Heading down south a while. Part 1- Farewell Spit to Queenstown

So it's been over a week again since I've written anything here. I apologise for that but Internet is not one of New Zealand's stronger points. I have quite a bit to fill you in on so I reckon this will be a post in two parts. Mostly because I am far too lazy to write it all now.

At the moment I am in Queenstown. I feel like something death carries with him in his suitcase.* Terribly hungover. Went to a pub last night called the world bar,(which coincidentally this Internet cafe is under). In this place place they serve a wide array of alcoholic drinks in teapots. So you get a teapot full of spirits of your choice. They also serve jugs of beer. So you see why I am dying today. I have travelled quite a way since last I wrote. Well, when I say travelled I've slept mostly really. Nils has travelled quite a way. I suppose from where I left off is usually the best way to write.

Last Monday we took the ferry from Wellington to Picton. (Not much to say on Wellington by the way, seems like a pretty cool town but didn't see enough to judge.) From Picton we headed North-west to the little town of Motueka. the kayak company we used is based there. Stayed the night in Motueka, a Hamilton kind of place. It was pretty funny though, the first place that had no Germans there when we arrived and shortly after we arrived a busload of German teenagers came along. On tuesday at 9 o'clock we began our Kayak trip, with three french people, an english woman and a korean girl. We also had a guide who's name I cannot recall, he was pretty good though (it started with a c...) Kayaking in the Abel Tasman natioal park is an amazing experience. Completely unique. On the first day we brought up to Tonga island via "water taxi", a boat which is dropped into the sea by a tractor. From Tonga we made our down the coast under the guidance of our eh.. guide who will from here on be called Mr. C. The coastline there is very beautiful, strecthes of forest sit atop the pale rock coast and in places there are long tidal estauaries. That bring to mind places like the amazon or vietnam. The forest reaching reaching down to the water, with some trees hanging over. We were first brought to Tonga island, a short distance from the shore. Mostly to ease us into sea kayaking I think, so we could get used to the boats and waves. On Tonga island there is a colony of seals. Over 150 we were told. We saw 3, though one did swim right beside our Kayak which was pretty damn cool. From Tonga we were led back down the coast stopping by in the lovely Bark Bay, a tidal estuary. Starting in a wide bay and finishing in a rocky creek. Then on down to anchorage where we camped for the night.

Some free advice if you plan to do a two day kayak, bring water and sun cream. These things are very important. Went a small bit insane the second day after about four hours on the open sea in the sun. Paddled constantly for about 2/3 kilometres in a mad rush to get to some shade.

Aside from that it was all good though. On the second day we were left to our devices, we went out to a small off the coasr. Looked like the kind of place where a person would get stranded, was nice though. There was a big seal just lounging around on the beach there.

After Abel Tasman we headed up north to the Farewell Spit.A 26 km sand spit on the northern tip of the noth island. It was a terribly desolate place. The lonely planet guide book describes Cape Reinga on the north island as having a very "end of the world" feel, I don't think so. If you want end of the world go to Farewell spit. At low tide the sea retreats to over a km away. So you're left with this vast stretch of sand only interupted by small pools of water. You can hear the distant rumble of the sea and the beach is covered in broken sea shells and dead trees. On the eastern side of the spit it's eerily calm but on the west gale winds sweep the sand across the beach. It hurts quite a bit when it hits you. On the west side in a place called Fossil point I found a big Sealion kicking back on the beach. Some more free advice, if you go too close to wild sealions they will try and attack you. They are quite big and I would say pretty scary. The whole area makes you feel very lonely. Somewhat similar to the feeling I get in the burren, but much stronger here.

From the Farewell spit we went south to the Nelson Lakes National park. A park set around two lakes, Rotoita and another one that I can't remember the name. Hulking snow covered mountains surround both lakes. It was one of my favourite places so. We hiked to the top of one of the mountains, the name which has thus far elluded me. It was a 5 hour return trip and somewhat taxing but all worth it for the incredible view that greeted us from the top. The photos are on facebook, have no facilities to upload them here for the moment. While in Nelson lakes I was in contact with a friend*from the volunteer group, found out he was leaving soon (tomorrow in fact) so we had a bit of a whirlwind trip down through the south island. Quickly passing the glaciers and the stunning southern alps. So I'll do a proper blog on those after we see them properly. On another note was in Rohan today, one of the locations from the Lord Of the Rings films. Unbelievable, straight out of the movie. Actually felt like it IS Rohan.

