I Know It's Been a While...

... since I last wrote but I've been out of commission. I spent some time in the hospital recently to have a dangerous mole removed from my penis. That's the last time I'm shagging one of those! Ha ha ha!!!

Sorry, I couldn't resist that one. My buddy Zack told it to me. That's the kind of shit you get into when you spend 9 days with someone camping across Southern Australia. But more on that later.

Pictures here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/whnFxFLqRzz239zHA

Last time I wrote I was heading for Alice Springs, smack in the middle of Australia. As the plane descended into "The Alice" the first thing that came to my mind was Needles, California. The only reason I even know about Needles is because it's in the middle of freakin' nowhere. That pretty much sums up Alice Springs as well. It's like being in the middle of Death Valley, except everything is red. I was only there one day before my Uluru tour, so besides enjoying the 100+ degree desert heat I didn't do much. The next day I headed out at 5 AM for a 3-day trip around the red center's most famous natural landmarks: Uluru (Ayers Rock), Kata Tjuta (The Olgas), and Kings Canyon. I have never seen as many sunrises cumulatively in my lifetime as I have the last three weeks. These camping tour guides are like freakin drill sergeants. Our guide was a French expat named David. Most of the three days was spent driving because everything was so damned far away. There were about 20 people on this trip and it's the most Americans I've seen thus far: 6 exchange students on holiday from the University of Queensland. Anyway, probably most of you have seen Uluru from postcards or pictures or whatever, but it's an impressive sight to behold in person. I have to admit that the first thing I thought of when I saw it was that it looked like a giant nipple. I guess if the whole of Australia was a big breast, Uluru could be the nipple. It's right there in the middle, it's round, flat, and reddish brown. Come on, admit it. I could work for the Australian tourism bureau. Anyway, I didn't climb to the top because The Rock is sacred to the three local Aboriginal tribes and they ask that you don't climb it. Since it's controlled by the Australian government, however, you are still allowed to climb.
Three people from the group went ahead and climbed it anyway and the rest of us went on a base walk with David. He's really in with the local Aboriginals so he showed us some of the drawings in the rock, what they meant, and taught us some words in the local dialect. At night we camped out in swags, which are these kind of tent/mattress hybrids made for one person. Like I said earlier, up at 5 the next morning to catch the sunrise at Kata Tjuta. It's a good call for a few reasons: sunrises on these monoliths are spectacular, you beat the crowds from the countless other tours, and you don't get beaten down by the ridiculous desert heat. At sunrise, the rock looks so RED. I had to go up and touch it to make sure it didn't rub off. It's because the rocks have a high ferrous content that makes them more red than normal rock. The number one thing I'll remember from the red center, though, is how beautiful the sky was. You really never hear about that, but it's awesome. It's the biggest sky I've ever seen as you can see the horizon in all directions, and it's a beautiful blue with fluffy flat-bottomed clouds stretching as far as the eye can see. Stunning. The number two thing I'll remember about the red center are all the damned flies. It was unbelievable. Once the sun came up, they swarmed all over you. There was no defense for it. And they were ballsy flies too, not the type that'll go away after just a wave of the hand. I have a picture of my back just covered with the freakin things.

I stayed a couple of days in Alice Springs before taking the Ghan train ride down to Adelaide. If you ever go to Australia, make sure you minimize your time in Alice Springs. There is nothing to do there. The only entertainment I got was from listening to the stories of my roommates in what was possibly the shittiest hostel in Australia. My roommates were a Scottish guy, a Dutch guy, and two Irish girls who were traveling together but had run out of money in Alice Springs. They were working odd jobs to save up to get out of there. The Scottish guy was complaining to me that they were having trouble saving money and it was taking them a long time. Well, maybe if you didn't go through two cases of beer and 5 packs of cigarettes a day you might be able to save a little more you dumbshit. They also decided that the room's kitchen was their personal area so there was some rice and pasta of indeterminate age in the sink that didn't get cleaned the whole time I was there.

I was glad to get moving to Adelaide. The train ride was uneventful. I helped an old lady with her crossword puzzles. That was the highlight. Adelaide was a cool city though. It has a compact city center that is easy to walk around. The hostel I stayed at was run by these two old dudes who served free ice cream and apple pie every evening at 8. There'd be a scrum every night when the apple pie was served... it was like a bunch of little kids. Good pie though. I did a day tour of the Barrossa Valley which is one of the best wine producing regions of Australia. The trip was cool, although as you'd expect there were a couple of poseurs on there who thought they knew everything about wine. They were the ones who ended up passed out on the bus at the end of the day. Our guide Matt has a master's in viticulture and his family owns a vineyard in the valley. It was a really good value as we ended up tasting about 25 different wines. Plus, there was barbecued kangaroo for lunch.
Mmmm.

