Day Two: Glade House to Pompolona

Now, before you get too tired of pictures of just us, let me say that - hey, we're a nice looking bunch of girls! (I mean, aren't we?) We're putting our best feet forward, we are having a laugh at every turn and there's really something to be said about throwing a group of people together who don't really know each other well and having it become as easy, as natural and as much fun as it was.

The first night there had been an activity to get to know everyone in the group that I missed - beyond the singing of Take Me Out to the Ball Game - oh joy. I was suffering from a pretty good cold and trying my best to "KEEP UP!" I got thrown in the middle of that one while stopping through the commons area for something hot to drink to clear my head. (And not that getting to know everyone wasn't a priority for me, it's just that I didn't really want to get anyone else sick.)

Back to the Milford Track... my internal alarm clock is working, no matter what time zone seemingly and to my dismay, so we all wake up about 6:30 a.m. to a chilly morning. For those who aren't morning people, I felt badly, since the schedule of our days demanded quite a bit of get up and go. Our guides are lively and rather a lot of fun. They get us going with positive attitudes, carrying probably twice what the rest of us do at double the speeds, smiling and laughing with us along the way.

We pack up, eat a lovely hot breakfast (and why I seem to eat like it's the last food I'll ever see, I'm not quite sure!) and put on our gear to start out into the ancient beech forest and boglands that await us this morning.

The day remains cool and rather gray as we find our stride. We aren't really gaining too much altitutude today, but there are spots where you're climbing up a rocky bit and need to watch your footing. At the lunch hut, aptly named Six Mile Hut, we stop to take on a persistant and clever little guy, called a Kea, who finally wins out for his watchful harassment of the lunch eaters and flies off with a Crunchy Bar. What a sugar rush that guy was going to experience...it would be like me eating my left leg's worth of chocolate! (I'm inserting links to show the birds I mention, because I like the pictures on the NZ bird site better than the ones I took.)