Random Thoughts

♫ Wonderful, Wonderful Copenhagen ♫

Neil Jenkins — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 17:15:00 +0000

Apr 08

The arrival in Denmark of King’s Voices for a choir tour was not met by hoards of screaming fans, which is just as well as dinner was more at the forefront of our minds than signing autographs. After dumping our bags in the hostel, notable only for being the largest in Europe with 16 floors and 1,020 beds, we headed out into a surprisingly dead capital city. Looking for a place that actually showed signs of life we found a gourmet burger bar, perhaps not traditionally Danish but excellent quality. The menu provided much amusement as each burger was apparently served with ‘8 slags’; thankfully, this turned out to be the Danish word for ‘types’ and was referring to the different sauces. Danish, however, does seem almost deliberately built to read amusingly to those from England. On our travels we came across everything from a shop called ‘Bog handel’ to another advertising a ‘slut spurt’, which apparently means end of sale.

When thinking of Danish cuisine not a lot springs to mind. In fact, perhaps the only fare I can come up with is Danish pastries, and certainly these delicacies were to be found in every bakery in the city, the quality without exception far surpassing any I have ever found in England. ‘Snegl’ time (literal translation apparently ‘Snail’ due to the shape) was quickly established as a highlight of every day. Apart from this, the only other traditional food we were served was open-topped sandwiches served on rye bread, a wholesome and tasty staple.

Fortune prevailed with the weather and most of the time we were able to stroll around the streets without being drenched. A certain tidy uniformity runs through much of Copenhagen, with tall, pastel coloured houses and clean streets. That is, until you reach Christiania, a small neighbourhood of the city just over the bridge from where we were staying. Pristine roads and buildings are not to be found here; instead, run-down houses and a dirt road are the setting for a semi-independent hippy community. Whilst home to much of Copenhagen’s drugs trade, these days this is slightly more discreet and outdoor cafes and bars give off a relaxed vibe. Beautiful large scale murals and graffiti art adorn the buildings; it certainly contrasts greatly with the rest of the city, which was interesting albeit less unusual. Rosenburg Slot is the old palace, now home to the crown jewels; I looked round the grounds again but declined to pay the entrance fee having seen the jewels before. Instead, we went to the National Art Gallery, an absolutely gigantic building containing everything from a modern sculpture of a man with 12-foot long legs to ancient oil paintings depicting biblical scenes. Climbing the round tower in the centre of Copenhagen we enjoyed a 360 degree panoramic view of the city‘s skyline, although this was, sadly, fairly unremarkable.

Most people travelling to England find UK prices a bit steep, but they are nothing compared to Denmark. Beer fetched up to £5 a pint in town, with the average price at least £4. We did however find a student bar to frequent, which was much more reasonably priced. But really you might as well go to the source, so during some spare time on one day we took a train out to the Carlsberg Brewery, producer of just about every beer Denmark has to offer. Our two free samples at the end allowed us to try some of their more unusual products, including the curiously titled ‘Elephant Beer’, presumably named due to the 7.3% strength being enough to fell such a beast. This clearly wasn’t enough for some guests however, as whilst there we saw one man walk up to the bar and order a glass of practically everything they had on offer. Evidently he was either a connoisseur, a man with many friends or perhaps simply an alcoholic.

It would seem remiss of me to write an entire account of my time in Copenhagen without mentioning the singing, what with this being a choir tour and all. We gave three concerts and one service during our time here and I think I can safely say that all were a resounding success, the only real problem being deciding on what to do for our encores. Turnout was excellent with over three hundred people seeing us perform in total. Congratulations must be given to Simon for rehearsing and conducting us through the Byrd mass, several anthems and a number of madrigals; all very British and apparently pleasing to the Danish ear.

And then it was time to leave, really not too long after we set out, but perhaps long enough given the certain lightness to our wallets by this time. A good time had been enjoyed by all and perhaps this is best summarised by the slogan emblazoned on the T-shirts we bought Helen (our wonderful organiser) and Simon: I ♥ Copenhagen.

Introducing nmjenkins.com 3.0

Neil Jenkins — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 16:50:00 +0000

Mar 08

Procrastination is practically a recognised sport in Cambridge and when the holidays come round what better way to avoid revision than to redesign your website again? To be fair, I had been planning on doing it anyway because I couldn't find a way to make my new improved photo gallery fit in with the old design. Also, the old design with the photos of Fiji and New Zealand in the header didn't seem appropriate now my gap year finished over a year ago.

The idea for this design came to me whilst I was walking through Nottingham. It popped almost fully formed into my head, which was kind of nice, and I created the whole thing in less than 24 hours. The half-face was inspired by a David Bailey picture I think I remember seeing many years ago (although I could of course be mistaken; I know I've seen it somewhere before but I can't remember where). I wanted to keep with a black and white design with just a few splashes of colour and looking at it I can't help but notice I've been influenced by subtraction. The sidebar was moved to the bottom of the page as seems to be the latest fashion (it also happened to fit in neatly with the rest of my design).

The photo gallery has been completely rewritten, mashing together the old one which dynamically queried Flickr and the one I designed for FastMail last summer. Credit goes to an old diveintomark design for 'inspiring' the idea of splitting an image into lots of little squares. The gallery has loads of funky features; it builds the page dynamically from Flickr each time, lets you view an album as resizable thumbnails and pre-loads the next image whilst you're looking at the current one. A filmstrip at the bottom allows you to browse thumbnails whilst looking at a large photo and the photo resizes to make the optimum use of your screen. The whole thing is written in JavaScript and requires no server-side support at all. Groovy huh?

I've decided to release the code to my photo gallery for the world to use as it beats the hell out of any other online photo gallery I've ever seen and quite frankly the world is full of too many frustratingly bad photo galleries. I'm licensing it under the GPL 2.0 license. If this doesn't fit in with your usage, send me an email and we'll see if we can sort something out. You can find it at the newly created code section of my website.

North, further north and then home...

Neil Jenkins — Thu, 07 Sep 2006 16:07:00 +0000

Sep 06

…which is, you've guessed it, even further north (I've given up on this whole 'south' option people keep telling me about). Yes, for those of you who I haven't yet seen or spoken too, I am now once more back in Merry Olde Englande, arriving back in London 8 months to the day after I set out. I have been rather delayed in updating everyone on the final few weeks of my travels but better late than never, eh?!

So, cast your mind back if you will to mid August. After two days skiing under a stunning blue ski, I hightailed it back up to Rotorua to rejoin Doni and Roy, the Dutch people I'd met in Taupo. Whilst home to a pervasive whiff of rotten eggs, Rotorua also hosts many more pleasant attractions from thermal geysers that shoot 10m up in to the air to Maori Culture Evenings, where tribal dancing and story telling is followed by a huge hangi - a feast of chicken, lamb, kumara (sweet potato) and much more, all slow roasted underground on heated rocks. However, one of the highlights for me was Zorbing. For those of you that have not yet heard of this fascinating new 'sport', it goes something like this: Take one hamster ball and enlarge in to human size. Add 30cm warm water and up to 3 people to the inside. Seal off the entrance then roll down a hill. I tried to stand up but it was impossible, it was very much like being in a moving flume and the three of us just tumbled down the hill, slipping and sliding all over the place; I couldn't stop laughing for 10 minutes afterwards.

Katherina had been skiing for an extra couple of days but she joined us the night before we left Rotorua for Waitomo, home of a seriously big network of caves and a seriously rich farmer who charges £5 per person every time someone goes caving. We joined Rap, Raft 'n Rock to spend half a day exploring an underground river and a few of the caves around it. After rappelling 27m into a chasm in the earth, we waded upstream then diverged from the river to squeeze into a few very narrow and extremely muddy passages. We turned our torches off and floated downstream on inflatable rubber innertubes, staring up at the glowworms covering the ceiling, then squeezed through a few more tiny holes downstream of the opening before rock-climbing back out again.

From Waitomo we drove a long way up to Paihia for a spot of sailing around the picturesque Bay of Islands before continuing all the way up to the northern tip of New Zealand: Cape Reinga, where the Pacific Ocean meets the Tasman Sea, clashing together in waves of spray. The weather was bizarre; we exited the car and in 2 minutes were absolutely soaked to the skin by a horizontal downpour, driven by a gale force wind. Five minutes later though, the rain stopped, the sun came out and by the time we returned to the car I had completely dried off. The cape and surrounding coastline is one of the most beautiful parts of New Zealand and someday I would like to return to walk a three day track around the coast. Unfortunately, Doni, Roy and I all had flights to catch over the next couple of days, so we had to head back down to Auckland. We did, however manage to fit in sand rolling (a bit like sand boarding only cheaper - you basically just climb up a huge sanddune then roll all the way down) and a flying visit to a kauri tree with a trunk the width of a small sky scraper (OK, I exaggerate slightly).