I don't know where to begin to describe my 9-day camping trip from Adelaide to Perth across the Nullarbor plain, so maybe I'll use bullet points or something.
-There were ten people on the tour: 4 English, 2 Irish, 1 German, 1 Japanese, 1 Swiss, and me.
-Our guide, Jake, looked a lot like Kit. He was tall, gangly, and loped instead of walking. He loves the outdoors, though, and he's a vegan, so maybe he's more like a bizarro version of Kit.
-We travelled a total of 4040 Kilometers, so there was a lot of bus time.
-The natural sights were something incredible to behold. The Great Australian Bight looked like it was a painting. We went swimming in a lake that was in a cave below the Nullarbor plain. We stayed a day and a half at LeGrand national park which had some of the most beautiful white sand beaches I've ever seen. The sand contained so much silica that it squeaked when you walked on it. We got to drive through an area where the rangers were doing a controlled burn at night which was wicked cool. I have shitloads of great pictures.
-The German girl was insane. First, on day 2, she took off her top and tried to flag down an 18-wheeler.
Day 6 she was skinny dipping in the underground lake.
By day 8 she stripped down completely naked at a truck stop because it had a gag sign that said Nudist Crossing and she wanted her picture taken in front of it.
-I mooned truckers twice. The first time was from the front seat of the bus and it was just me. I kind of got into it and was dubbed "the ass slapper" for the rest of the trip. Hey, if you're going to do it, have a good time no? The second time Jake told the truckers on the radio that the German was going to flash them as we drove by, but instead all the guys stuck pulled their pants down and slapped their asses as we went by the trucks. They told me they were just following my example. The truckers were not amused.
-We met an old English ex-biker who's crossing the Nullarbor on a horse and cart with his dog. He fancies himself a "bush poet" and recited some of his poetry for us. It was filthy. I bought one.
-One of the English girls, Sarah, all she did was eat.
She always shoved her way to the front of the food line and didn't lift a hand to help with anything. I dubbed her Ms. Pac Man. Waka waka!
-Bush camping is a really interesting experience. The sunrises are unreal because there's nothing but landscape around you. The worst part is having to take a crap in a dug up hole. Jake insisted that we do everything in the hole because it's less disruptive to the environment. The hole took on a life of its own. After a while, we had some pretty good running jokes about what you're supposed to do in the hole.
-I made really good friends with an English dude named Zack and an Irish couple Ronan and Roisin. We're all staying together at a hostel in Perth. We drank many cases of Tooheys on the trip and probably know more about each other than we should. Zack and Ronan call me The Beast, which is better than ass slapper. Anyway, I've got a place to stay in Leicester, Dublin, and Galway if I need it. Sweet as.
-Zack is a machine. We went up this mountain that was supposed to be a three hour return climb. The rest of us stopped about halfway and then headed back down because we only had an hour and a half to do it. Zack came back fifteen minutes late. He had made it all the way up the mountain and back, met some girls from a tour group, and arranged for us to meet them at a bar in Perth on Saturday night.
-I have a newfound appreciation for the mighty wombat.

I'm sure there's loads of stuff that I'm forgetting but this message is already long enough. I have some unbelievable pictures from this trip which I will definitely post when I get back. Hope everyone's doing well. I'll be in Perth a few more days so I'll try to respond to your messages if I haven't yet.

As always, the dude abides.
Dave

How I Almost Won 500 Bucks

Hi everyone,

Pictures here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/Bh5ZtvphQ3wbTb8H9

When I last wrote you I had just arrived in Airlie Beach, Queensland, which is the northeastern part of Australia. I was there barely one night before I left for a 3-day, 2-night sailing trip around the Whitsunday Islands. Although, the night I was there I somehow ran into Lior again and we went out for a couple of beers. One of the bars called Magnum's had female jelly wrestling that night, so of course we had to stick around for that. Let me tell you something... women can be vicious when they're wrestling in jelly for cold hard cash.

I have to say that the sail was one of the highlights of my trip so far. I've really enjoyed, both in NZ and here, the opportunities to get out amongst nature and enjoy some of the things that make a country unique much more than my time in the cities. The sailboat was called the Ragamuffin II, a 56-foot sloop that used to be used for racing. The captain went by the name Splash, and the assistant was a Kiwi named Craig. There were only 10 of us on the boat which was great because there was plenty of room to roam. There was plenty of snorkelling to be done as the coral was very shallow and the marine life extremely abundant. We had to wear these body suits to protect us from the box jellyfish which are about the size of your pinky fingernail but have a lethal dose of venom. I didn't mind so much, except on the first day the suit I wore irritated my skin for some reason. When I came out of the water and took off the suit I had some sort of crazy rash all over my body. Not only that but my hands had swollen up to like twice their normal size.
I looked like I could've been Woods' brother with these thick stumpy fingers. I was very concerned that I wouldn't be able to get my hands around a beer can, but luckily the swelling went down by the evening. I think I was the only one who didn't have any problems getting to sleep, as I found the rocking and the sound of the waves soothing. Hey, I'm a Viareggino, we have salt water in our veins. The next day we headed to Whitehaven beach where the sand is 99% silica. This is supposed to make it extremely bright and white in the sunshine, which I couldn't verify for you because it was raining all morning. Luckily, by the afternoon things cleared up as we were sailing to another harbor. For those of you who've never been on a sailboat, it's bitchin' when the boat is angling at like 45 degrees down into the water and you're cruising along. We snorkelled again that afternoon (different stinger suit) and I found myself among a school of what looked like transparent sardines.
There were like 200 of them. I chased them around for like 5 minutes... they'd all change course at once to try and avoid me. The next day Splash took us to this resort island called South Molle Island. 5 of us went and played a round of golf at the 9 hole course they had on the island. I've never played golf before with no shirt and no shoes. Judge Smails would've slapped an injunction on me.

