NZ 2011: #14: SKYDIVEEEEE.

SKYDIVEEEEEE (: (: hehhh woke up at 7 plus this morning in the cold beside lake taupo, and it was SO cold that I just had to check the temperature online, and in the end it was -0.4 degrees, and with the wind it feels like -2 degrees! Goshhhhhhh. No wonder I was freezing despite using that double layered duvet o.O

Herny made the call the first thing he woke up and in the end, they told us that the weather is good and the skydive will be done! And immediately, I freaked out and started hiding in my blanket lol. But in the end we still packed up and drove over to the office and soon enough, we were sitting down deciding the package (which we chose the silver one since it included a video footage and photos) and gearing up for the fly.

driving to the skydive site!

prepping for the moment

nervous smile haha

Andden we were up sitting on that small little plane, thirteen people including a pilot, a crew member and the four of us with four tandem masters and 3 camera men. All in that small plane. Andden we took off and once we hit the first 1000 ft my tandem master, kristy, tiold me that we have another 11000 more and it’s going to take another ten to fifteen minutes goshhhh. So I spent the time thinking “oh my God why am I doing this why am I doing this!” and psychihng myself for the jump andden we eventually reached the 12000ft mark and in front of my very eyes, I saw herny shift to the edge of the plane, his legs hanging in the free air, andden disappearing from my sight GOSH. And I instantly screamed! Damn scary! That was how quick it is!!! And soon kristy moved me forward to the edge, and told me to smile at the camera, and before knowing it I was right at the d=edge and with a push down we went!!!

And then it was just “AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!” “OH MY GOD THIS IS DAMN AWESOME” “WOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” “THIS ROCKSSSSSS!!!” *inserts mambo actions for time of my life*

“I’M LOVING THIS!!!” andden the parachute opens and “WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!”

herny - the first one to go!

hahahaha omg my mouth open so big

floating 12000ft above ground

heehee

totally loving it!

Andden I was just talking to kristy how awesome it is and how I’m so going to do this again! And of course enjoying the view of lake taupo below me and looking at how tiny everything is from above (: loved the sights! So thankful for that experience! Oh yes I saw the rest of the three in the air too and so I was waving to them happily but none of them saw me. Roars!

Soon we were reaching the ground and kristy maneuvred to a nice place and we landed on our butts :D and that marked the end! I gave her a handshake and a big hug and thanked her so much for the awesome experience (: rocksssss.

And so when the 4 of us reunited at the landing ground we gave a damn loud cheer to mark the end! :D damn crazy hahah we totally went insane! Super happy~

in our gear!

my tandem master

our cute little plane!

the tandem masters

kritsy and i!

Went back to the office after that and removed our gear with big smiles on our faces. Checked out of video shortly, and it was awesomeeeeeeee (: heehee. So we waited to get our DVDs and paid for the extra charges, then checked our DVDs (there was a small little problem with mine but that was quickly solved), andden yayyy time to go back!

And so in the camper we had a good, long, filling breakfast and after some packing up, we drove back to the campsite to visit the toilet andden started our long long drive back to wellington! :D this time we took a different route and omg the view was also very amazing! But unlike the other route which gave us the “bright” side, this route was slightly darker, with barren lands and brown, dying grasses, and plus the clouds made it all gloomy and sad.

At 1.15pm we started looking for a place to camp since jojo’s got a phone interview and so we needed to find a place with reception. So we stopped somewhere near the highway after checking out some areas and looking for picnic points and emptied the camper for jojo to have his private phone interview.

And soon the 3 of us outside in the cold were finding many many ways to keep ourselves warm, like dancing to hwachong mass dance (which both darius and I already forgot), snsd, wu bai (ni shi wo de hua duo~), playing pepsi cola 1 2 3, the o-ya-bey-ya-so and cai-quan of death (where each time you lose you take a step closer to the highway), their FOC fireball dance, and many other crappy things! We looked like a total retard for that 40 minutes. Haha. But at least jojo’s interview sorta went well so if he gets it it’s all worth it! :D

where we camped - at about 1000m above sea level!

while waiting for jojo

back on the road!

So after his interview ended we went back up the camper and continued our drive to wellington, skipping lunch and talking rubbish on our way there! And finally at about 9pm we reached the ever familiar Westpac stadium and after exploring the bluebridge parking area we decided to camp at the Westpac stadium instead, and omg the memories hahaha.

one of the museums we stopped by but didn't enter

as usual, the three retards :D

Finally, we started cooking dinner (pasta with two different sauces with prawns, mushrooms and chicken! :D), ate, washed the dishes, and soon we were all ready to sleep :)

shiok!

+ guaishou's! :D

NZ 2011: #10. DIVE TUTUKAKA!