Apologies that this blog entry hasn't been very good, will do a better one next time I promise.

*This is a quote from a Warren Zevon songm, that I've always wanted to use.

**The friend is one Mr. Lorenz Grund. Another german of course and a freeloading bum from the land of Nuremburg. He's made his way through New Zealand eating other peoples food and generally hanging around in places where he shouldn't be. But all that aside, I can think of few better men to have a pint(or teapot) with. Looking forward to meeting him on his home soil

One more thing

Who is Kaizera_Maestra? Just out of interest...

105km Of Winding Unsealed Road

Right so it's been a few days since my last post again. We're in Wellington now. It's been a long trip here with a shitload of driving ( well mostly sleeping on my part, I knew there was a reason I never learned to drive). Been to quite a few places since I last wrote so I'll try to include them all...



So when I last wrote to you we had just arrived in Tairua and we were staying in this place called the Pinnacles which was quite cool. Mostly cause ther sign had Obelix on it. If you have to ask who Obelix is I don't want to talk to you. From there we headed north to Hot Water Beach and Cathedral Cove. Being honest neither of these were very impressive. If I could do it again I wouldn't be arsed with them. Hot Water Beach is this beach where at low tide you can dig a hole in the sand and it fills up with hot water. Sounds cool doesn't it? The reality, there is only a very small section of the beach where this is possible and that soon gets filled with half naked old people and likewise pasty europeans. So take my word it does not make for a pleasant sight. A hundred half naked people diggin holes in a tiny stretch of sand. They look like lunatics, something akin to one of Monty Pythons stranger sketches. Before this we were at Cathedral Cove. Which is a coastal cave. We have some of those in Ireland I believe. Fair enough they're not such a nice colour but I really don't think that it's worth so much tourist attention. Aside from this Coromandel is pretty beautiful but in my oppinion you get similar elsewhere in New Zealand without the hordes of tourists.



So after this we headed down to Rotorua very briefly and then on to to Taupo where we met up with one of the girls from CVNZ who had left a few weeks ago. Had a few pints here and stayed the night. Liked the town. Somewhere to visit on the way back I reckon..



From here we went to Waiotapu "Geothermal Wonderland". Very cool place. With a geyser (advertised from 20m high more like 5). Muti coloured lakes and bubbling mud pools. Kinda pricey at 30 dollars but I don't know anywhere else where you get a lake thats bright yellow/green/ orange edged and spouts off steam.



From here we went on to Te Urewera National park. Beggining the trip through the park we were met by a somewhat daunting sign "105km of unsealed winding road". For those who don't know what unsealed means (I didn't) it's a very basic gravel road. And when they said winding, they weren't taking the piss. The road we set upon wound its way though steep forested valleys. Sometimes descending to follow along beside streams, other times rising again to follow along cliff edges high above the forest floor with vast stretches of trees in every direction. Te Urewera National park is the largest in the north island and as you make your way through it you can really get a feeling of the scale of it. For periods of hours you will meet no one, and every time you rise above the tree line, all you will see in any direction is trees. It has a felling akin to what I imagine the Western Frontiers in America must have been like. *As you make your way slowly(slowly is the only way you can go on such roads) through this amazing place you really do think "Shit, it can't get much better than this." then you emerge form the forest and unto the steep cliffed edges of Lake Waikremoana. The lake is pristine blue, a perfect reflection of the sky. The deep green of the forest reaches down between the sky and its surface to provide a buffer between the two. Otherwise you wouldn't be able to tell the difference. And all too soon we left Te Urewera national park and still the gravel road winded on for quite a while. Before eventually getting to what people in those parts of New Zealand know as civilisation.



Nothing much interesting has happened since then. We stayed in Napier last night then drove all day to get here, Wellington. We're staying here tonight and tomorrow night. Getting the ferry to the south island on Monday and hoping to undertake a 3 day kayak trip through Abel Tasman National park on Wednesday. Should be interesting I think, especially knowing my natural grace and finesse. So thats about it for now... Oh met some Kiwis tonight who thought I was scottish, they kept shouting "BRAVEHEART!" I don't recall any scottish person ever shouting "BRAVEHEART!". I do seem to recall a film of that name though... Silly Kiwis. On another note. People don't know Fairytale of New York here. Is there not something fundementally wrong with this?