They reserved a table for us that night at Magnum's so we all got together for pizza and beers. For 40 bucks Aus we got 4 large pizzas and two pitchers! Anyway, this night they were having a pole dancing competition so I told everybody that if I entered it I would win. Of course, I didn't think they allowed dudes to enter. I mean, who wants to see a guy pole dancing? Well, apparently the folks at Magnum's do. It was too late to back out at this point, and besides they were offering $500 to the winner. Plus, you all know that I'm an exhibitionist at heart, so what the hell. The whole team from Ragamuffin II was there so I had my own cheering section and they also helped me out with my dance strategy. So around 10:30 I was whisked away to the VIP area of the bar where I was given free champagne along with the other contestants. I was the only guy in the competition, of course. So the time comes for them to call us down and I'm sitting there on this stairwell waiting for the competition to start. All the girls were so nervous but to me it was no big deal. I figure the worse that could happen would be that I look like a jackass, but a) I'm leaving tomorrow and b) I could win 500 bucks. So one girl goes first and does a passable dancing routine.
My number is called next. I wanted to go last so as I could leave a lasting impression with the audience, but that's the way it goes. There were about 200 people in the bar and I couldn't even tell you what music they played for me. I decided I was going to pull out all the stops so I charged in there and started workin' that pole baby! But when you're going for money, you've got to go for the gold, so I started losing clothes. First, my t-shirt went flying into the audience. Next, the pants exited stage left so I was dancing around in my red Calvin Klein boxers. But I knew that it wouldn't be enough to ice first place, so I had a secret weapon. One of the guys from the boat by the name of Chris gave me some props to use while I was dancing. First, I had a pair of illuminated devil horns that I was wearing on my head. But the big guns had to come out for the grand finale. I whipped off my Calvins and bam! Unleashed the tiger print g-string! I didn't ask Chris why he had a tiger print g-string to loan me. For some reason, it just made sense. The cool thing about it was that it had some kind of electronic speaker built in so that when you squeezed it growled. But you couldn't really hear it onstage, unfortunately.
Anyway, I'm sitting there waving my boxer shorts over my head in a g-string and I'm thinking I've got this competition nailed. They did the voting by who got cheered the loudest and I actually came in a respectable 3rd place. But let me tell you why dudes will never win pole dancing competitions. (I can't believe I just typed that last sentence). First of all, you're competing against women named Jasmine and Bambi (no joke, they're the ones who beat me). I should've told them my name was Amber. Second, no guys are going to cheer for another guy when he's pole dancing, especially if he's wearing a tiger print g-string. So you've got only 50% of the audience at most. Lastly, two words: fake boobs. Hey, I would've voted for Bambi too. The cool part was that I became some kind of minor celebrity that night. I had people coming up to me saying they thought I should've won, I got the loudest cheers, etc. One of the boat crew took some pictures for me, although he didn't take any when I was in my g-string (thankfully). Another guy actually videotaped the whole thing so I expect it to be up on the internet any day now (so much for my presidential aspirations). I keep having flashbacks to that night when I'm trying to go to sleep.

After the pole dancing incident I quickly left town and headed to Cairns. Cairns is very touristy, I would come to find out. There's souvenir shops, restaurants, cafes, bars, and tourist agencies lining just about every street. To be honest with you, I didn't like the city so much because it doesn't seem to have much character. It seems like a lot of people, especially backpackers, just go there to get hammered and hang out on the lagoon during the day. Still, I was there to get my open water scuba certification, which turned out to be awesome. There were two days of training in the classroom and pool. My instructor was a guy named Steve who used to work in the UK as a fluid dynamics engineer for Williams' formula 1 team. He's also a karate instructor, but we just called him Scuba Steve. I loved every second of it, even the pool time, but the real excitement came on the three day liveaboard boat trip out to the Great Barrier Reef. I didn't take any seasickness medicine on the trip out because I wanted to see if I was susceptible to seasickness. The answer is yes. Once we got out there and into the water, though, it ceased to matter. The marine life we saw, even on the certification dives, was outstanding. Giant turtles, fish of all shapes and colors, we saw Nemo, some people even saw reef sharks. It was brilliant. It even made me forget that they were waking us up at 6 every morning. I did 2 dives on the first day, 4 dives on the second day, and 2 dives on the last day. They fed us constantly because your metabolism speeds up under the pressure of the water. I liked it so much I continued the open water cert and got my adventure diver certification, which included a night dive, a deep dive, and a photography dive. The night dive was creepy because it was hard to get your bearings and tell how deep you are without looking at your gauges. When you shined your flashlight on other people it looked like they were in outer space because everything around was black. The deep dive took me down to 26 meters where everything looks blue and green (you lose more of the color spectrum the deeper you go). I was hoping to suffer from nitrogen narcosis, which is a state that makes you feel high from your body not being able to get rid of excess nitrogen at depth below 20 meters, but unfortunately I was resistant. The photography dive was brilliant because I was able to get some really good shots of a stingray hiding under the sand and then swimming out to chase a fish.

