so we headed out of franz josef - yummy toastie sando in hand and made our way down to Lake Waneka - or as col keeps calling it "wwaaaannnneeekkkaaa" with a strange and slightly scary accent. i have picked it up though and now waneka will always be "wwaaaannnneeekkkaaa". a few days later i asked him why he was calling it that - and he smiled and said, i dont know - its just something that joe and i would think is funny. that made me smile thinking of those two guys, and their strange and adorable senses of humor.
on our way to waneka we stopped at lots of places, but my favorite being the blue pools - it was just a quick 30 minute hike down to a river that lead out into some pools - all this amazing light blue color due to the freezing cold temperatures. we drove a bit further and as we started to approach the waneka area the season changed... it went from winter to autum almost. the trees were all stunning burnt oranges, deep reads, bright yellows - leaves everwhere and all in a long row leading us to what would end up one of our favorite places. we both had always wondered what the east coast would be like durring the Fall - well i think we got the extreme version in NZ - the colors were incredible. we got the lake and fell in love with trees, the small town (probabaly a 10 x 10 blocks), all the lake front around it, and the friendliest people. we just kept on driving around the lake for a bit because everything was so gorgeous - and then settled on the lake front to grab col a new jacket. we walked intoa store and this girl asked us immediately if we were in town for the winter season - like we were ski bums just coming to be there for a couple months of good snow. we looked at each other and smiled, told her sadly no, and then simultaneously but individually started to plan our next winter away in a ski town. we got him the raddest marmot jacket, and then headed to our campsite - another awesome one to reccomend. we met some new friends Dave & Maz who told us how much they loved SF, and we said yea - us to (a bit nostalgically), and then we headed to a great restaurant called "the cow" hidden behind the post office in an old cow stable. it was adorable, word burning fire place, lots of history and character, and yummy pizza. after than it was home for an early night getting ready to enjoy a slower day at waneka.
the next morning was met with a bit of a late rise, some yoghurt, fresh berries, museli, and hot tea. and then a work out session for col, yoga session for me. we (kinda of strangely) did this in the common area with the TV - but were happily surprised to see the warrior game on - live, so col did a bit of yelling during that work out. im sure the other guy sitting on the couch loved it.
later that day we went for a fairly long hike around mt iron, and saw georgous views of what happened to be the first snow fall. we saw the same amazing mountains that we saw the day before - this time they were just dusted with snow, stepping up their cool factor. we chatted with some people on the hike about the earthquake in christchurch, and our hearts went out to them as we can somewhere understand their fear it will happen again. we saw a bunch of dogs and got uber excited to add a new little pup to our family when we get back home, and then brainstormed where (in our dream world) we would shack up for a winter of being ski bums. it was a great hike, and then we treated ourselves to a movie, some wine, and homemade chocolate chip cookies. yes - there is a theatre in town that has couches and runs older-ish movies (i mean - it was silver linings playbook... i'd watch that movie years past its prime), but they also have an intermission half way through all movies where they they bring out freshly baked chocolate chip, double chocolate, and whitechoclate ginger cookies. really??? col and i dipped into our personal cellar ( aka trunk) before the movie with 2 mini glasses of wine in our camper van, then watched the first half of the movie, got our cookie and had them with ice cold milk in our campervan then returned for the second half. such an awesome date night. and can we talk about how great silver linings playbook is?? i cant believe we waited this long to see it - we both thought it was brave, touching, and real. we headed back that night for some hot showers, and to snuggle while catching up on some reading. we loved everybit of waneka - and if it were not so far from our families it might have been our little home for a ski bum winter - but we've got way too much in store for the next couple months. however - we will absolutely be back. waaaaaaannnnneeekkkkkaaaaa!
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