To deet or not to deet

My dear friends,

"How much DEET do you want in your bug spray?"

"What are my options?"

"30% or 98%."

"Jesus Christ!  Let's go with 30% - no need for overkill."

It's an odd conversation to have, no doubt about it.  What's even stranger is that bug repellant containing 98% DEET even exists (and is illegal in Canada, apparently.)  From the Wikipedia search I just did, I also learned that DEET was created to assist in jungle warfare, and is an affective solvent, should you need to remove any paint or varnish.

But the point of this post is not to share the wonders of DEET; rather, it is to briefly touch upon the oddness of travel and the ways in which people prepare for it.  I know some people who just throw a bunch of shit in a bag, and they're ready to go.  One of my dearest friends once packed for a trip to Paris in 7 minutes and all she forgot was her watch.  Power to her!  Some folk, however, approach it very differently; they need all new clothes, gadgets, and maybe even a personalized airline seat cover.  Yes, they do exist.  Other bizarre travel accessories include a solar powered cooling helmet, an 80,000 volt electric suitcase, a portable washing machine, and a laptop USB fragrance burner.  Oh yes, and the "Pillowig", featured on the right.

I'm more a mix of the two.  Because I will admit, I did acquire a few new things to accompany me to the lovely country of Costa Rica, and I did get a fabulous new backpack (Osprey + crimson + carry-on = sexy time).  The thing I've been the most excited about, though, is my research!  Thanks to Lonely Planet, I now know all about Costa Rica: like how they abolished their army in 1948, and how this one country (about the size of NH and VT put together) has more biodiversity than the United States and Europe put together.  If that doesn't blow your mind I'm not sure what will.  I've googled bus schedules, done more images searches than I care to admit to, and plagued the administrators at the school I'll be attending for information.  My guide is well-thumbed as I search for exactly the "right" places to go during my three weekends there, with the "right" hostels and the "right" activities highlighted.  So I guess rather than hoarding things I am hoarding knowledge, in the hopes that I will have a more enriching experience and become a linguistic beast in Spanish.

But spending my time with my nose buried in a travel guide is a detractor from my last little bit of time home with my love.  It also takes part of the spontaneity out of travel, and it also doesn't do much to calm my nerves.  It's going to be a little scary, living with an anonymous host family, and really finding out just how good (or bad) my Spanish is...  But a little bit of fear never hurt anyone.  It's like bungee jumping, and we all know how fun that is!

I must relax, and trust in the fact that I will see my love in only a month - and I must make it a point to love every moment of my Costa Rican adventure.  It doesn't matter if my hostel isn't perfect (whatever that means), or if I don't get to do every single thing on my list, or if I even struggle a wee bit with my Spanish.  The thing to remember, I suppose, is that it's not the percentage of DEET in your bug spray - it's the quality and kick-ass-ishness of your adventures that matters.  Wise counsel for you and me.  Happy adventuring!

*Olivia

“Half the fun of the travel is the aesthetic of lostness.” - Ray Bradbury

I'm back!

My dear friends,

After nearly a three year travel drought, I am back in action!  This time, my wandering feet will be bringing me to the gorgeous Central American country of Costa Rica.  Why, you may ask?  I would be happy to tell you!  This fall I started with a teacher certification program, which will enable me to teach high school Spanish (and eventually German and Italian and whatever else I happen to pick up along the way.)  I have a finite amount of time to acquire six credits in undergrad Spanish, since I didn't take any in college and the state of Massachusetts is picky about that kind of thing.  To help speed the process, I will be doing an "intersession" - between fall and spring semesters - in Costa Rica, for the entire month of January 2012, studying Latin American Literature.  And it's for school, how bad ass is that?!  And then, not to long after, I am going to Granada, Spain, to study Spanish in all its glory for another six weeks.  

But let's not get ahead of ourselves.  The focus right now is Costa Rica, and I'm more excited than words can say.  Sad, also, at having to leave a certain someone who has become rather central to my life now, but I think this adventure will be a good thing.  Of course it will!  It's a foreign country, full of people to plague with my faulty Spanish, plenty of platanos maduros (sweet plantains that are so delicious it makes me want to weep), and a daunting number of sloths for me to avoid.

My passport has been renewed, my plane tickets have been purchased as of yesterday, and I'm in the process of figuring out the tricky territory of the fear-inspiring Sallie Mae.  Only a few more things left to be done like, oh yeah, celebrate the holidays with the fam, exercise like the dickens so I'm bathing-suit ready, and gather up a few last items...  More to come when there's more to say.

If only it wasn't for the sloths.

