One Does Not Simply Walk Into Mordor

Edit: This is an old update that I had to re-post because the formatting was screwy. Sorry for the confusion. I'm sure to have something interesting to say within the week. I hope. =)

I want to apologize for the lack of updates recently. There’s no good reason for it aside from my own inability to plop my butt down on this stool and start typing – something that, once you do it on a regular basis, begins to feel more like work than fun. And that’s the double-edged sword of writing. When it’s good, when I’m enjoying it, it’s truly one of the most fulfilling experiences I can have. And when you first get inspired to start writing something, this blog for example, you feel as though you’re doing it voluntarily (which is, of course, the truth even now) and your creative mind is on fire, and words literally leap onto the page before you know it. Then it gets harder. It always gets harder. The peculiar phenomenon of writing is that it is one of the few things in this world that the more you do it, the more you learn, the harder and harder it gets.

But enough! This blog is not my virtual notepad for unloading the woes of my own writer’s block – a slippery slope indeed, since when one can’t think of anything to write it’s easy to succumb to the urge to write about that.Yet here I am, halfway around the world from my place I call home, having new experiences ‘on the regular’ and I dare complain that there is nothing to write about. Of course there is.

The highlight, recently, was spending a weekend at National Park at a friend’s bach (which I’ve been told I’ve been incorrectly spelling as ‘batch,’ short for bachelor). Along with two friends (Will and Josef) I walked the Tongariro Crossing and saw arguably the most beautiful sights I’ve come across in my time here. Although Tongariro Crossing probably means nothing to most of the readers here, Mordor might ring a bell for fellow Lord of the Rings fans. I hadn’t expected another opportunity to arise during my time here to experience another LOTR location, and it wasn’t until I was literally standing at the summit of an enormous, ice-peaked mountain that I was informed it was the Mt. Doom. The geek inside me almost couldn’t control itself.

Unfortunately, I’ve fallen under somewhat of a technological curse on this trip when it comes to cameras. The first night I arrived I dropped mine on the sandy beach, sending it straight to “Lens Error” hell never to return. My mother was kind enough to mail me hers, which I’ve yet to destroy in a similar fashion but plagued nonetheless by constant issues, mostly of my doing. On one particular trip, I brought the camera but not the memory card – on another, the camera but not the battery. On this trip, however, I remembered to bring everything. And thus, the Gods of Canon Digital Cameras saw fit to punish me. With an entirely new error that I’d never knew existed: “Memory Card Error.” I felt like Michael Bolton from Office Space (“PC Load Letter? What the (profanity) is that?”).

Sad to say, I currently have no pictures of this wondrous trip (wondrous is a terrible adjective, by the way, but as I said – it gets harder). However, my friend Josef was sure to take dozens upon dozens of pictures that I will soon acquire so that I can share with you my experience in Lord of The Ringsdom.

Just a few details about the hike: It was long. Really long. Roughly 21k (13 miles), which doesn’t even begin to do it justice because nearly half of that was a grueling uphill battle while the other half was an equally-slash-more painful down (note: knees begin to give out long before your 30s). Also, unlike most of my weekend adventures with Will, this hike was packed with people. I mean hundreds. This hike is the second most popular in New Zealand and this was certainly evident within the first 20 minutes, when I heard accents and languages from all around the world as we continually passed people along the way. Also a side note: people don’t like to be “passed.” For whatever reason, even though one might acknowledge they’re not in the best of shape, they don’t need three young men in clearly better shape to remind them. We received quite a few unfriendly stares (probably French. Haha, just kidding. But seriously). One woman even exclaimed “there goes them boys again passing everyone!” We wore these intended insults as a badge of honor.

My final observation before I end this much-needed update. Hiking for the masses can be a hilarious experience. Toward the end of this epic trek through Mordor I began to notice a pattern. It began as a subtle grumble, an occasional “are we there yet?” (okay, that one was me) but soon escalated into what can best be described as the baa-ing of sheep, an overlapping noise of people complaining of tiredness, soreness, hunger(ness!?). The smiles of mother nature’s beauty were turned upside down at the thoughts of warm showers and hot food. Happiness had – to appropriately steal a quote from Lord of the Rings – suddenly “forsaken this land.” In the end, nobody wanted to be walking aimlessly anymore. And to that, I wonder, why people would voluntarily make themselves so miserable when there are plenty of things in this world to do it for them. No matter where you go in the world, you can’t get away from the masochists.

That concludes this update. Hope you’re still reading. Sorry if you thought I’d given up on this. Love you and miss you all.

Fit as a fiddle,

John