Woke up at 8 today and drove to the dive area early in the morning while darius and jojo were still in bed! :D managed to find the dive place by 9 after asking the peeps from dive tutukaka (and omg those direct competitors are really friendly people!) and got our wetsuits and gear (7mm wet suits is damn zai) andden soon we went over to the yatch and took a 45mins boat ride to poor knights! :D

view from my window - very awesome!

( photos taken with my point & shoot in a $10 waterproof casing! )

ready to dive in!

some kayaks! would have gone kayaking during the break if not for the cold windddd

our dive master

our gear!

welcome to poor knights!

And soon we were all geared up and ready for our first dive! And to be frank I was really nervous – the dives at aur were almost painful and definitely not very enjoyable and so I was quite afraid I wouldn’t be able to equalize and descent fast enough. And the worst was the water was at 17 degrees celcius! Goshhhh. Comparing to aur which was 28 degrees, plus the cold canyoning experience just two days ago, it’s really pretty scary.

gearing up!

But the dive turned out to be pretty good! I was a little too heavily weighted so I kept sinking and had trouble with my buoyancy, but we managed to get to see quite some stuff! Herny spotted a stingray but I somehow didn’t get to see it while I was there -___- roars. But saw a few other things here and there and plus the visibility was very awesome! But the scary part was keeping buoyant, I even ascended all the way to the top once and had to descent back down :/ and even scarier was herny and daryl were far below and swimming really quickly and so I was quite tired finning already.

And in the end my oxygen used up super quickly and we had to stop after 35 minutes. Once we were oin the surface, I was super reliefed but super tired, but amazingly not that cold! Hehhh. Swam back to the boat and started on our surface interval, with two cups of instant soup, some cookies and some gums. It was super cold after a while with the wind blowing and the rain falling, and plus we were driving around poor knights looking at the volcanic isles and even going through a cave! Super shiok.

beautiful waters

After an hour twenty, we started gearing up for our second dive and this time I removed another weight and after that the buoyancy was so much better! :D :D I could finally focus on the dive itself, and not to forget, the second dive site is three degrees warmer and damn pretty! We swam into a cave (with the surface still within the cave so perfectly safe) and even had to use a torch to see the stuff running underground! There were schools of fishes andden many things crawling on the seabed (I suspect its crayfish but we can’t see much) and it was dark and scary but super nice! And what was the most amazing part was went we turned around to the other side, and OMG SO AWESOME.

Its like the cave walls around your sides, deep blue waters in front with boulders full of seaweed and corals, visibility that is probably at least 50m, and schools of fishes around you and even nice white sand! :D just exactly like what we saw in the pictures! Super dreamy (: (: I was so in awe that I almost screamed into my regulator. And the experience of swimming next to the fishes was like WOAHHHHH.

And we continued swimming on and saw super a lot of things, like many sea urchins, red snapper, moray eel, and the LOBSTERRRRRR. And the lobster super cute! :D just pops his head out with the feelers and looking at you with that earnest looking black beady eyes lol. Loved it! Eventually we swam until herny was only left with 40 psi (I was left with 20 the previous dive!) and ascended near the boat. And when I came up all I could scream was AWESOMEEEEEE.

Seriously a super good dive! And with this I’m now a much more confident diver and ready to explore more sites (: and all those paranoia and reluctance to dive is now converted to enthusiasm and passion (: wooooots.

thats the location of our 2nd dive!

very very happy after our dive!

Changed out quickly into my wellington marathon tee and track pants then drank some hot milo andden rested! Waited for the other couple and soon we were back on our 45 minutes drive back to mainland new Zealand.

By the time we reached shore, we got daryl to sign our log books and rushed to our dearest campervan and omg jojo and darius were damn awesome they were all ready to feed us with warm soup, awesome chilli cabbage with carrots and nice sausages with potato and rice!!! :D :D lovesssss. Now I know why husbands want their wives at home so after a tiring day they get nice warm fuzzy food to fill their stomachs hahaha. Now I need to learn to cook well.

And so now I’m typing this while being on the campervan for our 400km journey from tutukaka to rotorua, for our zorbing tomorrow afternoon and white water rafting two days later and skydiving three days later! :D goshhh. It’s gonna be an exciting 3 days ahead! (:

Oh yes, one last thing before I sign off, darius is joining us for skydiving! I’M DAMN PROUD OF HIM. :D

(continued later) drove a total of 330km tonight, and stayed up all the way while the other three took turns to drive. Darius drove the last 120km, with the very last 50km focused on trying to find a good camping ground while being on our way to rotorua nonetheless. Super hard to find!

And so eventually when we somehow found a carpark with a public toilet near a ulu park at Cambridge town, we fasted set up the tables and cooked a simple dinner of pasta with cream sauce, and almost immediately I fell asleep after dinner and the rest of the three washed up and even set up the bed hahaha. Felt like a pig but was seriously tired after that long journey. O.o

+ guaishou's! :D