In Auckland we went our separate ways. It was almost time for me to return home but first I had 5 days to enjoy the delights of San Francisco. Coming from New Zealand, America seemed very expensive so I did all the cheapest activities I could find: walking through Golden Gate Park, hopping on a cable car and walking around the tourist-o-licious Pier 39 and of course a visit to Alcatraz, a strange but interesting place which has basically been left untouched since it was abandoned as a maximum security prison back in the 1960's. Walking through the cell block with the commentary from former prisoners and guards gave you a chilling insight into life locked away on a block of sandstone, tantalisingly close to civilisation with the sounds of Christmas parties drifting across the mile long stretch of water if the wind was right. Despite all the films, only 3 people ever managed to 'escape' and all are believed to have drowned in the frigid waters as they attempted to swim back to the mainland.

America is famous for many things, one of which is of course the ridiculous drinking age; at 18 you can die for your country but if at the end of a hard day in Iraq a young American soldier has managed to avoid being hit by friendly fire, then they can't celebrate with a beer if they're under 21. Despite this, I did go out to a bar one night with some people from the hostel and had no trouble getting served but it felt very strange to be underage again after being legal for almost 2 years everywhere else.

And then, finally, it was time once more to return home. Eight months seemed such a long time when I set out but after the first few months it just absolutely flew past and before I knew it I was back in Nottingham, with only 4 volumes of diary, 4500 photos and a pile of dirty washing to show I'd ever been away. But you have to return home at some point because after all, until you get back you've never really been away.

On the road again

Neil Jenkins — Sun, 13 Aug 2006 06:51:00 +0000

Aug 06

As you may have guessed from the title of this post I'm travelling again, having spent the last two months working for the Department of Internal Affairs (sort of like the New Zealand version of the Home Office), first doing some boring data entry and then rewriting their website. Wellington's been great and it feels odd to be on the move again but I'm due back in England on the 31st of August (scarily soon) and there's so much more I want to see.

So anyway, I left Wellington last Monday and went to Napier for a few days. The weather was dreadful and I think this may have coloured my opinion somewhat; it was a pretty dull place with a very English looking beach (cold grey sea and pebbles instead of sand). It's main attraction is the Art Deco architecture, which can be seen on one or two buildings once it's actually pointed out to you.

From Napier I moved on to Taupo and while I left in miserable rain I arrived in glorius sunshine, a sign of what was to come I'm sure. The next morning I went for a beautiful scenic flight in a plane whose occupants seemed to like playing sardines. This was rudely ended when at 12,000ft some idiot decided to open the door and push me out of it; I didn't even have a parachute on! Luckily, I was firmly strapped to someone who did have such an item and also didn't seem to have 'Go splat' on his todo list for today; mind you it took him 45 seconds to find the right cord to pull, by which time the ground was approaching at a speed somewhat over 200km/h. Given that the ground is not all it's cracked up to be I then went and walzed along some poles and ropes suspended 40ft up in the air, otherwise known as a high ropes course.

The Tongariro Crossing is supposedly the finest day walk in New Zealand and never being one to miss out on a good stroll, I naturally signed up to do this the following day. Of course, when most people walk the trail it's not knee deep in snow but not to worry, I was prepared: I had my shorts and gaiters with me. We climbed the saddle in some low lying cloud, at times surrounded completely by white, which is really weird — it makes you think you're in a simulation or something rather than the real world. Luckily, the cloud cleared as we stopped for lunch on the edge of an (inactive) volcanic crater and the picturesque views for which the walk is famed came in to view. We may have climbed slower than in summer but we certainly went down quicker; who wants to walk when you can don a pair of fleecy snow-proof overtrousers and slide down on your arse?!

So what's next in the great adventure? Well I'm off to Mt Ruapehu tomorrow, New Zealand's largest ski-field, to spend a couple of days whizzing around the slopes with Katharina, a German girl I met here in Taupo. Then we're going up to Rotorua to meet up with a Dutch brother and sister we made friends with; we're all going to squash in their car for a big road trip up to the Bay of Islands. Should be fun!

Wellington

Neil Jenkins — Tue, 13 Jun 2006 10:15:00 +0000

Jun 06

I've been firmly ensconced in New Zealand's capital city for 3 weeks now. For the first week I was delighted to have the company of Fiona and Jenichka and we toured the highlights of the city, taking in the planitarium, botanical gardens, a bit of Te Papa national museum and a tour round the New Zealand parliament. We even went to see The Da Vinci Code at the magnificent Embassy Theatre (it was a bit rubbish really... Cars is a much better film :-)).

Sadly, they then had to depart to continue their whirlwind tour of these isles and so I had to get sorted. Through one of the numerous temp agencies I've signed up with I got a job setting up a new Toy department in a shop just outside of town. Together with another English bloke I put together the flat packed shelves (thankfully without any IKEA diagram hell) then over the next couple of days had to get all the toys layed out correctly, which required more brainpower than I would have predicted as there were specific rules about how they can be arranged and you've still got to try and make them look good and fit them into the available space. This work was only for a week however and after that I was back looking for more and managed to find a job selling furniture at an expo over the weekend. I'm still looking for something a bit more permanent.

My other big job was to find somewhere to live, as staying in a hostel for extended periods of time is less than ideal. After a couple of weeks of searching I finally found a room in a house right in the centre of town. It's rather cold and the kitchen's tiny but the people are cool and I've got my own room and unlimited internet access (and at the equivilent of £44/week + bills how does this compare to a room in England's capital city? Imogen? Nicki? :-D). There are three other people currently sharing the house, all of them in their early twenties: Sheryly, who works in a coffee shop, Jimmy, who works as a bank teller, and Alex, a Canadian girl in her third year of architecture at the nearby university. Despite having only one proper student, the whole place has a definite studenty feel, right down to the pile of unwashed dishes I'm going to have to do something about...

Should any of you wish to contact me then, I now have an address:

66 Abel Smith Street
Wellington 6011
New Zealand

My home phone number is +64 4 3813740. Please remember that New Zealand is 11 hours ahead of England!

If you need a lift, you can rely on the Germans

Neil Jenkins — Tue, 23 May 2006 15:58:00 +0000

May 06

Yet again I seem to have left it quite a while since my last update, so I will try to keep things reasonably concise. My only excuse is the distraction of all the things I've done as detailed below :-P. I'd better start with my first stop after Queenstown.

Besides being a picturesque lake-side town, Wanaka is noted for two unique attractions: Stuart Landsborough's Puzzling World and the Cinema Paradiso. Puzzling world is a cool little place with a maze and 4 illusion rooms set in some crazy architecture just outside of town. Inside there's an art gallery of 3D holograms, a room with 168 famous faces most definately following you around, a room of distorted perspection (watch yourself become a dwarf then a giant!) and, probably best of all, a room where gravity has gone wrong; the entire room is tilted which really affects your perception of the horizontal and creates illusions such as water running uphill.

Cinema Paradiso is different to most cinemas in the modern world. For a start, there's only one screen and it's running off two 40 year old projectors, giving the film a less clinical and more cinematic look. The reception area is a little cafe selling quality homemade food (such as delicious cookies and ice cream) at reasonable prices and they still have an intermission half way through the film to allow you to go to the loo or buy some more refreshments. The most noticeable difference is the seating; rather than just rows of standard chairs, there is instead an eclectic collection of old sofas and recliners and even an old Morris Minor in the corner with the roof removed but the windscreen intact. It was a great experience and it was helped by seeing an excellent film, Keeping Mum; if you haven't seen it try and get the DVD - it's a great black comedy starring Rowan Atkinson and Maggie Smith.

From Wanaka I hitchhiked up to Fox Glacier on the west coast. I was picked up by Anika and Alex, two girls recently graduated from university in Germany and doing a little round the world tour. Walking on the glacier (I did a full day guided trip) was a really interesting experience; they're not as flat as you'd think but equipped with crampons and led by two great guides we worked our way up the ice, passing through cravasses and tunnels with stunning deep blue ice on either side, to get a fair way along this 13km long block of ice.

