Waimarino

Paul: Mate you’re going to kick yourself, we have just had the most insane day!

Luke: I was kicking myself the moment I cancelled. I don’t want to hear about it.

Paul: Too bad. We were up before sunrise and headed out to the airstrip where we were picked up in a beast of a helicopter. They had all our gear organised. Took us out the back to some premium powder and dropped us at the top. Seriously some of the best skiing in my life!

Luke: Ughh. Stop it! Did you get some pics?

Paul: Yeah they filmed us coming down, the footage is insane, I’ll send it over. When we hit the bottom they picked us up again and we flew out to Dart River and we did the jet boat, Richie screamed like a girl the whole time. We took the long way there and flew out over Milford sound, felt like we were in Jurassic Park, this place is seriously crazy. 

Luke: I’ve always wanted to see that place...

Paul: We got Adam to do the bungee. Mate, I almost wet myself laughing! He was the last to do it and the guy had to pry his fingers off the rail and push him, we were giving him a hard time about it but he loved it…

Luke Geez, you guys had a full-on day. What’s on for tonight? 

Paul: We just got back to the lodge, we’re going to head down to the distillery and have a drink before dinner. They’ve got a fire going It’s a pretty epic.

Luke: There’s a distillery? 

Paul: Yeah it’s called Still Waters – Waimarino is Moari for Still Waters, hence the name, it’s a little micro-distillery where they make their own gin and vodka using the glacier water. Richie is already down there infusing his own gin with some of the herbs from the garden. 

Luke: Ya killing me… Tell him to bring some back.

Paul: Next time mate you’ve seriously got to come, and we’ll do their lakeside fire dinner. The chef does an open fire on the lake's edge and cooks the whole meal over the coals. If you come on the next trip I reckon we go trout fishing in the backcountry and get the chef to smoke what we catch over the fire.

Luke: You’re on, have a ball mate, see you when you're back, cheers

Paul: will do, cheers mate.