Mt. Hutt

wow..two days in a row...don't get too used to it!

We went snowboarding at Mt. Hutt which is about an hour from Christchurch. It was a little bit bigger, much more like an American Ski Resort. The type that should have stopped selling lift tickets about 500 people back but wouldn't dare turn down the money. It was still lots of fun and beautiful. We learned not to take runs that said "OPEN with variable conditions". I should have known better after watching a couple of really good snowboarders about eat it, but apparently my better judgment didn't make it to the top of the mountain with me. Drew and I sat there with a couple of other snowboarders deciding if this was a good idea. Without my better judgment helping me out I decided to be the guinea pig and ending up sliding half way down the run on my butt down an entire sheet of ice. I guess that is what the variable conditions meant. Since my wonderful husband didn't want to leave me he did the same thing, only a little more graceful. The other two snowboarders decided against it after watching our failed attempts. We either could finish going down the tricker part of the run or hike back up the mountain. We choose the later and had to hike up the mountain, then climb down a hill into the back of the parking lot, and walk back to the lodge. All while carrying our snowboards. I refer to this as "the walk of shame".

On the way home we stopped to pick up a Japanese hitchhiker who needed a ride down the mountain. I thought about asking him to fix some of the electronics in the car as payment because it was probably his people that made them, but after Drew tried to speak some Spanish in attempt to communicate I decided it was better if we all just sat quietly and listened to music. I would have played something out Japanese hitchhiker would like, but I don't have any techno or Japanese rap on my iPod. I made a mental note to myself to download some of this music in case we come across this situation again.

Well, I'm going to spend the rest of my time trying to fulfill my mission to legally touch a baby lamb. They are super cute and I will go to anything to be able to do this before they grow up... since I won't be living here when the next group of little balls of cotton roll around.

kiwi fun fact: Kiwi here is considered people and kiwi fruit is the little green thing that we eat. It is very important to use correct terminology here because if you say, "I ate a kiwi today" they might think you eat people and not be your friend.