Hitching to Greymouth, a dreary place further up the west coast, I was given lifts by a spanish couple and another two different German women (one of whom was living in Ireland before she came out and had a wonderful hybrid accent!). Greymouth was just a passing point on my way north but before I headed all the way up to Nelson on the north coast of the south island I stopped in Barrytown, a tiny little hamlet, to make a knife. From scratch. I spent the whole day there, first forging the steel then cutting out the handle and riveting it to the blade then finally sanding and polishing the whole thing down in to an awsome bowie knife; Ben Jermy eat your heart out! To get more of an idea about what the finished product looked like, have a look at the pictures on their website. We also got to have a go throwing axes at a big wooden board (getting them to stick in was bloody hard!) and after we'd finished, we celebrated with a bit of home distilled moonshine; a great day.

From Nelson I had easy access to the Abel Tasman National Park, the most visited NP in New Zealand. The famous coastal track is incredibly well tramped with up to 27,000 people a year walking along it, normally in 3-5 days, and it passes along stunning coastline with beautiful golden sandy beaches. It also happens to be the sunniest place in NZ, which I can attest to having had 5 days of glorious blue skies whilst I was there. I walked the track in 2 days (which meant a slightly long 33km/20.5 mile first day), meeting mainly English people in the well-maintained huts then came back along the little used inland track, meeting not a soul in the two and a half days I was on it. The inland track cuts right across the heart of the NP, climbing steeply to follow a ridgeline through beautiful beech forest with the occasional viewpoint providing 360 degree panoramas of the surrounding park. The path is rough but well marked and well worth walking, so I was rather surprised to find in the hut log books that the last people to pass through it had been over a week ago. On the last morning I climbed up to Castle Rock, a terrific viewpoint with views across the bay to Nelson, back over the tree tops of the park and down through a valley to the sea to watch the sunrise over the ocean; a magical experience.

I took my leave of the south island yesterday, taking the ferry from Picton on the 3 hour jouney across the Cook Straight to Wellington. I felt rather like one of the immigrants arriving in America 150 years ago as we pulled in to the harbour and I disembarked into the bright lights and hurly burly of a busy city. After being in small places for so long, the wide roads, sky scrapers and hurrying commuters were quite a shock, but I'm sure I'll get used to it again. I should be meeting up with Fiona and Nish today, as they're arriving tonight on their way south through NZ. After they've gone I think I might try and find a job here as it's a convenient stopping point on my journeys and I need a bit of extra cash!

Walk, paddle, fly

Neil Jenkins — Fri, 05 May 2006 10:01:00 +0000

May 06

Well, I realise it's a long time since I last wrote an update so I have quite a lot to fill you in on; I've now been away over 4 months - half way through my trip! I suppose I'd better start with my excursion to Milford Sound, a fortnight ago now. This is quite possibly the most touristy place on earth but only between the hours of 10 and 3, when the army of tour buses arrive. Kayaking out on to the fjord in the evening after the cruise boats had finished was astonishingly peaceful and definitely a great way to take in the majesty of this gigantic place; when your head is only a meter above the water and either side of you the cliffs at the edge of the sound are literally a mile high and practically vertical, your brain just gives up and thinks everything is actually smaller than it really is. The 162m high Lady Bower Falls, the spray of which was whipping my face I was so close, seemed small and insignificant set against the cliff behind it.

The next stop on the grand tour of New Zealand was Queenstown and in this adventure capital of the south I briefly crossed paths with Oli, Mel and Alex; we had a couple of hours to fill each other in on our experiences and swap tips before they headed south to Dunedin first thing the following morning. I headed for the hills.

The Rees-Dart track is not one of the most well known New Zealand walks but it's only in the next two valleys down from the Routeburn, one of the world's most well worn tracks. It is however astonishingly beautiful, passing through glacial valleys rather reminiscent of Scotland (mud, mud, mud, bog, bog, bog!) with snow capped mountains beautifully framing any photos you may wish to take. It also turned out to be D of E central (that's Duke of Edinburgh award not Department of Economics); there were two groups on the track - a party of girls from Wanaka and a collection of boys from Dunedin, both accompanied by teachers (in the case of the boys there were almost as many teachers as walkers; they all just wanted to come along for the walk). I took an extra day half way through the 4-day-long route to take a stroll along the dart valley and try and climb the Cascade Saddle, a spectacular 1500m high pass with views out towards Mt Aspiring, the highest peak in the park. Unfortunately, the day I set out to do this was one of the two bad weather days I had on the track; It more or less eased off raining but was very overcast when I set out with 3 Americans I had made friends with. We easily walked up the dark, silt coloured Dart valley then started to climb up the saddle, soon rising above the snow line. We got pretty high up, though the way was slippery and steep, and when we stopped for lunch there were spectacular views down in to the valley and across the Dart Glacier that blocks off its end. Unfortunately, it then began to snow and the cloud lowered, so we soon decided to turn back as we didn't want to get caught in a snow storm.

I didn't even have a day off between tracks this time; I got back to Glenorchy from the Rees-Dart, got the washing done, restocked on food and the next day headed straight off for the Routeburn. Due to transport issues I had to do the first two days of this traditionally 3 day walk in one; this actually turned out to be a good thing though as the weather was absolutely awesome, barely a wisp of cloud in the sky. The climb up to the Harris Saddle was through native beech forest, with plenty of small inquisitive birds tweeting at me along the way. The open scrubland on the saddle allowed unfettered views across to the valley and when I took the optional climb up Coronet Peak (which was incidentally bloody steep, especially as being eXtreme(ly stupid) I had my full pack with me) there were amazing 360 degree views of the mountains all around and down the Hollyford valley you could even catch a glimpse of the sea. In all, I walked over 20km that day, gaining 1000m of height then dropping down 500m again to reach the MacKenzie hut; this was by a lake so still the reflection of the mountains in it was a perfect mirror image.

I returned to my starting side of the mountain range via the Caples track, which joins on to the end of the Routeburn. The beginning of this was an absolute killer. After crossing a stagnant pond by walking the tightrope on several partially submerged logs, the path climbed steeply through a forest. I say path as there were some little triangles attached to trees to tell you you were still on it, but following it was another matter entirely, entailing clambering over tree roots and hauling yourself up slippery rock; I think I used my arms almost as much as my legs to haul me along the path. Once I reached the saddle at the top however, it turned into a nice stroll back down the Caples valley, although there was still the odd tree root to trip you up.

I was due to be picked up from the end of the track at 2pm. At ten to three a bus arrived driven by a man (rather oddly I thought) wearing a life jacket. The reason for this soon became apparent when the bus stopped only 5 minutes up the road for us to disembark, don our own life jackets and board a jet boat to take us across Lake Wakatipu to Glenorchy!

I hitched back to Queenstown and scoffed the biggest burger you have seen in your life. The next day, not having got the walking bug quite out of my system with 9 days of continuous tramping, I decided to stroll up the 1748m Ben Lomond, a mountain right behind Queenstown. From up there you could see the sprawl that Queenstown is becoming (despite having a very small centre) and I watched a helicopter and a few clouds drift by beneath me.

Queenstowm is known for its crazy activities and in an effort to be as eXtreme as possible (it's what he would have wanted), yesterday I went and jumped off a cliff into a canyon. Twice. Luckily I had a rope attached to me or I would probably only have been able to do it once. The canyon swing involves a 60m freefall before the strain is gradually taken up by a rope attached to your full body harness, swinging you out across the canyon at 150kph. There are a number of different ways you can launch yourself into the abyss. For my first jump (entitled 'Pin Drop') I stood side on to the edge, feet together and arms behind my back, looked down at the river far below then simply hopped to my left and plummeted down. After being winched back up again, I decided to do it in the 'Elvis Cutaway' style: I lay on my back, suspended horizontally in my harness, and wrapped my feet around the main rope. The guy counted down 5, 4... and I didn't really hear the rest as, being playful buggers, at this point they released me and I hurtled down on my back before swinging across the valley upside down, giving me the biggest headrush ever; stars literally before the eyes.

