19 Sept

Sorry it's been a super long time since I've blogged anything.
Actually that's not true, my Willamette class just started last week so I've done two "blogs" through that recently, just none here.

I just got back from Milford Sound in the Fiordland national park. 8 of us went on this trip and we rented two small sedans to do it. We stayed one night in a hostel in the actual sound, then left the sound and camped the next night next to a river in the Fiordland. We made our own meals each day, and managed to see some super super cool stuff. Every day was an amazing adventure. Since it's currently the offseason, the place isn't very crowded so it felt like we had most the National Park to ourselves. It was pretty sweet. Milford Sound is probably one of the coolest places on earth.

The first day we got into the heart of the Fiordland (this place is actually pretty big, takes around an hour and a half maybe to drive from the Sound to the edge of the Fiordland) and did a hike up to a summit. At some point along the way we crossed the snow level and we found ourselves hiking through snow covered paths. There were no tracks to follow, as the snow was fresh and undisturbed, and no view at the top because the clouds were too thick.
That night we walked from our hostel (the only one near the Sound) right out to the edge of Milford Sound and stayed there until it got dark. It was a scary walk back, but it was totally worth it.
The second day we checked out the warm hostel (remember it's just turning to spring right now so things are still pretty chilly here, think mid-March) and went on a cruise through the Sound. The cruise took about 2.5 hours and took us all the way out to the mouth and you could see the vast ocean that Australia was hiding somewhere behind. During the cruise I had myself a little scare when I looked at the ingredients of a bar I had just eaten and noticed that I had somehow missed the fact that peanuts were an ingredient. Then I thought I was going to die. I informed my friends about it (but not of the possible severity of the reaction) and they sat with me for awhile to see how I progressed. After like 30 minutes nothing had happened yet and I started to think I was somehow in the clear. We got off the cruise and went to find lunch and still no reaction. Strangely enough, throughout the day I experienced no reaction at all except a slight tinge in my side for a few hours. I honestly have no interpretation for this and am still dumbfounded about the whole thing. But I'm very happy that I'm still alive.
We then did a hike that one of the girls with us said was super cool when she was last there, though it might be different because of the snow everywhere. Turns out we couldn't do much of the hike at all because the snow elevation was too low, and the walk out to the closed off area ended up being over feet and feet of snow on shrubs, making it actually pretty dangerous. Someone would be randomly falling through the snow every few seconds, and my foot even got stuck once and needed a couple people to help me get it out. Nobody sustained any serious injuries so it was alright. Since there was a lot of snow there we stayed for a while and had some snow fights and rolled some massive snow balls down the hill. We also got to watch more than a few avalanches roll down the mountains surrounding us.
Then we hit Lake Marian (I think that's what it was called) and sort of spontaneously went on a 3 hour hike. The trail wasn't really a trail and would go from super steep climbing-with-hands hills to jumping down from ledges to slopping through mud in a matter of minutes. We started to worry that we were cutting it close with time and everything since it would be dark in a couple hours. Not knowing exactly how much farther we had to go didn't help either. But we eventually got there and the view of the Lake was amazing. We had each shed probably 3 layers throughout the hike and at the lake shed another couple and one guy even took all his clothes off and took a dip into the lake. Sounded pretty cold. After resting there we headed out.
We camped next to a river that night. It was really cold. It warmed up though since we had 4 people in each tent laid like sardines and packed for warmth. Dinner that night was mostly cold.
We came back the next day. One the way we stopped at a place that makes some pretty well known meat pies. They were good. I also snuck into a public bathroom that charged a $1 entrance fee (right? what the hell is that?). It was a pretty good trip.
Here's some pictures of it. I haven't even put these on facebook yet. I'm excited to see what other people have.

Try not to be too jealous.

Love you guys,
David

6 Sept

WUT UP GUYS???

It's been a long time since I last posted here. I'm too lazy to look at the last post to see where I left off, so I'm gonna just go for it.

