Traveling to Hanmer!

Day 12: Arthur's Pass, CastleHill
We got up early and headed on our way again. THis time we had a 4 hour drive ahead of us to Hanmer. BUt this drive ended up taking al day because we stopped a million times. First we stopped in Arthur's Pass. It was a really cool valley and there were amazing birds. It was really cool to see all the mountains surrounding us. We talked to the manager of the visitor center, he told us all about the history. Then we left and stopped again at CastleHill. This was where they filmed the final fight scene in Chronicles of Narnia. It was awesome. And we all hiked around and we got to see a bunch of different people climbing all the different rocks around the area. And Ulla's fiancee climbed one of the boulders and let us take pictures of him. While we were there we ate lunch and talked to Ulla. Then after awhile we had to leave again and continue on our way to Hanmer. WE finally got to Hanmer around 5:30 and got our room assignments. LAUREN and I got to room together AGAIN! :) IT was quite an exciting day. Then we went and had thai food and it was awesome. ANd when we got back to our campsite we had POW WOW and all almost fell asleep during it because we were so tired. But Ulla gave another talk that night about all her different expeditions and how she prepares for each, it was really cool to see the pictures for a rainforest expedition she did for BBC and se how they lived.

***We're modelz, I swear! :)

PANCAKE ROCKSSS! Yummm

Day 11: Pancake Rocks, GLOW Worms, and light Painting.
WE woke up and we went to the Pancake rocks. We head out and we get maybe 15 minutes away from the place and we run out of guess. (When National Geographic says expedition and adventure they really mean it). So we walked to the national pancakes rock park, while Carl, our bus driver hitched a ride to go get some gas. But once at the pancake rocks everything was so amazing...the view, the water, the blow holes, the paths, ect. Sometimes i just had to sit down, put my camera down and take it all in. After the hike through the pancake rocks we went to the Pancake Rock Cafe. I got Pancakes with hot cherries and cream. They were awesome. Once we left pancake rocks, we went to another trail to take some more nature pictures, but it also led down to the water, so we all got some cool pictures involving the water, sun, and sometimes people's silhouettes. Once we got back to the place we were staying at we worked on our pictures a bit and ordered in pizza. After dinner, Ulla showed us how to put our pictures together in order to make a story. Then we hit up the GLOW WORMs. It was only a two minute hike up the path and you had to turn off all your lights to see them but they looked like a lot of blue dots. And we also took pictures of the sky. When i took a picture of the sky and the city lights, everything looked like it was on fire.

Gorge, getting to Hokitika, and meeting Ulla

Day 10: Hokitika
We left Franz Josef and headed to hokitika, we didn't stop to much. Once we reached Hokitika we met Ulla Lohmann. Then we went to lunch at a take away place and then headed to a super cool Gorge. At the gorge Ulla talked to us about making pictures cool and different. At then end of the Gorge trail we took cool pictures over then huge rocks. And along the path was his really cool swing bridge it reminded me of Indiana Jones a little bit. After we left the Gorge we came back to the new campsite and relaxed, and sorted our pictures. Right after we went to a really cool beach with black sand, Ulla told us to take pictures that represent what the beach means to us. We went to dinner at a grille in town then headed to the owner's house of the campsite. There Ulla gave a speech and showed pictures from her life and told us her life story. We went to the owner's house because they wanted to meet Ulla and their Hokitika photography group wanted to meet her too and listen to her talk. The whole day altogether was really cool and meeting Ulla was awesome and she is totally helpful. When I showed her my ending project for National Geographic she really liked it. My theme is Reflections, showing a different perspective of a picture.

HAPPY FATHER'S DAYY

Hey Rupert! i miss you and love you. Hope you had a great father's day! I am having so much fun here and i took a few really cool photos for you. The views here are amazing! <3 Can't wait to see you on the 28th.

Relax and Work on our Pictures!

Day 9: Relax and work with our pictures.
Today we relaxed and got to sleep in a little bit longer. It was really rainy so we all hung out in the common room and worked on our pictures and blogs. (Happy mom? <3 ) It was a pretty chill day and it was fun to just hang out with everyone in the group. We had sandwiches for lunch and them Ms. Carter, one of the teachers, made spaghetti for all of us for dinner. It was DELICIOUS! But i think one of the best parts of evening was when we all gave our funniest pictures of each other to Ms. Bottoms. Later that night we watched a slide show of all this pictures, it was HILARIOUS! And then after the slide show we got to just relax and watch the movie Anchorman. It was pretty funny. But that pretty much wrapped up our day, and tomorrow we will be traveling to our next destination. And its exciting because our national geographic photographer is going to meet us at our next hostel. Her name is Ulla Lohmann. :)

Glacier Hike

Day 8: Glacier Hike in Franz Josef!

This morning we had to wake up extra early and get ready to go on the glacier hike. They had us borrow boots, over trousers, crampons, and rain jackets. It was this long process but then we all got on the bus to head to the glacier. Once we got to the glacier area we hiked to the rocky valley. There we spilt into 3 groups slow, medium, and fast. MaKenna (MaKyle XY) and I chose the slow group thinking it would be a leisurely pace. Not a SNAIL pace. After we walked over a mile to the end of the valley, an Indian family decided to turn back because the flat part of the hike was to hard for them. The next part was a harder uphill rocky path; it was a bit more difficult. The sad part was that we had to stop every 20 minutes and wait for this Indian man and his Asian wife. The path up there was a long and tiring one but once we got to the top it was really cool. LITERALLY! And at the top we at a crappy sandwich, and of course MaKenna took a video of me acting like a freak on the top of the glacier. The way down was a lot easier, but since we were so tired it seemed 100X longer! Once we got back to the hostel we wanted to die! But overall it was fun, especially because we hiked up together and were joking around. 

Representing the 80's!

Thanks mom! Love ya!