10 - years - on

I normally spend about 2 hours writing a blog entry. I started and completed this one already, but due to a combination of the back button on my laptop and my stupid fingers, I deleted the entire thing. If you don't believe me take a look at the posts, the one before this is just the word blog - that's it, that's what's left of my two hours work. I am starting again and trying to recreate the beautiful and joyous script from the rear of my brain noggin. Enjoy,

February 22nd. 

A lot happened 10 years ago today on Feb 22nd 2011. 

In a re-scheduled game, Blackpool FC - 'The Seasiders'  - beat Tottenham Hotspur 3-1 in a soccer match (Football to real people) at Bloomfield  Road. 

On that very day, the weather in Winnipeg was a balmy -7 degrees celsius.

If you were in the UK on 22nd Feb 2011 and got up early, you would have been able to tune into Cbeebies at 6.50 am to see the finest Pingu episode ever - 'A windy day'. An absolute classic weird penguin based cartoon series. If you ain't ever seen it, then here's a link to the episode that missed 10 years ago when you stayed in bed past 7am...

I myself spent the previous few days of February 2011 sleeping in a tent on a clifftop,  taking photos of friends in front of rainbows, finding icebergs in remote lakes and drinking large amounts of booze in front of late-night bonfires,  whilst on a certain bus tour of New Zealand.

That morning of the 22nd day of February, in the year some call twenty eleven,  my friends and I started by climbing and then running down Baldwin street. That's a weird thing to do you are probably thinking? 

Well, it would be weird, if it weren't just the steepest street in the whole goddam world!

We were then on an ever-increasing slope to drunkenness as we reached the Speights brewery around lunchtime and spent the next few hours of that very day enjoying a lovely boozy brewery tour. 

All of this took place just outside and inside of the City of Dunedin, which is in New Zealand, and just 300 kilometres away from Christchurch where the very same day a 6.3 magnitude earthquake occurred, demolishing the city and taking away the lives of nearly 200 people. 

We were lucky in the fact that we had been right there in the city centre of Christchurch just a couple of days earlier. We had left some friends there to travel onwards and were happy to hear that they were ok later on.

A lot of things changed for some people in New Zealand that day. I have every sympathy for anyone there and anyone involved in the earthquake, but the day the earthed moved,  two weird people met for the first time ever. 

Fate, luck, destiny, the beginning of a long journey that began in the midst of two other journies, one longer than the other. 

A story foretold in ancient scripts, that a young-looking old man, would meet an old acting young woman. 

They would fall in love and she would write a song that would be sung and remembered for millennia as 'Roll, Roll, Roll, flying kiwi' about those few first days and weeks.

Yes, Feb 22nd 2011 has different memories for myself and Buffy. 

10

                    years 

                                        ago

                                                            today

You see the bus on which I was travelling, expertly driven by Vinnie the driver, was parked in Dunedin at the train station, whilst I and the rest of the pissheads were enjoying our tour of the brewery. 

We greatly enjoyed the free beers and even more so with the fact we were allowed free reign to pour ourselves pretty much as many beers as we liked! 

We were a little pished and ever so slightly wobbly on our return to the bus on which we planned to sleep and recover and as such didn't really take notice of the guitar-wielding, crazy speaking Canadian backpacker that clambered aboard our transportation as we crept on our knees towards what we hoped would sleep-filled seats of warmth and silence.

The guitar wielding Canadian was known at the time as Ms Buffy. J Cowtan.

Rainbows about 20 Feb 2010

The steepest street - Feb 22nd 2010

Iceberg dead ahead

Pulling our pints on the Speights brewery tour

Vinnie the bus driver who parked....

..at Dunedin bus station

Buffy climbed aboard the bus and immediately set about making friends with the girls - who weren't as drunk as the male members of the troop. 

Questions such as 'What was your worst first date' eminated from two rows in front of me and I was not a happy bunny rabbit! I just wanted sleep and hear nothing but the sounds of rubber tyres rolling over the warm grey tarmac. So I ignored this obvious rude intrusion to my afternoon of recovery. 