We all got back on Friday and went out and partied on Friday night. It was a good mixed group and one of the girls was a local so she got us into some good clubs for free. The rest of the weekend was spent recovering as I got some kind of wicked chest cough from being underwater all week I guess. I also got some new ink... heh heh.

Well, I flew to Alice Springs on Monday and have been here a few days already. I'll save that for the next chapter since this has already been a way long e-mail. Hope everybody's doing great!

As always, the dude abides.
Dave

Greetings from Oz

Hey everybody,

Pictures here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/regdWDget6nkJRubA

I think the last time I wrote I was in Queenstown. I'm now in Airlie Beach heading up the east coast of Queensland in Australia. Being surrounded by queens makes me feel at home I guess. For those of you who don't know about Queenstown in NZ, it is a town literally designed to suck the money from your wallet. It's renowned for all the adventure activites you can do (bungy, skydive, canyoning, sledging, parasail, jetboating, etc), it has tons of bars and restaurants, and it has a casino as well. Needless to say, I spent my share of cash there. The first day I got to Queenstown I was just wandering around checking out the place when who should I see walking down the street but Hollie and Jonny Red Roses from Fiji. The weirdness didn't stop there. After we went out drinking that night and I headed back to my hostel, I got in a conversation with an American guy who was staying there. Turns out his name is Lior, he used to work for C&W/Exodus, and he used to be the SE for Keynote (my old company). So we went back out for a couple of beers, and while we were out I ran into Ralf and Eelko the two Dutch guys from Nelson, who told me to come party with them on St. Patricks day.
So Queenstown turned out to be a total blast. I did two jumps from the canyon swing, the first one just straight out to get it overwith, but I liked it so much that I did another one. The second one (the one that's in the pictures) was done "gimp-style" where they hang you upside down and release you headfirst. The reason they call it that is because they take a stuffed animal that they've "altered" with electrical tape to make it look like the gimp from Pulp Fiction and they strap it to you while you jump. It was great. I could probably write another whole story about St. Patrick's day in Queenstown, but I'll try to keep it short. I met up with Ralf and Eelko at about 4 o'clock. From that point I can't really tell you in terms of hours or minutes how long we were out, just in terms of Guinnesses. We met up with William (a Brazilian guy we also knew from Nelson) and Helen, then we were also met by three Irish guys who were bunking with me at the hostel. I remember buying a lot of rounds. The two Dutch guys had never celebrated St. Patrick's day so they were surprised that so many Irish people were crawling out of the woodwork. I explained to them that it's cool to be Irish on St. Patrick's day. I also added that it's cool to be Italian *every* day. The next day I decided to clear my hangover and sweat out the toxins I'd climb up to the summit of Ben Lomond which is a mountain overlooking Queenstown. The peak was 1750 meters. About halfway up I thought I was going to cough up a lung, and that was before I hit the steep part. There were old women passing me by. I think it's because I didn't have one of those cool walking sticks. Anyway, once I finally reached the summit after about 3 hours of climbing, the views were spectacular. You could see clearly for 360 degrees, from Queenstown and the lake below, to the Remarkables, to some snow-capped mountains off in the distance. It was awesome. On the climb back down I had a falcon swoop down within 10 feet of me and perch itself on a rock. I tried to get close to take a picture but it flew away. The climb and the Nevis bungy were the higlights of my Queenstown stay, but they couldn't have been more different. The Nevis is a 440 foot bungy jump where you're falling for over 8 seconds. They make the heaviest guys go first, and I was tied with two other guys at 91 kg, which was weird since when they weighed me at the canyon swing I was 88. I guess I gained some weight on St. Patrick's. They drive you about 40 minutes out of town, and the last bit is up this narrow, winding road to get to the Nevis gondola. In retrospect, I think that drive was more dangerous than the jump itself. Anyway, they picked the four heaviest guys and winched us out to the gondola in the middle of this canyon. They asked who wanted to go first, and since no one answered, they picked guess who? So they made me sit in this weird dentist's chair with stirrups so they could strap me into the foot harnesses. I was making jokes asking them if they were obstetricians and whether it was a boy or a girl, but they didn't seem to think that was too funny. The rest of it you can see by the pictures at the link I mentioned above. They make you inch out onto this narrow ledge, then give you the quickest countdown in history before you have to throw yourself into the abyss. It was sooooo cool. I screamed like a little girl.
After Queenstown I headed to Christchurch, which wasn't all that exciting especially after Queenstown. I got my pictures put on a CD and sent them home so hopefully Ang will be able to put them up on my website soon. Honestly, I was disappointed. I don't think pictures could capture all the amazing things I've seen, so you'll have to take my word for it and use your imagination.
From Christchurch I flew to Sydney for my first glimpse of Australia. I met another guy on the bus ride into town who worked in the Antarctic research station, so I think I am destined to go. The hostel where I stayed was in King's Cross, which is the strip club ground zero of Sydney. There are also lots of "massage parlors." I spent a day doing the ubiquitous city walk, checking out the harbor bridge and Opera house and walking through the botanical gardens. The next day I headed to Bondi beach, where I was pleasantly surprised to find many hot girls, some of whom chose to sunbathe topless. Of course, as a sorbet to counter the effects of the topless ladies, there were many dudes wearing speedos. This one really burly guy was actually wearing a thong speedo.
He chose to place himself about 30 feet to my left, which essentially blocked that whole side of the beach from my view lest I get an eyeful of man ass. When I become president, my first official act will be to pass the Dave Bresci Speedo Bill where you can only wear speedos if you have a license. So you'll go to the DMV and in addition to a driver license and registration you can get your speedo license. Someone would check you out to make sure you're not too grotesque or wrinkly to be wearing a speedo and off you go. There'd be a three strikes law so if you get caught wearing a speedo without a license three times, you'd have to go to jail in your speedos. So then it would be a deterrent for other criminals as well...
would you want to be jailed with a bunch of old guys in speedos? I think not! So my platform would be no speedos, I'd legalize weed, and institute a monthly foam party on Air Force one. Vote for me in 2008! Where was I? Oh yeah, Bondi beach. I also took the ferry to check out Manly beach the next day, which I didn't like as much as Bondi, maybe because there was not as much toplessness. Heh.
From Sydney I flew to Brisbane where I stayed for a couple of days. I met up with Helen who showed me around the town (she lived there for 4 months) and was now back in Brisbane for a while. Brisbane really goes crazy on the weekends, especially around Brunswick street. It reminded me of some of those Girls Gone Wild videos of Bourbon street, minus the nudity. Just a load of people out in the street, bars blasting music, general chaos. It was great! I was also able to catch up with Anthony from Fiji who invited me to his house for dinner. We spent an enjoyable evening with his cousins throwing rocks at rats and possums in his backyard.

