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.