swagat from the southern hemisphere to south india...

arrived in the motherland, goa to be exact, a few days back. already making some good connections and visiting an area i've never been before, north goa, for some good new zealand to india connecting and (re)searching. you know searching, that's one of the reasons that foreigners love this country and goa specifically.

i went and did a yoga class, all foreigners and taught by two western teachers yesterday (it was a good class) and a woman in the class has a tattoo that said, "it's better in goa." perhaps, though this swami's friend, the swami behind the camera insisted that he wanted to take a photo of us in front of this elephant, then immediately tried to run me for 500 indian bones... of course, i'm an old hand at that game and slyly evaded the hustle...

love and health to all....

the mountains then the sea...

one of the great things about new zealand is the closeness of the sea. one is never really more than a couple hours away from a magnificent beach and so driving from big mountains to the sea in an afternoon is easy as pie. it's a stark contrast to the states, where hiking the big mountains of montana, well to get to the sea, it's a long road trip away...

here are a few shots from when luke and i drove to the banks peninsula, a beautiful little spit of land east of christchurch, a place where one can get easily lost and find great hostels, like the onuku farm hostel seen in the last few shots.  our neighbors where two very randy peacocks, or at last the one in this last photo, who kept putting the moves on the other peacock by the little cabin we stayed in. though i didn't get to see these peacocks mate, i did get to see this very blue one try his (i assume) darnedest to get the lady to dig his moves... it would have been great to see some mating too, perhaps the next stay...

tonight i'm off to a land of even bigger mountains... stay tuned...

love and health to all...

from ice to water. from a hut to a home.

the new zealand backcountry is dotted with a remarkable hut system, recently & wonderfully captured at the end of the last year with the release of the book, Shelter from the Storm: The Story of New Zealand's Backcountry Huts.

it's a beautiful thing to end a long day of arduous hiking and arrive at a splendid hut, big and small, a night when a hut really feels like a home.  the above hut is the ball shelter/hut.   it's located in mt. cook/ aoraki national park and is on a lovely alpine meadow high above the tasman glacier, the longest in new zealand, 20 kilometres or so. yet due to the annual ice loss it is estimated that within 20 years time the glacier will entirely disappear and a permanent lake will form in the valley (the lake that is present today can be seen in the third photograph).

the journey up to the ball shelter was more grueling than expected, actually maybe not grueling, just long, along a 4x4 old raggedy track for about 7 kilometres and then anoth 4 kilomtres or so.  all in the same day we descended from the mueller hut.

all the drinking water at this hut was rainwater and the club, well damn skippy, one of the finest views in the world!

love and health to all...

dawn & sir edmund hillary...

sir edmund hillary & tenzing norgay reached the summit of mt. everest on may 29, 1953. the first folks to do so.

here in new zealand, hillary is a legend, and he adorns the orange five dollar bill and is a part of daily life.

it is said that the first mountain hillary climbed was mt. ollivier, which happens to be about a 20 minute walk or so from the mueller hut in which luke and i and a bunch of other folks from new zealand and around the world spent a night, early last week i'd guess it would've been.

the wind had been whipping and it was cold when we hit they sack that night. i woke up round 4am and went outside in my long johns for a middle of the eve trip to the ticket office. it was unseasonably warm and the tender warm breeze compounded by warm air felt almost abnormal with snow surrounding me and only the light of the moons and stars bouncing off the darkened white that was everywhere. i returned from the natural t.o. and walked back on the porch of the hut as a young israeli cat was smoking a cigarette outside. dude couldn't sleep and we chatted for a minute or so. then i went back to the bunkroom and lay in my sleeping bag, hoping to hit the hay yet again. through the wall, i heard the radio crackle in the hut warden's quarters.  i found out in the morning that two australian climbers had been hit by falling ice on mt. cook and miraculously found their way back to a hut and the radio call had been the news and the park officials assessing whether a middle of the night airlift was needed.

eventually i did fall asleep, but only for an hour or so and then woke up before sunrise, thanks to the hut warden who was fired up to be a rooster and get peeps up for sunrise. i put on my jacket and walked up mt. ollivier on an early morning sunrise solo meditation tip and breathed and watched the dark turn to dawn turn to light, like always, siempre fresco, beautifully on this forever remarkable & mad planet...

love and health to all...

the road to aoraki...

The journey to Aoraki/Mt. Cook National Park traverses right up the middle of the south island of New Zealand, off a road that goes both to the city of Christchurch and the small lake side town of Wanaka.  The road goes straight north, more or less, and ends in Mt. Cook village, which is at the base of the highest concentration of the biggest mountains in New Zealand.  Luke & I (see fotos) had come from Invercargill, where we had retreated during a period of massive and torrential rainfall in the majority of the natural places we hoped to hike in. So when as we got closer and closer to Mt. Cook and the clouds began to clear, we were very, well, happy campers!

We spent three days in Mt. Cook and had exceptional weather throughout.  The photographs above are a few selects from our journey to the park, the road and the clear blue lake beside that leads towards the park.  We slept the first night in the campground and woke up before eight to reach the Department of Conservation office of which we had been told we needed to get to before it opened in order to secure a night at the highly coveted 28 bunk Mueller Hut, which has just awesome views of both Mt Cook/Aoraki (cloud piercer - & the mountain on the right in the last photo).

As it had rained for almost four days straight, the rocky and grassy high alpine table where the mueller hut stands was covered in a tremendous amount of snow and when we eventually headed down the following day, sliding on our bums turned out to be mad fun!

Alas, a few views of the just awesome and i do mean awesome view from the Mueller Hut, sipping tea, making noodles, reading books, wearing sunglasses and bundling up at night. It was a good 24 hours of hiking and chilling in one part of a great national park. Deffinitely worth the troop...

love and health to all...

re-framed.

my trip to the south island of new zealand was framed by the city of christchurch. it is the city i flew into and out of in order to explore the natural beauty of the southern alps of this country.

christchurch is a city rebuilding, reframing and reforming slowly, after what were two powerful and devastating earthquakes in 2011. the central business district of the city has essentially been closed since the second earthquake in june 2011. it is technically a "red zone," identified by a massive fence and blinking yellow stop lights. most of the buildings still standing have been condemned and will be torn down at some point in the future.

i spent two long afternoons. one rainy one on the front end and one sunny one on the back end, exploring what was once a thriving downtown core a few kilometres from the pacific ocean. the devastation is still everywhere. a solemn reminder of the power of nature. what has been destroyed will be re-birthed, reincarnation, physically and spiritually. scars, however, can take time to heal and patience is a virtue.

so before i head to the hills, here are a few images from in and around the "red zone" of the central business district of downtown christchurch city, sometimes known as the "chur." 

love and health to all...

there they are...

the mountains of the new zealand southern alps.

one day, this wheel attempted to navigate their slopes, precisely in this case, mt. aspiring national park, here beside the banks of the wilkin river, which only began to burst its banks after we had dice-eely crossed it mid-morning, only hours before the rains came down and down and down and down...

siberia hut was our destination that day and we made it right at the birth of a mountain thunderstorm around the late hour of ten pm or so. sun sets late here these daze...

these southern lands are blessed and no wonder their peaks got the spirit in the man who graces the 5 spot here, one sir edmund hillary.

many snaps were taken. many trails walked. many rain jackets soaked in rain and perspiration. but it was all just mighty fine for our minds. perhaps the main organ (is it an organ?) that needs the most cleansing on the regular...

much more from the backcountry to come...

love and health to all...