Topper's TravelsTopper Kain's blog. Topper Kain is a world-famous kazoo player and traditional norwegian food chef. He wants you to use the comments. Wednesday, March 30, 2005Hey Everybody! I'm currently living it up in New Zealand on spring break. I've seen some absolutely amazing landscapes here and done some amazing things. Our first stop on our tour was at a place called Fox glacier. We were supposed to hike up to the glacier field and then hike all over the field. Unfortunatly, about a daybefore a massive rock slide washed out the trail and we had to be satisfied just hiking up a little tiny part of the glacier. It was very cool looking though, with milky white water and blue pools all around, and amazing waterfalls coming off the insanely steep valley. Pictures will come soon. After a ridiculous (~7 hr) drive we made it to Queenstown, NZ and have been doing "Extreme" activities ever since. The first, and my favorite sofar was a downhill mountain biking on this absolutely insane trail. It was 45 degrees in places, with a mix of dirt, mud, shale, and rock all throughout, and on one side of us was sheer cliff shooting up to the sky,and the other a very steep rocky fall. We passed a few old mining buildings and stopped to think "how the heck did they live here," but the best part of the biking was my wipeout. NZ bikes have the brakes reversedso that the right brake is the front, unlike the US where it is the rear, so my instinct was to squeeze the right brake. This ended up being a very bad thing as on the first really (45 degree) steep part we were on Igrabbed the right handle to slow down, threw the bike up on its front tire, and launched myself over the handle bars. I rolled twice, popped up, threw my fists over my head and yelled "Extreme!" Needless to say, Iwas not hurt, and this action gained me lots of respect with my group. The next activity was jet boating, which was where a boat, going at least 45 MPH, drove withing centimeters of rockwalls, spun out in 360s and ingeneral got everyone wet. It was most fun. The last activity of the day yesterday was a white water rafting tour. Ifelt like I was floating on a river in Lord of the Rings the entire time, which, in fact, I was. The river was used in those great movies. The rapids themselves where pretty cool, if not as big or plentiful as I expected. The most thrilling part was travel threw a 100 Meter rock tunnel barely big enough to fit us inand being spit out into a hugerapid.Our second day was also great fun, with most of the group jumping off the 2nd biggest bungy jump in the world. I elected not to after a harrowing ride out in a the tiny pod. I did do the sky swing, which was a gigantic rope swing that you get harnessed into, dropped at a 90 degree angle and swung out over a massive cliff. I think at the highest point of your swing you are over 200' in the air. We also had street luging down some special made trails, which was very high speed and fun. At night we went to a really cool bar: literally, it was made entirely out of ice. Someone just installed a bar in a giant meat locker and made all the cups, furniture, and decorations out of ice. I was so upset I forgot my camera for that one. Yesterday I only had one activity: hang gliding. Pictures of that are coming, but let me just say that you will never find another activity that will make you feel more like a bird. I wasn't even technically doing the flying, but the glider is like an extension of your body. It was so amazingly beautiful too. I really am still at a lose of words to describe it. IM me some time for more. At night we had a 4 pub pubcrawl around Quennstown. I love how much cheaper pubs are around here then in Australia... Okay, I'm running out of time on the computer, so I'm going to be brief: I went canyoning today, which is where you rapelle into a little tiny narrow canyon wearing weatsuits and then proceded to walk, climb, swim, slide, and jump down this river running through the canyon. The entire canyon was so small in some places I had to turn sideways to fit, and the entire thing was just amazingly beautiful. Okay, gtg. I hope everyone had a happy easter. .: posted by Topper 7:46 PMHey Everybody! I'm currently living it up in New Zealand on spring break. I've seen some absolutely amazing landscapes here and done some amazing things. Our first stop on our tour was at a place called Fox glacier. We were supposed to hike up to the glacier field and then hike all over the field. Unfortunatly, about a day before a massive rock slide washed out the trail and we had to be satisfied just hiking up a little tiny part of the glacier. It was very cool looking though, with milky white water and blue pools all around, and amazing waterfalls coming off the insanely steep valley. Pictures will come soon. After a ridiculous (~7 hr) drive we made it to Queenstown, NZ and have been doing "Extreme" activities ever since. The first, and my favorite so far was a downhill mountain biking on this absolutely insane trail. It was 45 degrees in places, with a mix of dirt, mud, shale, and rock all throughout, and on one side of us was sheer cliff shooting up to the sky, and the other a very steep rocky fall. We passed a few old mining buildings and stopped to think "how the heck did they live here," but the best part of the biking was my wipeout. NZ bikes have the brakes reversed so that the right brake is the front, unlike the US where it is the rear, so my instinct was to squeeze the right brake. This ended up being a very