Round and round the South Island I go

I have soo much to share!

The first week of June I spent doing fieldwork with Dave from my lab and Andy, another PhD student in my dept. We went north and west over the mountains to Lake Poerua. I wanted to collect snails from a creek that runs into the lake and a student from Indiana U told me these snails were highly infected with the parasite I work with. Well, we get there and the creek is dry - damnit! So I collected snails from another creek and 3 locations of the lake. I'll be screening these snails this week to determine if they're infected. We stayed in Shearer's quarters on a farm on the lake - a complete shit-hole with mouse turds and faulty heating and no hot water for the first day - I took pictures. The good thing was we had easy access to the lake since this farm was on the lake. Then we drove down the west coast - absolutely beautiful! - to Haast area for Andy to collect some fish. The drive was windy and up and down...horrible when you're in back pain and want to lay down but laying down makes you carsick! Yes, I was in back pain when we left for this trip, then I spent the week sitting long hours in the truck or bent over collecting snails. By the time we got back Friday night, I couldn't sit or stand very long. I had a ticket for a whiskey and chocolate tasting for Friday night. Haseeb in my lab put together the tasting and the chocolates were designed and made by his wife who is a chocolatier. The chocolates were made with the whiskey they were paired with...ahhh, whiskey was great for the back pain....until Saturday...I could barely move - I couldn't even sit up in bed, I had to roll over and roll my legs out so my knees were on the floor and then stand up. It hurt to sit, stand, walk, so I spent most of the day in bed...then something must have happened in the middle of the night because Sunday morning I felt great, just had sore muscles and by Monday I was feeling perfect - weirdest thing.

So good that I felt back to normal cause Leah arrived that Monday. I had to take care of my snails so they'd live while I was traveling with Leah and she mostly rested on Monday since she had vertigo from traveling. Then Tuesday we made a couple of stops in the Catlins and then headed to Te Anau and stayed at a backpackers. We went to the glow worm caves - they were pretty cool - insect larvae that glow to attract other insects upon which they feed....they have these little sticky fishing lines that insects get caught in. On Wednesday we went kayaking in Milford Sound - that was the highlight of the trip for me! Kayaking is sooo much easier than canoeing. I got to try Sea Urchin, raw, for lunch - very, very salty! Thursday we shopped for souvenirs and drove to Queenstown, which we decided was too commercial and touristy so we continued on to Wanaka via the Crown Ridge road over the mountains. Spent the night there at another backpackers and on Friday we had lunch and a tasting at one of my favorite vineyards, Mt Difficulty, which has incredible views of Central Otago. Then we drove like hell to get to the Moeraki Boulders on the east coast and we arrived there just at dusk and in time to take a couple of pics before it was too dark. We had dinner at Fleur's in Moeraki, a place many folks have recommended - it's a run-down looking place with the best food ever and the fish on the menu were caught that morning! And finally by Friday night we were back at my place. We spent Saturday going to the Farmer's Market, shopping, and Rachel came over for dinner and we made Roasted chicken and vegetables, then we headed to town for a few drinks - the latest Leah stayed up the whole time she was here! Sunday I drove her around for some sight-seeing and then headed to Sandfly Bay for the penguins. There were heaps of sea lions and fur seals so I didn't know if we'd see any penguins. We saw one right away but I was worried that was it until right before dark and two more popped up over the cliff and then another two popped up on the rocks. Leah was so excited and said that was the best experience of the whole trip. And Monday I saw her off at the airport...talk about a whirl-wind of a trip!

Albums and videos will be posted shortly...

Now I'm trying to get back to the swing of normal life. Still haven't been able to infect my fish...argh. But hopefully I screen these snails and find infected ones so I have more parasites to sort out the problems I'm having with the infection procedure.