Overall the canyon swing was great fun but it wasn't really scary and so in my search for ever more eXtreme activities, in the afternoon I went and strapped myself face down onto what can only be described as a small plane suspended by a metal cable in a valley, and spent 7 minutes zooming about the skies using something like a bicycle handlebar to accellerate, bank and turn, reaching speeds of almost 140kph (87mph) as I swooped down across the valley. Fly By Wire they call it. Great fun.

Today I'm off surfing down a river then tomorrow I think I'm going to head off to Wanaka for a few days before hitting the glaciers. It's a tough life.

Tramping in NZ

Neil Jenkins — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 04:51:00 +0000

Apr 06

Since my last update I've covered over 100km of New Zealand bush, walking the Rakiura and Kepler tracks. The Rakiura track on Stewart Island was a nice little warm up, being only 36km long and spread over 3 days. The weather was blessedly sunny and the path so well made it was a rare occurrence to come across a section of mud, for which Stewart Island is traditionally famous. The path is more or less all though native forest, very lush and green with ferns and moss covered trees. The wonderful New Zealand hut system meant that I didn't have to carry a tent with me; instead I stayed both nights in purpose built huts, each with a bunkroom and a cooking area with a pot belly fire - they even had sinks and running water! Very luxurious compared to a Scottish bothy. Tramping the route at the same time as me were a Belgian, a German couple, a Czech man and a Polish women - quite the European mix. Luckily for me, the only common language between everyone was English.

After flying back to Invercargill and taking a bus up to Te Anau I took a day's break to restock then set out on the Kepler track, a rather more difficult route going 65km and climbing 1270m (4167 feet) to the top of Mt Luxmore then descending all the way back down again and following a river back to Te Anau. Apparently, the record time for completing the circuit is an insane 4 hours and 37 minutes. I did it in a rather more leisurely 20 hours across 4 days. Again, I was incredibly lucky with the weather; it only rained when I was safely in a hut for the night.

The Kepler track is very popular and the first two huts were huge (taking up to 60 people a night) and at $40 they were the most expensive places I have stayed at in New Zealand! But then they did have gas stoves, solar powered electric lighting and flushing toilets, hardly your standard hut facilities. With so many people there it was easy to find a group to talk to and play cards with.

The first, third and fourth days are more or less exclusively though forest so not so interesting (although still quite beautiful). The second day, however, is simply stunning. Virtually the whole day is spent above the tree line, first ascending to the summit of Mt Luxmore (1472m - 4829 feet - in Scotland that would be a munro bagged for sure!) from which there were 360 degree views over cloud filled valleys to the snow capped mountains beyond then continuing along a couple of ridges, with views down either side; occasionally the clouds would part and you could catch glimpses of Lake Te Anau, glittering 1000m below.

I also came across a party of quite possibly the worst prepared walkers I have ever seen. Two Germans and a Canadian set off from a campsite just before you start climbing (at all) and arrived at the first hut just after I did on the first day. Only they were intending to make it to the campsite at the next hut, a good 6 hours away at their pace. So first they stopped for lunch and then an hour or so later set off, with only 4 hours til dark and rain descending on the mountain tops ahead. They ended up having to spend the night at an emergency shelter, soaking wet and with only one dry sleeping bag. Oh, and for one of the Germans it was her first ever hike and she was wearing jeans. She also got massive blisters on the back of her foot and twisted her ankle. I caught up with them at the end of the second day when I found them sitting round the fire in the second hut, warming up and drying all their clothes.

The last hut I stayed in was a little different to the first two. For a start it was 1/8 of the price. It was a tiny one roomed, 6 bunk hut slightly off the main track and not advertised much (the DOC would prefer you to stay in their $40 hut). Then again, it didn't even have running water, although Lake Manapouri was conveniently 10m in front and I ate dinner sitting on the shore watching the sun go down behind the mountains. I shared the hut with a group of 3 girls, two Americans and a Slovenian; they had been walking the same days as me but I hadn't bumped in to them before.

Tomorrow I'm heading up to Milford Sound. I'm going kayaking on it in the evening then staying the night and doing a cruise in the morning. From there I'll get the bus all the way to Queenstown, but I'm only going to stay there a day to restock and arrange transport to the small hamlet of Glenorchy, from where I have access to the Routeburn-Caples and Rees-Dart tracks - another week or so's worth of hiking in the mountains before I return to Queenstown to see it properly.

Down South

Neil Jenkins — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 02:28:00 +0000

Apr 06

Well, I'm now on my Johnny Todd after parting with Oli, Mel, Alex & Laura etc. in Auckland and being driven to the airport in a gorgeous, open-top vintage Porsche by a family friend; an unexpected bonus. I flew in to Christchurch over the magnificent Canterbury planes, totally flat and stretching for miles. INJOKE: I was slightly alarmed when the captain first cane on the radio and announced himself as Peter Duncan but thankfully he was quite competent and didn't claim to be able to fly because his brother used to be a pilot.

Christchurch was a nice city with plenty of green space and a large park near the city centre. The Avon river winds its way through the middle and the banks of this are presumably where Christchurch gets its reputation for being the most English city in NZ, being reminiscent of the river Cam. An old tram does a short circuit of the city centre, costing rather more and travelling far less than back when it was actually a proper means of public transport, but it does at least take you to the museum, with detailed information on how the Brits were beaten to the south pole by the Norwegians but still became more famous, and the magnificent glass fronted art gallery. A little way out of town, a Gondola takes you up on to the surrounding volcanic hills and despite not having a map I managed to wander round for a couple of hours, taking in magnificent views of Lyttleton harbour, the Canterbury planes and of course the ocean, stretching out to the eastern horizon. A visit to Canterbury Brewery proved that not all Guinness is brewed in Dublin but for $10 was quite fun and you got at least that amount of free beer at the end.

Dunedin is apparently the Edinburgh of the south and from the pictures that accompany all the advertising leaflets you would expect every building to be 100 years old and made of stone. You would be wrong. With the exception of the railway station and the university however, everything is pretty standard and new. It is nonetheless a nice city, apparently the largest (by area) in New Zealand and the 5th largest in the world, easily beating London, despite having a population of only 120,000. It also contains the world's steepest street as well as the world's longest walk to a not-really-worth-it-attraction (the aforementioned street).

Rugby is the national game in New Zealand and with the venerable Carisbrook stadium nearby, I of course took the opportunity to go and see a Super 14s match between the local team (the Otago Highlanders) and a team from Perth (Western Force). It was a glorious sunny day and I had a ticket for the terraces, where one could stand or sit on the concrete steps. With Perth winning 15-3 at half time the crowd behind me were rather despondent and I wandered down to the railing at the edge of the pitch where four girls were standing wearing capes and clothes in the Otago colours of yellow and blue and sporting faces painted to match. I started chatting to one of them and whilst we watched Otago mount an amazing comeback in the second half (going on to win 25-22) we became friends and she offered me a ticket entitling the bearer to free transport back to a pub in town and 3 free glasses of beer; she had been given two of these tickets by mistake. Naturally I accepted; it would have been ungentlemanly not to. I ended up getting back to the hostel at 3am. Oh, and as if a load of free beer and a great night out wasn't enough, Katie also happened to be the daughter of the owners of Stewart Island Flights and got me a hefty discount. Bonus.

So here I am, currently on Stewart Island, having been flown over this afternoon by Katie's dad from Invercargill. The nice weather stopped literally as soon as we passed from the sea over the island and currently there is a distinctly cloudy look to the sky. Tomorrow I set out on the Rakiura track, a 3 day circular walk taking me along the coast, inland and then back to Oban (the only town here), hopefully in time to fly back to Invercargill on Friday evening.

Diving with sharks and other things that eat you

Neil Jenkins — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 05:26:00 +0000

Apr 04

So I'm in New Zealand now and yes everything is very nice. I've wandered around Auckland, got refused entry to a casino for being underage (min. age 20) and have been out into the bush to do a morning's conservation work, retrieving wasp poison from little plastic containers on a transect line off the beaten track. I've already booked my flight to Christchurch for monday and then the real adventure starts. Before I left Fiji however, there was one other thing I did worth mentioning. You might have guessed what it involved from the title of this piece.

The shark dive on the Shark Reef Marine Reserve is apparently, according to many world class divers, the best in the world. It's even in the list of 1000 things to do before you die in the back of Oli's diary. This was an extra activity organised by Greenforce after the phase had officially finished, although of the 17 volunteers 11 of us did the two dives.