*I promised I'd actually try and describe some of the things I see from now on. It's not usually the kind of writing I'm very good at but I tried. Hope it does ya.

One more note. The forest described is not actually rainforest. Which was a nice change. Was something more like the woods back home. Just much bigger

A brief run down of the first few days

Tane Mahuta, the god of the forest

Father of the Forest

Steve, the terribly creepy mannequin. Why does he have a name tag!?

Right I'm on a timer here so I have to be quick. And also pictures will be a long while yet cause I've lost my camera lead (which cost me 20 dollars).

Anyway. Upon leaving Auckland the other day we ventured into Northland via 'motorway' 12. Most of the roads here are akin to rally courses albeit really well paved rally courses. And when they're not like like they're terribly dull. Going through countless little towns which all look the same. For all the beautiful places they have here they sure do have an awful lot of ugly ones. Northland at the start for the most part was long flats of farming land with brief intermissions of tiny towns with names I can't remember and don't care to. They might as well have been the same place run past my window several times over. All the streets look the same, all follow the same kind of grid plan. Dargaville being the highlight of dullness on our way. For a while it seemed like Hamilton country. Our first stop on our way was the Kauri Musuem. A place that allegdedlt gives a fascinating insight into the history of the Kauri tree and will leave you amazed. It was the single most weird experience I've had here. The majority of the museum is taken up by creepy mannequins of ' pioneers' placed in different settings. Like their houses or barber shops etc. I was really at loss as to what exactly this had to do with Kauri trees. The first one was an old style kitchen with three life size dolls. A mother and two children, one an incredibly unsettling little child in a high chair and the other a bizarre girl boy hybrid with some unidetentifed white substance covering its hand. On a little plaque under the display was a message from Pete "your friednly musuem guide'. "Can you see the boy stealing the cream?" Both insightful and fascinating. Other highlights included a robotic cow that was 'milked right before your eyes!' i.e twitched like it was having some form of seizure. And a huge room paying homage to the sawmills that killed most of the kauri. Including an entire wall of chainsaws, some bigger than I am. Ironically this was the only part of the museum that had really very much to do with Kauris.*

Luckily an hour or two after this we eventually made it to the Kauri forest. The scale of the place is just awesome. It is impossible to capture in pictures, the most impressive being The Father of the forest( can't remember it's Maori name). The tree looks like a cliff face, again it is impossible to convey the feeling of awe being in the presence of it. And the whole forest is full of them, most at least as big as that one I described in an earlier post. After the forest again more dull landscapes rolled past and sleep threatened to take me a few times but I managed to stay awake till we got to Kaitia. At the southern most tip of 90 mile beach where we stayed for the night.

We headed out early the next day hoping to reach Cape Reinga before the arrival of the dreaded tour buses. Bout 3/4 of the way there we were stopped by roadworks and asked by a nice lady if we wouldn't mind coming back in about half hour. They were putting metal on the road. I don't know why either. We used this half hour to take a look at the Giant Te Paki sand dunes. I'll tell you now they certainly live up to their namesake. Huge hulking things they are, hundred feet or more and stretch for miles in every direction. Standing in the middle is like being in the middle of the Sahara or some such. Tremendous fun to throw yourself off as well, though likely to get sand every as a result(and yes I mean everywhere). After this brief soiree we made it Cape Reinga. Again an amazingly beutiful place, a walkway perched on high cliffs look down on where the Tasman sea( I think) and the Pacific Ocean crash together. Its really something to see, the size and power of the waves. We also had a splendidly sunny day so that helped.

Right I've only five minute left so I'd best wrap this up. We've made our way back down through Auckland( with a stop off last night in a horribe little caravan park) and across the southern end of the Cormondal ranges(rainforest), which were shrouded in cloud as we crossed so that was pretty cool. Tonight we've come to rest in a nice little seaside town called Tairua, at the foot of the ranges. And tomorrow we're off to Hot Water beach and Cathedral cove. Next update will probably be when we get to Wellington, so Sunday I reckon.

*Another great Kauri attraction was "Ancient Kauri Kingdom. FREE ADMISSION!" It was in actual fact a shop.

Also apologies bout spelling mistakes and such, this was very rushed.

Back in Auckland. Again

Right I've just returned to Auckland for the what I hope will be the last time in a long time.
Spent the last two days up north. Cape Reinga and The Kauri Forest were amazing.