*Olivia

 "I am not an adventurer by choice but by fate."  - Vincent Van Gogh

Australasian Adventure

My dear friends,

Segement two, as promised (though, I admit, a bit tardy.) Filled with tales of aquatic exploits, animal encounters, natural wonders, and, of course, adventure. However, three plus weeks of solid adventuring is quite a lot to catch up on andI will attempt to do this in the most succinct way possible, so please bear with me.

3 May: Mother and daughter ecstatically reunited in Christchurch! The entire day is spent walking around the city, going to the Arts Centre Market, talking, hugging, and napping.
4 May: Drive our sexy little green car (lovingly christened Jezebel) to Tekapo and went for a plane ride over Mount Cook National Park. Circle the peak of Mount Cook (highest peak in NZ), pass over mountains and all the glaciers.
5 May: Go along the impossibly windy roads to Queenstown, walk around the city, purchased some wonderful spives (spoon + knife and used for the eating of kiwifruit) and visit Fergburger.
6 May: Drive south to the town of Manapouri where we sail across the lake on a ferry, cross a mountain in a bus, and board the ship in Doubtful Sound that is to be our evening's accommodation. We go kayaking, see little blue penguins, and sail out to the Tasman Sea to visit the NZ fur seal colony and watch the sun set. Sleeping quarters are sardine-like but wonderful all the same.
7 May: Spend a lovely morning on Doubtful Sound, then arrive back where we'd started and re-do our trip over the mountain and across Lake Manapouri. Hop back in the faithful Jezebel (that doesn't sound right) and drive up through Te Anau, up an icy and perilous mountain road (and have to wait for about half an hour because another car had gone off the road...) and back down, finally arriving in waterfall-filled Milford Sound. We board another ship and cruise along to the Tasman Sea. A pod of about seven bottlenose dolphins play in the wake at the front of our ship, little blue penguins swim by the shore, and a group of five young fur seals sleep and play for hours on the back of the ship. We spend the night in our own spacious room and sleep like babies. Seasick little babies, or at least, I did.
8 May: We wake to a beautiful clear day on Doubtful Sound and go kayaking. Arrive back on dry land (thank god), take lots of photos, go for a walk in the southern rainforest, and drive a very long and twisty road up to Wanaka. That night, Mummy sleeps and I visit to Cinema Paradiso, the movie theatre that has sofas, armchairs, and even an old car for seating.
9 May: Drive up along the West Coast, stopping for a walk in Fox Glacier to see Lake Matheson, and end up in Franz Josef. We decide to forgo a walk to the glacier itself since we'd already seen it close up from the plane in Tekapo.
10 May: Continue up the West Coast with stops in Punakaiki to see the Pancake Rocks and Greymouth for an extremely lame tour of the Montieths Brewery. Keep driving all bloody day until we reach Marahau, the gateway to Abel Tasman National Park.
11 May: Cruise along the coastline (what with my love of boats and all...) and see lots and lots of fur seals, a couple little blue penguins, and hang out with a solo bottlenose dolphin named George in the shallows of Tonga Bay. We go horse riding on the beach at low tide with a psycho-jaded American and, ignoring him, have a lovely time.
12 May: Sadly, we leave the Abel Tasman behind and drive around to Kaikoura with pit stops along the beach to watch the fur seals do their thing. Seal poo = super gross. A dolphin swim is on the agenda for the next morning.
13 May: Dolphins, it turns out, are heartbreakers. Our side trip to Kaikoura is all for nothing when the dolphins prove to be no-shows. Lovely coastline though. With heavy hearts we drive up to Picton to catch the ferry, on which I am very seasick so I have to spend the whole time outside in the freezing wind. Mummy is too kind to leave me to my own devices, so the majority of the three hours are spent huddled together in her sleep sack. Many hilarious photos are taken. We don't stop in Wellington, just keep driving north until we can drive no more. Author's note: never go to Taihape.
14 May: Onward! We pass through Tongariro National Park where we see Mount Doom, snow storms, and a double rainbow. We finally get to Rotorua and go to a Maori hangi that night, with a cultural performance and impossible heaps of food. The water is from a natural spring and tastes delicious. Later we are taken to see some Kiwis (the birds, not the fruit or the people) and I'm surprised by how big they are!