Let's clear something up straight away as this always seems to be everyone's first question: you were in a cage right? Ummm... no, actually. But don't worry, we were wearing full length wetsuits and gloves to ensure we don't look too much like morsals of food. So with that out of the way, let's get on to the dives themselves. We descended quickly to a depth of 30m, where a small stone wall had been built for us to kneel behind whilst no more than 2m in front of it, the dive master stood wearing chain mail gloves and holding on to a huge wheelie bin full of fish remains from a local processing factory. In front of me and above me (in fact all around) were over a hundred giant trevally, enormous vicious looking fish up to a meter and a half long and 75cm tall. Whenever a fish head was thrown up to them they would descend upon it like a pack of piranhas, ripping and tearing before a massive one simply swooped in and swallowed it whole. There were also some other large fish in with them, particularly red snappers and a fair few shark suckers. All these fish were no more than a meter or two away and often passed close enough to touch, should you not value your fingers that is.

It wasn't long before the sharks came. Three absolutely gigantic tawny nurse sharks arrived, each between two and a half and and three and a half meters long. Despite this, they weren't that scary as a rather toothless grin with two little tassles hanging below their mouth like a goatfish and they ate straight out of the wheelie bin, their head stuck inside. The bull sharks however were much more impressive, starting off slinking throuigh the shadows at the edge of the visibility; they look like real sharks.

After 17 minutes we ascended to another wall at 10m and watched a show of smaller sharks, white tips and grey reefs, along with some smaller fish. We ascended and had an hour-long surface interval before dropping back down to 15m and watching a stunning display of giant trevally and (apparently) 15 bull sharks (although I never counted more than 8 in my sight at one go). Up to two and a half meters long and fat as a barrel, they had little piggy eyes and a sloping mouth. The dive master was feeding them out of his hand; the sharks would approach from the left then he would swing the food around so the sharks turned to face towards us as they opened their cavernous mouths a meter away from where I sat and slammed them shut on the fish. Absolutely awsome. And to top it off, a giant moray eel was poking his head out of the wall just below me, apparently enjoying the show as well.

We were of course slightly disappointed that we didn't see a 6 meter long tiger shark that actually scares the bull sharks away, but you can't have everything ;-)

Past, present and future

Neil Jenkins — Tue, 28 Mar 2006 11:20:00 +0000

Mar 06

Three weeks since my last update and so much has happened. For a start, I'm now sitting in an air conditioned internet cafe in Suva typing this rather than scrawling it on a flimsy aerogram. So here are the highs and lows of the last few weeks outside of civilisation.

First of all of course is the diving. Two weeks of intensive surveying allowed us to gather all the data they needed. To survey, we went down in teams of 3; one person laid out the measuring tape along the 50 meter transect marked at either end by a metal bar implanted in the substrate then all three of us traversed the length of it twice. On the way out we recorded fish (to species level) under 10cm, between 10cm and 40cm and over 40cm respectively. On the way back two of us recorded the substrate under the tape at 50cm intervals while the other recorded any invertabrates within 1m either side of the tape. Then we had to wind in the tape and surface, all in under 45 minutes. It was tough and twice we had to come back to finish the substrate survey after running out of time, but we got them all done.

In other diving news, Adam and I continued our night diving, one of which was my 50th dive on the island; as is traditional for a 50th dive I was of course wearing fancy dress - Heidi very kindly lent me her pink bikini. And then of course there was also the naked night dive just because, well, when the water is a permanent 28 degrees, why not? And yes there are pictures and yes there are fins/dive torches placed in strategic locations.

In total I racked up 65 dives on the island; 4 of these were done on one awsome day (our second to last diving day) during which I saw 5 turtles, 4 of which were just on one dive (to give you an idea of how special this is I only saw two other turtles during all my other days of diving). On one of these dives I almost bumped in to the turtle; I was swimming along looking at a school of large snappers when I looked down and there not more than 20cm straight below me was an 80cm long hawksbill turtle. It didn't seemed concerned by me at all and just hovered there for about 30 seconds before swimming off at a leisurely pace, allowing me to follow closely behind for a while. Absolutely awesome.

During these last weeks I also got the opportunity to try some new activities. I went spear fishing twice with Tino, a man from the local village. The metal spear was about a meter long and fired from a gun powered by a very strong piece of elastic. Snorkling through the water and occasionally free diving down to around 5m, you had to try and creep up on the fish so you could get close enough to shoot accurately; it was pretty difficult as the fish moved so fast, especially when a metal rod was hurtling towards them through the water. I managed to catch a few lined bristletooth surgeon fish and a couple of parrot fish; very tasty. I also got to try a bit of bare back horseriding. Cantering up and down the beach was fun, if a little uncomfortable, and controlling the horse was slightly difficult at times - if it wants to go on to those rocks it's not going to let some inexperienced foreigner on top tell it not to!

With the last of the fresh fruit and veg going two weeks before the end of the expedition, everyone got a bit tired and run down in the last few weeks; I managed to drop my mask into the deep blue swimming back to the boat after a dive and while I could easily borrow someone else's for my remaining dives, none of them had my prescription fitted in them. I also managed to remove a nice line of skin from the palm of my left hand; I was hanging off the side of the boat holding on to a rope attached to the front trying to watch the dolphins swimming in the water just in front of me. When I let go, the carabina on the end caught on my hand and ripped off the top layer of skin, about an inch long and 3/4 cm wide. Happily, now I have returned to civilisation this is healing quickly.

For the last fundraiser at Navatu village however, I had a bit of difficulty as in a traditional kava ceremony one sits cross legged and claps loudly before and after receiving a bowl. My injured hand combined with a very unfortunate and painful rash on my rear side (which has thankfully almost healed as well) made both of these requirements extremely tricky (ibuprofen is my new god, I'd never have survived the evening without it!). I didn't have any problems playing volleyball with the villagers earlier though, although the torrential rain and sloping, muddy pitch with no boundries marked made playing an experience like no other (and yes I did slip over and get very dirty).

It felt like we'd only just arrived but, come last sunday, 9 weeks had passed since we first stepped upon Navatu island and it was time to leave. Emotional goodbyes were said on the beach and practically the whole village was in tears as we departed, not to mention a fair few of the volunteers and even the staff who will be back in two weeks time. Then after a few last lingering looks, we were taken across the channel to the mainland and loaded in to the back of a truck for an express trip back to civilisation which would see us go staight on to the overnight ferry from Savusavu to arrive in Suva early Monday morning.

So now it's time to look to the future and my plans have changed slightly from my original intentions. Oli and I will be going to New Zealand on thursday and there we will be parting, at least for a while. Oli has a new girlfriend (Mel) from our Greenforce expedition and he wants to join her on the month long trip she has planned , taking a Magic Bus tour around NZ, going from Auckland to Christchurch. After that he's got no idea what he's going to do. I'm going to be heading straight down to Christchurch with a cheap flight then heading further south so I can go walking in the stunning southern alps before winter makes then impassable with the gear I have. Then I'll be heading back up north, working my way back to Auckland over a period of about two to two and a half months. After that, I'll probably try and find a job in Auckland for a couple of months, but who knows? Plans are flexible and I'm still considering hopping over to Australia for a bit.

Last weeks at Nukubulavu

Neil Jenkins — Fri, 03 Mar 2006 11:11:00 +0000

Mar 06

All too soon, I seem to be nearing the end of my stay here at Nukubulavu. Our letters will be going out with the last ration run to Savusavu, which will supply us with enough food and fuel for the last three weeks on the island. These promise to be very intense as on Monday 6th March the proper surveys start: 30 transects we need to follow in teams of 3, recording fish species and size, invertebrates and substrate. The data will then be processed by both Greenforce and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) to assess whether the marine protection areas set up (preventing fishing in certain areas) are working to conserve biodiversity and a healthy ecosystem, as well as providing a breeding ground for fish, increasing the yield in areas where fishing is permitted.

The last few weeks have been quite eventful. A couple of Saturdays ago we finally got to play the Fijians at rugby. Touch rugby, that would be, as we value our lives. It seemed like the entire male population of Navatu joined us for a mammoth 2 hour game on the playing field of the district school, half hour's walk away on the mainland. I believe the final score was something like 65-60, probably to the Fijians, but as I got bored after 3/4 hour and wondered off to chat to people on the sidelines, I'm not quite sure; if only we had been playing something more interesting like football! Probably not a good idea to say that to the rugby-mad Fijians though.

