Pictures

160 new pictures being uploaded right now from Queenstown activities etc. Should be on flickr soon.

Balance

Today I was able to balance the single without the oars on the water for the majority of my row.  I now can pause and balance the boat as it runs out smoothly; its an amazing feeling.  It was especially awesome today on the glassy crystal clear water.  I can tell that I have a much stronger feel of the boat and what effect my every motion has on it.

As far as erging goes, out training has picked up.  We are doing more hard fast workouts now and not as many endurance pieces.  I PR'd 3 times in the past three days on my 1500 time during two different workouts, granted, my previous time wasnt very good, and it was from mid season last spring.  Oe workout was a 2x1500 all out with a 10 min rest, no sprint.  5:00.5, 4:59.5.  The other was 1500-10 min rest-1000-8 min rest-500.  4:57 on that one, also with no sprint allowed.

Queenstown

The Queenstown trip was absolutely amazing.  We drove through the mountains for four hours and came out at lake Hayes just outside Queenstown, rigged boats, then went bungy jumping off a 130 foot bridge.  While we were there we also went on a 9 mile hike up into the mountains on the Ben Lomond trail, saw Doubtful sound in Fiordland, and were taken by helicopter into the backcountry to hike around for an afternoon.  We did all this plus training every day; either running around lake hayes or going for a  row in a single or both.   The heli-hike was up into the "Remarkables" range.  Being in and around Queenstown was really weird because it seemed like we were on a ski trip out west in te US, even though its mid July.  It was much colder than Dunedin and we were in snow most of the time we were there. In the Fiords we even came to a frozen part that the boat had trouble getting through.  Coming back to mid forties in Dunedin was nice after below freezing temperatures for five days.

Queenstown

Big post to come when we return to Dunedin. Limited Internet for now. Expect videos and pictures.

More photos from the trip south on flicker site above.

Secret Trip

Our secret trip consisting of two days and a night was to Invercargill.  Its a town about 2 and a half hours southeast of Dunedin, pretty much on the bottom of New Zealand.  On the drive over we stopped at an amazing peninsula and a waterfall in the coldest tropical forest I have ever been to.  Pictures are posted. We then drove to Invercargill where we went directly to the boathouse and had an beautiful row as the sun set on a part of the New River Estuary in an eight with three kiwi rowers.  Being on a flat river was a great change from some of the rough water in Dunedin, even though when we came to out turnaround about 8k from the boathouse it was announced that we would be doing a timed piece back.  This morning we rowed again in the below freezing temperatures then had a short erg workout.  Before we left we went into the city and saw the original motorcycle from The Worlds Fastest Indian, then went to the beach where some scenes of the movie took place.  A really cool trip overall.