when mobile phone batteries die...

You get stuck with a day of doing nothing. Last night my mobile phone battery died, meaning that the alarm didn't go off the next morning. (This is a big design fault, because on my previous nokia, even if the battery died, there was enough juice in it to set the alarm off.) I woke up at 9.05, precisely the time I was supposed to be boarding a funky little helicopter to go sweeping over the Fox Glacier. It was even a beautifully sunny clear day. I was not a happy bunny, although I clearly needed the sleep. I signed up for the 12noon flight, but of course since then, in true NewZee fashion, the weather has closed in and it has been raining for hours. So the day has been spent reading a book instead, which had actually been rather pleasurable. Sometimes, it is nice to just sit and read and chill. Furthermore, the book I'm reading, Birdsong, definitely needed a couple of hours dedication to actually get into it.

Almost everything I have wanted to do in New Zealand has been cancelled due to weather - Siberia Expeditions, the heli-hiking, the Routeburn Track. A heli-trek up to Chancellor's Dome was cancelled because of filming on the upper glaciers, and the train to Arthur's Pass, one of the top five great train journeys in the world is also not on whilst they build a tunnel. I'm pretty upset about that one, since I am a bit of a train geek. Still, I've been having an amazing time here, and basically this is a trip for learning where I want to go next time. I also have more time on the North Island, which will be fun too, since originally I only had a week there. Now I'll have about two. I'll just have to come back in the middle of summer here, and book all my hut passes months in advance. Oh, and save about $5000 for all the fun things I have missed out on. Ah, my poor wee credit card!