Gretchen 2.0: [Just Over] A Year Later

"Any given moment can change your life, you just have to be there"

-Curly Girl Greeting Card from Lake Wanaka, NZ

"Everybody needs a change, a chance to check out the new

But you're the only one who sees the changes you take yourself through."

-Stevie Wonder

It's hard to believe it was more than 12 months ago when I made my first post to the blog. Since I got back from my last trip a month ago, I've had a lot of time to reflect on what the year meant to me. It's hard to sum up in words, but there are times when something will happen and I'll think, "This is what Gretchen 2.0 is all about!" For example, in the picture at the top - I'm in a helicopter on top of Fox Glacier in New Zealand. My friends have given me the front seat for the ride down, and I've just realized what a fantastic view I'm going to get.

Tomorrow, I'm starting a new chapter as I begin my new job. While I could keep hanging out for longer and be happy, I know there is a time to move on and now seems like the right place.

Rather than philosophize on the blog (something I try to avoid), I made a list of everything I did this year. I'm sure I left a few things out, so apologies to anyone who got slighted inadvertently. A lot of my blog readers were involved in these things, and to all of you I say a big THANKS! Let's do it again soon.

• Things I did during Gretchen 2.0, in no particular order:
  
  Rode my bike through a rubber plantation in Vietnam in the pouring rain
  Visited a sheep station in New Zealand
  Learned to ride the bus around Austin and Sydney
  Got to know my neighbors
  Spearheaded a vicious animal hearing which never happened
  Worked with my homeless neighbors in downtown Austin
  Wrote a book
  Bought new clubs and worked on my golf game
  Worked out a LOT…
  Visited with friends I hadn’t seen in years
  Hiked in the Smokies with my dad
  Went to Vegas three times!
  Got Neil married off
  Snorkeled in Bali and contracted a skin rash
  Visited Botanical gardens in Singapore, Adelaide and Sydney
  Saw the Sydney Opera House for the first time
  Rode in a helicopter over a glacier and landed on top of it
  Saw Milford Sound from the air and from the ground
  Visited the tomb of Ho Chi Minh in Hanoi
  Bought too many purses to count in Thailand and Vietnam
  Cleaned up my own yard for the fall
  Went to Thai cooking school and learned to make Thai food
  Took a cooking class in Vietnam
  Saw the hotel where my dad was based out of when he was a journalist in Vietnam
  Stayed in a hotel on top of the tallest building in Bangkok
  Saw rainbows in Austin, Thailand and New Zealand
  Said goodbye to my loyal cat and longtime friend, Hugh
  Had too many massages to count
  Helped my sister move into her house in Portland, OR
  Fixed Lory’s thermostat
  Helped Susan and Pablo move into their first official home in the US
  Helped Andrea bail out her backyard after a thunderstorm tested the drainage system
  Met some koalas from afar but did not cuddle with any of them
  Fed kangaroos and saw a joey in its mothers’ pouch
  Lived in the same clothes for 2 days when my bags got lost on the way to Fiji
  Saw John Mayer and Maroon 5 concerts
  Made great Australian friends sho I know will be lifelong
• Wore lots of sunscreen (thanks Valerie!)
  Tasted wine all over Australia and New Zealand
  Sat on a beach in Fiji and contemplated my navel
  Tried possum jerky and whitebait in New Zealand (yuk)
  Realized my mom is my best friend
  Went to church in Austin and Australia
  Running on Sunday mornings with Eric, Eddie, Valerie and the gang
  Had a psychic reading
• Lived in the Gluskoter’s house in Singapore for 10 days and made myself into a local
  Took my mom to Asia for the first time
  Rode the Star Ferry in Hong Kong and went to the top of Victoria Peak
  Lived on my own for a week in Bondi Beach – bringing up average age on Bondi Road
  Attended and even co-hosted some of Fifi’s fabulous parties
  Three trips to LaGrange, TX starting with the Gretchen 2.0 kickoff party
• Rode in a tuk tuk through Siem Reap Cambodia
  Saw the sunset over Angkor Wat
  Stomped grapes in Milton, Australia
  Walked across the Sydney Harbor Bridge
  Walked along the Sydney coastal beach path
  Walked with Sheila along Marginal Way in Ogonquit, Maine
  Ate lunch at Stonewall Kitchens in Maine
  Learned how to say “hello” in Fijian (Bula!)
• Skiied in Breckenridge in mid-April
  

I still plan to keep the blog up to tell about my adventures, it may not get updated quite as much, but I know you'll understand...

