kyle's blog

G'day everyone,
This is Kyle, and I'm here to share some of my favorite New Zealand pictures with you.
The first, is when we were at our farm stay. The farmer, Bruce, had me jump in the pin of hoggetts and catch one. A hoggett is the name of a sheep that is older than a lamb, but younger than an adult sheep. At the farm stay, Bruce, had his sheep dogs move sheep from one pen to another using a high pitched whistle. He could have a ten acre field covered with sheep cleared in only about 3 minutes He would use different patterns with his whitle to make the dogs do different things such as fast, slow, left, right, sit and bark.
My next picture is of us on a jet boat. This was in The Shotover River Canyon near Queenstown. Our driver was very experienced and skilled. He was going over 80kph(50mph) through the canyon dodging rocks by less than 30cm(one foot). The jet boat had impellers that it only needed 10cm of water to not touch the bottom. Also the jet boat would do multiple 360 degree spins. You can see we have just done one by the prop wash.
On the very same day we went bungy jumping! Where we bungy jumped was the original bungy site of the world. It was 43 meters tall(about 145 feet). That's equivelant of jumping off a 14 story building. My dad went before us, and then my sister and I went together. They had us stand out on a plank and did a count down from 5-very fast. This was one of the most terrifing, exciting, and memorable days of my life, especialy when you include the jet boat.
This next picture was taken when we went on a hike to a lake at the base of Mt. Cook. Mt. Cook is the tallest mountain in New Zeland. It is the mountain directly behind me. On the Hike there were dozens of glaciers calving off. They were really loud. We really lucked out with the weather because the day before we couldn't see 30 meters in front of us because we were so socked in with rain. We almost left, right when we got there. That would have been a huge mistake because this ended up being one of my favorite hikes I've ever done.
Next, is also of Mt. Cook, but many kilometers away. The water below is Lake Pukaki. Isn't the water beautiful?!
This next picture is just a close up of the Shotover jet boat. I'm on the left,three rows back.
I hope you enjoyed looking at this very small portion of this adventure just merely started. I now have an email adress at ksteen93@yahoo.com. I look forward to hearing back from everyone.
CHEERS,
Kyle