Brittany and I splurged on everyone's widely acclaimed 'favorite guided activity' in all of New Zealand. Dion charged us down the Dart River in an 880 horsepower jetboat gliding over water as shallow as 4 inches and at speeds up to 60 mph. Jetboats were invented in New Zealand and are unique in that they don't have propellers or rudders or anything for that matter to confine the hull to deep water. We cruised about 50 kilometers up river in a valley used for much of Lord of the Rings befor
e heading slightly back downriver. The group pumped up inflatable kayaks (brought up-river on another jet boat) and we made our way back down, stopping in a few carved-out side areas. My real splurge was actually the day before. I left Brittany for the morning to take my first helicopter ride. The helicopter had a bike racks mounted on the sides, BRILLIANT!!
My 6 person group w
as lifted 1900 meters into the Remarkables mountain range just north of Queenstown. We applied body armour, made final adjustments on our full-suspension 8" travel downhill mountain bikes, and took to the exposed and windy ridge-trail. For those unfamiliar, these mountain bikes look more like motocross bikes with front shocks that extend from the front axel all the way up to the handle-bars. If you know my affinity for mountain-biking then you realize this was cloud 9 for me. 
2 comments:
Wow! I've heard of heliskiing, but this is the first time I've heard of helicopter mountainbiking! Awesome! I bet that was cloud nine!
Pretty cool!
Dude! That's awesome Joe. Im very jealous, sounds like something i need to try. Im getting better at the mountain biking excursions. Hope the rest of your journey treats you well brother. Safe travels.
- Jay
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