Wino forever.

Since starting a new entry with a song is so cool:

“Are you ready for the time of your life?!”

          Slipknot – Vendetta

Ok, hold on to your hats, here we go! First lets do some summary: Ive been on the road for 9 weeks this Sunday. I can honestly say, I haven’t had a bad day since leaving Finland. I’ve had 2 invitations to Australia and 1 to Thailand, including a place to stay. I’ve gathered some ideas on how to live my life back in Finland. And the most drastic change is the decision to take on studying again and applying for university, there it’s no secret no more. Obviosly met some lovely people and had some good times and great memories.

You must be curious whats been happening since I last made an entry. Last entry was in Taupo after the Crossing, we were exhausted the day after, but still decided to go for a walk to Huka falls. What was supposed to be a nice evening stroll turned out to be bit of a hike but well worth the efford. First of all Huka falls is freaking crazy and second of all there was a hot stream with some ladies bathing in it on our way back. Volcanic soil can do some amazing things, you cant imagine how hot the water was.

We left Taupo to head to Wellington just for one night. We booked a hostel beforehand. To our joy, there was a slight booking mistake on their part, and instead of a 6 bed dorm we ended up having a private double room ensuite, which wasnt bad at all. Next morning was once again an early one, we made our way through wind and rain to ferry terminal. The 3 hour ferry ride wasn’t most enjoyable since food was too damn expensive and we were both starving. After 3 hours of torture we were in Picton and it was pouring outside. After some waiting we decided to go for it and headed to the city center for some Subway and some groceries, well worth it! A slight setback occured later on, because Eero forgot his mp3 player’s recharge cord to the ferry terminal.

Nelson was our next destination. After few hours of waiting a bus driver, who turned out to be a mad man, arrived. Two hour busride to Nelson was pure madness because of the way this guy drove. We still got to our destination safe and all was good again. We had booked YHA hostel from Nelson, and it turned out to be a good choice, with ping pong tables and a sweet kitchen. We also got to watch a movie that evening, super inspiring Into the Wild, which I recommend to you all. We decided to stay one full day in Nelson, and took a walk uphill to the Center of New Zealand, after that we just walked around town.

It was time to leave Nelson and retreat to Golden Bay’s silence. Again our busride was really early, our destination was a town called Collingwood (pop. 250). Every busride I’ve taken here has been really well organized, and so was this one, even though there were 3 changes. From Collingwood we were picked up by the owner of the camp site we would spend 7 days. Puponga was even smaller than Collingwood, oh the peace and quiet, it was awesome! First night was misty to say the least but we went for a walk along Farewell spit and a nearby beach, just a small glimpse of what was to come. The wind was crazy up there every day, but we didnt really care. 2nd day there was all about chilling, and that we did. Though in the evening we went to see the seals on a beach about 5 minutes walk away. Wild seals, WILD FREAKING SEALS on you doorstep! On our 3rd day we borrowed some bikes (munamankeleita molemmat) and rode to the nearest shop 8 kilometers away. Other than that we just took it easy, did some laundry and chilled. Some of the nights were also cold, and our night fashion included fleece jackets, double socks, wool hats etc. On the 4th day we were supposed to go for a long trek, but the weather was a bit lousy, so we decided to postpone it and just chilled again . On the 5th day we finally did the Hilltop Walk to Wharariki beach. It was about 3,5 hours to the beach in the strongest wind Ive ever seen anywhere! The beach was desertlike but beautiful. We had some lunch in a cave on the beach and then headed home. 6th day was chilling again, Eero’s antibiotics ran out so we celebrated with some red wine. On our last day we went for a walk again, to a beach called the Fossil point, and further along the Spit. Once again in one of the strongest winds ever. Crazy! Today we left Puponga, which already felt like home. One of the best places in the world, easily! Now we are back in Nelson, preparing for our last hectic weeks.

Tomorrow we’ll head back to Picton for one night. On Sunday Aino (Eero’s sister) will arrive in Picton and we’ll pick up our rental car. Its gonna be hectic I tell you, HECTIC! Stay tuned! Oh and the name of the entry is really random, maybe some of you will catch on to it.

PS. Some pictures will follow, since the computer Im on is too retarded.

Oode to Ville Peltonen

Its been a while again. And lots and lots has happened. We’ve started a new religion based on Ville Peltonen’s smile. But more about that a bit later. Last few days in Mangawhai were productive, and we even went to eat in a restaurant which was nice. On Wednesday Ngaire dropped me off to Auckland, where I had a touristy day to say the least. Just walked up and down on Queen Street, visited the national museum and stuff like that. Stayed on a pretty fine hostel for the night. Eero finally arrived on Thursday morning. I went to wait for him at a bus stop, but he decided to drop off on another bus stop and we spent half and hour searching for each other. Note to self: dont use clock towers as landmarks because there might be 10 of ‘em on the area. We spent few hours in Auckland sipping coffee, eating kebab and being lost in shopping malls.