15 May: We get to Wai-o-tapu (a volcanic park) just in time for the... 10:15 geyser show? They pour biodegradable soap into the Lady Knox Geyser to make it do its thang. I want to punch the soap dispenser man in the face. But the park itself is very cool, though it seems like the devil's butt (ie: sulfur. Lots and lots of sulfur.) That afternoon we take a gondola to the top of a mountain and go luging! The evening is spent at the Polynesian Spa which feels wonderful and relaxing at the time, but unfortunately makes our bathing suits smell like farts.
16 May: Adieu to the smell of rotten eggs! We leave Rotorua and drive through "The Shire" up to Auckland. Auckland is nice, Jezebel is unwillingly returned, and we take a nap for a few hours until...
17/16 May: The 4:15 AM shuttle takes us to the airport for our flight to SAMOA! We arrive around 10 o'clock in the morning on... 16 May? International Date Line, you are a tricky bitch. Our silver Rav4 with issues is collected and we have lovely and enormous prawn sandwiches with fresh taro chips for lunch. We then go to the huge market in Apia. So much random food and coconut jewelry! Dinner is at one of the nicest places in Samoa (tuna steak with size of my head) and we crash early at our kind of lame hotel.
17 May: The day starts early, driving up the Cross Island Road to Taufua Beach Fales on the southeastern coast of the island of 'Upolu. We learn the none of the roads in Samoa are marked, and the maps that exist are completely useless. Both of these things are very helpful. But our en suite fale is lovely, the obscenely large Sunday dinner is deliciously and strange, and the beach is exquisite. The afternoon is spent snorkeling, which I had never done before. Fishies spotted: Moorish idols (think Willem Dafoe in "Finding Nemo", but without the cool voice), orangestripe triggerfish, blue starfish, sunset wrasse, surge wrasse, christmas wrasse, black and white tiny angelfish, a pufferfish! (unpuffed), a white with black stripes sea dragon, tons of parrotfish, bluestriped snapper, longnose filefish, needlefish, racoon butterflyfish, threadfin butterfly fish, and MORE!
18 May: We leave Taufua and get horribly lost, but eventually find our way to the ferry and cross over to the island of Savai'i. I, with my love of moving things, of course get seasick. Our next destination is Manase and while the beach fales are nice, the food sucks and the staff is very weird. One staff member spends twenty minutes staring at us from the doorway while we play cards. Also, no one even mentions just how loud seafront property is!
19 May: Another first- I go scuba diving and I get to fulfill my dreams of being the little mermaid. Mum gets her refresher course and I take an introductory from a hilarious Frenchman. Things are going fine until we get to the open water because 1. I am seasick and 2. I am scared shitless. However, the fabulous Fabian talks me into going through with it (though it took mucho cojones on my part too.) We saw lots of fish and I'm proud that I did it, but I could feel the currents underwater. I had to resurface five minutes early and as soon as I did I started puking or rather, feeding the fishes. And I kept puking. Canceled my second dive and snorkeled back to shore, puking the whole way. The rest of the day is spent the same way.
20 May: We switch fales and move down the street to the nice place, Le Lagoto. Our enclosed fale (with air con, thank god!!) is beyond beautiful, with nice linens and fresh flowers everywhere. Our view of the sea is paradise. I make Mum leave me to my sicky devices (still sick) and she does two more dives and sees some incredible things, which makes me happy. There's a lovely cool pool for us to soak in, which also makes me happy. Dinner is luscious and the scenery is to die for.
21 May: Last day in Samoa. We sadly leave the fale and our new friends at Dive Savai'i and drive back to the ferry. Still sick from before, I enjoy the disgustingly rolling seas and contemplate throwing myself overboard. More souvenirs are collected at the market in Apia, we have a delicious dinner while watching the sun set over the water, and have an uncomfortable nap in the stifling car until our 1:30 AM departure.
22 May: Didn't exist. See previous statement about the International Date Line.
23 May: We arrive in Auckland exhausted and disheveled, but happy to escape the oppressive heat of Samoa. The day is spent at the zoo, followed by a trip to the cinema to see "Angels & Demons".
24 May: Not too much happening. We pack, we have lunch, we head to the airport and we are a little bit sad. After such an incredible adventure though, what is there to be sad about? If you've stuck with me through that whole narrative, you understand me. I give her a hug, I give her a kiss, and I smile because I know I'll see her again.