Sun Came Out: Wanaka, Queenstown and back to Christchurch

I am happy to report that positive thinking prevailed. The weather for my last three days in New Zealand was fantastic!

The day I last posted, the rain held off long enough for us to visit the Lake Hawea Sheep Station. There, we met Dougal Burton, who is a third generation sheep farmer. There are 10,000 sheep on their land, out of a total of 40 million sheep in all of New Zealand! To read more about the Burton family and their business you can go to http://www.lakehaweastation.co.nz/.

They had just been shearing last week, and we got to see some of the wool. All the shearing is done by professionals. Dougal told us that wool in general can sell from anywhere from $1000 to $100,000 per bag. A bag is about the size of two large garbage bags in the US.

Dougal treated us to a real live sheep herding deomstration by the working dogs. Unfortunately, one terrier got a little carried away and kind of messed up the demo. We got the idea, though. Note from the photo that Pam has dried off from her bike ride the other day.

That night, I saw the most beautiful sunset ever over Lake Wanaka. I love this little town. If I move to New Zealand, that's where I'm going to live (no, I am not moving to New Zealand).

The next day was the best day of biking for me. The scenery was beautiful and we did 43 miles before lunch. Thankfully, lunch was at a winery. Here I am going up the last hill:

From there, it was off to Queenstown, the adventure capital of New Zealand. They are best known for having commercialized bungee jumping. I did not jump from a bungee, choosing instead to relax in the hot tub at the lovely Nugget Point Resort. Nugget Point is a boutique resort and family owned operation, and I would highly suggest staying there if you are out that direction. look them up at http://www.nuggetpoint.co.nz/. You can see how pretty it is in our group photo, and in this photo of my friends, Debra and Larry.

The weather was so good, we decided to make another run at Milford Sound. We got to go! What an experience. We flew in a small plane 40 minutes each way from Queenstown to Milford, then took a 2 hour boat cruise. I think you will be able to tell the plane pictures from the cruise ones. Note that we were REALLY close to the waterfall - the boat pulled up so near it that my hair was wet! Brrrrr!

Sadly, it was time to say goodbye to all the Backroads gang that day. It was such a fun trip, made all the more so by our excellent guides, Paul and Eoin. Thanks guys, for making my trip special! The blog salutes you.

Although it was chilly, at least for Texans, the weather in Christchurch was sunny and clear the next day, as I wrapped up my Kiwi adventure. I got to spend the day with Jenny Meadows from the St. David's Writer's Group. She's over in New Zealand for two months, and left about when I did. We had a perfect day and I am really bummed we did not take a photo together. We did love this sculpture because it reminded us of Austin:

And, the begonias in the Botanical Garden were not to be missed!

I made it to Sydney and took possession of my flat in Bondi yesterday. Let's just say there will not be any idyllic shots of the building on the blog. It is, however, clean and well located. More on Sydney soon. Good on ya!

New Zealand is a Green Place: Rain, Rain Go Away

In the last 48 hours, we have discovered one reason New Zealand is so green.

When it rains here, they do not mess around.

I am sort of bummed out today because I was supposed to be flying over Milford Sound right now, and am not doing so because of the weather. Bummer. Since we cannot control the forces of nature, I am posting to the blog instead.

A few words about my stay at Lake Moeraki Wilderness Lodge - that place rocks. Check it out at http://www.wildernesslodge.co.nz/. The first night, we went to feed some eels. Here is Cory the naturalist with the eels. I fed them some pork tenderloin, which they seemed to like. My friend Deborah was much better at feeding them though.