Our next stop was Rotorua. We found a camping ground pretty close to city center, and set up our tent there. The camping site had nice facilities and was overall pretty cousy. First night on Thursday was supposed to be pretty mellow, but we ended up buying some wine, and you know how it goes. Met some local guys who served us with some rhum-coke. Well, they ended up evicted and we ended up sleeping in our tent. Friday was a rainy day, so we just hung out on the camping site, in the evening we went to do some shopping and stuff. Later on the evening we decided to go chech the local night life, which ended up being a crucial mistake, on the other hand not that much.

On our way back a chain between two poles got me and after that it was face vs concrete. You can quess the outcome of that one. Chipped a few tooth in the spirit of Ville Peltonen. Also got my face bruised a bit. We got a ride in a police car to the hospital where we spent the night. We were supposed to leave to Turangi, but the only available dentist was in Taupo, so we took a bus to Taupo village, which turned out to be a blessing. The dentist was awesome, even picked us up from the bus stop. The ACC system (dont ask) in NZ paid all my costs so that was all good. After I got my teeth back we went to the tourist information point. Earlier on we heard that the Tongariro Crossing -trek in Tongariro National Park was closed, but the nice lady in info point told us we have a few day opening. We booked ourselves for a trek on Sunday and were thrilled!! After leaving the IP we just wandered around, since we had no place to stay for the night. We found the local BASE hostel and booked ourselves in for 3 nights. This is freaking luxorious, let me tell you.

Yesterday we got up 5am, got some soup and bread for breakfast and went to the pick up point. Bus ride to the starting point in Tongariro was about an hour, and it was raining most of the time. We started the trek at around 8am. And overall it was awesome! There was snow and we even got some snow showers up there. We also went to a side trek to Mt. Tongariro summit. I didnt go all the way up, Eero summited the mountain. I was about 30 meters from the peak, but Im content. I cant tell you how cool the trek was, so I just show you some pictures from there soon. Last 7km’s it was snowing, then raining, then snowing again, and we were pretty much soaked. Obviously last night we slept really good, today is a lazy day, and tomorrow we’re leaving to Golden Bay to “release our inner hippies”. Cant wait. Stay tuned!

 

 

Rock lobster!

It’s time for a big update again. Since starting with a piece of a song was so fun, and some of you might be feeling a bit down with the minus temperature and the sleet. Here is a little piece, that helped me get through hard time:

We were at the beach / Everybody had matching towels / Somebody went under the dock / And there they saw a rock / But it wasn’t a rock / It was a ROCK LOBSTER!

- Peter Griffin (B52′s)

Ok, enough Family Guy references. But few honorary mentions for the music section since I completely forgot few bands last time I wrote about my favorite past time. Hidria Spacefolk’s astro rhytms and Von Hertzen Brother’s almost progressive rock deserves a mention. Also Lightman has been a huge success among everyone I’ve met so far. Haven’t heard much sports news while being here, but UFC 88 was a few weeks ago. I read the results online and was a bit surprised. Chuck Liddell got knocked the f’ out on the 2nd round by Evans. Pretty sweet knockout to say the least, since I got to see it online later on. Waiting for the Leben – Bisbing bout at UFC 89. Enough for MMA, since I don’t think anyone reading this is interested in it. Some more miscellaneous chitchat. Martti Ahtisaari got his well deserved Nobel peace price at last. That was a delight to hear. Economic crisis is obviously baaaaad, and makes me a sad panda. But I don’t want to put any toughts on that one while Im here.

On to other matters at hand. Whats been happening you ask. Its been a busy week. We’ve got heaps and heaps of stuff done, including a cattleyard and some gates to it, planting the orchard and shertering most of the trees plus much more. Its nice to see your accomplishments . We’ve also had some fun times, Jim’s stepsister from Australia came to visit with his husband. We went for a local 1 hour trek in the forest, and even spotted a native wood pidgeon, which are hard to photograph. I managed to snap few sweet photos of the bird, which you will see at the end of this post. From the forest we went for a little beach walk and from the beach we went on to Smashed Pipi (a local restaurant, good enough to have a honorary mention in the Lonlely planet) for some beers, pool and pizza. Overall a fantastic night.

On Friday me and Jim walked on top of a nearby hill which has an awesome view over both coasts and all the way up north to Whangarei. Photos from this trip included also. We’ve also played some tennis, Thursday night was the regular tennis club night, and I got to play few games of doubles, nice as always. We’ve also been playing some singles with both Ngaire and Jim. Yesterday we went for a birthday lunch at Ngaire’s sister’s Cathy. The lunch was fantastic, sun was shining, but still the whole situation was a bit awkward since everyone else seems to have loads of catching up to do, on the other hand I sit there my mouth shut. Atleast I got myself sunburned. After lunch we headed to nearby beach at Waipu Cove since the weather was too good to miss. Thats most of what has been happening, but what will be happening from now on is far more important!