It's funny looking back now but Buffy doesn't even get a mention in that day's blog update - no surprise as the brewery trip and earthquake take centre stage...Here's the actual post from that day

http://rickssummer.blogspot.com/2011/02/trees-boulders-storms-and-earthquake.html

I'll be honest  - In my slightly inebriated state I HAD noticed Buffy, when she got on the bus I DID like what I saw. She is my type of girl - she knows what I mean. But as this was a bus tour and we would be travelling together for at least a few days I thought I would get a chance to chat with her later, and I was correct as per usual. 

Just a day or two after Dunedin, we were all given the chance to walk the Routeburn trek - a 2 -3 day walk through and over the most stunning New Zealand mountain range.

 Everyone had their own itinerary and due to lack of beds along the route everyone had to stay in different locations overnight. 

I was walking with a mate - Rich, and after an early start on the 2nd day of walking we had caught up with Buffy who was walking with her new friend Lindsay 

At one point around lunchtime, there was an extra side track that led to a peak with wonderful views. Its called Conical Peak, so me, Lindsay and Buffy climbed it, while Rich took a rest. 

At the top, we took some jump photos and then walked the rest of the day as a group enjoying the wildlife, the fresh air and the company. It was a great great day.  Here are a few pics.

Me on the Routeburn

Buffs first jump shot on Conical peak

We never quite got the timing right

cool

The infamous bridge photo

sweet

The infamous bridge shot was great as we had been walking for about 4-5 hours together by that time and been chatting all the way. When we weren't talking I had often dropped back a little to take photos and also so I could look at Buffy's arse, 

It was nice. 

So I was happy that she joined in on the bridge photo with me.

It isn't the first photo I had of Buffy though, That was late on day 1 after the brewery trip, when we found ourselves drinking again and I took a photo of the group in the pub and she was in the corner. I want taking a photo of her, she just happened to be in it!

First photo I took with Buff in it. She's on the right in front of the window.

The first photo we both appeared in together was actually taken at the beginning of the Routeburn. 

We didn't really know each other then, but it's a cool photo that brings back great memories. Notice everyone is dressed in big jackets or sweaters, apart from me in a t-shirt- i knew we would get warm fairly quick on the trek.

First photo we are both in - at the start or Routeburn

Buffy started to appear in my blog a few days after we first met....the first bit about her is highlighted to make it easy to find....

http://rickssummer.blogspot.com/2011/02/stunning-few-days-in-wilderness.html

If you want to read more about our first few days and weeks together, then there's a way to look through them all.

 Near the bottom of each blog page is a map.

 Just above a map is a pull-down box where you can select entries. 

Scroll the box to the first entry and then back up to the first February entries - these are from 2011. Go to May and June and the rest of summer and you cal also read about our trip across Australia and then Malaysia, Thailand and South East Asia.

Feel free to take a peek at whatever you find there - Its all true, its all documented (within reason)and I absolutely love that I can now look back on the beginning of the best thing that ever happened to me and that I can share it all with you - and Buff of course.

On the fateful, Flying Kiwi bus trip, we got close fairly quickly and became good friends. We were both leaders and adventurers on the bus - helping with tents, organising dinners and helping people get drunk and worked really well together. 

Our relationship started so great and developed over time in to the partnership we have today - even though we still reminisce often about New Zealand, 

If you ever want to know your partner well - go travelling together, Its awesome and I rue every day that we aren't waking up in a hostel, a tent or by some remote beach. One day we will leave all this snow behind and we WILL go around the world together

I know we would love to take the kids to New Zealand too and maybe walk the Routeburn trek with them, take them up the peak and do some jump shots, then they can recreate the bridge photo with us, that would be amazing. 

There's no way we could ever recreate the 3 weeks we travelled in Flying Kiwi though. It was an amazing time with some great people - like I mentioned earlier, it was so good there was even a song written about it (By Buffy of course and some of the bus mates) Here it is if you are at all interested - it brings tears of happiness to my old tired eyes.

That's today's entry  - 10 years on. 

I don't know what the next 10 minutes will bring, never mind 10 years, but whatever happens, providing it's clean and not that illegal - Ill tell you all about it on here!

I love you, Buffy you knobhead.

xxxxx