Swimming with the dolphins

Bazil wanted to be with me so much that he slept in my snowboarding bag so that I would bring him back to the states. Tricky little kitty.


Rob and Chris celebrated my leaving by each getting a piercing.


My mates...


Kiakoura, New Zealand. This is where I took a nap on the beach and slept here for....well, I dont know how long.....I was asleep, I dont keep track of time very well when I sleep.


Kiakoura, New Zealand. This is where we loaded on to the boat to go swim with the dolphins. Here is a video when I went out to swim with the dolphins. There is no footage of me in my wet suit or actually in the water because I was too busy entertaining myself to entertain you.



Our flatmate John was a fun guy to have around. He liked to drink milk......preferably mine and Chris's. We never really said anything because we are like ninja's cool, calm, and collect until, SNAP. Then watch your neck!



This was pretty funny to us and we were going to tell John and buy him some more Stellas but he came home early from the party and he wasn't happy. He told us how some of his stellas were water, of course we didn't know anything(next morning confession would obviously be better). Chris suggested to call the company which they had already done. Internally we laughed. Then he stated how he just wanted to have a few drinks tonight because his grandma passed away an hour ago.........we felt terrible. Terrible enough to never ever tell him it was us.

So I hope you are not reading this John, but if you are......It was Chris's idea, and he will buy you some more.

Home

Im back home, Its good to see my friends and family here. I miss my friends and "family" in NZ but I will go back someday. I still might put some pictures up on here of the last couple weeks but other than that this blog is TOAST, OVER, FINIS, no point in looking unless you wanna wait for some more pics and vid.

I forgot to mention before I left New Zealand I went to Kiakoura my favorite town in NZ and swam with the dolphins. Pretty crazy, its not so much actually "swimming" with the dolphins as much as it is the people dropping you off in front of a huge heard of wild dolphins. It was absolutely crazy, and scary at first when all of a sudden there are hundreds of dolphins swimming past you an arms length away.

Thanks for checking it out and leaving comments to make me feel loved. Hopefully I will see you all before God calls me out of Nebraska. I think God is calling me to Denver, and I hope he is calling me to snowboard a lot this season :)

Thanks

Freaking still in Australia

9 HOUR DELAY IN SYDNEY!!!

Coming to Sydney I had some fun though. As I was having my last cold one with the boys at the airport Chris said he heard my name over the intercom system. I thought he was messing around but eventually I went to go get on the plane and they said, Sir, you re going to have to come with me" They repeatedly asked me if I had anything flammable in my bags and I said no but they were all pissed off about something. When I looked at the X-ray of my bag I forgot to put on my belt buckle that is half of a grenade and I put it in my bag.

THEY WEREN'T PLEASED!

I thought it was kinda funny afterwards but don't worry I showed them respect. So they let me put it on and no worries, but then in Sydney they took it from me!

SORRY DADDY-O, they took your present to me. I will buy a replacement to sent the universe in order.

I'm just chilling in Sydney at the airport.....confining myself to a wheelchair to run an experiment to see if peeps treat me differently( and then I don't have to carry my stuff around)

Pirate or Ninja.........Definitely Pirate.

AUSTRALIA!!!

Hey, Ive been in Sydney and Wollongong Australia this week and headed to L.A. soon for a few days with a friend there. I will slap some pictures of Sydney up here when I have a comp that I can put my pictures on. Talk to you soon!

Sad day :(

Mt. Hutt Staff 2007
My last day at Mt. Hutt :( How sad. It's sad I have to leave a place where I get free food and a warm bed. The boys came up to the mountain for a good last day and it was one of the best days of the season. Although its spring here we have been getting a ton of snow and windy conditions. We got in some nice pow runs before it was all said and done and some nice drops.

My car buried after a night of snow.


My last day down the mountain I was kaning it. The rode is so dodgey and they usually have a couple peeps die on it every couple years. There is no guard rails except for a couple spots. I was fishtailing it around every corner I could "safely" and one time (on this trip) I lost control and spun the car around. It was head backwards towards the edge of the cliff. It wasn't a huge deal and I was laughing hysterically, but I think I blew out my tire there and continued down the mountain fish tailing around corners on 3 tires. I have to buy a new rim I think


I had to leave some of my best friends up in the mountains....

