![\"Smile](\"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/12\/wlEmoticon-smilewithtongueout.png\")
.\u00a0 Thank you South Island, action packed adventures in beautiful and dramatic landscapes.<\/p>\nWe\u2019re getting up at half five?\u00a0 On boxing day?\u00a0 OK then.\u00a0 And this is how it has generally been on Stage 6.\u00a0 Who needs sleep? We can do that later.\u00a0 The journey today is a biggy: Kaiteriteri to Picton and then on to the Tongairio National Park (for Lord of the Rings geeks \u2013 Jamie \u2013 that is where Mount Doom is). We\u2019re looking at a travelling time of about 14hrs.\u00a0 Good job we didn\u2019t celebrate Christmas too hard .\u00a0 Thank you South Island, action packed adventures in beautiful and dramatic landscapes.<\/p>\n
Kate and I only have three days left?\u00a0 How quick was that. Feeling a bit melancholic as I write this, and thinking about the highlights my thoughts return to the good times with the Stage 6 crew.\u00a0 I think we have worked really well as a team with a lot of laughs and banter.\u00a0 Good natured banter, with the exception of an outrageous wide call by Steve during beach cricket on Christmas day.\u00a0 Thankfully we lost the ball, which saved me ruining the day with my petulance. <\/p>\n
Stage 6 has given me a couple of new friends too in the form of Jamie and Kate Abela and if you can look past their filthy tongues and sarcasm they have been a real treat ha ha ha!\u00a0 Seriously, Jamie and Kate have been top tour guides and thanks to them we have packed so much into this stage.\u00a0 Today was no exception, although we had a mammoth trek up to the National Park, the route was epic and after a bit of scratching around for a camping spot we ended up in a ski lodge with one of the vista\u2019s of the trip, just as the cloud clears and we entered the golden hour \u2013 check out the photos.\u00a0 We are dog tired and after a smidge of Risk and some pasta we hit the hay – night night.<\/p>\n
As this is my last blog (not such a shame for you readers), I wanted to big up New Zealanders and your awesome country.\u00a0 Also, the generosity over here has been second to none.\u00a0 Thank you New Zealand.\u00a0 I also want to wish the rest of the crew good luck!\u00a0 Especially good luck to Amy and Steve who set sail on the 10th January for over FOUR weeks \u2013 they are going to be bored so get on the sat phone people.<\/p>\n
Happy New Year!!<\/p>\n
Chris<\/p>\n
Culinary highlight:\u00a0 Mince cheese pies. ABSOLUTE FILTH.<\/p>\n
Cultural highlight:\u00a0 Does playing Risk count?\u00a0 Sorry.<\/p>\n
Musical highlight:\u00a0 Brothers in Arms heading to Picton.<\/p>\n
Activity highlight:\u00a0 Jumping off or out of stuff.\u00a0 Mummy.<\/p>\n
[flickr album=72157625579822253 num=30 size=Square]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We\u2019re getting up at half five?\u00a0 On boxing day?\u00a0 OK then.\u00a0 And this is how it has generally been on Stage 6.\u00a0 Who needs sleep? We can do that later.\u00a0 The journey today is a biggy: Kaiteriteri to Picton and then on to the Tongairio National Park (for Lord of the Rings geeks \u2013 Jamie […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4542","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-expedition-updates","category-stage-5-new-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4542"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4542\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5940,"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4542\/revisions\/5940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.followthatfireengine.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}