Easter In The Mountains

This week in Davey's blog, we travel back about 2 1/2 weeks in time, to Easter weekend, 2006. Since I am away from home for all of these holidays, I have had the chance to spend them with my friends over here in the NZ, along with other people that have taken us in as well. In this case, Chris' boss and his friend took us all to spend the weekend in an awesome large chalet on Mt. Ruapeho, the tallest peak on the north island and a volcano that has erupted 10 years ago. Not being quite winter yet here, there wasn't a ton of snow around us, but higher up on the peak there was plenty, and of course it got pretty cold up there.

While everyone else sat around the chalet and enjoyed the cloudy cold weather, Greg(Chris' boss, mine too kinda) and I went flyfishing. For any of you who know stuff about flyfishing, you may or may not know the name Taurangi, or the Tongariro River. Taurangi is the flyfishing capitol of the world and the Tongoriro is the river that runs through it. Also, this flyfishing was a bit different from what I have done before in South Dakota. The water rushed quite rapidly and sometimes it was too difficult to cross the water that was stomach-depth. Greg, by the way was a great teacher to me, teaching me how to set up the rigs and little techniques and such. So, we spent the first whole day out on the rivers and such but with not much luck at all, but did have beautiful weather. I actually only caught one rainbow trout that day and Greg caught about 6 rainbows, and they were all pretty small. He did catch one that would be a good size trout in SD, but here it was on the small size of average, he said, which surprised me. The next day, we all got out and went to spend a part of the day on a small lake. There, we all took turns going out, in groups of 3-4, onto the lake in a rowboat and dragging a few fish lines. Again, no one caught a thing. We also spent a little time biking around the property there and such. I actually got to chase some sheep, along with a few cows, on a mountain bike!! I will admit though, that I may or may not have ACCIDENTALLY caused harm to a few sheep. You see, I was chasing after them (and some of you may know that it is a life-dream of mine to wrestle a sheep, so this is getting closer) and then I realized that the gate was closed ahead of them and they all ran towards the corner of the gate and fence, which may or may not have been electric, which may or may not have been on, and there may or may not have been a sheep that got caught in the fence. So, I did in fact feel a little bad about the whole ordeal, but still had fun! After this little adventure, we were all a little cold, so we went to a restaurant/hotel thing that had a swimming pool, where we spent a little time and ordered a few drinks, that we forgot to pay for! Oops. The very next day, Greg and I were up around 4:30 am, to pack up to leave the chalet before everyone else and do some more fishing. The moon at this time was a little less visual and more cloudy, so the fish seemed to be a little more active. I again only caught one small fish, but in less time. I did see 2 good size trout, which will be posted on my pix sight, that one guy caught. Also, Greg caught more fish that day, but apparantly still not up to par for the river. Around midday that day though, we all headed back home to Welly, runnning into the worst traffic jam I have ever encountered. It took us about 6 hours to get home and should have only been about 3 hours. We actually were fortunate to spend at least 1 1/2 hours in a certain town, moving only about 1 or so in that time! But, we all made the most of it, certain people doing their duty to moon Kiwi Experience, a tour bus, along with 2 stupid ladies that were trying to cut us off! (sorry mom/dad)

Back to Wellington again, the fun wasn't quite over for me! I was fortunate enough to get free tickets to see The Rolling Stones, with Nickleback opening for them! Actually, the tickets weren't exactly free. I did, or rather still do, have to work them off for Greg, by working/cooking in his kitchen for free for 3 days, but I feel that it is worth it! So, we all got shuttled to the concert, which is in an open-top stadium and got there just in time to hear the last 2 songs of Nickleback. Me and Amanda (Gregs daughter) were seated to the left of the stage, eight rows back, so we had great seats, but it just wasn't good enough! We attempted to move closer to the center of the stage a few times, but didn't have much luck, as the security was not letting anyone go anywhere, even dance in the aisles or stand on their chairs. But, even with the resistance, we were able to get about 2 rows closer and 1 section closer in to the center, standing in fron of a drunk lady that was almost passed out in her seat! Anywhase, the concert was pretty sweet, lasting 2 hours with the Stones. Also, at one point, part of the stage that the drumset was on, along with Mick and Keith, moved from one end of the stadium to the other side on some sort of motorized catwalk. This was pretty cool and all, but was the only time of the concert when I couldn't see them clearly, but they were only there for about 2 songs. The next morning, I was off to pick up my parents from the airport!!