Camp Practice

 

our campsite, front and back

So, our next big adventure begins with a little warm up.
In the heart of deepest darkest Thames, your intrepid heroes find themselves ready to practice being able to survive in the (fairly tame) wilds.

Armed with our little tent and tins of beans we set to work claiming our space and making ready our nook. 

(fun fact about our campsite, just beyond the trees on the left of the second picture up there, there is a river, it makes awesome natureish noises all night long... and also brings midges to keep us company all-the-live-long-day.)

  

  

A magic pixie floats into view as the tent magically self assembles

SHELTER!
Our ancient ancestors would be so proud! Especially as we then wrangled another necessity into place... FIRE! 

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

What i should be telling you, (mostly to make you ridiculously jealous,) was we arrived here, in this bristling kiwi wonderland, under the most gorgeous sunny weather... It works wonders in the department of making you believe that you are actually on holiday, and that its fine to stretch you at put on your best "ahhhhhhh" (silly looking,) faces.

 

 

one of these things is not like the other

Okay, to be fair, we did have a minor dash of pesky weather, but it wasn't that bad.

In fact it was the looming grey appearing in the evening that forced us to break out the trusty cooker nice and early.
and with its little flames valiantly holding back the first little spits as they came down, it was about time we put together the we fritters we had long trained for in secret rituals passed down through the generations in forbidden locales.

 

 

behold our utter pride, (this must be how parents feel... before they eat their kids)

At that point, we feasted and congratulated our selves on surviving our first day of crazy travels past dangerous Christian camps (woo, there's a whole other story,) GPS treasure hunting and living like little townie pioneers. 
Time for some kip!

 

Looking out, looking in.

Aww man, I'm a most awful story teller.
I forgot to mention that we actually took a jaunt to "OUR" swimming hole!
The first time, (of two,) we went there, if you'd been present, you would have witnessed something like a vision of a little dancing wood nymph skipping from stone to stone to find her way to the goal. This sight was followed (a good pace back) by something like a giant having an avalanche like epileptic fit and falling from painful spot to more painful spot.

Never the less. We arrived... And it looked, well, I think our faces say it all.

 

 

Ahhhhhhhh! Cool and soothing!

So, yeah, where was I...

Oh right, the next day!
We clambered awkwardly from our tangled sleeping knots into the shiny light of a shiny day!

And what did we have in mind for this unique gem of a time.

'Sploring!
Well, hiking really.

Drawstrings were pulled tight, laces were strapped down, and packs were made ready.
And after some fine heroic posing, we found a mountain, and started on up.

 

Pack + Pose

Aaaaaaaaaaand, we didn't die!

Though at times i thought we may have.
Turns out 4 hours of going only UP, is not what we were build for.
Still, it felt majestic to stumble all the way up that incline and come face to face with a solid structure build in glorious nowhere.

I'm sorry to say we didn't click many pics on the way up, as it drizzled all the way, and, to be fair, we were scared to stop moving forward!

But, after landing at the top, (and making a sprint through the icy cold mountain shower,) I clicked one or two of our home for the night, and a friendly Sherpa that taught me Gin Rummy.

 

 

Home, sweet, home for the night

Oh my how we started to hurt the next day!

But there was nothing for it, we had gone UP, and an old adage dictated our destiny, and no matter how forlornly I looked at the helipad, no choppery saviour came from on high.

Sustaining ourselves with a yummy combo of porridge's, we said good by to some Aussie friends we had made, (who had a magic bag that held THE ENTIRE WORLD,) Shouldered our packs once more and began our downward tumble under cerulean blue skies!

 

By now posing was pretty much our forte

 

 

The path out of shangrala!

This sign very nearly recived kisses from me.

 

Infact when ever I was nearly dead, signs would appear, and I would bound on!

 

The tippy top! and the place we stayed!

And that was that!

We nearly died on the trip down, but knocked an hour of our time!
We promptly fell into the icy stream and tried to regain the use of our shattered limbs, And then our little tent tucked us up once more and we went out like a light.

So thats the first really real adventure post on this blog, and its miles to long.

AAAAAAAND I'm cutting it short because I have to get to bed, because tomorrow, well, thats when the next adventure begins.

So stay tuned listners, and sorry for the spelling.

Sweet dreams, and look out for grinning natives!

Dangerous sort!