Reminded me of how Teddy would sound like if he could sing.
Since we were leaving Queenstown for Mount Cook National Park the next day, we stopped by for a ride on the Shotover Jet after skiing. It was a very thrilling ride indeed! They designed these very high speed boats with jet engines that could be operated on just inches of water, and you could get VERY close to rocks and do 360 degree turns! Much more exciting than any Disneyworld ride! Our driver looked just like Gaston from the Beauty and the Beast animated movie. Gaston was the village hunk who was wooing Beauty (you know, the one with the chestful of hair!). Our driver had this perfectly chiseled face, and also this perpetual smile on his face. It was a very chilly day, and with the boat whipping along at 70 Km/hr (that's 45 Miles/hr), we were TOTALLY frozen, and we were wearing our ski outfits. Our driver was so cool that he didn't wear any hat, and when the ice-cold water drenched his face and hair, he would just wipe it casually with a towel. Totally unbelievable! After the 30 minute ride, Robert waited around to take pictures of the other jet boats while I went into the gift shop for postcards and HEAT! The lady at the counter was writing up this silly certificate for me, and must have thought that I was Japanese, considering that they get most of their business from the Japanese tourists. She told me to write my name on the pad for her, and was very relieved to see an English name. At least she wouldn't have to do calligraphy with Japanese characters. Whew!
It was such a cold day that Robert and I decided to go to dinner early and maximize our time in front of the restaurant fireplace. We picked this restaurant called Solaris. It was a very cozy place, and had two fireplaces going on the two floors. We were the first customers there. It was only 6pm. What a nice feeling it was to sit in front of the fireplace and sip Chardonnay! Our waitress was real hip and nice, and reminded us of Jo from the series Melrose Place. I wished that Singapore had nice cozy restaurants like this one!
Wednesday morning. It was time to leave Queenstown and drive to Mount Cook National Park. Mount Cook is the highest mountain in New Zealand, and the area was actually originally discovered by this thief who stole sheep and kept them in the mountains with his clever dog Friday (that was what the guidebook said anyway). We decided to drive alongside Lake Wakatipu for a ways before heading to Mount Cook, and it wasn't long before we were alone on the road. We pulled off to the side and rolled down our car windows, and just sat there in the sun listening to the birds and insects. What a life!
The Hermitage Hotel (run by the THC group) had unbelievable views from everywhere! Our room was in the new wing, and we had a great view of Mount Cook right from our window! We must have hit the low season, since the rooms were 50% off. Fine with us! In the first evening, we had dinner at the Panorama Room. Our waitress was very efficient but quite abrupt with her service. I nicknamed her Robo-waitress. Dinner was quite okay considering where we were, in the middle of nowhere! After dinner, Robert and I amused ourselves with a few games of pool. Robert did a few impressive shots, and I got lucky a few times.
We got up bright and early the next day for skiing at the Tasman Glacier. This was the biggee! Skiing at the Tasman Glacier was like nothing else that we would do, so we were told. It would be skiing on real powder on mostly 'virgin' snow. We were very fortunate with the weather as it was PERFECT for skiing. They just had fresh snow from a few days ago, and the sky was sparklingly blue and clear. Weather at Mount Cook could be very unpredictable. It could be perfectly fine, or have very high, biting winds, or it could be fogged in for days. So we decided to shell out a small fortune to try out the skiing there. It was an experience that neither of us will ever forget. First of all, I had never seen a glacier before, and now we were to ski on it!
We all gathered at the Mount Cook airport where we were to be transported by ski-planes to the top of the glacier. They decided to break us up into several groups. The other groups were all Japanese tourists except for our group of four. Another American couple, Burke and Karen, was in our group. They were expatriates living in Belgium at the moment. Our guide Dan was from Canada. What a wonderful job he has!
Our group got into this VERY small plane, and we headed off to the Glacier. It was really amazing to see the plane land on the snow! After we landed, we were supposed to carry our skis and poles and hike up to the top of the glacier to get out of the ski planes' way, and also to see the beautiful view of the Tasman Sea. Everybody huffed and puffed all the way up there, but I was really lucky. One of the other guides must have thought that I was really clumsy, and he helped me carry my skis. Hee Hee! The scenery was well worth the trip.
My guide decided to take us on the more gentle slopes on the glacier because of my skiing abilities. You were supposed to be a solid intermediate skier to be able to ski the Tasman Glacier, and I wasn't quite one yet. It was more of a ski tour. It was completely weird to ski on fresh deep powder. Our skis would sink in so deep that you couldn't see them! And once you thought that you were used to the really soft stuff, all of a sudden you would hit a spot where the wind had frozen the surface of the snow, and your skis would go whichever which way. Our guide was so good at skiing that he had complete control, but the rest of us took our turns in falling. Luckily, falling on fresh powder didn't hurt at all. I just hated getting up. Dan cautioned us to stay CLOSE to his tracks and always stay on the uphill side. This was because glaciers can be a very dangerous place as they were filled with crevasses. Some crevasses could be up to 30 feet deep, and could be covered with snow on the top. If you were not careful, you could easily fall into one of them and kill or injure yourself very badly. Gulp! Needless to say, I stayed REAL close to Dan's tracks. In spots where the slope got pretty gentle, Dan told us to ski right in his tracks to make it easier for us. But it was difficult to ski in his actual tracks, since he could ski with his legs completely together all the time while yodelling down the hill. Sick! I got smart after a while, and started skiing using the other lady Karen's tracks.