So that's the latest. Hope everyone is doing well!
As always, the dude abides.
Dave

Happy Anniversary

Hi all,

Pictures here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/i5sDHM2Lz3BocfCC7

Today is the one year anniversary of my unemployment. Woo hoo! In honor of this momentous event, I've decided to celebrate by... not working! Ha ha ha!!!

Last time I wrote I had just gotten to Nelson, which is where I ended up staying for about 4 days just lazing around the pool at the hostel and taking some walks around the area. I was lucky to have great weather for the time I was there. Nelson is kind of like Santa Cruz; it's near the water, has good weather, and has a bunch of little shops that sell arts and crafts, hippy stuff and organic shit. The hostel where I stayed has a bunch of lifers there. From how they tell it they've been there for months. These two Dutch guys Ralf and Eelko have spent two months picking fruit in the Nelson area. From what I can tell their day consists of picking fruit, hanging out in the hot tub, getting drunk, and waiting for the Kiwi Experience bus to drop off girls.

From Nelson I wanted to hit the Franz Josef glacier on the west coast. I'd read in the Lonely Planet guide about how the TranzAlpine train across the southern alps was one of the most beautiful rides in the world so I went out of my way to go to Christchurch first then take the TranzAlpine to Greymouth the next morning. That was a big disappointment. Maybe it's better in winter when there's snow but I've taken more scenic train rides in Europe. I was pretty pissed off that I spent extra time and money on this diversion when I could've stayed an extra day in Nelson by the pool.

Franz Josef is not really a town, it's more like a few hotels and some stores at the base of the glacier. I'd never seen a glacier before so I decided to sign up for an all day hike. I was considering doing a helihike where they bring you up the glacier by helicopter but the weather was really crappy so they didn't know if it was going to be available. For the hike they hook you up with boots, a rain jacket, an ice pick, and some steel talons to attach to your boots. I think my favorite view of the glacier was at the base where you can see how enormous it is. We spent about 6 hours on the glacier itself and it was pouring the whole time. Much climbing was involved, as you can imagine. It's not considered an extreme activity, but I managed to turn it into one by slipping headfirst into a crevasse. Somehow, the slippery snow nullified my cat-like reflexes. I think I had defective talons. Anyway, we're crossing over these crevasses when next thing I know I'm sliding down on my back headfirst. I must've used a combination of my left knee and my skull to stop my descent because that's what was sore afterward. It was about a 30 degree decline that went down about 25 feet so I don't think it was life-threatening. Still, I don't think it would've been too much fun. There were some pretty amazing things to be seen on the glacier, like the blueness of the ice and some of the natural caves that we slid and crawled through. Wicked!

From there I headed to Wanaka which is a small lakeside resort town. I stayed there a few days doing some day hikes and kayaking out in the lake. I met a guy from Marin who just spent 5 months working on a research station in Antarctica. I think I've found my next job! There's this cool little movie theater in Wanaka called Paradiso where they have couches and lounge chairs and serve fresh-baked cookies at intermission. I watched Return of the King (again). I think if Lord of the Rings took place in modern times they'd replace the ring with a cell phone. You know what I'm talking about, how people treat their cell phones. I'm going to text you later with... my precious! Anyway toward the end of the movie when they show a shot of Liv Tyler up on Minas Tirith someone had spliced in about 1 second of a porno. This naked woman was up there and gone in a flash. The whole theater started cracking up! It was just like in Fight Club! Awesome.