Round Trip

I made a trip all around the South Island to hit up the East North, and West coast in a couple days and come back through a certain pass. The picture above is from one of my favorite towns, Kiakoura. The road and train tracks fight (or mate) like two snakes on the coast, winding back and forth over each other through tunnels and bridges......a great drive.

Kiakoura Sand....


A Picture of the west coast near Westport


My boss took me to the top of Mt. Hutt this morning on a snowmobile at about 7:00 A.M. This is why the native people (Maori) of New Zealand call NZ "Aotearoa", which means "land of the long white cloud"


Ummm, Im tired of typing and you probably just look at the pictures anyways so have at it.

These waves were massive. When the water is flying up into the air it is close to 200 feet.

New Zealand Jungle???

I went to Milford Sound last week which was an amazing drive. I love to just get in a car and drive forever so this trip was great just me and the road for a long time. Although peeps in NZ say being in the car for 3 hours is a long time. Pshhhhh! I've slept in the drivers seat driving through Nebraska for longer then 3 hours! I probably pick that up from my grandma. RIP Grandma Byrn.

The picture up top is after we took the boat out to sea and were coming back in. This is off of the South West side of the Southern Island in New Zealand. There were some dolphins playing next to the boat and some seals sun bathing on some rocks and a couple penguins that I got to see (nobody else was looking, hahaha, suckers)

There was a big waterfall that pictures wont do justice, or video for that matter, so thats why I will give you both?!?!




A boat that I decided we were racing.....we won!


The outlet headed out to the ocean. These mountains were so massive, and just straight up.


I wandered off the beaten path when I heard some water and this place looks like a jungle with a bunch of ferns and vines and what not. The drive down to milford you drive through what seems like every climate there is from dry desert conditions to lush green jungle.


This is a waterfall that I found and decided to climb up the rock face to find the source or a pool of some nature. Without a very much needed machete and a sprained ankle I got about 15 feet up and almost fell. I decided this was close enough.


I saw a HUGE waterfall off the side of the road so I thought I would take some video of it. The sound you hear is off some rapids downstream a bit. The water was so clear and so deep here I decided a swim was in order.


After all this beauty I needed a good dose of death and destruction. The mountain was closed one day so I came in to Christchurch and caught a punk rock show. The Exploited were in town and are an old skool punk band from the UK. They sing such lovely songs as:

F*#! The System
Your an F*$%ing Bastard
F@#% the U.S.A
F*^$ing Liar
System F*#&ed Up &
Sex and Violence


They have quite the repertoire and their diction is quite diverse. It was a good show because for the most part you can't understand what they are screaming so you just get to listen to some good punk music with out all the crap. But I really just had to see the band that played some music from one of my favorite movies.

I'm off to drive across the country again. Peace!

Dudes, Seriously......

This was a freaking sick day. Not only did I skip out on work the whole day but I went Heli-boarding with some peeps from work and some Japanese fellow from.....um.....Japan.



Here is a picture of the Sheep Ranch which we took the Heli from. It was so peaceful here. It is actually a B&B out in the middle of nowhere. It took about an hour to drive here from work and is kinda on the other side of the mountains I work and live on. Some of the mountain ranges that we flew to were spots were they filmed some of Lord of the Rings. They filmed all over the place down here and apparently they have some sort of tour somewhere to show you some spots like that..er something. You can tell I know a lot about it.

So the Heli took us from the farm up into the Southern Alps and dropped us off in the middle of nowhere. Or should I say the top of nowhere. Our first run they call Coast to Coast because it is close to the divide and you can see the west and east coast of new zealand standing on the top of this mountain. Absolutely breathtaking. I should have taken more photos but I was taking so much video at that time.

We got to snowboard on a glacier which was cool except we had to be careful for crevices, which I wasn't and got a stern talking to. Then after a few runs we had lunch up in the mountains as you can see in the picture below. There was a lot of different food....and lollies (candy) to eat. In the picture you can see where there was an avalanche slied within the last 2 weeks in that area, and all the brown rock on the left side is where a glacier came through and pushed its way down the mountain......that was longer than 2 weeks ago. Then we went up for a few more runs and I ate it pretty hard a couple times but since there is soft snow I just slide around until I regain conciousness.



I put together a little video of the Heli ride but because it is a couple minutes I knocked down the quality a bit. Still you can kind of enjoy it.