Training is now complete. Having finished my EFR course, should I meet an injured person I'm now qualified to say, 'Hello my name is Neil. I'm an emergency first responder. May I help you?' I then may or may not be able to save their life. I've also had to learn the various types of coral and completed an exercise where I had to estimate the length of several pieces of plastic tubing strung on ropes beneath the water, meant to simulate fish size estimation.

The number of dogs on camp increased dramatically recently from 4 to 16, as Busty gave birth to 5 puppies in the corner of our bure (where they remained for a day before we moved them out due to the smell) and another dog - three legged Peggy - came down from the village to give birth to a further 6 puppies behind one of the staff bures. At the moment they all have their eyes shut and never stumble more than a few yards from their nest, but soon they'll be trotting around camp, tripping people up and annoying everyone by being overly inquisitive. But we'll love them and then they'll be taken to the village to be disposed of as we can't have any more dogs on camp.

Another fundraiser was held recently at the village of Nakorrou, which was an hour's truck ride in to the mainland (plus 2 and a half hours sitting on the shore waiting for the truck to arrive - Fiji time in full force). We were greeted by what seemed to be the entire village in their huge community hall for a great night of dancing, kava and, wait for it....cold beer!! This had been brought in an ice box from Savusavu, especially for us. We also managed to raise $321.20 to go to the local school.

Just about all of us have now been diving in Namera, a marine protection area a couple of miles across the sea which is supposedly one of the top ten dive sites in the world. On my visit there I saw several big fish of all varieties and swam next to a stunning coral wall but compared to the 2m Giant Manta Ray, turtles and bull sharks that have been seen on subsequent dives, this feels a bit lame.

On the way back from setting up a transect at Namera a couple of days ago, Wayne (a guy from WCS) and Heidi (our stunning assistant scientist) went fishing and surprised us all by arriving back and heaving a huge 1.5m great barracuda over the side of the boat. This went to the village to be eaten, but we kept the two 70cm yellow fin tuna that had also been caught (which by our reckoning would have fetched about £200 in the UK) and baked them in a fire. From being caught to on our plate in less than 5 hours - absolutely delicious.

On two consecutive nights this week, Adam and I decided to go on a night dive. We can go shore diving whenever we want - just grab a buddy, kit up and write your name on the dive board. However, the reef just in front of our camp is rather poor with sparse, mainly dead coral and little fish life. At night, however, it's a different matter. Just swimming out to one of the dives we saw a small blue spotted ribbon tail ray in the shallows and underwater we came across a black blotched porcupine fish just sleeping on a ledge, a 70cm blue spined unicorn fish asleep in the coral (I got so close I could have reached out and tweaked the scalpal-sharp spines at the base of his tail) and to top it all two iridescent cuttle fish - transluscent purple with electric blue spots, they were quite a sight to see swimming through the dark ocean.

Cakes, kava and cupids (not forgetting the fish!)

Neil Jenkins — Sun, 26 Feb 2006 14:22:00 +0000

Feb 06

So, to fill you in on news from the last few weeks....Well, first of all I passed my fish test first time, as did Oli. It's funny to think that we thought learning 3 or 4 seaweed was difficult on the A-Level biology field trip and now I've just learnt over 150 fish; the work doesn't stop there though as we've now had to start learning invertebrates - I've got my test tomorrow! We've also completed our dive training now - Oli is qualified to Advanced Open Water and I did all the advanced stuff again as well, although I just need to send off a form to upgrade my junior qualification. Now everyone is qualified, we've been able to go diving in some much better locations with drift currents to carry you along and coral teeming with everything from ornate butterfly fish to 1.5 m long grey reef sharks.

Two more Sundays have passed since I last wrote and on both occasions we've gone to Navatu (our local village) as the truck driver that was meant to take us to another village for one of them was ill. It's been really good though as each time you go you are hosted by the same family who give you tea and cake before church, then, after you've sat through another dull ceremony, provide a good lunch which invariably contains very fresh fish, noodles and cassava. On the first Sunday of every month, three villages in the Kumbutavu district join together to host a service and on the 5/2 it was Navatu's turn. As such, on this Sunday the village was bustling with extra people. After lunch I wandered round the village and was invited into a house that seemed to be a boys' retreat, the occupants at the time all being male and under 20. I ended up chatting to a lad of my age from the nearby village of Namalata, named Tulele who was studying computer science at college and wanted to come to Brighton to do his degree. Around 3pm I drifted over to the village hall where a big round of kava drinking was going on and stayed there drinking kava, chatting and singing with the local choir until 8pm!

On the following Friday, we went to the village of Namalata for a fund raiser, buying each other bowls of kava for 50 cents each to raise money to send a girl to school/college (I wasn't quite sure). The locals joined in and it was great fun, going on for several hours and raising a total of $374 - not bad. After we'd eaten dinner there we were meant to return to camp but the boat had been moored in the wrong place and was now grounded by low tide, so instead we had to try and make ourselves comfortable on the floor of a nearby house and return early the following morning.

On one night last week we had 'Cake Night'. The ladies of Navatu village came round in the evening with a fantastic selection and we stuffed our faces with sweet food. To contribute to this some people made doughnuts and Becky (one of the other volunteers) and I made flapjacks, which we baked by putting in a tin, then balancing this on a can inside a really large pan on a gas hob, The result was exceedingly good. After we'd had our fill, music was put on and the dancing commenced; the ladies taught us a Fijian dance and we showed them the Macarana!

On the 13th February, Marc (our expedition leader) arrived back with our brand new boat: Vola Siga (pronounced Vol-a Sing-a). During his week's absence, he'd gone all the way back to Suva, picked the boat up from there and driven it all the way back, a journey which took around 8 hours from Suva to Savusavu. The boat is 10 m long, white and has twin Yamaha 40 engines on the back to drive her. Specially fitted out for diving, a rack fitted down the centre line of the boat securely holds up to 10 tanks with BCDs attached and spaces underneath the bench provide storage for the rest of the gear. Marc also brought with him some brand new BCDs and Regulators as well as a special delivery of post.

With Valentine's day just past, last Saturday we themed our party on it and everyone had to come up with a love related costume. Hearts were conspicuous everywhere but the star prize has to go to Laura and Ciara who actually made wings out of chicken wire and an old sheet so they could dress up as cupids. For Valentine's day itself we had a 'secret santa' with Valentine's cards, each picking a random person to write one for. After dinner they were handed out and read aloud before the sender was revealed. The cards ranged from the hilarious (M's card to Marc using all sorts of locally themed similes to invite him into a gay relationship) to the obscene (perverse drawing involving pigs and A's breasts on her card) to the actual sweet and serious. My card from Mandy (our trainee staff member) fell in the first category with a sort of rhyming poem following similar lines to M's.

Navatu Island

Neil Jenkins — Thu, 02 Feb 2006 21:43:00 +0000

Feb 06

2nd February - I can't believe I've been away a month already! I'd better fill you in on what I've been up to since Suva. Fiji has two main islands: Viti Levu, upon which Suva is situated, and Vanua Levu, off which the island of Navatu and our camp is situated. The overnight ferry we took from Suva to Savusavu was aboard a slightly rusty boat that looked like it was built in Soviet Russia, complete with Russian signs to direct you around the ship and the odd boarded off broken staircase. Arriving in the early morning at Savusavu, the difference to the cosmopolitan, almost Western Suva was noticeable. A single road along the edge of the shore was lined with shops, many of which seemed to be out of an old Spaghetti Western, made of wood with a little verandah in front. We were only there a day but made good use of our time: in the morning we did some real last-minute (alcohol) shopping, then in the afternoon we all piled into the back of a truck (literally) and drove off to the middle of nowhere. Plunging into the bush at the side of the road on a small unmarked path, this widened out into a good path through dense rainforest and eventually reached a river running through the trees and our destination: a waterfall. We spent the next hour or so jumping off the top of it into the pool below and generally having fun in the water.