Been keeping blog stuff in my journal and I've forgotten it so you're going to have to wait for a proper entry with pictures and such.

But for now just be happy that I'm happy.

Almost forgot

There is the Nils I'm travelling with, possibly the strangest of them all.
But I'm not finished with him for a while yet so he'll get a mention at a later date.

This is the end. Or possibly the beginning.

So it's my last night here in Auckland.

It's been an interesting 7 weeks I must say. Not at all what I expected and all the better for it.

We're leaving at 7 in the morning, heading north. Our destinations being 90 mile beach and Cape Reinga. Further than that no plans have been made. I don't know where we'll be staying. In fact I don't even know where I'll be at this time tomorrow night. And that my followers is a pretty cool feeling. I've enjoyed my stay with the volunteers but it's been pretty on the rails. Gonna be nice to go off them for a while. As was my original intent in coming here. Wandering. Albeit the original plan was to wander alone and I now have a German in tow. Or I suppose more accurately I'm in tow seeing as he's the driver... Cape Reinga is where the Maori believe spirits depart this world and enter the underworld, its the one of the Northern most tips of the country. Also pretty much deserted. I like the sound of it.



Now seeing as I'm finished with CVNZ I think it's about time I told ye people what I REALLY think of ye. Bastards;





Heh, not really.( Well aside from the one, who is genuinely a bastard. You know who you are). So I'll try to give a mention to everyone here.





Suppose I'll start off with the first two. Paulina and Katharina. Aka Kadi and Pauli. Been hanging around since my first days here. For the first while I pretty sure they were on a exchange program from some insane asylum in Germany(Kadi anyhow, never have I met a lady who give such an evil evil stare). But after not too long it became apparent that they were allright and I suppose at this point I'm pretty good friends with them. And Pauli was along for my first sitting through both of the series of the Conchords, surely a bonding experience? Two nicer ladies you'll never meet. Planning on meeting up with them at some point on the South Island. So I'll say no more bout them for now.





Then there's Nils(the other one, not the one I'm travelling with). Affectionately known as Penguin Nils. Good man, great laugh when he's on the beer despite the fact he speaks this crazy english-german hybrid language only he understands when pissed. Also wins the award for best laugh. One minute completely dead pan, then it seems to erupt out of his head in short bursts.





Then we've got Helen. the Scowse of the group. But shhh. She's trying to lose the accent(and succeeding mostly). Helen is my drinking buddy, don't know how I survived without her. There's plans afoot for me to come to Liverpool to visit her where I am promised a mountain of drink beacaue it's so cheap over there, I even intend to brave talking to her artsy friends. She was also the 'neutral' person of the group. Never took any sides eh?


After that then theres Eva and Lisa. Who were actually sent on exchange from an asylum. They're okay though Eva was a terribly violent person. She was shipped off today to a high security facility in the South Island. Braided my hair as parting gift(seriously, there's pictures, somewhere) Lisa is awesome when she's angry, "ITS 10.30. WE NEED TO HAVE OUR FUCKING MORNING TEA". I can't remember if she actually said fucking but it sounds much better that way. Aside from the temper she's cool, prone to collapsing though.


Then there's Tomas. Well Tomas is unique. He drinks about a gallon of tea a day. Get's up at 6 o'clock every morning and has an encyclopedic knowledge of geology. I've only ever met one person who had as much energy as this guy. and he used to crash around 12 everyday. Nice guy though, always do his best to help you out and always good for a chat. Whether you like it or not :P. Tomas plans to move in to the cupboard in the volunteer house and never leave.

So thats pretty much all of ye. There's others I've mentioned in earlier posts, new ones I don't know well to mention and I'm sure some I've just forgotten. So apologies.
Oh one more. A shout out to Bruce as well. Bruce is the other team leader. Only had him for 2 weeks so didn't get to know him quite as well as Wayne but he's cool nonetheless. He read The Men Who Stare At Goats even after I'd recommended it. Also has a pretty sharp sense of humour. So thanks to Bruce. Enjoyed the two weeks with ya, which is pretty impressive given that one of them was Hamilton.

And a quick hello to Fionna, Sandra and Steve. The office people involved in CVNZ. It's okay I don't hold a vendetta against you for sending me to Hamilton. I've forgiven you.
So yeah basically thanks to everyone for giving me a memorable few weeks both volunteers and Cvnz staff.

