2022-12-23 — 41 ish

How the day started on the 23rd (New Zealand 24th) is a little vague for me.

Wait… it’s coming back. We woke up late to other cars joining us in the parking trailhead dirt parking lot/pull off.

We had been out of reception all night, so we first went back to the Devil’s Punch bowl waterfall trailhead parking lot, did our online stuff. From there, we went on a hike past Twin Creek Falls up to a “ski resort” that looked like it was from the 20s, with one “lift.”

Had fun chatting with Lior, a nice young guy from Israel, hiking up with him part way and then down the whole way.

We ate lunch back at the car (i think?). From there, we went to Devil’s Punchbowl Falls, which reminded us quite a bit of Shine Falls. It had very much the same look to it, super beautiful. Just happened to be a lot more… public. Super beautiful, though.

As usual, I took my customary dip in the frigid snowmelt pool that the falls came crashing down into. It was crazy cold (of course 🙃), but it was also ridiculously refreshing 😁. I grabbed my biodegradable soap and took a quick cold shower. Felt so good. 😁

The wind was blowing really strongly, though–really strongly, so that made it even colder with the probably… maybe 30+ mph wind blowing super cold heavy mist (basically rain) all over.

Still, it was lovely, all the way around. 🙂

I think we ate again after coming down. It was my birthday using the New Zealand calendar that day (so now I’m 41ish), searches wanted to take me to a cave that he’d found that was fairly nearby, but first I wanted to go to a nearly unknown waterfall that most people have no clue is even there.

So we drove over to where the starting place was, parking the car, and then walking a little ways toward the river in order to get a view of where the waterfall was and where we were going to be heading. Once I saw the waterfall, we knew where to go, so we went ahead and started up.

This little adventure was exactly the kind of adventure that I love. There was no trail. You just followed the creek up. 😊

I love those trails.

Up, up, up we went. It was a bit of a scramble in places, climbing rocks that were both big and small, scrambling up big boulders that were on top of other big boulders, and criss crossing the creek again and again and again. There were lots of little mini waterfalls, even up to maybe a or 10 feet tall as we continue up, up, up.

Chase had his regular hiking shoes on, so we tried to do everything that we could to stay dry, and we were completely successful the entire way up.

It was certainly a challenge in many places, as you’re hopping from rock to rock, sometimes with very large gaps and possibly slippery rocks between.

It would have been a lot easier (and safer) to have just walked through the creek, as it was never dangerously deep. But we hopped along (Chase to keep his shoes dry, and I to try and find routes that would let Chase keep his feet dry.

Creek hiking is easily my favorite way to hike. I just love love love it! 😊

The falls at the top was beautiful, just like so many others, and we absolutely love the trip. We easily liked it much better than the much more popular Devil’s Punchbowl Falls, both because it was beautiful, because they hike to it was much more fun, and also because it was secluded. Not a soul around, even in the busiest tourist time of year that we’re now in the middle of.

Absolutely loved it. 😍

On the way back down, we spent a bit more time scouting out the ways up and down, trying to gauge whether our friends who would be passing through this area after us might be able to make the hike safely.

I scouted out several routes on some of the more challenging areas to see if i felt like we could recommend it as a hike.

With water shoes, I think it’s totally doable and pretty safe. Some challenging areas, but i don’t think dangerous areas. Of course, there’s always risk of hurting something on hikes when you’re walking over rocks. I’ve been creek hiking my whole life pretty much, and even my regular hiking has most often been without trails, bushwacking, so these hikes are second nature to me.

So I took my time going back down trying to gauge what someone who hasn’t done this stuff their whole life might experience.

Anyway, when we got down, i passed the info along to our friends who’d be by on the coming weeks/months.

Loved that hike. 😊

From there, Chase took me to a cave that he wanted to share with me for my birthday. It turned out to be a very cold water cave, and he doesn’t generally like to get cold, so it was i think an extra effort for my birthday. 🥰

In fact, the cave and water in it were cold enough that a great many of the people who rated the cave on Google suggested wearing wetsuits to go through the cave with. Fortunately, both chase and I have wetsuits! So we put on our wetsuits, scrambled down the path to the opening of the cave where the water comes running out, and then spent the next probably 30 minutes or so going from one opening of the cave to the other–twisting and turning and winding all sorts of directions underground before it pops back out again.

Though it was a simple cave without really any side passages to explore, we actually both liked it quite a lot. It was different than all the others in that their really weren’t any mineral formations. It was just a solid passageway carved out of the limestone I think it was by the water.

So cool. 😊

It’s so nice being prepared for all of these little adventures period we have just this little wagon, but we’re so well prepared–water gear, backpacking gear, day-hiking gear, Caving gear, snorkeling gear, boogie boards.

We’re loaded. 🙃

So grateful. So lucky. Wish I could share more of these things with the people I love and care about more than I’m able to right now.

I spent more time today trying to write my “Down, Up, Down.” I’d spent a lot of time on it but still didn’t feel like i was making much progress.

I think I’ve thought of a better way to describe one of my fears in telling people how I’m feeling when I’m struggling in social situations: I guess, to be honest, in some ways, I’m a pretty fragile person? and I don’t want people feeling like they have to walk on eggshells around me, making life and interactions very awkward for them when it’s my insecurities that are the issue.

I hesitate to even write what I just wrote because I don’t want other people thinking that they have to be careful around me. I just want everybody to treat me as they would anyone and let me deal with my own junk.

Anyway, it was a good day, a good early birthday. 🙂 I definitely still struggled a bit with what happened on the 21st, but we had some really good times and fun experiences that helped to make it a great day.

By the time we’d gotten out of the cave, it was dusk. I think we spent some time just sitting in the car, each on our phones doing our things before looking for a place to crash for the night. Chase found a perfect one, and we pulled in, got the car all set up, and crashed.

Love to all y’all. 😊

Lift the World

~ stephen