Eero has successfully managed to leave Finland behind, and should be in Hong Kong soon. Thursday morning we’ll finally meet up at Auckland ferry terminal. Months and months of planning will finally come true, it feels awesome! My plan before that will play out like this: Today and tomorrow there will be some more work to do etc. Wednesday Ngaire will be heading down to Auckland and of course I will be able to hitch a ride with her. On our way down we will stop at Ngaire’s other sister, who owns a restaurant, for lunch. Ngaire will drop me down to a hostel I have booked from central Auckland. Decided to go for a bit more expensive single room for one night, because rest of the next month will be on budget and probably using out tent quite a bit. Before spending a night in Auckland I got a few tips on where to visit in Auckland. Depending on the price I will or wont visit the top of Sky Tower, which obviously would have spectacular views about 50miles to every direction. Also some art galleries and Auckland Museum are said to be worth a visit. So one touristy day in Auckland ahead!

Thursday, around midday, we’ll take a bus to Rotorua which will be our first destination. From Rotorua to Tongariro National Park to do some trekking and check the famous Mt. Doom. From Tongariro to Golden Bay to do some chillin’. And so forth. Ill keep you posted as best as I can. On the same bat channel, definately not on the same bat time! Stay tuned!

It been a while

I miss my newfound friends / We were a family for a short time / Learning from life together

- The Impossible Shapes – Infinity’s Lips

Dedicated to Lin and Graeme in Kerikeri. Yep, its been over a week, I know. Lets talk some music first, since listening to music has been the most popular past time on this trip. I’ve been introduces to lots and lots of new artists/bands which is only good. Swedish music is a reason to forgive almost all those ice hockey games during last ten years. 70′s was the golden age of music and the guys behind Circle are musical gods. There, some random thoughts I’ve gathered so far. Oh, and Interpol is the band when talking about modern rock. Also remember the name didier Labbe octet while Im on the subject.

Leaving Kerikeri

Nick Cage is one of the best actors around btw, though he makes crap movies. Sunday was our tourist day as I might have mentioned. We went south to Bay of Islands. Visited Paihia and the Maori treaty grounds in Waitangi. It was a cool but exhausting day . Monday Chris left us and me and Linette made a path between the two clearings in the jungle. It turned out to be awesome, and I have a video which Im gonna post to Youtube pretty soon if its possible. Tuesday was all about chilling and preparing for a big last day in Kerikeri. I watched some movies and took it easy. On Wednesday we went to this small beach during sunrise, collected some seaweed for the garden and took a dip to the ocean! It was more than awesome. After the morning refreshment we ate some breakfast and the rest of the day we were on the move, driving around picking up stuff etc. Graeme also took us to central Kerikeri to have a look. There was not much there obviously, but I managed to found Terry Pratchett’s Fifth Elephant to entertain me for the next couple of weeks.

Back to Mangawhai

Thursday was a sad day and a happy day. It was sort of sad to leave Kerikeri but it was nice to head to a new place, which I knew to be terrific. I visited Ngaire and Jim briefly, when I was staying with Craig, to see their place and get to know what the work was gonna be like. My bus left Kerikeri at 7.30am and all the way to Paihia I was the only passenger in the whole huge bus. The bus driver was really nice and we had a good chat until other people filled the bus in Paihia. Ngaire picked me up from Kaiwaka 10.30am. We started planting a few trees to their soon to be orchard but Thursday was mainly laid back. Thursday was also my mother’s birthday, so once more: Happy Birthday Mom!

On Friday Jim had some business elsewhere, meanwhile me and Ngaire worked on the orchard and planted around 20 trees there. Got it all done which was awesome! On Saturday we did some work at Ngaire’s raised bed gardens, cut down some bamboos to build wind shelters for the newly planted trees. In the evening Ngaire’s mother, sister and her sisters husband came to have dinner with us. It was a calm evening and we had the dinner outside by the fire. I think the vegetarian died was good for the two weeks, but Im back eating meat and having beer, which is all good . On Sunday we were all pretty tired, but worked as long as we could.

Oh and its raining again, loud on your car like bullets on tin

Moby is also a genius. Today I woke up to the sound of rain, I hope its not gonna rain much. Soon me and Ngaire are gonna go play some tennis(!) and in the afternoon we’ll plant some stuff in the garden. The forecast for tomorrow is rainrain, so we’ll see what we come up with.

Next Sunday my partner in crime is gonna leave Finland! Have an excellent flight and a good time in Hong Kong mate, we’ll be in touch and Ill see you very very soon!