Of Self-discovery
Dear TomHa,
Kia Ora

I am back from NZ after some successful conquers of mountains along the Southern Alps of New Zealand. How am I feeling right now? I am not sure if there is any words that can describe this feeling. I am feeling extremely elated and yet I am feeling really disappointed that I am right smack in civilisation right now. However, man are a bunch of greedy folks and now, I am embracing the comforts of urban life, cursing the hassles that comes with it (refer bathing and keeping clean). Haha.

Oh yah, New Zealand. Well, New Zealand or Aotearoa (Land of the long white clouds in maori) is a country that is really blessed with gifts of Mother Nature that not many other country can rival. Well, perhaps it is due to the fact that we come from low-lying, geographically-boring Singapore where the mention of our highest peak being 164m never fails to bring astounded looks on those Kiwis' faces. The Southern Alps is just beautiful. I just cannot stop exclaiming. So, over here, I shall chronicle my trip to New Zealand and back, starting and ending with mishaps that kept occurring in Singapore's very own, Changi international Airport.

After saying goodbye to my family, I proceeded to have my passport checked and make my way to the boarding gate. Really simple process that never fails to turn complicated in my hands. Somehow, as it still remain a mystery until now, my boarding pass made its way to Faizhal's bag and blimey, I was freaking stunned when I couldn't find it anywhere on me. Team mates said that my face then had turned so pale, they thought I sudden;y died or something. Trust me, with the amount of money spent on the tickets, I sweared I would have had a heart seizure next had not been for the boarding pass dropping off Faizhal's bag and catching Sau Yee's attention. Alas it is found and I can make my way to take the plane. Phew!

10h flight is not funny and fun. It is about the most boring thing that you can do. Watched the plane's movies, Must Love Dogs, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Dukes of the Hazzard. The first one was a romantic comedy that was kinda nice. I fell asleep on the second one, and the third is just a stupid movie that I happened to have watched before in a Singapore theater on my birthday. Could not have a good sleep as all of those sleeps are just 20 min naps. Very frustrating. The return flight was the same. I hate aeroplanes.


So after transit in Auckland, we took another flight to Christchurch which would be where we would be for the next couple of days. Stayed at some backpackers lodging. Lots of gear shopping and my, Christchurch is such a boring city. We could not find things special to keep ourselves entertained. Lucky for us, we only had to stay there for 2 days. I cannot imagine having to stay there for another couple more days. Mount Cook Village next.

Stayed at Unwin Lodge where we met our guides. Unwin lodge is a hut that is situated right smack in front of mountains. You wake up in the morning, rub your eyes a little turn your heads around the corner and look through the window and there you are, a mountain right in front of you and you feel just so zen. Very picturesque. Makes you feel like everything that you had fret about in the past are rubbish. I was just lucky to be there.

Met our guides and the journey began! Mount Cook Village is already at 800m above sea level, so we started rather high. Not very high though. We had to go to Kelman's hut, which would become some sort of our base camp plus all the luxuries of a bed and tables. Kelman's hut is at 2460m. Long journey but nothing much happened, which is a good thing. Kelman Hut became a major camp for us as we often make a summit push or do some other snow experience-thing and then retreat to the comfort of a good shelter. Temperatures above the snow line is amazingly cold. However, as we kept moving, our gore-tex and fleece managed to keep us warm and to think of it, I was sweating at some points, which is an incredible thing since the temperatures are so cold and the humidity is so low. Nights were the worst. You feel cold and wet and even the warmest down jacket doesn't really keep you THAT warm enough. Can die. My fingers and toes still felt a little numb. Must have been a little frost nipped. Common injury. Staple food up there is expired bread and peanut butter and ham. Spaghetti is a luxury and so is meat. Mountain life is about suffering, and the sadist in me likes that. Ha.

Snow cave living is one of the interesting highlights of the trip. Building one highlights it even brighter! However, somehow, our snow cave looked more like an ice kachang with a scoop of ice cream on top. Dang! no matter. On the mountains, nothing is a certainty. As long as it works and is safe, it is ok. Risk Assessment. The skill that all mountaineers must possess if they wanna stay alive to tell the story.


We summitted 2 mountains. Mount Aylmer and Mount Sebastapool. Mount Sebastapool is something like a recreational climb as it is below the snow line and is rather low, at 1490m. Aylmer almost killed me. In case I had forgotten to introduce, the first picture you see in this entry is Aylmer. It had really narrow ridge line and frankly, given that the snow then was rather soft, I was cursing about the guides' decisions for us to wear crampons, spiky things that you wear under your boots to walk on ice properly. The summit push was ok. The guides built really strong anchors and guide lines that we were able to follow with relative ease. However, it was perpetually whiteout conditions at that time,

I could only barely make out where my rope up buddy was. It was in effect, a rather traumatising experience. No matter. as I made my way down, I stepped on some snow which collapsed and I fell. It was a 1000m drop and boy was I glad that the anchors held. From then on, it was all ice axe and crampons and again, I am grateful that I had worn my crampons. If not for them and my ice axe, who knows, I might not be telling the story today. A really frightening experience although I kinda felt more like "Woohoo! here I go!" sort of thing then. Guess I was too confident of my ability. Must really remember that man are nothing in the eyes of MN.

Shan't blog more, rather lazy to do so. I got enough in my travel journal to last me a lifetime. Shall tell when I see you. Hence, here is a night view of the Southern Alps (yes it looked more like sunrise. Guess I had adjusted too slow a shutter speed already.).

And this is me.