Peak to Pub

At the beginning of the year my buddy had asked me if I was interested in making a team for the annual Peak to Pub race which is a Triathlon consisting of snowboarding, mountain biking and trail running. Its a real cool race with the starting line at the top of the mountain and the finish line at the local pub in the closest town. I told him it sounded like a great idea and I would love to do the run portion. At the time I had all of these training plans and workouts planned (don't think I ever did one).

We recruited a German for the bike portion so our relay team consisted of a Kiwi (Jono) doing the snowboard section, German (Marvin) doing the mountain biking, and Canadian doing the running. Talk about an international team!

This crazy weekend started Friday morning waking up very late and only having 20 minutes to pack up and get out of the house for the crazy weekend ahead. I literally threw my runners and a change of clothes in a bag, made a PB&J and was in the car ready to go. It was a 3.5 hour drive to Ashburton where we were staying with Jonos family. Friday night we literally never left the couch.

Saturday morning it was very disappointing hearing that our race had been postponed due to high winds on the mountain. So we decided to go see a Lord of the Rings film site from the Two Towers movie. We went to Mt. Sunday which was an hour outside of Ashburton where the kingdom of Edoras was in the Two Towers. It was once again a very slow night, consisting of homework, television and bike tune ups.

Sunday morning we all got up all ready to race! We ate breakfast and headed straight up to the mountain. It was a real crazy drive heading up the very steep mountain road to the ski resort (Mt. Hutt) where the triathlon was being held. Thankfully it was such a beautiful day that when we reached the top we could see the whole country-side and the oceans coastline! Buzzay!

We had our race debriefing and each headed to our transition zones. It kind of sucked that I was only up the mountain for only a half hour, but it was so awesome for that small time. The race started and I anxiously awaited the arrival of Marvin at the transition. When he finally came I had to take the pinny off him and then I was off starting my 11km journey! (And a journey it was)









First two kilometers I was literally running  down a river that was around 40cm deep. Glad to be out of that, the river dried up and I was running through the dry riverbed for the next 6km; rolling my ankle around three times. The river led me to a highway where the dreadful swim across the RDR was waiting for me (RDR is the Rangitata Diversion Race which is part of an irrigation system that is around 12m across). I had to jump in and swim across. I planned out that I would jump in early and flow with the current across but just my luck; the current was going the opposite way... Had to work twice as hard!

After the river it was a couple kilometers until the finish; it took me around 500m to actually recuperate and recover from the swim. I was very thankful to see the finish line and picked it up for a last final push. Hitting the finish I was congratulated with a beer that almost came back up as soon as I drank it.

I found out after the race that Marvins breaks had snapped as soon as he started his portion of the race so he only had front breaks for the entire bike! The crazy German still pulled it off!
We stuck around for awards and spot prizes. Marvin actually ended up getting free brakes by telling his story in front of the whole crowd. We got another round of beers, ate dinner at Jonos, packed up and were back on the road to Dunedin.



We ended up coming 12th out of 42 teams and placed 9th out of the mens teams. Super awesome weekend! Had a great run and some amazing times with the boys!

20th Birthday Kiwi Style

My Birthday started on the Sunday, September 30th with my bestie Laura staying up with me until 12am. As soon as the clock hit October 1st she proceeded to beat the hell out of me while screaming "ITS YOUR BIRTHDAY! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" While I curled up in the fetal position trying to defend myself. Once Laura's arms got tired of hitting me, the birthday battle came to an end and I went to bed planning on getting up for my 9am class.

Waking up Monday morning I didn't share the same feelings as the night before and had this strange idea of "its my birthday! I don't need to go to class..." So I made an awesome breakfast, went to the gym and came home to get the house ready for the evening ahead. I heard a rumor from some Kiwis that a dairy close to our flat had a birthday special of getting 5 scoops for just a dollar! So we ventured over to "Dundas Dairy" in hopes of us all splitting this massive ice cream. But much to my surprise the ice cream special wasn't there anymore (they only did it for 6 months and then stopped? sucks to have your birthday in the other 6 months of the year...) 

Walking home after that strange explanation we encountered all of these drunk Kiwi girls running around the road trying to round up people for their initiation (basically long story short some roads are so prestigious for partying that the people living there next year literally have to be initiated by the students living there this year). And these 'wastey cases' are running around on a Monday afternoon trying to find people to help them. Of-course Laura forces me to do it saying "its his birthday, he'll do it!" And that was it, I was running behind these drunk Kiwis back to their flat where 40 other people were waiting for our arrival. I really want to forget what happened next, but I will tell you this. It required this girl to lick ketchup off my stomach, take a shot of tequila (almost spewing on me), then wiping off the rest of the ketchup...? Definitely a story for the birthday books!

