Jakub Nemec - freeride kayaker: February 2009

Hi from the beautiful New Zealand again

After couple of weeks there are already some new pictures and some more stories to write. I had to stop the work in Cromwell because they didn’t need anymore thinning on the vineyard. Thanks god! :) So I tried to apply for a job all around the Queenstown and in some another orchards… Nothing… So I was like I should start with a job and saving money for trip to California and BC in summer.

But there was no job and nice weather so we decided to go to the west coast. For me it meant spent all last money and punk it out. Why not actually. We took my Mazda and fit three guys (Pavel Bendl, Jakub Sedivy and myself) in there, put three boats on the roof and fill the last room with all other stuff. We have run without warranty of fitness and registration. Sooo much fun. We came to Hokitika at around midnight and just fell asleep ready to paddle on the next day. We tried upper Kakapotahi cause you don’t have to fly in and it was a good test for my car. J we have come and we weren’t sure about the waterlevel. Looked quite dry but we decided to check out the first drop and see. We have seen the line so I had paddled. Quite tight and bony so we decided to go back to the road. Was a good idea because guys who have done it before told us we wouldn’t be able to paddle most of the stuff. So we have checked out waterlevel on Waitaha and looked good. we called Bruce Dando because of flight and it was another bad luck. His helicopter had a broken gear box. So we gave it up as most of the people who were on the coast and went to the freezing Fox river flowing from the Fox glacier.

On the next day we switched our creekboats for playboats back in Qtown and went to Dunedin for a surf. First day it was so good and the other one was like tooooooo windy out there. Our car almost flew out couple of times. I ve just done couple of surfs in the evening when the wind wasn’t so hard. Next day was Monday and we started to run out of money so we tried to find a job around Roxburgh. There are lot of orchards but we have found place just on one of them. So we have worked for seven days and then was no more apricots and peaches to pick. It’s a long way from the Kawarau anyway so we drove back to find a job in Queenstown. Still nothing but I already had an interview in tradestuff agency and seems good but will see. So we have paddled the wave all day long and have done the Nevis bluff rapid couple of days ago. Hope to have similar day tomorrow…

By the way. On te way back from the Roxburgh we have been stopped by police and we had no Warranty of fitness and no registration. Police man even didn’t want my drivers licence and was just like I understand u guys u have no money but u must fix it. He gave me one week to fix otherwise have to pay 400 bugs. The car is already in garage to fix and seems little bit cheaper than 400. So will finally have a legal car and hopefully gonna find some job to make money and finish my trip around the world with a kayak.

Next place to go is California and Canada. Then back to Europe for a while and South America in winter. Will see… At the moment it pretty much seems like I am gonna stay here for one year. Why not. Queenstown is just lovely place with good options for paddle and work. That’s pretty much all what I need.

Have fun

Jakup

what a view eh?