(written on the 11th from notes taken previously)
I was up later than I should have been and then got myself OCD’d trying to recover a Gemini chat conversation I’d had a week or two ago (OCD’d meaning not wanting to do that anything else until I’d finished piecing together the conversation, bit by bit, from my AI activity history from myactivity.google.com [Google’s stalker center]).
The result was that I got it all pieced together, but that made me exceedingly late for church. 😅
The irony being that it was a gospel research conversation I was piecing together. 😆 (because Gemini conveniently couldn’t remember the conversation, so it wasn’t in my app history 😶)
I guess the church building technically wasn’t in Queenstown but in the neighboring village of Frankton, just a few miles away.
And it was definitely an interesting building.
As I entered the neighborhood, seeing on Google Maps that I was getting close, I was looking for a steeple or a familiar roof outline. What I found was a little sign directing me down a narrow driveway to what was essentially a converted house. 😶
I never would have guessed. 😆
Queenstown isn’t large, by any means, but I figured it would be big enough to at least have a decent-sized branch and a small chapel, but nope.
As I descended down the little driveway between two houses to the converted chapel behind, the driveway opened up into a little parking area with room for maybe 10 cars. The parking area was completely full except for a spot just wide enough for my van to squeeze in between a van and a little storage shed, two of the wheels up on concrete. 😅
I quickly changed into my Sunday clothes and opened the door, finding myself staring at the congregation members. 🙃
To my left was the kitchen, with food on the counters, presumably for a linger longer/much and mingle. To my right was a section that felt like overflow rows, and straight ahead was the main section, the congregation making a backwards L shape, the short end to my right, the long end straight ahead of me, and the speakers at the corner.
I couldn’t see any empty seats anywhere, so I just stood leaning against the kitchen counter for the last maybe 10 minutes of the meeting.
After sacrament meeting, it was a split of priesthood and relief society today, with priesthood meeting outside underneath a little overhang.
It was a really good meeting today, with some wonderful sharing from several attendees. I was grateful to be able to share several related thoughts in a way that came together surprisingly coherently.
And it was nice to feel the Spirit again.
I think the majority of us were visitors, with even several of the branch members being immigrants to New Zealand, one from Chile, one from Brazil, and one from the States.
(I always find it awkward writing the name of my country because it takes a long time to write The United States of America, but I know that some people take issue with simply saying America, even though that’s the word that I think the majority? of non Americans I meet use to identify my nationality, because it could be said that anyone who lives in North, Central, or South America is an American. It’s also a little awkward to use States or United States, because we’re not the only country whose official name begins with “The United States of…” But it’s easier, and it seems as though the rest of the world uses those labels to identify us, so I probably shouldn’t stress about using those labels for myself. 🙃)
After priesthood meeting, I chatted with an American from Houston, I think it was for a little while and then with another American who was in New Zealand I think for a few weeks with his wife and daughter, his daughter being a big Lord of the Rings fan, so they were doing a big Lord of the Rings tour.
My friend Cory had called while I was talking to people, so after I finished talking to people and eating a tiny bit during the linger longer, I headed out and called him back.
As we chatted, I drove over to a park at the lake shore just a few blocks from the branch building, hoping to be able to park and stare out at the lake while chatting. Unfortunately, it was pretty crowded, so I decided to drive through Queenstown and find a less-crowded spot somewhere along the eastern side of the north end of the lake, gratefully finding a perfect little perch on a large turnout looking out at the surrounding mountains and down on the water below.
My friend Cory and I have both been using AI to enhance our gospel study (I admittedly doing very little of that because I’ve been spiritually struggling so much), and Cory had an interesting AI perspective he wanted to share and discuss.
We went over the AI-generated perspective line by line (the concepts were super dense), talking for at least an hour, I’d guess, if not two?
I did pause us toward the beginning, though, for a fairly awkward period when some elderly people pulled into the same pullout just as I had begun availing myself of Micro John. 😆
I had the curtains drawn in my van, but the windows were rolled down, so I had to interrupt the uh… proceedings 🙃 to put the lid on Micro John, to prevent the dissemination of the unholy incense to the elderly sightseers.
😅
So for the next… maybe five or so minutes? I hovered awkwardly 😆, repeatedly wiping the sweat off my forehead as the sun beat down on the van.
Finally, they left, and I both finished the proceedings and restarted my conversation with Cory. 😆
After 4 months of Micro John, that’s just the second time I’ve had an awkward situation, the last one being on the mountainside overlooking Edoras, though for that one, I was actually outside at the start.
Anyway, it was a great chat with Cory. 😊
I was supposed to be catching up on all my journal entries today, but I ended up just calling and chatting with family–my brother Richard for a bit, my sister Heather and her husband Hans for a bit. I tried more calls but didn’t get any answers, so I headed on up the road.
My next stop was a place I had found while searching for cliff-jumping spots, and I had marked it on my map as a desired destination to check out. So I headed over there, and scrambled down the hillside between the road and the jumping spot. Someone had secured several sections of rope to help people climb down safely.
I really do appreciate the people who do that, giving both of their time and money to make it easier and safer for others. 🙏
I was the only person there, and though it looked like it could have been a fun little spot to jump, the highest point was maybe 20 to 25 ft off the water, which wasn’t quite high enough for me to want to do the work of ensuring depth before jumping. 🙃
So I continued on up the road, destination Chinaman’s Bluff (my hoped for freedom-camping spot for the night), doubling back after seeing an excellent view of Mount Earnslaw and wanting to get a picture of it to send to Heather, as I’d been describing the area to get as she looked at her Google Maps satellite view.
The place I doubled back to was a place that Chase and I had stopped at last time I was here, an official “lookout spot” with a large dirt parking area and long-drop toilets (where I was able to dispose of Micro John’s contents 🙏).
I forget the name of the spot, if I even knew it, and I don’t have good enough reception right now to look it up on the map. 🙃
Anyway, I snapped some pictures and sent them to my sister Heather. I also picked up some trash on the way down the walk, and then spent a little while chatting with my mom. 😊
The drive from there to my camping spot was beautiful, mountain views, lake views, river views. I’m far enough south, and the mountains are high enough, that many of the mountains have glaciers on them, which adds to the beauty, at least in my eyes ☺️ (though you can’t really see many glaciers in these next pictures)
The last long stretch of dirt road to the campsite included several fords to cross, most of which were simple and only mildly technical. The last one, was quite wide, but shallow, so the only concern was the potential of spinning tires if I went too slowly.
I stopped here and there to take pictures, and then, once at the campsite, I spent a little time journaling before veging out and eventually crashing.
Lift the world.
Bring it on.
~ stephen
Lift the World 