Running out of there, Laura and I headed home both very shell-shocked on what we just experienced. I got in the shower right away and got ready for everyone to come over.  A bunch of us headed out that night for a birthday BYO to an Indian restaurant. Apparently it was a rule was made that I had to wear a huge colorful sombrero the entire night which was pretty good at acting as an umbrella. 

                                                               After Robs Great Idea

Dinner was great! I made a very terrible speech, spilled half my curry on my jeans and barely ate what was left of my curry because we were all talking so much! Once the obnoxiousness group of us paid we all traveled back to our flat for some drinks and drunken banter. I couldn't believe it but I got heaps of birthday presents! A Canadian cupcake platter, carrot cake, and candy card was all made for me! Definitely was not expecting that.

BYO

Overall it was such an awesome experience to celebrate my 20th birthday in NEW ZEALAND! It was much different than any other of my 19 birthdays before; lets hope the big 21st can top it.

Just a Feather in the Wind

This passed weekend was literally a large sum of random events that had such an impact on making it a wicked amazing trip. It really all started with Laura and I sitting around the kitchen table Thursday night writing a "Queenstown pros and cons list"  for travelling there on Friday. The pros definitely out weighed the cons but the two MAJOR cons were that we had no rides to and from and there's always the $$$ issue. We were both back and forth on the decision to go and at one point we both decided that it was just too unrealistic to go and thought we could just go another time.

That thought didn't last long at all; I feel sometime Thursday night during all the usual "Thursday Night Leith St. Shenanigans" we both made a promise to go! We were up Friday morning packing our bags not knowing how we would get there or where we would stay if we did get there. I told Laura to not worry and "everything will workout for the best." but I really had no idea haha, I just didn't want her worrying. We called our kiwi friends to find out if they could drop us off at the highway on-ramp going to Queenstown! Our initial plan was to hitch-hike out to Queenstown, meet up with the 12 guys that went out there for the weekend, then hitch-hike back on the Saturday afternoon.

Our buddy Ben dropped us off right outside of town just before the highway and he said it would be the best spot to catch a ride to Queenstown. It was awesome! Both of us dancing, holding the sign, Laura ended up hula-hooping holding the sign. A lady pulled over real quick and we both freaked out! Turns out she was just going to the business we were standing in front of. That poor lady was just pulling into a mechanics garage and had us two crazies running up to her car with all of our stuff both real excited thinking shes giving us a ride to Queenstown. She definitely psyched us out and it was a really funny awkward interaction with her explaining that she was just going to the mechanics not Queenstown.

After 20 minutes of being out there we both instantly thought that we were never getting picked up! Little did we know that 25 minutes later we would be picked up by some super awesome people travelling around the South island in a campervan! Watching them pull over was such a relief! At that point my initial thought was "what the hell am I getting myself into now?" but there was just too much excitement to back out at this point. Bob, Laura (I'll refer to her as travel Laura) and Sam were the ones crazy enough to pick Laura and I up. Travel Laura just got back from travelling around Australia in a van for a year with her best friends, Sam (Travel Laura's cousin) was on mid-semester break and currently doing a semester on exchange in Sydney, Australia, and Bob (Travel Laura's Dad) took time off work to travel and experience New Zealand. They are all initially from America and I believe from Colorado.

The 4 hour drive was just so so cool! We all exchanged our different travel stories that were so interesting and bonded over some amazing music. When we stopped for lunch they even gave us beer and I thought to myself "man I love this hitch-hiking thing." Heading into Queenstown we exchanged numbers to meet up later that night for a drink downtown. They dropped us off right at a trail head because Laura and I were planning on doing a hike as soon as we got there. Walking out of the trail was 2 of the 12 guys we were initially planning on meeting up with. They just finished the trail and were planning on going to get Ferg Burger (Since I've been in New Zealand I've known about Ferg Burger and when you go to Queenstown it is mandatory to that you get Ferg Burger). We decided to boycott the trail until the following day and head to Ferg Burger with them. Walking into Ferg Burger I had the expectations of conquering the biggest, nastiest burger they made. I ordered the "Big AL" for $17.50 and both physically and mentally prepared my body for what was coming (felt like I was on the show Man Vs. Food). The Big AL came and to this day I have never seen a bigger burger in my life! But there was no hesitation, I dove straight into crushing that burger and after around 12 minutes of strict concentration she was finished. Jordan - 1, Ferg Burger - 0

FUN FACT - Record for completing Big AL 
IMPOSSIBLE

Double patties of beef (1/2 pound), lashings of bacon, a whole lotta cheese, two eggs, beetroot, lettuce, tomato, red onion, a big wad of aoili, avocado, and pineapple

We headed back to the hostel to meet up with the rest of the guys staying in Queenstown. We arrived dropped our stuff off, hit the liquor store and walked around downtown Queenstown. After that it was straight to "the piss" (drinking) with us 14 taking over this common room in the hostel. Scrumpies (alcoholic  cider) were on sale so everyone was drinking the Scrump! After around 2 hours we headed into town, Laura and I met up with Travel Laura and Sam and we went bar hoping all over the place. After that I can really only recollect ordering a Big Mac (still not sure if I ate it), watched Laura and Sam go swimming, and then saying goodbye to travel Laura and Sam. From that I can definitely say that it was a great night! Queenstown was one awesome place to party.