Speaking of Fight Club, it's true what Ed Norton says about single-serving friends. When you're travelling you end up meeting random people and just chatting with them for a couple of hours and you'll never see them again. Sometimes you don't even find out their names. Weird.

After Wanaka I headed to a small town called Te Anau from where I took a day kayak trip out to Milford Sound. It's in the middle of Fjordland which is named so because of... surprise... fjords! If you don't know what a fjord is, www.m-w.com. Again it was raining but the amount of gear they gave us covered everything but my hands and face. Which, of course, was enough for the sandflies to feed on. Those little fuckers bled me dry. They just swarm around you. Maori legend has they were created so people wouldn't linger too long in Milford Sound. I can see why because it was just spectacular. The mountains are almost perpendicular to the water and there's waterfalls streaking down just about everywhere. It rains two out of every three days in Fjordland which supplies a constant amount of freshwater on top of the salt water in the fjords. This creates a unique ecosystem where there are many species of plants and marine life growing in the sound that usually grow at much greater depths. I also saw a few seals swimming around. Toward the end of the day the sun came out so there were some amazing views. I think I'm getting jaded by the views in NZ. I've taken some good pictures though.

Well, I'm in Queenstown now I only have one week left in NZ. What else can I tell you... I stopped biting my fingernails... I miss my Les Paul (take good care of it Ron)... Swiss army knives are very useful... whitebait patties are good.

Take 'er easy!
Dave

Two Chubby Canadian Girls

Pictures here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/URiagyWLaJgCocLU9

I think if I were to write a book about my trip that's what I would call it. They're everywhere and they seem to travel in pairs. Every hostel and every tour I've been on has included a pair of chubby Canadian girls. But I digress.

Last e-mail I said that I was about to go whitewater sledging. I am happy to say that thankfully I am still alive. You all know that I am prone to exaggeration, but seriously that was the most terrifying activity I've ever done. Worse than bungy, skydiving, motorcycle, or anything like that put together. I wasn't expecting it so it sneaked up on me. I should've known when we started putting our gear on and they gave us some kind of lacrosse helmet with a face shield. We spent half an hour in the river in the calm current just figuring out how to turn and how to turn over if we flip. The slegde is a plastic sled about 3 feet long with a handlebar on the inside. The golden rule is hold on no matter what.
So I wasn't taking it too seriously until the first rapid, which was class 3+. I've done river rafting before, so how hard could it be? Well, let me just describe it as a combination of sledding and drowning, with slamming into rocks is also involved. After the first rapid I wasn't sure whether I wanted to puke or crap my pants. Luckily, I was able to control myself and just wept uncontrollably. We had two more rapids, one of which was a class 4. Oh, by the way, says the guide, there's a waterfall on the right at the end of the class 4 which you want to avoid. The fun just keeps on coming! At the end of it all, rather than the sense of accomplishment that I had when I went skydiving, I just had a sense of relief that I wasn't dead.

I headed to Wellington next, which is a very cool city. It's full of cafes, bars, restaurants and clubs, and its city center is small and walkable. It's right on the water so just hanging out at the harbor on the waterfront is a cool way to chill. I spent a couple of days wandering around Te Papa, which is the national museum of New Zealand. It's fairly new and modern and is very interactive. There's heaps of exhibits on Maori culture and on the Treaty of Waitangi. Overall, I'd have to say it's the best museum I've ever toured.

I hooked up with this cat named Wairemu (Maori for William) on the bus ride on the way down to Wellington. Cool guy, but I wonder if he has ADD because he was constantly changing subjects. He's a chef who works at a restaurant called Fidel on Cuba Street, which is a sweet area in Wellington that has tons of little shops, restaurants, and cafes. Lloyd always said I was a communist so maybe I'm just drawn to it for that. Anyway, I managed to weasel a free dinner at his restaurant so I can't complain. There's supposedly a tattoo museum in Wellington that I went to look at, but it's just some guy's tattoo parlor with a bunch of pictures of freaky tattoos. I also checked out the Embassy Theater which is where each of the Lord of the Rings movies has had its world premiere. I saw Return of the King there... it's plush! They have assigned seating so I got a premium seat which is like a leather recliner in the middle of the theater. Plus you could get a beer in the theater. The only thing it's missing is... never mind. My mom's on this distribution list.

I finally got some good weather in Wellington, but when I was on the ferry crossing over to the South Island it turned to shit again so I couldn't see anything. I headed to Nelson where I stayed for a couple of days before heading out sea kayaking in Abel Tasman national park. It was a 3-day trip up the coastline of the park which was absolutely awesome! It's easy to see why it's the most popular walking park in New Zealand. The forest comes right out to the sea, and you get a really cool perspective from the water. I lucked out with the weather because I got two days of sun and one overcast day. The only rain we had was the first night which made it hard to get to sleep in the tent but otherwise it was all good. We paddled out to some of the small islands and had lunch and coffee on some tiny beaches. My guide was a dude named Leigh who does sea kayak trips in the summer and is a snowboarding instructor in the winter. His real passion is his rock band where he plays the drums. This guy's got the life! They're about to record an album and shoot a video so I told him if they ever tour in SF that they can crash at Ang's place. Ha ha!