The next day (22 Jan) we set out early along a rough bumpy road in driving rain to finally reach our camp. A short boat ride was needed to take us across the 100m channel that qualifies Navatu as an island and we went straight to the village (also named Navatu) to be officially greeted by the spokesman for the village in a sevusevu ceremony - just some short speeches while we sat cross-legged on the floor. And then, finally, we got back on the boats for a quick trip from the east to the south of the island where our camp, Nakubalovu, lies nestled in palm trees. The narrowest strip of sand separates the sea from our camp, which during spring tides is covered completely. An open-sided thatched shelter serves as the communal eating/living area next to the wooden kitchen, which looks like an old fashioned corner shop with shelves lined with tinned food covering the walls (at least after our fortnightly restock). Two gas hobs and an open fire allow for a surprisingly wide range of food to be cooked, especially given the limited ingredients available, The dishes I've cooked have gone down particularly well - my meatballs and fried potatoes with tomato sauce was widely acclaimed (it's amazing what you can do with corned beef!) and my spicy chicken risotto had people scraping the bottom of the pan for more.

The large communal bure is nearby, inside of which all 18 of us volunteers squash in to form a web of mosquito nets. Sandy paths lined with coconut shells connect all the buildings and lead up the hill behind us to the showers (which I helped rebuild on our first day here - they are simply bamboo covered pits with walls woven from the leaves of a coconut palm tree; to shower a bucket is filled from the tap below, carried off and tipped on your head) and toilets (similarly open air and requiring squatting). On the other side of the kitchen, the dive shack houses all our dive gear, the compressor and the generator, and beyond this the five staff bures house our expedition leader (Marc), our chief scientist (Chris - a cool Belgian; who'd have thought it?), our assistant scientist (Heidi - also our chief village liaison officer; she knows the several hundred inhabitants so well she could probably draw their family tree), our dive instructor (Elina - she's Greek) and the trainee (Mondy, short for Andrew - he was a volunteer on the previous phase, a bit crazy but good fun).

I had originally planned to do all my dive training again from scratch but Elina put me in the refresher group for those that were already qualified. After a quick revision of theory and a refresher dive where we practised our basic skills, I felt I was OK and could remember what to do. Since then, I've been on a further 8 dives (we dive every day except Sunday) and I feel fully confident. I have decided to do the advanced training again, mainly because you get to do some fun dives like deep and night dives. Of the 10 weeks with Greenforce, only 3-4 weeks are spent on doing the actual surveys. This is because, due to the need for accuracy, we first have to learn over 200 fishes as well as corals and invertebrates and need to be able to accurately estimate the size of the fish we see. I've begun learning some of the fish and can identify most Angelfish and Butterfly fish but there's still a long way to go!

On Sundays we all don our smart(ish) clothes - sulu, shirt and tie for the boys; bright colourful misshapen Bula dress for the girls and go over to our local village (or on alternate Sundays another village in the local area) for church and lunch. My adopted family in Navatu is Laponi and his wife Mere - two very friendly people who live in a simple one-room house with a nice woven-reed floor for sitting and socialising on. Church was slightly weird as much of it was conducted in Fijian and we had to sit (uncomfortably) on the floor for longish periods. The singing was good though - unaccompanied and in close harmony. I joined in as best I could from my Fijian hymn book, despite the strange notation and foreign language.

Being the rainy season and given that we're in the wettest part of Fiji, we've seen a fair bit of rain. The last few days however have been quite fine and hopefully this will continue, as it makes camp life much more pleasant!

The Yasawas

Neil Jenkins — Thu, 19 Jan 2006 04:22:00 +0000

Jan 06

I don't have much time to write a lot here as I've now joined up with the Greenforce expedition and we're on our way out to a remote island off Vanua Levu, the second biggest island in Fiji. Last week, Oli and I went out to the Yasawas, a set of beautiful islands off to the north west of Nadi. Travelling in a bright yellow (and unfortunately expensive) catermeran, we cruised past many beautiful islands to our first destination - Adi's Place - a friendly little hostel on the Waya island. While we only stayed here two nights, we enjoyed a trip to a waterfall (very refreshing), some good snorkling on the corel reef just off the bay and we partook in a kava ceremony both nights (at first you think it's just like muddy water but the taste grows on you).

The company was excellent - we made good friends with a German student called Michael, two Norwegian sisters and an Alaskan. This allowed for some very interesting after dinner conversations, particularly when a couple of Swedes arrived and started arguing with us over the state of the English football team!

Our second island was Nanyua Lailai, right at the top of the Yasawas group. Seaspray, the place we stayed at, was very basic - there wasn't even any running water. We didn't really do a lot here - mainly reading (I finished an 800 page book and a 400 page book within 3 days) and a bit of swimming. We walked over the island to the 'famous' Blue Lagoon but this proved to be disappointing - the coral reef was in a terrible condition. The food was good and our hosts very friendly but the highlight of this island was probably the little teashop just down the beach, where you could get a slice of chocolate cake and a mug of tea for only $3.

The journey back to Nadi was over 4 hours long and I came down a bit sick on the way back; not due to the boat but probably due to minor food poisoning or something, as two of the other people staying at Seaspray had come down with the same thing the night before. I wasn't actually sick but felt ill and went to bed early, thus it wasn't til the following morning that I met up with all the Greenforce people that had arrived in our absence.

Over the last few days we've got to know each other well and Oli and I have both made good friends with a lot of the people here. The staff are also very cool - all in their mid twenties and good fun. We're currenltly in Suva, the capital of Fiji, and tomorrow we go to take an overnight ferry up to SavuSavu on Vanua Levu. I've just bought a couple of Sulus (skirts basically - it's the traditional dress we need for our village trips) as well as an extremely loud shirt, but unfortunately I won't be able to post any more pictures til I get somewhere with a fast connection and plenty of time - probably around the end of March.

While I'm living on a remote island updating this blog will be tricky, although I will try to post some updates. For those of you with RSS readers, the site feed is http://www.nmjenkins.com/atom.xml - you can subscribe to this to be notified of updates.

Namuka Bay Lagoon

Neil Jenkins — Mon, 09 Jan 2006 16:13:00 +0000

Jan 06

Well, it has been several days since I last posted an update and a lot has happened since. For a start, I am now 19. We left Nadi on my birthday and took the bus along the coast through rolling hills and fields of sugar cane to the small town/village of Cuvu (pronounced Doovoo). From there, a taxi took us over several kilometers of rough, unmettled track to reach Namuka Bay Lagoon.

Upon arrival, the first word to grace the lips of both Oli and myself was, "Wow!" We were greeted in the largest of the four traditional, thatched wooden bures by Theresa our host/cook/guide. As we were currently the only guests at the resort, we were upgraded to our own small bure (we had booked our beds in the dorm), complete with ensuite facilities. Inside this, a double bed (which Oli immediately baggsied) and a single bed took up most of the space. The walls appeared to have been made by weaving supple branches together and the floor was covered by wicker mats and a carpet between the beds.

Outside, the sea lay 50m away down a grassy slope. A couple of hundred metres out to sea a constant wall of white borderd a darker blue beyond as the coral sheltering the lagoon dropped away to form a deep ocean beyond. Three hammocks lay strung between tall, wind-swept palm trees, one so battered it lay at almost 45 degrees to the ground. Two thatched shelters covered tables and benches upon which meals were served; the open sides of these allowed stunning views of the ocean, which stretched the full width of the horizon with not a spot of land in sight. A seemingly permanent breeze ensured the temperature was always pleasant and the crashing waves out at sea provided a constant background noise.

Over the first three days,in addition to lazing around reading in the hammocks, we managed to fit in the following activities:

A nocturnal stroll through some nearby woods in hunt of crabs for tomorrow's dinner (while we saw their burrows and even spotted a few with their legs poking out we unfortunately didn't manage to catch any).
Stargazing (no city lights to encumber the view)
A visit to some ancestral caves, at the back of which a small hole hid the entrance to an astounding tunnel that passes under the sea for many miles, emerging on a distant island. Unfortunately, the journey takes three days and three nights in the pitch black and, although we had our head torches, we didn't have the provisions to attempt the journey. Shame.
Snorkling over the coral reef - it wasn't in great condition but I still managed to spot several angel fish and small zebra-striped fish, as well as the odd sea cucumber and brightly coloured blue starfish.
A walk through the local countryside to see some bats and also to sample freshly cut sugar cane and a coconut. This was poked down from the tree with a long stick then skillfully cut open with a machete by our guide, Nasim. After drinking the sweet milk from the centre, he split it open and scooped out the flesh for us to eat on the way back.