bad thing as on the first really (45 degree) steep part we were on I grabbed the right handle to slow down, threw the bike up on its front tire, and launched myself over the handle bars. I rolled twice, popped up, threw my fists over my head and yelled "Extreme!" Needless to say, I was not hurt, and this action gained me lots of respect with my group. The next activity was jet boating, which was where a boat, going at least 45 MPH, drove withing centimeters of rockwalls, spun out in 360s and in general got everyone wet. It was most fun. The last activity of the day yesterday was a white water rafting tour. I felt like I was floating on a river in Lord of the Rings the entire time, which, in fact, I was. The river was used in those great movies. The rapids themselves where pretty cool, if not as big or plentiful as I expected. The most thrilling part was travel threw a 100 Meter rock tunnel barely big enough to fit us inand being spit out into a huge rapid. Our second day was also great fun, with most of the group jumping off the 2nd biggest bungy jump in the world. I elected not to after a harrowing ride out in a the tiny pod. I did do the sky swing, which was a gigantic rope swing that you get harnessed into, dropped at a 90 degree angle and swung out over a massive cliff. I think at the highest point of your swing you are over 200' in the air. We also had street luging down some special made trails, which was very high speed and fun. At night we went to a really cool bar: literally, it was made entirely out of ice. Someone just installed a bar in a giant meat locker and made all the cups, furniture, and decorations out of ice. I was so upset I forgot my camera for that one. Yesterday I only had one activity: hang gliding. Pictures of that are coming, but let me just say that you will never find another activity that will make you feel more like a bird. I wasn't even technically doing the flying, but the glider is like an extension of your body. It was so amazingly beautiful too. I really am still at a lose of words to describe it. IM me some time for more. At night we had a 4 pub pubcrawl around Quennstown. I love how much cheaper pubs are around here then in Australia... Okay, I'm running out of time on the computer, so I'm going to be brief: I went canyoning today, which is where you rapelle into a little tiny narrow canyon wearing weatsuits and then proceded to walk, climb, swim, slide, and jump down this river running through the canyon. The entire canyon was so small in some places I had to turn sideways to fit, and the entire thing was just amazingly beautiful. Okay, gtg. I hope everyone had a happy easter. .: posted by Topper 7:30 PMTuesday, March 15, 2005http://emmahinds.net/topper/ has some pictures up. More and text to hopefully follow. Sorry about not posting in a while, it's been a crazy last couple of weeks.Topper .: posted by Topper 10:41 PMSunday, March 06, 2005Wow... I just read a celebratory view of western civilization. How often do you get that? The best part is that it is called "The Black Armband View of History," which it specificily and vocal tries to counter. It seems like academics in the humanities and social sciences have trouble naming their essays in a logical manner...On a more personal note, I had a pretty good weekend. On Friday we sent away all the Med Students to their hedonistic drink fest called MedCamp, and then I went to the Footy with Andy, Craig, and the Bourge. Footy (Australian Rules Football) is great fun to watch. Essentially, a ball carrier can run with the ball for 15m, and then they have to bounce it off the ground, or they can kick or punch it to another player (but not throw it). If the ball is kicked and caught without bouncing, the player who caught it may not be hit provided he does not engaged in forward motion (this is called taking a mark). Points are scored by sending the ball through a set of 4 upright poles with no cross bar. If kicked through the middle set of uprights, it is worth 6 points, if it goes through the outer uprights it is worth 1, and if it is punched, touched, or ran in anywhere it is worth 1. After footy was Marissa's 21st birthday, which was at an irish bar with a cover band. They weren't very good and the drinks were expensive, but the company was great. I then joined the Loyola students on their regular migration on the nightrider bus. And Frank (I think) accidently threw orange juice all over me. Nice of him, really. Saturday was studying, dinner at Nando's and the Australian-American Cultural Exchange program (I showed Aussies how to play Beer Pong). I think it will be a sensation crossing the nation here. We certainly had a lot of fun. Sunday was sleep, Formula 1 on the TV, and movies. Somethings never change... .: posted by Topper 6:33 PMTuesday, March 01, 2005Interesting observation: Australia has a degree of racism approximatly similiar to the United States. This is considered a relatively bad thing. However, the degree of the problem is on an entirely different scale because of the preponderence of caucasions, who are the traditional racists, and Asians, who are famous for their willingingness, ability, and success at "playing by the rules" in both Australia and the US. In the US ~50% of our population is a non-white minority, in Australia it less than half that (I think). The lack of daily contact and understanding creates a larger cultural divide than in the United States..: posted by Topper 5:21 AM |
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