Here comes the snow

Life is so much more enjoyable with friends! A few days ago I was hitching to the recycle center (after my bike had been nicked) to try and find a new one, and was picked up by 3 English girls, also around for the winter season. I joined them later that day at the spa pools, the next day to do some mountain biking in 'Sticky Forest', a wicked mountain biking area locally, with loads of trails, and then to top it, at 4 o'clock the next morning to walk up a mountain in the pitch black to catch sunrise at 8. It was so beautiful, 1st the experience of walking up a rough track in the dark, then coming through the cloud layer to see all the stars, then seeing the sky lighten gradually from a faint blue to a gorgeous full blown orange across a whole swath of the horizon, with pink reflected on the snowy mountains all around us. We got to the top, trudging through snow, and munched on biscuits and drank warm tea (a god-send given the -8 it must have been) for 30 min as the sky became animated, changing every second, before we needed to start moving again to warm up.

And today the Ski field open!! but I'm nackered after the last few days, and going out last night, plus my skis wont be ready until tomorrow. But tomorrow it will be, my 1st ever excursion in to the realms of skiing. Its rather daunting, as is anything unknown, but we shall soon find out!

I hope to let you know soon!

x

Wanaka - to stay

Wow I have had a full last few weeks. I managed to get from Christchurch to Wanaka perfectly, and stayed with a previous wwoof host for 3 weeks. They are based 15km from the main town, but i was able to go in for a couple of days to get about 30 CVs around to restaurants, shops, pubs, hostels - everywhere really. At the vast majority of places the answer was no, or at least not yet. This is the first time in my life I have had to really look for a job properly, and the most i have ever been rejected, so it has been challenging to deal with the brick wall. Despite that, more recently I have been following up some of the shops, popping back every week, with a vague possibility with a few, so there is light yet. As well as looking for work, I was able to very easily find suitable accommodation, as there are a number of places where all the adverts for that kind of thing are posted. Also in the three weeks with my host I was able to get all my ski gear, including some very good clothing very cheep from a recycling/ 2nd hand center.

I moved in to my 1st renter accommodation ever on the 29th May, which I share with a local 37yr old girl. Although i could have moved in with 8 other 20yr olds, it didn't take my fancy as much, as i enjoy my space, plus I'm veggie, which is awkward if there is group shopping, including meat (bonus as my flat mate is veggie too). I have now been in my accommodation just over 3 weeks, in which time i have managed to get out a lot more as I'm 5 minutes cycle from town, meet like minded people, and sort endless bank troubles, get on to the case of possible employers, buy all my food, cook interesting things in all my spare time, do lots of e-mails, make lots of contacts and experience a whole different area of life.

Tomorrow I'm returning to the shop which has got the most likelihood of employment, so I'm really really hoping I get something out of that. I have also just won an online auction for some ski boots, so I'm pretty much totally ready to ski when the fields open in 5 days. Very exciting, and also rather daunting.

I'm going to be celebrating Christmas in 5 days too, as there are so many English here, and its of course winter, we feel we really need to have Christmas, or life just wouldn't be complete. So I'm heading over to friends for the day, not sure whats in store but it will be wicked fun whatever.


I will up-date you on the job front soon, and I hope its positive or other wise I don't think I will be staying around :(

x