So yeah my conservation days are done andI go onward into the unkown. *

(Apologies if I've bored any of my usual readers with this piece about all these people who you don't know at all. These things need to be done though.)

*I am aware that this is a 'tad' too dramatic but it's often you get to say such a thing.

A quick note

Firstly go back to my previous post 'coming to an end' which now features an image of David 'pretending he's inside a washing machine'

Also kindly check this link out. myspace.com/autonsland. It's his band. The music's actually pretty good. Who'd have thought it?

Food Poisoning is not fun

So I woke up last night in a cold sweat with a heavy churning feeling in my stomach. 6 hours later I'm still in the toilet. I've had no sleep and it's time to go to work. Luckily my sorry state discouraged our leader from bringin us out.
But a perfect end to a perfect week in Hamilton I think. Other events during the week included my lighter being stolen. By some tatoo'd sonuvabitch. He left a little green plastic one in its place though. He also ate a whole pile of our crisps and cookies. AND kept me awake one night with his snoring.

A midnight rant (ii) *READ PREVIOUS POST FIRST*

(Right no idea what happened there, why blogspot saw fit to split this in two is beyond me. Moving swiftly on...)

In fact I'd go as far as to say that they're much better craic then a lot of Irish people I've met. And we're famed for being "mad" and 'havin the craic'. You people rising to defend the Irish, hauld on a second. I'm not slating our people, a lot of us are pretty good but you know as well as I that we've more than our fair share of dullards and arseholes. Our volunteer program most of the time had about 50-60% German people. Each one with a great sense of humour and all a great laugh(bar one) there's not one of em who wouldn't be able to bring a smile to my face I reckon.







So yeah that's my brief rant in defense of the Germans over so moving on to the next topic...







I have been planting constantly for the past 3 days. My sanity is at stake. 3 days planting(with one more to go) beside some sodding river in the middle of nowhere. I'm not talking good middle of nowhere either. This is Irish midlands style middle of nowhere. Nothing to see. Anywhere. Planting in the same place all day. Four days. In the past 3 we've put down close to 3000 plants between 7 of us. I get THIS for my last week at CVNZ. I actually cannot put into to words how annoyed this makes me feel. During the day I find it hard to supress the urge to embed my spade in our kind mannered (but terribly annoying) Kiwi farmer fella who has been supervising us. One of his legs is lame and the opposing arm is also lame. He sounds like Butters from south park but with a Kiwi accent. He has expalined to me on about 6 different occasions how I should be planting. Every time it seems we have all the plants planted he hops along out of nowhere with like a hundred more. How does he even carry them!? How can he possibly get over fences with a hundred plants, a lame leg and hand!? All this in the constant drizzle (or searing heat yesterday. The weather here is insane). Even the river itself is incredibly dull, it goes at the speed of one of those electric bike type things for the elderly and is murky brown. It feels like I've been here years. And I've to get up in the morning to back there again. I've to get up early to go back to that. I paid money, to get up early, to do this.


As I said my sanity is at stake. If you see a news article about the untimely death of a New Zealander at the hands of an Irish tourist expect the worst.



*By the way, I'll need more of you. 20 people is not really enough for a decent cult or my rather ambitious world domination plans.



** And I've met quite a few. Aside from the volunteers Germans also appear to have taken over New Zealand. I haven't been anywhere where there hasn't been at least a few Germans. Its a bit ridiculous, I mean to the point where the German I'm travelling with hopes he won't meet any

A midnight rant (borne of sheer boredom)

Right I'm in Hamilton and shock horror I am bored.


All the rest have gone to bed, went to bed bout 2 hours ago. Is it just me or is that terribly dull of them? And to make matters worse this is the norm, every week night. Lucky if any of em stay up til 11. Anyway that is why I am here, shitein on bout basically nothing to you my loyal followers.*





So what shall I rant about. . .





Germans. A topic I've broached before you may recall. Firstly I would like to say, the image of the stereotypical German is entirely incorrect. I know. It's hard to take in. How can decades of stand up comedians be wrong? Well truth is I don't know. The general way a German is portrayed is how. Boring, anal, lacking in any sense of humour, big into thier rules and systems.


The truth. All the germans I've met thus far** have been excellent fun.( Bar one, and you know who you are. You ass. Just in case you ever have the pleasure of reading my nice little blog).