The second day it was raining, but we still went on a walk to the beach, which was beautiful even though it was full of sandflies. Here I am on the beach:

The next day we were supposed ot have out longest and prettiest bilke ride of the trip. A huge storm moved in during the night, the likes of which I have not seen since the eve of the Gretchen 2.0 party in LaGrange last year! That storm dumped about 4 inches of rain, which was about the same as we got yesterday. I am certain it was raining sideways at one point. I chose not to bike, as did most folks. My friend Pam was hard core and knocked out 51km, here she is afterwards.

Our guide, Eoin (Owen), is Irish. He knows how to describe what type of rain is coming down in 20-30 different terms. Yesterday we moved from "wet" to "terrible." It stopped long enough for me to take this photo of a burned out pickup in front of a cafe:

No one biked up the Haast Pass, a 15k, 3000 foot climb. I did get this photo at the top:

We're now in Lake Wanaka, here was our first view of it, again in a quick break in the rain action:

Today may be better after all, even though it is threatening. Here was the sunrise this morning just outside my room.

Still having a great time. Otago region, where we are now, has wineries! And sheep. Plan for the rest of the day here is to visit a sheep station and a winery. A pretty good day if you ask me.

On the Bike Again: New Zealand South Island

Greetings from the land of Kiwis, where I am currently on Lake Moreaki, in the Southwest New Zealand World Heritage area. It is raining and we have a layover day from biking, which is giving me a great chance to update the blog on the trip so far.

After almost not getting into the country becuase of a jar of Tiger Balm, I arrived in Christchurch and spent a few hours exploring before it got dark. The next morning was an early start. I met my Backroads group at the train station where we boarded the TranzAlpine Express to Moana. There, we had lunch (eating is a really big theme for this part of the trip) and headed out on our first ride!

The fist sites we saw were beaches. We spent a night at Punakaiki in this really cool beachfront lodge. Punakaiki is near the Pancake Rocks, which are some large rock formations that look like pancakes. The rain was driving down so I have no photos, but will be getting some from other folks to post later. The second night we stayed in the little town of Hokitika, where there is a black sand beach! This was right outside my window:

Unlike Australia, New Zealand really has no dangerous animals (they also do not have koalas). The third day we ventured inland to where there are more mammals. This cafe in Pukekura is capitalizing on the local food source and even sells possum jerky and possum pies. I tried some of the jerky and it was not bad. The owner has quite a sense of humor as you can guess from the outside of his store. The place is for sale if anyone is interested.

A note on New Zealand possums: they are not like the ones at home. They are actually sort of cute. In fact, they look disturbingly like cats. The only ones I have seen so far are dead, because there is a huge overpopulation problem. Per the photo below, people set a lot of traps for possums and they even shoot the poor things. National Geographic did an article on the possum issue, including a photo of one still alive, which you can read at http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/04/0425_060425_possum.html.

From there, we cycled to Franz Josef where we joined several thousand of our tour bus friends. Franz Josef is a small town near one of two really large glaciers, so it is worth braving all the people. We had a day off biking to explore, and I went for a hike with Pam and our guide Eoin (pronounced Owen). We saw where the glaciers melt into the riverbeds. The water is so cold that sometimes there is still ice flowing by in huge chunks!

Here I am at the bottom of the glacier:

Later that day, we did one of the coolest things ever (no pun intended). We went for a ride in a helicopter over the glaciers! The pilot of our helicopter was about 14 years old.

I'll have more photos later on this from my friend Larry, but here are some previews. It is hard to explain what a glacier looks like until you see it up close. Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers are some of the only glaciers in the world that are actually getting bigger rather than smaller! However, there is still evidence of global warming around the area. They just get a real lot of snow there. Read more on Franz Josef at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Josef_Glacier.

Here I am at the top of the glacier:

Now, I am off for a hike in the rain - it has stopped for a few minutes so maybe I'll get lucky. Check the blog soon for more on New Zealand, and post comments!