Just got back from Samoa on sunday night. It was a super crazy epic week. The only dark spot of the trip was that on the last day I had some pretty severe sunburns. Like they were bad enough that some sores opened up on my face and started oozing pus and shit. I think they also got infected. It's all good now though, I'm almost through my bout of antibiotics and my face is starting to look normal again (as close as it gets at least).
While hiding from the world and feeling like a leper, I think I got to the bottom of how this happened to me. I had been doing a real good job of putting tons of sunscreen on everyday, paying special care to my face, neck, shoulders and vitiligo spots, but for some reason I woke up friday morning really fucked up. My reasoning leads me to conclude that I was probably somewhat burnt on my face before the events of thursday, which caused the burn I got thursday to be that much more severe. But so on thursday, our crew went on this waterfall/river hike. We met up with a local guide and hiked upstream a river. Along the way we would encounter these amazing waterfalls, and if you know anything about stream morphology you know that waterfalls create deep pools where they land. Furthermore, if you're into it, you'll note that deep pools are save to jump into. That's exactly what we did. We hiked all the way up this river, stopping at every waterfall to jump off rocks into the water. The highest jump was somewhere around 50 feet (the guide was nice enough to do the conversion for us). It was probably the highlight of my week. The thing is, I think swimming in these pools and jumping off these waterfalls caused the sunscreen I had applied earlier to wash away/rinse off. Then the half hour hike in the sun back to our starting point and the two hours I spent in the sun later took heavy tolls on my face.
Couple this intense UV bombardment with the years and years of skin damaging steroid and cortisone treatment I've done to my skin, the end result, I believe, is a pretty gross face. On my journey home from Samoa, I wore a Vailima (the local Samoan beer) hat to cover my forehead, and sunglasses to cover my eyes. I got the name of a nice pharmacist in the Samoan capitol of Apia from the family we stayed with thursday night, and she gave me some antibiotics since my face really wasn't looking so good, and some cream that would help with the eczema as well as kill the bacteria in the area. Now, roughly 3 days after waking up to that terrible sight in the mirror, my face is almost back 100% and I have a new appreciation for my handsome appearance. ;)

Anyway, sorry to be a buzzkill with that. Mom, Dad, Kristi, if you're gonna worry about me you might as well stop now, because there's nothing you can do from there. It's all taken care of anyway.

Here's a picture of our crew in front a waterfall.

Other than that epic journey chasing waterfalls, most of my time in Samoa was spent on a beach. It is, after all, an island in the tropics. We stayed in a place called Taufua Beach Fales. The fale we slept in was literally feet from the water. The staff that ran the place was on giant extended family and they were super cool. At first they seem a bit cold, but once you start joking around with them and they realize that you have a sense of humor they're super fun to hang out with. I don't think any of the staff were younger than 35 either, so it was all one big party. They would drink with us, play games with us, by the end of our stay there, they were one of us. There were probably around 100 guests there at a time and every night everyone was on the resort deck, speakers blasting having a good time. We met some really cool people at Taufua.
One day, one of the Taufua staff named Tele, challenged us all to a game of rugby. There were about 12 American guys there at this point, so we all took on the 5 staff members who felt like playing. Now, if you know anything about Samoan guys you know they're huge. Long story short, they kicked our asses and everyone was sore the next day. I actually wasn't so sore, though I took some of the biggest hits from these brown buses, I think my Aikido training way back in the day taught me how to fall gracefully. This was the second most awesome thing I did in Samoa (the first obviously being the waterfalls). The Samoans wanted to play again the next day, but my friends all pussied out, citing sore bodies and cut up feet (from beach rocks and shells). I was down to play, but it would've been even worse if the same 5 Samoans showed up and we had half our force. I think I really like rugby a lot, I'm just not real good at it.
A few times at Taufua they had a Fiafia or firedance. Here's some pictures of that. I think this is Tele in the pictures.

I've got a math midterm due this week, and a philosophy essay due next week. I think there's also a couple lab reports I should turn in soon. It's gonna be a busy week, but I had a pretty relaxed on last week, so I can't complain too much.

Love you guys (if you're taking the time to read my ramblings, you deserve my appreciation).

David