Challenge accepted

A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine asked if I could help her out on a project by participating in a mystery challenge that I and a group of other participants would take part in. Naturally I was all in. So, one weekend the 5 of us set of to Arthur's pass where we were to complete the challenge.

We started off walking through a cave stream which was waist deep (also, quite cold...) at times and the current was strong enough that it was quite difficult to pass certain areas, but luckily we were able to help each other (which I believe was an important aspect of the project). We would stop every so often to answer questions about ourselves such as what is my dream, what would I change about my life etc. I was tasked with recalling a funny event in my life and couldn't help but share the antics of last valentines day, which was a night out I'll never forget (even though I still can't remember being put in charge of keeping a friends glasses safe...how I was tasked with it still escapes me, loosing them was inevitable). Anyway, the cave was an excellent experience, loved every minute, although perhaps next time I will consider my attire a bit more carefully, no use wearing long trousers if they're gonna get wet anyway :P 

The second part of the challenge took place above ground in Castle hill, a popular site for bouldering and rock climbing which was exactly what we were going to do. Our mission was to find a boulder that would be challenging for everyone despite our different skill levels (mine being zero since I'd never done it...). So, we set out to find the perfect boulder for this task. We finally found one that would be possible for me to climb and had a harder side for the guys. We all managed to reach the top and concluded this portion with a group photo (Niko had 10 seconds to run up and make it in time, but with a couple of practice shots this was done in the most timely manner :P)

Tasks like these require difficult training

Leap of faith

Faze 3 was a much calmer exercise only requiring some creativity and thought, but it had been a long day so we decided to regroup the following evening to finish it. The task was to take everyone's experiences which have had an impact on their lives and put them all into a story. We were split into pairs and decided to have some fun with this. Thus, our story of Dziumbulabu set in the year 3333 and how he travelled to the planet of Kanukafloria was created.

This challenge was an awesome experience and it felt great to help out a friend and to learn more about each other. Bring on more!

Abel Tasman

After a wonderful New Years eve with cocktails, night time bike rides, fireworks in the park and dancing under the stars I was ready to kick off the new year with new adventures. And what hat better way to start the new year than with one of the Great Walks of New Zealand? 

We hadn't had a plan of where to go and didn't have any bookings which is not the usual way to go about making a trip to one of the busiest tracks in NZ especially during high season, but whatcha gonna do, when there's a will there's a way and so we set off at 4am for Abel Tasman national park to walk the coastal track with its numerous beautiful beaches having booked random campsites just 5 hours prior to departure hoping they wouldn't kick us out if we decided to stay the night in a different one :P

Having missed the road to the beginning of the track we ended up starting it about 4 hours in but did not regret this decision. With the weather on our side, we had a pretty chilled day, walking from one beach to the next, relaxing, taking photos and enjoying ourselves. 

Had to make one tidal crossing at the end of the day to get to the campsite (one we actually booked :P ). We were lucky that the tide was still low enough to cross, only knee deep in a couple places. After setting up camp, we were warned of some bad weather coming through the next morning and to try to make a start before 10am as high tide is midday and we would get landlocked otherwise. Naturally we started just before then

We set off the next morning through a rain storm, as the tide was coming in. The rain was practically falling horizontally due to strong winds and picking up sand which 'gently' massaged my legs (shorts may not have been the best choice here...) causing me to fasten my pace to get past that awful area.

The next couple of hours were spent walking through the rain, which with all the fern trees felt like walking through a tropical rain forest. A good time to just let the mind wonder and keep on walking. Will have to use your imagination on how that looked, as no photos were taken by me at this point ;)

To our relief, it completely cleared up in the afternoon and so we spent our time on another beautiful beach as the tide was going down and we saw the landscape change in front of us. Another tidal crossing later we arrived at one of the largest campsites of the walk which we had no booking for, but luckily weren't checked :D

In the morning, decided we had had about enough walking and took a water taxi back to where we started, therefore missing out on a couple hours walk at each end, but doing all of the middle part of the track :) However, the day was still young, so we drove up to more gorgeous places at the top of South Island. Saw some unforgettable sites, which is lucky as again, rain stopped me from taking photos to remember them from :P.

A great start to what will hopefully prove to be a great year! More adventures coming soon ;)