Breakfast of Champions

Waking up the next day, I didn't share the same thought. It was one rough morning, cleaning up and heading out. All the boys were going bungee jumping and Laura and I decided to finally do the hike. We could either hike or take a gondola to the top (at that point I would've paid anything to have taken the gondola). Laura and I stopped at a grocery store, got a bunch of groceries for free (cashier messed up our change and gave us $10 more than what we gave her? Winning). Then we started the dreadful hike to the top of the lookout. I personally stopped every 15 minutes along the trail and at one point Laura just ended up giving me a hug because she said I looked like I wasn't going to make it. Finally making it to the top, it felt like one of the best acheivements in my life (even though it was a very simple hike) I felt on top of the world! We celebrated over a classic PB&J at the top and just looked over Queenstown.

Heading back down was much more easier than going up, but we both started to worry about how the hell we were going to get back to Dunedin. I didn't let it worry me too much because I felt that everything has worked out so perfect all ready, we'll be fine. Getting to the bottom we went to a travel store found out that a bus ticket is $40 and defintley were both super keen on "thumbin' it." Heading to the outside of town we were both just super excited to have another crazy experience!

We weren't out there 20 minutes and these 2 guys pulled over who were Otago students on there way back to Dunedin!!! Like it couldn't have worked out any better! We hopped in the car played the "Name Game" to find out our mutual friends and bonded over some ice cream.

Tired out

This was definitely one of the best and most random weekends I have had in my life. Getting home Saturday night Courtney (Kiwihost) had been day drinking all day with the couches outside in the sun. All I thought was "here we go again!" haha and it turned out to be a great night too!

The All Blacks vs. South Africa

In the Beginning

I don't even know where to start on explaining this crazy day! It all started at 8:30am with my alarm going off and I literally went from my bed to a keg outside our flat. With the game being at 7:30pm the boys wanted to get an early start on getting ready for the game!?! At that point in the morning there was really only 7 of us crazy  (or brave) enough to start drinking. As the morning progressed on, more and more people came and things started to get out of hand.

At the beginning of the year a couple buddies bought a cheap car that ended up breaking down before they could really take it anywhere so it has been parked in the parking lot for the entire semester. I'm not relaly sure how it started but ended up turning into something similar to a riot with the car getting the windows smashed out, all the lights smashed and to finsh it off, she was rolled! Its definitley one way to get amped up for the All Blacks game.

A few of us ended up strolling into town to get a second keg, little did i know it was around 12pm (things we do in NZ). The next thing I knew we were at the annual "Naked Rugby Game" and yes it is exactly what you think. Something that no one should ever have to experience or take part in, in their life...
Came home from that and the time strangley hit 4pm and with everyone slowing walking back to their flats I thought it would be crucial to have a quick power nap before the game. What a terrible decision that was. I woke up so late that I thought I missed the rugby game!

What was left...

We started to walk over around 6:30 to the stadium and it felt like half the population of Dunedin had the same idea. The streets were packed with people everywhere all walking towards the stadium. It was the first All Blacks rugby game in the new Forsyth Barr stadium that just opened last year. The place was already packed when we arrived and we all had to split up because our tickets were all in different sections. I ended up sitting in row F (row A was front seats) right behind the All Blacks uprights. By the time I got to my seat the All Blacks were performing their traditional Haka.

The Haka

Walking into the Stadium

The game started and another international student (Jesse) came and sat beside me. Having an empty seat and some angry old guy on the other side I was happy when she took the seat. The whole game was quite the experience! The play was so fast pace, hits were huge, and being so close to the field we could see everything going on. One real drunk kiwi came and sat in-front of us wearing a   horse head, so we got some humor out of talking with him.


The All Blacks obviously ended up winning 21-11 against South Africa and the victory was not taken lightly. After the game everyone went home to prepare for one crazy night. I ended up only lasting an hour at a party before calling it a night. I just couldn't take anymore after such an eventful day. But from what I heard downtown Dunedin that night was just wild! The streets, bars, and pubs were all packed full of people celebrating the recent victory, while I was KO'd. These Kiwis really know how to party!