Vacation Update

It was the old boat. I am sure that you are now sleeping better knowing that bit of useless information. And with that said you will be glad to know that we are in Invercargill as I write this, yesterday we were in Doubtful Sound. I wish I was still there.

This vacation has been fabulous thus far!

We started in Barrytown (North of Greymouth) where we stayed at a dump of a holiday park but had a great time the next day at the pancake rocks, and then ... we made a knife. Well three actually, started with a piece of iron inserted into a fire and worked our way through to polishing the wood handle after putting an edge on the hardened steel! Way too cool of a day.

After that we went down to Greytown (Mom and Dad we drove by the hotel we stayed at when you were here) and went down to another holiday park right on the ocean. Dennis had a great time playing in the water (I watched.) Somewhere around 9:30 when the sun was setting we all went down to the beach to watch the setting. And we saw a Green Flash! What an unexpected big of magic that was.

The next day we made our way to the glacers. Fox and Franz Joseph. They looked so awesome. I will post pictures eventually (long story) and I have the best shot of Dennis and Chris walking over some stepping stones on the river on the department of conservation walkway to the glacier. The holdiay park we stayed at was wonderful, a picnick in the shadow of the mountains was to die for.

Unfortunately the next evening was not as nice. We stayed at a DoC campsite where our air mattress failed to inflate, a long night on the ground made for little sleep. Ugh. And the biting flies, well pound for pound I would rather face a swarm of mosquitoes.

We then made our way to Wanaca. When I die i want to go back to Wanaca. There were a few things to do there, most notably the Puzzle Place. A 1.5 Kilometre maze. That was a fun walk let me tell you! the next morning we went ot the Crown Range, this was an awesome ride over the moutains where we saw first saw Queenstown. Oh my I am glad that we are spending Christmas there. This trip we went through downtown and purchased an air matress on sale for $40. Money well spent as the holiday park in Wanaca was $30 more expensive for the room with a bed than the standard tent site.

The next night we went to Manapouri in preperation for our trip through Doubtful sound (http://www.realjourneys.co.nz/Main/Doubtful) That was an amazing journey almost worth the whole trip down here. I loved the place, and Dennis and Chris did as well. Something magical about the place that words (and the 200 pictures I took) do not do justice.

Now it is time to get to bed, almost 10:00pm here and tomorrow we leave at 8:30am for Stewart Island!!

Leaving on a boat

I am not sure which one actually. This is one of the old Bluebridge line.

Or we may be on the brand new (three year old) boat! The newest one in the fleet!

Either way we are going to have a ball on our South Island tour!

Anniversary Dinner

Okay so it is a few months late, sue me!

We went out to a Mexican Restaurant for our anniversary. It was a great time, here we are with the owner.

I liked the action shot of Chris above.

And here is our host El Senior Andres!

Thanks Andres for a great evening.

Everyone else go eat there, details can be found here ... www.lasmargaritas.co.nz

Hills above Heke ...

Taken with a wide angle Cell PhoneTaken with a zoom cell phone

Dennis is a Black Belt

Dennis took his Black Belt test today. I will describe it here but one must watch it to understand the emotion of the event. Five boys from 10-14 took the test (Dennis was the youngest.)

After lining up and introductions the examiner had someone from the audience pick a lad go stand by them and the testers were then told to do as many push-ups as they could do in one minute ... counted. Then they had to do sit-ups in one minute ... counted. Then they had to do squats in one minute ... counted. The numbers were reported to the examiner, and then it got hard.

Next was a few of the forms (there are eleven in all.) Break for some more counted calisthenics. More forms (each one was done three or four times, sometimes facing the front, sometimes facing the back (we usually practice facing the front. Then single out one or two kids for they may not have done it as well as the examiner would have liked, but not to worry the rest of the kids were kept busy doing sit-ups, push-ups, or squats. To break up the monotony the forms were intermixed with power test (that is kicking pads they had about 25 different combinations to execute,) self-defense (oh demonstrate that you can make an attacker wish they had not gotten up in the morning,) pre-arranged sparring (just fun little vignettes to prove competence of basic sparing techniques - these are very exhausting work) and of course all these were accompanied by push-ups, sit-ups, and squats. Did I mention that the examiner had them do sit-ups, push-ups, and squats?

Well after about 90 minutes of this hard work the fun began ... sparring.

This was not your average three one minute rounds shake hands and drink a sports drink. This was tough. First round was easy, pair up with another kid. Then they introduced the black-belts, most of which were in their mid to late 20's. The fighting was designed to break the kids and frankly it did. Dennis and the 11 year old lost it. I think the hardest part for Dennis was that he thought his fourth fight was the last, then they called him up for another. He fought well at first, then broke down crying when he was kicked hard in the gut. He rallied himself for another go and did quite well until he was kicked in the face. Then it was very hard for him, to keep on going. But he did get back in the fight.

This was the last fight which was a good thing, as he was crying and could not continue. They had a one minute water break where I spoke with Dennis and through his tears let him know that all the kids were crying. Then the examiner had the boys, and the black belts, line up in a circle. One child was chosen and then the rest of the members of the circle had 15 seconds each to kick the living sh_t out of the victim in the middle. I was weeping during Dennis last two fights, crying during this event and it took quite a bit of self-control not to walk-up to the examiner and stop the proceedings. (The examiner may be a 6th dan but he about half my size and I was sure I could make my point.)

Well it was over Dennis lived through the sparing. I helped him remove his pads as he could hardly stand-up. The 11 year old and Dennis were up for breaking some 18 mm boards (that is a nominal 1" for those in North America.) While the other three kids had one minute to do more push-ups than their last counted minute, then yes the next minute was to do more sit-ups. The examiner told each of them the number they had to beat.

When it came to breaking Dennis broke all his boards. It took him a few tries for one of the kicks but he got through it just fine. Now for him the exam was done. Just sit on the side and watch the other children break the boards. I don't know if the examiner was being kind by not requiring him to do the push-ups/sit-ups or just forgot.

When the boards were all broken the kids lined up again and the examiner told them to do 200 sit-ups. It took a few seconds for the children to register the request, they went down to a person and started doing the sit-ups. The examiner had a heart and stopped them after a few.

The results came in and Dennis was given a provisional pass pending a re-test of the forms. Dennis had made a few very notable mistakes when the examiner had them face different directions and the examiner believes that Dennis would do better if he did not have the distraction of the other kids.

I was very proud of Dennis. He showed amazing fortitude to stay in the test and proved that he has an indomitable spirit.