If you just read that entire thing, I am 1. surprised that you lasted this long and 2. delighted, because that's one less person I'll have to explain this to when we meet again. If, however, you only read about the first couple days and then skipped down to the bottom... Well really, I can't say that I blame you. I'm verbose at the best of times and then when I actually have something to write about I go nuts. All I can say is, thank you very much for your interest. I can't honestly say I wish you were there, because I was quite happy to have my mother all to myself. But I can say that I sincerely hope that at some point in your life you can have an adventure like the one I had. Incredible, beautiful, and I might even say life-changing. In fact there are only two bad things about it: 1. that y'all are going to be hearing about this until I have an adventure that tops this one, and that's too bad because and 2. this particular adventure was so amazing that I'm not sure it can ever topped.

Luckily and Adventurously Yours,
*Olivia

"Life is either a great adventure or nothing." - Helen Keller

Quarter-Life Crisis

"The big question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty yes to your adventure." - Joseph Campbell

My dear friends,

Scatterbrainedness (that is a word as of now) seems to be a common theme with my entries here. I hereby apologize and hopefully that, along with the cheeky grin I'm currently flashing, will be enough to make amends. Since it has been over two months since I've written anything besides Facebook status updates, I think I'll have to break up my adventurous goings-on into two different segments. The first segment will comprise of my final weeks in Tekapo (lovingly christened "The Po"), birthday festivities in Queenstown, and my subsequent party/departure from The Po. Commencing... now.

I continued working at the lovely and charming Tekapo Tavern right up until the day before I left, trying to earn as much money as possible before the adventure I knew was shortly to begin. And as much as I was ready to move on and see more of New Zealand, my last weeks were great because I was already looking back with nostalgia. I spent a lot of time with the incredible friends that I made and did all the last minute things I'd not found the time to do yet. On Easter Monday I drove down to Dunedin with a few friends and we spent a couple days there, staying in a hostel called... Hogwartz. Judge if you like, but we thought it was amazing. Went to the Speights Brewery, "the pride of the south" apparently, and the Cadbury's Factory (the highlight = chocolate waterfall). We also spent an evening in this cool pub where they had karaoke (read: one weirdo guy's attempt to have a solo concert, all while dressed in the most hideous of 80's clothing), and toasted at midnight to the beginning of my flatmate's birthday. Dunedin is really a very cool city and sort of reminded me of Germany. Except of course for the different language. And the different people. And the different hemisphere. More things that happened: spent an evening ice skating at my former job, The Po was coated in snow after a huge storm, I got a ridiculous cold that wouldn't leave me alone, and a friend in America popped out a child.

On 24 April I hopped on a bus and headed down to Queenstown. The drive was incredible, going through all these passes, and passing by a place called "The Wrinkly Ram Shearing Station", and up and down mountains, and driving alongside steep cliffs and a gorge at the bottom of which was a gorgeous and vibrantly colored river. I stayed at a place called The Last Resort which was actually anything but, being well situated and filled with very nice people, apart from that one backpacker who is a total weirdo. There's always one, wherever you go! Anyway, I spent a day in Arrowtown, which was a gold rush town back in the day and also a location that the illustrious Peter Jackson chose for those little films that he made. Actually, most of Queenstown is rife with "Lord of the Rings" locations. The geek in me was in geeky heaven.

The 26th of April was commemorated in a fairly dramatic way (come on, it's me. Of course it was dramatic...); you've probably seen the photos already. That was one thing I promised myself when I decided to come to New Zealand: I would go skydiving on my 25th birthday. Not the day before, not the day after, but on my birthday. My wonderful family was nice enough to give me money towards that for my gift. So the day dawned, I filled out my I-won't-sue-you-if-you-maim-me paperwork, got suited up in my feisty little jumpsuit, and hopped in a tiny tiny TINY little plane with teeth painted on the nose. See? Even the plane was badass. Now, it was slightly windy on the ground. Add 15,000 feet to the mix (although because Queenstown is already at an elevation of 1,200 feet, it was technically 16,200 feet), and that little breeze becomes a ridiculous gale that blew us all to bits. And now a little math.
massive turbulence + me + massive penchant for motion sickness = SICK
And so (keep this equation in mind), I jumped. The first bit of time, which feels closer to 6 hours than the 30 seconds it really is, was too exhilarating to think about anything besides breathing and the fact that I had just fallen through a cloud. My stars and garters, what a rush! But then, when the cord was pulled and the parachute sprang blessedly free, the real fun started, because then we began to paraglide. This is when we floated along, gazing at the breathtakingly beautiful scenery, and enjoyed the playful breeze that batted us around like the Furies from the underworld. It was at this point in time that I asked my tandem instructor for a sick bag (remember the previous equation), which I was promptly given, which I promptly made use of without spilling a drop. Or rather, a chunk. And so it was that I landed back on the earth with a smile on my face and a neatly folded bag in my hands. Happy birthday to me.

The rest of my time in Queenstown was wonderful, peppered with drinks with a friend from The Po, a visit from my flatmate, burgers the size of my head from the incredible Fergburger, the winning of a free 15,000 foot sky dive at a karaoke contest, and a generally fantastic few days that added up to a fantastic birthday.

When I returned to Tekapo, I spent that last couple of days working, packing, and spending as much time as possible with friends. My last night at work was followed by a really fun farewell party, attended by most of the people I had met during my time there. A great send-off, filled with lots of photos, lots of drinking, and lots of hugs. 2 May saw me on a bus to Christchurch and the morning of 3 May saw me at the arrivals gate in the Christchurch Airport, impatiently waiting for my mummy and the start of our Australasian Adventure! See next entry for details.

*Olivia