Physics Retreat 2009

For the past several weeks 8 of us had been working on organizing a retreat for the grad students and post-docs in the physics department. Physicists are globally known as geeks that are anti-social; and we were determined to change that!
We rented the Waiora Scout Camp (which I later found out was the location of the Winter Solstice party last June and I did not recognize the place at all!) and planned all kinds of things for the weekend. My main activity was organization of the food menu. So I had a chance to get my favorite really spicy chili on the menu. These guys were on the cooking team the first night and made a huge pot of it:
Most people seemed to like it (even though Kiwis are said to be very afraid of spices) - we only got 1 complaint. And it was really spicy - even for my taste.

As a little side note, we did the shopping on Friday morning at this Wal-Mart like place called Pak'n Save (or Pak'n Slave as the employees call it) where they treated us like 4-year-old children. We had 5 of these huge shopping carts full of stuff and started putting things into boxes as they came off the conveyor belt at the check out. Out of nowhere this feisty little lady showed up and told us we couldn't do that until after we had paid up. As she walked away we all looked at each other and couldn't really comprehend what she had just said. Was she finally going to send somebody over to help us getting the huge amounts of food off the belt? Well no - she didn't. So we kept doing what we had been doing assuming she must not really have meant what she said. But she did! So she came back to tell us that "we had been told to not pack stuff into boxes." And stormed off again. It felt like being in a psycho movie - nothing makes sense but all the characters pretend that everything is alright. In the end we did get all the stuff out into the parking lot and to our amazement managed to pack everything into 2 cars (one of them was an Audi I have to admit - 2 of my cars wouldn't have worked).
After dinner on Friday we did a pub quiz and I was able to play quiz master for an evening!
People hard at work solving quiz questions:Saturday started off with some workshops but then the afternoon was spent frolicking in the sun!Lunch outside on the lawn!No telling what Tim is up to in this picture...We had a Lego competition on Saturday evening where the teams had to put together a set of Lego pieces without getting instructions on how to do it. It was absolutely amazing - I haven't laughed this hard in a long time! I can't go into details here as this is the internets and children might come and read. But I'll post a picture - it is just what it looks like ;)
And we had a big bonfire on Saturday night ..
...where I finally came to understand how that all really works with Schrödinger's Cat and the global significance of Facebook. And the question came up if there really is a difference between Sweden and Switzerland (which Cajsa insisted there was but she had to say that since she is from Sweden!) and after "The Lion sleeps tonight" we agreed that neither Sweden nor Switzerland matter much in the overall scheme of things - Hollywood rules!

Sunday started off slow since we didn't get to bed until 3am the night before. We had a guy come out and instruct people in Abseiling (which nobody can pronounce correctly - damn German words):
And before we left the camp in the afternoon - a group photo!

Wellington

Since it was Easter break I had decided to continue on from Christchurch to Wellington. I took a quick shower at Steve's house and he gave me a ride to the airport. Tanja, Christoph and Marlo picked me up on the other end and I spent a marvelous few days with them.
I also had a chance to hook up with Lisa and Dan as they had us all over for dinner at their new place. They have turned into hard-core Alaskans - they don't even have a heat pump!

Click image to play
(See Ben, it's not a phone - it's a revolver!)

The Waimak

... or Waimakariri River. In Māori, Waimakariri has several meanings, one of which is "river of cold rushing water". The river is part of the Coast-to-Coast multisport race that goes all the way from the Tasman Sea on the west coast to the Pacific Ocean on the east coast of the South Island. I heard it takes the winner about 10 hours to cross the island. We decided to take 3 days just to do the rafting portion :)
So finally, a week later than planned we (that is Murray, Louie, Steve and I) left on the long anticipated trip. Steve and I departed Darfield at 7AM and drove all the way up to almost Arthurs Pass (got a good look at all the ski areas on the way!) where we met up with Murray and Louie and their ginormous dory. Put in was at the Mt. White bridge.
We blew up the raft,
.. carted the dory into the river
...and off we went!
The first section of the river was very braided and there were several shallows where we had to get out and walk the boats across some gravel. And Steve managed to break 2 blades in a single day! (He said he hadn't broken a single blade in 20 years of rafting.)
And then - NZ wild life! When I first saw them in the distance I, of course, assumed those were bears!
Some random shots from during the day:
The wind picked up quite a bit at the confluence with the Esk River but after some hard rowing we made it to the entrance of the Waimak Gorge where we ended the day:
Found a nice campsite:
... had a 'man dinner' ...... and of course a bonfire:
We packed up in the morning (actually I think it was closer to noon - bacon, eggs and toast for breakfast does take a bit of time to make and savior)...... and started our journey through the canyon.
There wasn't any real white water in there but some interesting hydraulics that could turn into quite the challenge during high water.
Scouting for a campsite (Notice the NZ fall colors are in full swing!)
Found the perfect spot!There is even an old railroad bridge across the river (and still in use as we were reminded of in the middle of the night several times):Needed to relax after an exhausting day...
.. and then had another awesome dinner (salmon - yum!) and dessert and 'cocktails'.
And for some after dinner exercise I tried out my packraft - first on the gravel:
(Steve tried to make it look like I was actually on the water to make me feel better about not being able to paddle.)
.. but then I found an alcove off the main river and thought I should just give it a shot:
When I realized that I could actually paddle with my somewhat disabled arm I decided to give that a try the next day and left the packraft inflated. I did end up paddling for a little over an hour before the pain got too bad and I had to stop. It was magnificent!
We had another bonfire that night and initiated a new tradition: sock burning! It came about when my socks just didn't want to dry and the firewood ran out. They burn pretty well albeit a bit smelly, especially Murray's ;)
On the last day we made our way out of the canyon and onto the Canterbury Plains where we again dealt with lots of braids all the way to the take-out.Since I had a flight to catch to Wellington we paddled furiously and got there an hour ahead of time. And here we are, 3 days later, drinking beer and cleaning up.