Although we were due to return to Nadi on Friday, we were easily convinced to stay another two days, especially given the wonderful food - all freshly prepared and in traditional Fijian, Cantonese and Indian style. The Indian curries with the flat,pan fried 'Roti' (a sort of bread) were a particular favourite, as was the Fijian dish of fish and vegtables served in a meaty white sauce with kasava (a dry, local root vegtable). As we needed to withdraw cash to pay for this, a day trip to the local town of Sigatoka was in order. As we were looking to save money, we walked the 50 minute route along a seldom used railroad to Cuvu and from there we caught the bus to Sigatoka for a dollar each. After replenishing our stocks of cash and purchasing two new books to read, we returned to Cuvu and walked back to Namuka Bay; by this time the sun was high overhead and the rain clouds that had threatened us earlier had moved inland - in hindsight I think the long-sleeved thermal base layer I wore that day was the wrong choice.

Today we returned to Nadi where we can do some much needed washing and recooperate from our 6 day period of, um, relaxation. We have already booked our next trip and on Wednesday we leave for the Yasawas, where we will spend 5 nights: 2 on one island and 3 on another, before returning to Nadi to meet up with the rest of our Greenforce group.

Two go off on a whirlwind adventure

Neil Jenkins — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 09:14:00 +0000

Jan 06

We're off! Our departure form Heathrow was largely uneventful, with the exception of Oli attempting to take knife, fork, spoon and a small pair of scissors on to the plane with him. Being clearly terrorist items likely to cause death and destruction they were duely confiscated.

The first flight to L.A. was aboard a jumbo jet. We were seated at the front of the plane so were more or less first in line when the champagne (OK, sparkling wine) came round to celebrate the new year (British time). Quantities were disappointingly small, not helped by the fact that the steward managed to pour it not only into my glass but also on to my trousers. Given that it was not just the New Year but Oli's birthday as well, I collared the next passing flight attendant and requested more chanpagne. Unfortunately stocks of this had been depleted, so instead Oli sampled the delights of two New Zealand beers whilst I enjoyed my first Gin O'Clock of the year.

Arriving in L.A. we were fingerprinted and photographed like the terrorists we are before briefly exiting the terminal and breathing in a few breaths of night-time L.A. air. Then it was back on to a slightly smaller but wonderfully empty plane for a further eleven and a half hours in the air. As soon as the seat belt sign was switched off I nabbed a row of 3 seats across the centre of the plance and, armed with pillows and blankets, slept through most of the flight, although I awoke in time to enjoy the sparkling wine handed round for our second new year (American time).

On arrival in Fiji we were greeted by two loudly dressed Fijians playing two equally loud guitars and singing whay I can only presume were traditional Fijian songs. They were actually quite good and were a welcome, if some what bizarre, serenade as we waited to clear customer and immigration at 2am in the morning. Although our plane ticket out is dated the 30th of March, the visas we were issued are valid for only one month, but this should be easily extended once we meet up with the Greenforce people in a couple of weeks.

After a few hours kip at the Nadi Bay Hotel, we dicided to go and see what tNadi has to offer. By chance we met up with two lads who had been on our flight and we took the traditional Fijian bus (open sides, very old) for a bargain 50c (that's about 17p). Nadi itself is rather boring, consisting of only one main street of shops and some housing at the side. Walking along the road we were accosted by a very friendly Fijian who invited us in to his shop. Oli and George (one of our newfound friends) joined him for a traditional Kava ceremony whilst Ed (our other newfound friend) and I politely declined. Somewhat predictably, our visit there ended with the guy trying to force Oli and George to buy a lucky charm - asharks tooth necklace. George bought it, Oli managed to extricate himself from the situation.

Given the lack of 'things to do' in Nadi (both sides of the main road having been duely tramped) we returned to the hotel for lunch and spent the aftenoon lazing around and planning where to visit in the two weeks we have prior to our Greenforce expedition. A few nights by the Namuka Bay Lagoon followed by a cruise to the Yasawa Islands sounds tempting to me...

About the making of this site

Neil Jenkins — Sat, 18 Jun 2005 21:06:00 +0000

Jun 05

OK, I thought I'd write a little bit about how I conceived, designed and produced this site. First of all, why did I do it? Well I wanted a presence on the web, somewhere I could display my pictures for those who were interested and also host a blog, the main purpose of which would be to keep everyone updated as to what I was up to when I go travelling next year and allow people to leave comments etc. It also provides an opportunity to show off my skills as a web designer should I wish to try and gain some commissions to raise some money.

So I had been pondering this idea for some time when study leave came round, and naturally the first thing you do when you should be revising is to find anything else to do instead. I did a bit of investigation and found a domain I liked - www.nmjenkins.com (for those who may not know, it stands for Neil Matthew Jenkins) - www.neiljenkins.com and www.jenkins.com already being taken. I really wanted a dot com address as firstly it's international, so should I move to Australia/New Zealand/Outer Mongolia it will still be just as appropriate, and more importantly, dot com being the most common domain suffix, I thought people would be more likely to remember it. I would have settles for dot co dot uk but these domains had already been taken as well.

Having found a suitable domain, I set about the hard bit - actually creating the web site. I started by deciding on a fixed width rather than a variable width (i.e. the page doesn't get wider if you make your browser wider), as this gave me more control over the dimensions of the site (its 760px wide so it should fit on the screen without horizontal scrolling even on really rubbish monitors running at 800 x 600). Then it was 'simply' a matter of firing up the old text editor (skEdit - the best web-site creation tool ever; reason enough to buy an Apple Mac) and making it so. Each page was coded by hand in XHTML (so it should be accessible even to people running something like Lynx which doesn't support CSS styles) and the same goes for the CSS file that styles it all. Given that the content is completely separate from the styling, I can (and almost certainly will) completely redesign the site in the future by just changing a few files.

The section I'm most proud of is the photos section. The 'squares' affect for the images on the page listing all the galleries (and the home page) was inspired by the similar effect at dive into mark, which I thought would look a bit different and cool. Each square is a link to the gallery and 'zooms' when you move your mouse over it. The actual galleries themselves are a bit special too. The photos are presented as slides (not a particularly original effect, but effective). However, unlike most (any?) other photo galleries on the web, you can view the thumbnails in two different sizes. And clicking on a photo presents it as large as can fit on your monitor and only requires loading of the image - not a whole new page. And there's a slideshow with fades in between that pre-loads the next image while your looking at the current one so if you're on a reasonably fast connection to the internet you should get one smooth slideshow. This is all powered by some cool javascript, originally written by Rob Mueller (Joint founder/CEO/Owner of the excellent email service FastMail.FM) and finished by me.

A special mention goes to the horrendous difficulties involved in getting MS Internet Explorer (IE) to display anything resembling the way it should. This web-site was designed with web standards (for those who don't know there's a group called the world wide web consortium who define how a browser should display the HTML/CSS code that is used to make web pages). This worked fantastically - I know the standards in quite a bit of detail so I knew exactly how the code I was writing should be displayed. Every so often I would fire up the web browsers on my Mac (Safari, Firefox, Opera, Omniweb, Camino...) and check that everything was displaying as it should. Great. So I finish and move over to the MS Windows box in my house to check it works in IE. Not a hope - Internet Explorer's was last updated in 2001 and it's support for web standards (especially CSS) ranges from buggy to non-existent. Now my layout isn't too complicated, but to get it working as well as I could in IE I spent about 8 hours and I was up til 2am in the morning. And there are still problems (for instance IE's inexplicable rendering of the 'slides' on the photo gallery - every so often it seems to decide it can't fit more than one or two on a line. Bizarrely, it works correctly with the large thumbnail size). There are whole sites documenting the inconsistencies in IE's rendering engine. There are all sorts of cool web-sites that could be created in all the latest browsers if it wasn't for trying to support IE. To close this post I urge you, if you are still using Internet Explorer, to switch to a better browser. I recommend Mozilla Firefox. It's free, more secure than IE (you're less likely to get spyware infecting your computer), it has features you'll wonder how you ever lived without once you begin to use them and this web-site (amongst others) will look better :-). Other good alternatives include Opera, Safari (Mac only) and Camino (Mac only).

By the way, if there's a question you want answered, you want me to blog about something or you simply have something you want to get off your chest, please make use of the comments section below.

In the beginning

Neil Jenkins — Wed, 15 Jun 2005 10:39:00 +0000

Jun 05

This is just a test post, really to check I've got everything set up right; I'll be posting some proper content soon. In the mean time, hello world! Neil Jenkins has a blog. If you've just arrived, be sure to check out the cool photos section.

Until next time...