowd didn’t notice the minor mistakes if there were any. Pack up was good, everyone helped and got it done quickly. We went back to our rooms and talked until dinner, which was once again good. We got to bed at a reasonable time because Neville was arriving that night at about one-ish. Her and I were supposed to be sharing a bed so I knew I was going to wake up when she got in. I was right. To be honest I had been hanging out for her coming because although I am friends with the other girls, I was the closest to Neville out of them all and I sort of felt a bit lonely without her. So when she came I was pretty happy and also half asleep and from what I remember how I greeted her showed that I wasn’t properly awake.. haha but it was good and I fell back asleep pretty much straight away.

DAY ONE

I woke up at 4:45am so that I could be ready in time to be at the airport at 6:00am. I finished packing my bag at about quarter past five only dad came in a “weighed” my suitcase to see if it was under the 14kg limit. He decided that it wasn’t (we don’t own scales in out house) and I agreed with him so I took all of my clothes out of that suitcase and put them in a bag without wheels which technically should have been lighter. So I was all set, had packed absolutely anything that I may have a chance of needing in another country and I went to the airport pretty much totally high because I was so excited! Got to the airport and checked in. Turned out that I could have taken my bigger and easier to carry suitcase because my bag only came to 12kg! I was pretty pissed off at that. I had to wait around for a bit between checking in and going through customs because our plane flight wasn’t for another hour. So I just sat with mum and dad and talked non stop. Finally it came time to say goodbye. I didn’t want to say goodbye because I'm really not very good with the emotional stuff so I ended up saying quick goodbyes about five times because I didn’t want to leave them. But I did and I GOT TO GO DOWN THE STAIRS! Most people don’t know what I’m talking about here but every year I go to the airport to say goodbye to Grandmama going back to Hong Kong. And she has to go down the stairs into customs that we are never allowed down because we’re not boarding the plane. But this time I got to go down the stairs while my parents stayed up the top! It was very exciting :)

I got through customs fine but the whole time I was semi-freaking out because I didn’t really know what I had to do and I was worried I would be pulled up for doing something wrong i.e. not putting all my liquids in the zip lock bag, or having the wrong things in my luggage. Good thing I had AJ with me because otherwise I would have had no idea whatsoever on what to do! I got through safely (phew!), waved one final goodbye to mum and dad up the top and boarded the plane. I sat next to AJ with a window sit which was of course directly behind the wing :( The plane flight was average I guess, probably because I have been on four plane flights in two years so I'm sort of used to it. But I was still pretty exciting! The sea was boring of course (its so flat!) but when we got in view of New Zealand it was amazing! Almost the entire west coast of the South Island is mountains, called the Southern Ranges or something like that. So the first glimpse we got of New Zealand was these huge mountain ranges. Now I’ve been to the Snowies in Australia but seriously, next to New Zealand’s mountains, those Snowies look like hills. The mountains of New Zealand are tall and jagged and capped with snow. They are totally free of any hint of human life; they consist of just rocks, trees and snow. And that’s it. No roads, no houses, no nothing. And there is so many of them! In Australia we have maybe two or three big “mountains” next to each other, but in New Zealand there is heaps of them all just sitting there! They really are so beautiful.

Anyway, we arrived in Christchurch and it was raining. And it was cold. I’m talking 7°C sort of cold. Which is cold. We loaded up the buses which took about an hour, the entire time of which was spent outside with a thin cardigan on in the cold. But I liked the cold because it reminded me that I was in a different country, because there was no way that Brisbane could ever have these temperatures in summer! We drove through Christchurch to our accommodation, which was quite nice! Christchurch has a big English influence on it so a lot of the houses were old English style. They were quite pretty. Christchurch is totally flat. It was built on swampy ground and that meant that there are absolutely no hills whatsoever anywhere in Christchurch. It was a little odd at first actually. And I would say that the tallest building in Christchurch would be no higher than about six floors. They don’t actually have a city as such like we have in Brisbane. And there isn’t much residential estates either. All in all, Christchurch is pretty small compared to Brisbane. Keep in mind that the entire population of New Zealand equals to that of the population of Sydney alone. So New Zealand is small. So anyway, our accommodation was very nice with about five people to a room. I was with AJ, Camilla, Renata, and Neville when she came two days later. Everyone sort of didn’t really know each other then but we all felt part of the group and we were all excited to be in New Zealand finally! Dinner was good, cooked by the teachers like every dinner on tour. I was on cleanup duty and let me tell you, washing up 90 plates by hand is not fun! We went to bed with the heater on full blast and got a good night’s sleep.

And in the beginning..

I’m back.

Back in shitty, stinky, hot, sweaty, smelly, dirty Brisbane.
Because it really does seem so after amazing New Zealand.

So I'm still in the clothes I wore on the plain; still smell like non-showered-ness; still have the New Zealand dust on me; still “feel” like New Zealand. And although my body is telling me that it is in fact five to twelve instead of the five to nine that it really is I am going to write this blog now while everything is still fresh in my mind. Because I’m scared that the moment I fall asleep, the last ten days will seem like nothing but a dream. And I know that pretty much all of my friends want to here about my trip so here goes the longest blog yet! I’ve actually decided to post each day as a different post so that it’s not just one huge block of writing.

I’m sorry if you find it boring and I certainly don’t expect you to read it all – its some seven and a half thousand words long! :S But just like with everything I write on this blog I wrote it for me to write not because I want you to read it! I mean you can still read it I don’t really mind. My point is that I don’t care if you read it or not, because I know that I’ve written it :)

ENJOY THE STORIES OF MY TRAVELS!
And my pictures! Would you believe I took 791 photos?!