Oh ya, I almost forgot. When I do come back to the states, I will probably be going to jail. Hopefully customs will let me through without finding a bench warrant for my arrest. Apparently 2 weeks ago I flew back to Nebraska to get pissed drunk at Hay Days in Cozad, and got arrested for pissing in an alley while I was looking for some girl. And then flew back to New Zealand without missing any work. I was pretty impressed with myself too. My court date is sometime soon and Im pretty sure I will be missing it, hence the bench warrant. I might be seeing this man in New Zealand soon.

NZ Moto GP

Ahhhhhh, feels good to get back on two wheels. Not only can I piss people off in America on a bike but apparently I can do the same in New Zealand. No no no, don't worry I didn't make any kiwi's angry.


I rented a Honda VFR800 and took it to Akaroa over some real sketchy roads. Sometimes even with ice and grit on the pavement. The drive was amazing once I got to the highway and was nonstop corner after corner.....with a few straight aways long enough to hit 210 kph, but when I did it was headed straight into a 55 kph corner. The bike is definitely capable of hitting more than that.


This was a picture of the Southern Alps that you can't really see too well in the picture but real life it was absolutely gorgeous. I had to stop and thank God for making this crazy country so beautiful.


The Road I took to Akaroa


New Zealand has a bunch of different advertisements along the side of the roads talking about slowing down, car accidents, drink driving, (that's right, "drink" driving) and racing. I saw this one while I was headed there and thought it was the coolest one I have seen yet. The interesting thing about them is that these advertisements are all over the place but hardly any two are alike.


This was a cool monument that displayed all of the peoples names who fought and died in WWI and II that were from Akaroa. Kinda interesting. The outside I thought was cool it said,"The Glorious Dead".


A spot where you have the mountains on one side and the ocean on the other so close you can almost drag your foot in it.

Bye Bye Lady Friend

Yesterday Crystal and I took it easy and drove up to Hanmer Springs and sat in some natural hot thermal pools which was very relaxing. The hottest pool was 106 degrees farenheit. It was very pretty because it was raining at first and then snowing a lot while we were in the pools. It was so cold trying to dry off afterwards though, plus somebody younked my towel so I didn't even have a towel afterwards. I just stood in the bathroom and stared at the wall for 10 minutes to dry off.

I dropped off Crystal at the airport today which was sad to see my friend go. We had a lot of fun together doing everything and especially nothing. I will get to see her again when she has her wedding in Nebraska in June.

After I dropped her off I headed South to Oamaru which is a very old historic looking city. The whole place had gorgeous buildings just like this one.

I ate an awesome sandwich at a very posh resturant on the beach called H2O (Harbor 2 Ocean). The doors to the place were pivited in the middle, but weren't revolving so you always pushed through the door on the leftside. It looked like the secret door you always want your fireplace to turn into to take you back to the room with all t he cylinders, beakers, schematics and bunson burners. I had an NZ beer there and laughed at the lady when she asked me if I wanted a glass. She could tell I was hardcore after that...


I went to watch the penguins come in to shore which was next door to the resturant. They have a little colony here of blue penguins which are really small penguins. They are really cute and you are not supposed to take pictures or video of them. So I took Steve Parkers advice from when he filmed the Letterman show when we were in the nose bleed section and filmed anyways. That is why it is terrible because most of it was out of the side of my hoodie and sometimes with the headhancho standing right beside me so forgive the crappy video where it is hard enough to make them out in such low light conditions.


I'm excited to get back to work because we had a huge storm come through and the mountains got dumped on, so that means fresh powder. Tony my German coworkers car was covered with snow.

IM NOT MIA

Sorry kids, ive been busy working at the mount-tain where I dont have interweb.

Jermey Jones the mammoth snowboarder that is everything snowboarding is came up to Mt. Hutt last week. It was freaking awesome. The dumped some snow on by this rail in the front where it is really violent down-flat-down kink rail as he 270's on and then hits a kicker on the roof to grind the roof and jump off. Sick stuff



Chris and I wore our RayRay suits to the mountain and took some awesome video. Here is just a picture of how hot we were.....our pants were so tight you could bounce a quarter off of us. And I grew out a handlebar mustache just for the occasion. We rode down the mountain at one point with no shirts on and I about froze my chest off. The only people who didn't enjoy it were a group of 10 year old girls that we rode past whilst hearing screams and gasps and "gross" "disgusting" coming from their now tainted minds.