Anyway, I'm back in Nelson now to chill out for a couple of days and save up some cash. Nelson is supposed to have the most days of sun in NZ so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. So far, so good. The hostel here has a pool and a hot tub, but they told me the pond would be good for me (come on... Caddyshack reference). I'm trying to eat as much venison as humanly possible while I'm down here. I'm also addicted to milk bottles, which are milk candies that are like those White Rabbits. Remember Woo when I ate that whole package over at your place and almost got sick?

As always, the dude abides.
Dave

This Weather Sucks...

Pictures here

https://photos.app.goo.gl/8S9HM6xgCuAQfAWd6

For those of you that haven't heard, there's some sort of crazy weather pattern going on in New Zealand that has caused storms and flooding mostly in the north island, which, of course, is where I am now. There's some kind of front from the west mixing with arctic winds or some shit like that. Hey, I'm not a meteorologist, I'm just a pissed off tourist who's getting rained on a lot. All I know is that my 4-day canoe trip on the Whanganui river got cancelled this morning which kind of put me on the irritable side.

Anyway, so far I've seen mostly cities in NZ. My first few days were spent in Auckland, which is much larger than I thought. 1.5 million people live there I think, which is about a third of New Zealand's population. I took a 10-mile walk across the city from one harbor to another which was nice. Auckland is built on top of 28 volcanoes so there were lots of hills, but I was able to get some good views and take some nice pictures. Some of the residential neighborhoods remind me of London, as do other things in Auckland, like a Starbucks and a kebab stand every half a block. Just as in London, I've almost been run over half a dozen times because I looked the wrong way crossing the street. There are a lot more sushi places, though, and a lot less Indian joints. Scott and James came back into town on Sunday and were kind enough to treat me to dinner in Mission bay. Things quickly turned sour though when I told them I wouldn't put out. Ha ha ha! (just kidding fellas)

Next, I headed to Hamilton which is NZ's largest inland city. I took a day trip out to check out a tour of Hobbiton from the Lord of the Rings movie.
The tour was very informative, but the set itself was pretty crappy. They've torn down most of the hobbit holes and can't restore them due to some legal stuff going on with New Line cinema. All you can see are cutouts of where the hobbit holes used to be and all the natural stuff that's still there like the lake and the party tree. Back in Hamilton Alex hooked me up with some of her friends from the time that she lived in NZ, which was great. I had dinner at Gay and Pete's house which is about 10 miles outside of Hamilton with an awesome 360 degree view of the countryside. Karyn was my chauffeur and also thankfully let me crash in her living room because I couldn't take another night at the YHA with the snoring, smelly Austrian dude who bunked above me.

From there I headed to Waitomo to check out the glowworm caves. I was scheduled to do a 5-hour caving trip which involved abseiling (which is lowering yourself by rope down into a cave), climbing, tubing, etc, but I was the only person who signed up for that trip that particular day so they cancelled it. I had to take the regular tubing trip, which was fun, but not the same. I learned a lot about glowworms, like the fact that they're not worms at all but fly larvae, which makes them really glow maggots. Also, the part of them that glows is their excrement. The tubing was really cool... definitely not for the claustrophobic. The glowing is actually a pale blue which makes it look almost artificial.

After Waitomo I headed to Rotorua which is a geothermal area that is also a center of Maori culture. It stinks like sulphur every once in a while, and it's nicknamed Roto-vegas because of all the tourists I guess. I can see where you could make that analogy because it's just like Vegas... minus the hookers, free booze, and casinos. I haven't seen any giant pyramids or replicas of Venice here yet, but I've only been here a few days. I have been to a replica Maori village courtesy of Tamaki tours which take you through a village and to a hangi (celebratory dinner) afterward. It was fun, but I think I was spoiled by my Fiji experience where I got to go to an actual village and saw firedancing and knifedancing and stuff like that. This was cool, but a bit touristy for me. I guess it also had to do with the fact that I was surrounded by old English people which kind of took away from the atmosphere. I think the combined age on the bus was about 100,000, but I would've had to cut the bus in half and count the rings to know for sure. So far, my favorite thing I've done in Rotorua is zorbing. What's that you ask? Well, it's where you get inside a giant inflatable ball, like a beach ball, and they roll you down a hill. You can either go straight down or do a zig zag course, and you can either do it dry or they throw in a bucket of warm water with you. I did a zig zag wet zorb, which was incredibly fun. It was like being in a washing machine. Awesome. I hope it comes to the US.

Anyway, I'm sure I've bored you enough. Since my canoeing trip got cancelled, I decided to stay an extra day in Rotorua and go whitewater sledging tomorrow. That's where they strap you onto some kind of boogie board with a helmet on and send you down a river. After that I'm heading to Wellington, then on to the south island.

