Falling into Place

Sometimes you just sit back and marvel when out of nowhere, a few things just come into place. The last week and specifically last few days have seen lots of this. I started off arriving in Wanaka, completely excited after a gorgeous drive from Christchurch eight days ago. I checked in at a hostel and spent the next few days just living. I did cool things don't get me wrong, but things hadn't settled yet completely. I went skiing, looked into the local climbing and met some people to climb with, and socialised with the hostel scene, spending lots of time with a few of them. Then I went to the climbing spot again a few days later and ran into one couple climbing, but they were content and I could tell they weren't looking for a third. On my own, I scrambled around a bit, set up an anchor at one point and climbed one route on my own, belaying myself by atc and prussik combination.

However, somewhat deflated after the attempt I sat in the parking lot with a peanut butter and nutella tortilla and thought I should get out of the hostels and meet the locals instead of snowboarders and travelers into their own things. So, I signed up to WWOOF, which is a network of farmers, worldwide who will take in willing workers to work at their houses doing whatever work there is to be done. Signing up enables you to contact the hosts and look at their bios. One bio, was of Bruce and Swenja, living right outside Wanaka with organic gardening and free range chickens, and they were climbers...possibly a good combination of my academic interests and outdoor pursuits.

Shot them an email, the next day I was sitting down to coffee with them and a friend from the hostel who is joining me WWOOFing. Climbers they ARE! Bruce sets many of the routes locally and has done much in the Darrans, the premier alpine climbing area in New Zealand. His name is in many of the guidebooks as having the first ascent of several routes and Swenja is not far behind. They are awesome people and have graciously accepted me into their home in return for a few hours of work a day. Plus Bruce and I went and explored some of the climbing areas of Wanaka today as he literally knows every route and who set it. That is only the surface of some of the amazing things that have fallen into place this last week, yet this post is already long and mostly a rant of "and then"s. But it is what I'm doing.

Hope all is well on other fronts! Much love!