And better yet Crystal Lindburg is here hanging out with me from Nebraska. She has been in Aus for awhile and needed to leave the country for her visa for some reason and came to see me.....yeah!!!! so we went to Kiakoura and chased around Sealions and played on the beach. It was SOOO incredibly gorgeous..........and so was the scenery. hahahahahah hahah hahaha (crystal is sitting behind me) Ladies!!!



We chased around the sealions at Kiakoura and Crystal almost got eaten.





I also dragged her up to come snowboarding with me and she did freaking awesome for the first time in 5 years. She was a natural.



Ive gotta get going cuz Crystal and I are going to either Hanmer Springs for some hot springs or Milford sound for a rainforest type experience.

Peace in the mideast, I mean midwest

My New Home

Back Yard


Front Yard

These are pictures of my backyard and my front yard. I work and live in the Southern Alps of New Zealand close to Methven. I am a caretaker of Mt. Hutt and work in the mornings and evenings giving me all day to snowboard until the season is up. This isn't the actual work I have been looking for as far as Engineering goes so I will probably return to the states and hit up Colorado for a job....which also happens to be right in time for snowboarding season.....hmmmmm, that works out nicely :) Ive still got plenty of places to check out here in NZ and now that I have a a car and some flow, I am excited. I dont however have internet on the Mountain so my ranting and ravings might be fewer and farther in between.

I went over this kicker and tweaked my ankle pretty bad. I wasn't sure if I could walk or not afterwards but I could put some pressure on it shortly after. Then a few days later I took this VIDEO of my foot. I learned something new about my injuries and proceeded to ignore all signs of danger.






From the top of my mountain to the top of yours

Returning from Mt. Hutt to Christchurch Sam was driving with very few points left on his license and guess who was waiting for him as we rolled through a stop sign? That's right the PO PO'S. Apparently Sam didn't take to kindly to my recording the demise of his license.

Here is a video of me hiking up to a high point on My Mountain.

Rolling dirty on fif-teens!

So I picked up a sick whip rolling on fif-teens! HOLLA!!! I bought a Subaru (pronounced Su - BAR - u) Leone which are excellent old cars because they have a boxer engine in them that WONT DIE. People put over 350k on some of these bad boys. And the engine is so efficient you could probably leave a mud in the carburetor and it would turn it into efficient energy. The picture is of me flashing my gang sign.....which my gang happens to have a lot of people with carpel tunnel syndrome so our signature hand gesture just doesn't look that cool.

Driving on the left side is kinda fun and scary but since all of my speakers and stereo have been kindly ripped out of my car it helps to concentrate a little more. The only thing that is different is you can't turn left on a red and they give way to the RIGHT! It seems like a crazy and kinda dangerous rule.

Ok let me break it down for you. There is oncoming traffic waiting to turn right across your path(keep in mind we are driving on the left side of the road). If I come to that same intersection and am going straight then I just barrel on through, but if I am turning left to go the same direction that the other cars want to go I yield to them and wait for them to go. But it also depends if anyone is going straight that is behind you. Seems crazy to me so it makes driving interesting at times.



I start my job tomorrow, but if I can't find an Engineering job soon because no one wants to hire an American that might leave, I might have to start sending some job apps to the states and see what comes of that until I can get some "experience" under my belt.

In a few weeks time I should be able to have some better pics of the place since I can get around easier. Until then keep your scene tight.



Some guy making some money and wishing the All Blacks well, which is the Kiwi's Rugby team. this sand art is his 734 one that he has done.



The lights at the pier are tight. They can make them do almost any color so they are switching all the time and send one color down the line so it looks like some sort of beacon or a rail gun.

Al Caponer - pronounced (pone air)

Dana got her car stolen! and if I can find it she will sell it to me for $800....sick. What else have I seen of the criminal underbelly of New Zealand??? Oh ya, I saw this guy get pulled over for a DUI and resist arrest. It was pretty cool, him screaming and cops slaming him up against the car. While fighting them he kept on screaming, "Im not resisting arrest!". Which I thought was a good choice of words and perhaps if he screamed it enough they would believe him.......Saw a hooker get picked up....but I guess thats legal here......Oh and I can walk into pharmacies and get asparin with codeine in it OTC, which is uber easy to extract because of its high solubitily.....good to know.

I got a job working at the mountain while I am looking for a real job. The cool part about it is that I will actually live up at the field so I can board every single day...and if I want to Im going to hike up the hill in the middle of the night to the mini park and jib by the light of the moon.



HE.....has the power.