Take it easy everybody,

Dave
Karate Expert
Cave Explorer
Zorbonaut

Greetings from Auckland

Hi everybody,

Pictures are here

https://photos.app.goo.gl/jrYgy67PPS7BMBqm9

I just arrived in Auckland after a week in Fiji. For a place that I didn't plan on going, it was an awesome experience. The first day was not so great as there was a ton of turbulence on the overnight flight so I couldn't sleep. I went directly from Nadi to a tiny island called Beachcomber. It took me less than ten minutes to walk around the whole thing. The water and the beach were beautiful. I fell asleep on the beach face-down so I got this weird sunburn on the side of my face and like a 1x1 foot square on my back. It was really nice but I don't know how the nightlife was since I crashed out by 9.

Friday afternoon I headed back to Nadi to stay overnight as I was being picked up on the Feejee experience tour Saturday morning from there. On the boatride to Nadi I got my first taste of a wicked tropical rainstorm. Apparently, it's monsoon season. It's not so bad since the humidity and heat can be oppressive. Let's just say it was a moist week.

I'm usually suspicious of tours, but I'm glad I booked this one. On the first day, we went to the longest beach on the main island (Viti Levu) which was a beatiful stretch where the water was as warm as bathwater. We then went to a small village to meet the locals. A bunch of kids came out and greeted us and showed us around the village. It was brilliant... they couldn't have been more friendly. We then proceeded to the Sigatoka sand dunes where we rode down the face of the dunes with boogie boards. It started pouring as we were doing it which made it especially sweet.

The second day of the tour had us on a three hour hike into the rainforest on the southern part of the main island, followed by a tube ride down the river and a swim under a waterfall. Again, more rain. We spent the night in Suva which is the capital of Fiji. It's not the greatest city in the world, but we got our pictures in the Fiji Times the next day because our hostel had no water due to a burst water main. Must've been a slow news day. From there we headed to visit a school where we met some more of the local kids. Portions of the proceeds from Feejee Experience go to fund this particular school which was great to see because it didn't look like their facilities were particularly good. We then headed to another village for a sevusevu ceremony. That is a traditional Fijian welcome ceremony where everyone gathers around and drinks kava with the chief. I had been warned that kava tasted like shit but I didn't think it was so bad. I ended up having three or four of them since it's rude to say no. It made my tongue numb and I felt kind of stoned. Good times!

This night we headed to an island off the north coast called Nananu. We had the option of going on a boat or taking a sunset kayak to the island. I chose the kayak, of course. Unfortunately, I didn't realize that it was a double kayak and I got stuck with this skinny Frenchman behind me who'd never kayaked before. For every three times I paddled he'd do it once. I think I developed some sort of combination of carpal tunnel and tendinitis. The sunset kayak ended up turning into a 90-minute endurance nightmare, but it was a good way to work off some of the beers I'd been drinking.

My highlight of the next day, which was the last of the tour, was having goat curry at an Indian joint. They should've called it bone and gristle curry. It didn't taste like chicken. Anyway, I'd met some interesting people on the tour, a couple of whom want me to visit them in Australia. Anthony from Brisbane is pretty mellow, but Julian is a pastry chef from Sydney who apparently ran a guy down with his car on the sidewalk for sleeping with his ex-wife.

The guys who I hung out the most with, though, were Scott and James, two ex-professional rugby players from Auckland, also known as Poss and Fetus. I think I could probably write a book about these two guys. They're both about 6'1" and a good 260. Scott stopped playing because he's 32 and James because he was temporarily paralyzed by a neck injury. I don't know where to begin. They definitely can put away a shitload of beers. I learned a lot from these two Kiwis... like what "rooting a bird" means (use your imagination). We got along pretty well so they invited me to join them to leave the tour early and go to another small island called Robinson Crusoe island. This place was outstanding. It was definitely a party island, but the Fijian staff couldn't have been friendlier. Fijians apparently love rugby and Scott and James signed about 10 shirts and pants. Scott didn't want me to feel left out so he was telling everybody about how I was a karate expert and I get mobbed every time I go to Japan. Heh. I would spend about 2 hours writing about these guys' antics so I'll just save it for when I get back.

Last night on the island, the Fijians put on an amazing show which actually lasted about two hours. My camera battery died just as the show began so I won't have any pictures of it, unfortunately. These guys did traditional warrior dances, then they busted out the knife dancing and topped it off with a fire dance. It was awesome! They were totally getting into it with the screaming and the face painting. Most of them are pretty ripped so it must've been terrifying having to fight these guys hand-to-hand a couple hundred years ago.

The last thing I have to say about Fiji is that I encourage everybody who wants a tropical island experience to go there. It costs about 1/3 of what you would spend in Hawaii, and it's not as exploited. The Fijians are without a doubt the friendliest people I've ever encountered. It was almost freaky how nice they were. On the boat ride out this morning I got phone numbers from two guys who told me to come stay with them if I ever come back to Fiji.

Hope you're all doing well! I'll write again in a week or so.

Dave