July 14th, 2011 The Lord of the Rings Tour

Sadly, my close friend has passed away yesterday. My brother's G2 pen broke, unfortunately. The part that connects the pen together broke while it was connected so it cannot be repaired. R.I.P. Mr. G2 Pen. May the rest of your days be filled with drawings and words.

Since the tour people didn't cancel (finally!!!) we got to go on this amazing and scenic tour. Our fantastic tour guide was named Paul. Personally, I prefer Katie as my tour guide but Paul did provide us with short (and funny) videos and information about the movie. Even though my family and I aren't that big of a fan, we did enjoy this tour.
We began our little adventure by waking up around 7:30am and then got dressed, ate breakfast, and brushed our teeth. Next, Paul picked us up around 9:00am and then picked up the other three passengers. While we were driving to the mountains, there was this huge roadblock (or should I say sheep block). It was so awesome and the sheep were so cute!!!
Our first stop was this Staveley Cafe where we met up with the other three passengers and had some afternoon tea. We ordered a sausage roll, mince and cheese (meat) pie, a latte, a canned carbonated lemon drink, and two hot chocolates. I have to say, the food was delicious!! The hot drinks were also good but I still think the food was much better.
After some bumpy driving, we arrived at this hill where they filmed a part of the movie (Middle Earth Rohan is the name for all of you L.O.T.R. fans.) which was inhabited by black cows (and their cow pies). After about 10-15 minutes of uphill walking/hiking, we arrived at the top of the hill where it was -2oC or roughly 28oF. At the top of the hill, my brother and I did a "sword fight" with replica L.O.T.R. swords, found some super thin ice, and got to see a great view.
Then, we walked downhill for the same amount of time as it took going uphill and we eventually came to the vehicle and then went to a place where we ate lunch. Our free lunch consisted of a choice of ham or smoked chicken sandwich, orange juice or campagne, and a chocolate cake with powdered sugar on top of it.
After a good and satisfying lunch, we began driving back to the hotels. On the way there, we stopped by the same cafe to drop off the same three passengers. As we continued to Christchurch, there was another roadblock. This time, it was a roadblock created by black cows which wasn't as cute as the lambs but it was good enough. While we were coming back, we watched some L.O.T.R. interviews and behind-the-scenes things. If you want to view the pictures of the trip, click here
Have a nice day!

July 13, 2011 Nothing, Banks, and Walking

My brother and I started our day by eating chocolate muffins/cupcakes and studying the SAT. Since I finished the book I was working on the other day, I got to start on another lovely (sarcasm) book.

This book was exactly like the other one, boring, monotonous, and outdated. Again, this is not worth your money and all copies should be burned!
After I folded some clothes, my mom, my brother, and I took the free shuttle to a park and then walked the rest of the way to a bank. At the bank, my brother and I sat in some comfortable chairs. While we were waiting, the bank people began asking us questions like:
-What country did you come from?
-Why are you here?
-How long are you staying?
Though these way sound like ordinary questions, I think that they are going to get plastic surgery to look like us an then steal our identity!! It could happen...
After that, we kind of got lost but eventually found our way. We then visited a butchery and bought some fresh sausages and aged filet mignon. We also went to the fruit and vegetable market where we bought some potatoes and bananas. Then, we travelled back to our hotel/apartment/motel, exhausted. Later on, we ate our second home-cooked which was delicious. We ate delicious steak, mash potatoes (courtesy of me), and steamed broccoli and spinach. Personally, I think the steaks tasted a lot better than yesterdays $32 ones. The vegetables were awesome to but needed quite a bit of salt.
The other day, I visited a retail store and I was looking at the shoes and clothes. While I was studying the shoes, I noticed that many of the shoes were sizes 6 or 7 so I'm guessing that most women have small shoe sizes. This may be very far from the truth but it's just a guess.
While we were walking, we walked through this huge (and relatively famous) park that had this interesting tree.

Well, I've typed long enough! Bye!