#continued above#

Coming to an end

David reminiscing bout his favourite childhood game, pretending he was inside a washing machine

Well haven't written in quite a while and for that I am sorry. So I've two weeks to fill you in on... Well one of those weeks was in Hamilton which as I said before is not thee most awe inspiring places to visit. Though we did take part in a Maori blessing ceremony. We were planting Kauri trees. The Kauri is New Zealand's largest tree, monstrous would be the only word to describe the bigger ones. Biggest I've seen had a 36 ft circumference have a picture that I'll upload at some point. Though the picture really doesn't do it justice. It's almost hard to believe it's real. Impossibly big and this one was 'only' about 800 years old I was told. The oldest tree they had was over 3000 and something crazy like 40/50 meters around. Anyway there's a disease here that's killing the Kauri. In fact it is believed that it will wipe them all out before too long. So planting them is a big deal. We planted about ten and the chief of the local Maori tribe came to bless them. Wasn't quite what I expected, he arrived in a big white car and was wearing a sports jacket and jeans. He wandered about the site chanting in Maori and waving his walking stick. After he told us some of the history of his tribe and a couple of little stories about Maori gods. He also blessed our group in Maori. Pretty cool to able to say you've been blessed by a Maori chief. Nothin much else report from Hamiton that week, oh one of the local guys we were working with brought us up to his place for beers and a BBQ which was nice. So greetings to Don if he ever happens to be reading this. Any man who gives you a free beer is allright in my books.

The past few weeks have also seen the loss of quite a few good people from CVNZ. Team Germany has disbanded, team Germany was comprised of the 4 four Germans I started here with. The 'elite' as we say. Alas it is no more though Karin and Anja are gone. Karin back to Germany and Anja is currently making her way to Wellington. Must say I was somewhat sad to see them go. On top of that Wayne left this week too, off to work on Yogi Bear the movie. it's unbelievable he's actually going to be playing Yogi. Well no not really, I made that up, he working in the 'greens' department on the film. Doing stuff with trees and such. I've no doubt he'll keep up the conservation fight as well. Probably be on set with his spade in tow just in case he happens upon some weeds like those pesky pine trees. Was a pleasure to be on his team for his last week. We were at Huia in the Waitakiere ranges. Stunning place, rainforest and mountians the usual drill but I hadn't experienced it on this scale before now. And he lives there so he brought us to all the best spots. Some amazing beaches and views. And for the whole week we only did about two days work. One was dismantling fire pits, though calling that work is somewhat misleading seeing as all it involved was throwing rocks away. The other day we had a 6 kilometre hike through the rain forest putting up some signs. Was pissing rain and had to cross a river so we were soaked through and slipping and sliding all over the place, immense fun. Though some of the girls wouldn't really agree with that surmise I'd say, bit of an aversion to mud I believe. Another evening we went to Waynes local fishing club, really cool little place with seriously cheap drink and some interesting characters. We left with a cd of native bird noises in tow and orders to find some French ornithologist.

Also lost two good people this week. Sophie who was one of the most pleasant people I've had the pleasure of meeting thus far on my travels( So where are you from?:p) rarely seen without a smile. And David who I'm reasonably sure was clinically insane ' When I was a nipper I used to pull my jumper over my head *to the point where just his face is sticking out* and pretend I was inside a washing machine'. Great sense of humour five minutes rarely went by without him giving us something to laugh at. Also had a worrying interest in Jack The Ripper which is best not mentioned. I'll start to get worried if a bunch of dead prostitutes turn up now that he has left the country.

I'm currently in my last week with CVNZ. And I must say...
WHY!? Why have you sent me to Hamilton for my last week? What atrocious crime could I possibly have committed in a previous life to deserve such a fate? Seriously did I inadvertently cause the death of someone close to ye or what? * sigh * Brief little rant over.
Aside from that I also must say that I'll miss CVNZ, or more the people rather. Its been a fun few weeks for the most part at least.
And next week I'm heading north, myself and Nils* are renting a car. Heading north first then making our way down to the south island. It should be pretty cool. Not much else to report. Will leave it at that for now.

*Nils is the German I mentioned before. The one who likes Irish rebel songs. As it turns out he not only likes them but has a wide knowledge of them which puts my own(rather measly) knowledge to shame. It is quite a spectacle to hear a german guy putting on an irish accent while singing the likes of Come out ye Black and Tans.