The Tasman Glacier was awesome. I couldn't think of another word to describe it. There were giant ice formations that would rise straight up from the gentle slopes of the glacier. We climbed up one of them to view the scenery from high above, and since it was too steep to climb down, we actually just sat down and slid ALL the way down. It was very scary. I screamed all the way. But it was fun in retrospect. Karen's husband somehow ended up sliding down face first. Ouch! He was covered with snow when he got down to the bottom.
After skiing for about 8 Km (5 miles), we were picked up by the ski plane and were whisked up to another part of the glacier where we had lunch. Everybody arranged their skis and poles into makeshift chairs. We stuck the skis down into the snow, and then laid the poles on the bindings. It was actually quite comfortable. Lunch was good and hearty. They had brought up hot vegetable soup, sandwiches, baked potatoes, fruit juices, LOTS of champagne, and chocolate bars. Yummy! Unfortunately, I never seemed to have an appetite when I ski. Perhaps it was nerves.
After lunch, it was time to go on another 10 Km (6 miles) run. We climbed up to this one ice cavern and went inside it. It was totally amazing. When you touch the ice walls, they felt dry and smooth like glass. Our guide Dan told us that he had actually camped in one of these ice caverns. You had to be careful in picking the right one though... some of them were not very stable at all. It was really strange to be inside one of these caverns. All the ice around us appeared blue, and it was actually warmer to be inside one of these than to stand outside (because of the wind).
While we were taking pictures later on, we witnessed an actual avalanche of snow! It came tumbling down the high mountains and hurtled to the ground. We were quite far away so it wasn't scary at all, just amazing to hear and watch. By that time, I was getting really quite tired from the skiing, but I was REALLY glad that I gathered my nerves enough to go skiing at the glacier. It was definitely an experience of a lifetime.
When we got back to the airport, I hurried into the T-shirt shop to get a couple of souvenirs. I had been wearing my ski hat all this time, so I didn't know that my hair was completely sticking up when I took it off. I looked like Bart Simpson. Of course Robert didn't tell me anything, so I walked around the shop looking like a zombie. The Japanese there in their brightly-colored matching outfits must have thought that I was a mental retard or something. But, hey, I would never meet these people again, so I didn't care.
Later that evening at dinner (this time, we dined at the Alpine Room at the hotel), I didn't even recognize Karen, the lady whom I skied with all day long! She looked so different with a nice hairdo and glasses! I guess ski hats and sunglasses really made a good disguise. I have to remember that in case I want to rob a bank in the future! We were served by Robo-waitress again, but this time, I was too tired to care. For dessert, I decided to try the orange steam pudding. It was supposed to be a very good English dessert. Well, BORING was a much better adjective for it. It was basically a warm sponge cake with hardly any taste. After dinner, Robert and I tried to play pool again. As usual, we sucked.
I actually got Robert to take me to a sheep farm the next day on our way back to Christchurch. It was actually a 'sheep show'. I couldn't believe that the guy actually started the show even though there were only Robert and I. The place was a very small family-run business. It was quite an educational show. He showed us all the different kinds of sheep, gave us all sorts of sheep farming statistics, and showed us the different kinds of wool each breed of sheep would produce. All of his sheep were really nice and tame, except for this Wild Merino sheep who just didn't like anybody. Good thing that sheep was chained up! He kept on stomping his hoof when his master was sitting nearby. One of the sheep whose wool was to produce carpets and rugs actually looked like a giant rug!
Eventually, another group of locals showed up. They had brought their Japanese exchange students with them. Now, these students acted quite unlike the stereotypical Japanese tourist. Not once did they take a picture. At the end of the show when we went on stage to pet the sheep and the farm dogs, they didn't want to participate at all. Their hosts were a bit upset about it. I thought it was rude of them not to show any interest at all.
The next part of the show was the sheep shearing. He showed us both methods of sheep shearing (machine and manual). He even showed us how to make the typical shoes that a sheep-shearer would wear. These special shoes were well padded at the toes, just in case the sheep would stomp on the shearer's toes. It was unbelievable to see how well he could handle the sheep. Once he got the sheep into position, it looked like it was paralyzed, and would just let him do whatever he wanted. The trick was to hold the sheep just right. He could simply touch a knee and the sheep would extend its leg for him to shave. He called it the 'Push-button' sheep. He then showed us how he could fool the sheep by covering its eyes with its own wool and just laid it down quietly on the floor. The average sheep would actually lay still for 2-3 minutes! Ours looked like it was hypnotized. We never knew that this was what the saying 'Pulling the wool over somebody's eyes' came from.
One of my favorite parts of the show was to see the sheep dogs in action. There were two basic breeds of sheep dogs. He had both of them. One would control the sheep by just giving them 'the evil eye'. |
