Meet the Kea

Back in Arthur's Pass village, up the montain and meet the Kea.

Awesome views stuffed in a 360 degree video. Enjoy.

Old shoes

After some more relaxing days in Wanaka, I packed my bags and started my way back North. As I had no need for my old running shoes, I got rid of them straight away.

I wonder who is missing their bras..

On my way to Lake Coleridge. Nice and lonely place.

Challenge Wanaka

"They pissed and spit on me, tried to shoot me. But it was the easiest race I've ever done".

But, lets start at the beginning. Due to some knee injury in September I had been in a backlog of training anyway. Nevertheless, I did a lot of full day crosstrainings. To such an extent that I was completely overtrained end of December. Consequently I took a 2 weeks regeneration period afterwards and finally stood at the swim start at Lake Wanaka, along with just some 200+ irondistance athletes.

The Lake was rough, with strong winds generating huge waves. I nearly drowned on the swim leg, I almost wanted to quit every single second. I never thought of being in the water for nearly 85min and getting seasick on a swim!! My breakfast kept coming up and down. Yammi.. The Lake was quite cold too and I couldn't feel my fingers anymore. In T1, I was not able to get of my wetsuit quickly and also had to get rid of all the water. 8min in Transition.. Omg..

Couldn't get worse I thought, Yeah.. I thought. The bike leg started quite nice towards Mt. Aspiring National Park, along Lanke Wanaka. Some up and downs and not too much wind. But, after returning to Wanaka and continuing towards Lake Hawea, strong north-westerlies hit me and I hardly made progress.

Finally after 5 hours in the race I started feeling comfortable at all. After 6 hours I was finally free in my mind and around 7 hours I felt such an energy push in my body that could have been called FUN.. Yeah. From this moment on I knew that I was going to finish this race.

Sometime during the race I overtook a female competitor. Just after entering the drafting zone she got out of her saddle and started to pee!! Omg, nearly got showered.. Ahh.. Told her that this was disgusting, she just smiled...

Only minutes later some storywith snot, but this hit me. Ahh.. And last but not least, a big bee or what ever decided to commit suicide on my glasses. Blinded.

Cause of my lack of power endurance I kept on a quite low heart rate. I got of the bike after 8h in the race with an average of 145bpm. Sweet as..

On the run course the sun was quite strong. Luckily I got creamed in T2 :-). The marathon was not flat, it had some 100's in altitude.. The race director said during the briefing:

 "Walking is like smoking a joint. Nice, but keeps you slow. So dont walk. Run."

Even though I had been looking forward this spectactular run course, I just didn't want to run. I continuously wanted to withdraw from the race. But I knew why. I was just lazy. I had no pain. Running was easy. I was not fast, but it was incredibly easy. So there was no excuse.

Running an 150bpm average was more a training than a race, but who the fuck cares.

I am the fastest Austrian in this race.

On the last mile, the crowd was cheering. Driven by pure adrenalin I sprinted along Wanaka's waterfront and finally over the finish line of the world's most scenic iron distance triathlon.

And it was so easy.

The race in numbers:

Distance: 3.8km swim, 180km bike, 42.2km run
Time: 12h 53min 18sec
Weight lost: 4kg
Energy burned: 6300kcal
Tail wind ratio: haha, kidding ey?
Average wave height during swim: 1m
Unintentional hydration during swim: too much
Top speed: 72km/h :-)

(Nearly) the end of the world

Lake Manapouri: End of the world

Fiordland ist neben nass vor allem eines. Einsam. Die Straße zwischen dem Manapouri Kraftwerk (nur per 1h Bootsfahrt zu erreichen) und dem Doubtful Sound ist die einsamste Straße Neuseelands. Neben den Bau des Kraftwerks in den 50ern dient sie eigenlich nur mehr als Touri Zubringer zu den Cruises im Doubtfull Sound. Hier ist wirklich der A**** der Welt. Aber ein schöner...

Die Cruise war schön, regnerisch und Delphine gabs auch..

Wieder zurück gings auf dem Weg auf die 3te Insel Neuseelands: Steward Island.

Für insider...

Rush hour im Süden

Oban, SI

Oban ist die einige Stadt auf der Insel, die man nach einer einstündigen Fährfahrt erreicht. Gerade mal 400 Menschen leben hier.

LOL

Ein Paradies für Vögel..

Ein Weka

Kolbenreiber ?

 

What happens on Steward Island, stays on SI

Chain between Bluff und Oban

Bluff Hill Outlook

A Kiwi Christmas

Christmas 2012 was special. It was different. It was warm and had no snow. No cell phone coverage, no wifi, no internet and no social media. Well, the whisky the Kiwis spent was social :-)

This year, I decided to go for one of New Zealand's Great Walks, the Milford Track. The number of trampers is limited to 40 people, so I had to book well in advance (in May, to be precise). The track follows a 56km trail over 4 days from the top of Lake TeAnau to Milford Sound.

Some say it it the world's most scenic walk. Me, having walked around NZ a LOT, fully agree.

The bus picks me up in TeAnau around 9am and drives me 90km south, to TeAnau Downs - the gateway to Milford Sound. An one hour boat ride with perfect weather later, the track starts at Glade Wharf.

Ride on Lake TeAnau

The first day is only a short walk to Clinton Hut, where I spend the day reading and socialising with the other trampers.

Something to read at the first hut

A real Kiwi and some Whisky

The next day leads us to Mintaro Hut, just before the Mackinnon Pass. Because we reached the hut quite early, the weather was fine and more than 30 degrees with sunshine are quite uncommon in Fiordland, some of us decided to make the return trip to the pass. The 500m in altitude took me 50min running. Absolutely no wind and the heat made be having a bath on the top. Of course, there was nobody upthere at this time. Except the Keas. Awesome.

MacKinnon memorial

Kea watching

On the third day, there was some wind, but still warm, dry and sunny. This was already very special. Normally it rains 2 out of 3 days on the Track ( days later the track was closed to flodding..).

The last day was still warm indicating a real trampers jackpot. The final 18km went through forests, over bridges and finally to Sandfly Point. There is a reason for this name btw.. I hate those bastards.

Sandfly Point

They bite without mercy. Even the stongest insect repellent rather disperses any fabrics than drive away those insects...

The Greater Milford Sandfly (Miniblackbitus Milfordii)

A 2 hour bus ride back to TeAnau finalized this Christmas to a wonderful experience.


Milford Track - definitely "the finest walk in the world".