Tongariro Crossing, Waitomo Caves, Rugby

Today we wanted to hike the Tongariro Crossing up around a volcanic peak but were stopped by high winds and cold weather.We did a shorter 5 hour hike to the Tama Lakes instead. Here is the lower lake, and it was pretty cold at that point so I am quite bundled up :)













Yesterday we had a fun adventure type experience in the Waitomo caves, saw some underground glowworms, rode an underground river, and did some spelunking :) This is a shot of us rafting in the dark.















The day before was a Rugby game in Hamilton and some excellent surfing at the Raglan beach, but we crashed early afterwards (It slipped my mind that it was Robbie's birthday, sorry Robbie and Happy Birthday ).














The day before was our last day at Auckland. We experienced the trendy area of Auckland, Ponsonby, and hiked a little nearby hill overlooking the city. We actually stayed out until the bars closed that night!

First set of Photos.

Robbie holding our beer's in Auckland at noon on St. Patty's Day.




















A traditional Maori sculpture in the Treaty House in Waitangi.














Sailing on a ship used in the America's Cup.














Perched atop Mt. Rangitoto after a nice warm-up tramp (hike).

Well Here is some sort of Blog, although no promises on how often I will do this. Our itinerary so far has been fairly packed. We were in Auckland Monday and Tuesday and we climbed Mt. Rongitoto and went sailing in an old America's Cup ship (with very low winds). We then rented a car and had an exciting time driving a stick shift, on the left, through downtown Auckland, up hills, and trying to parallel park. Fortunately I didn't hit anything, and nothing hit me :) We drove up to Whangerai (Fang-er-eh) and ate dinner and went to a Bar for St. Patty's day. In the morning we made it over to a little town on the coast, Tutukaka, for a scuba dive trip at the Poor Knight's Island. It was a pretty amazing dive, we saw ray's, scorpionfish, lots of snapper, and schools of little fish. There was an underwater cave with a little air bubble in it that we were able to get into and breath :). Then we headed farther North to Pahea on the Bay of Islands and Robbie and I swam to one of the Islands, then swam back quickly because we forgot to put on sunscreen. Anyway good times so far and no major mishaps.

Belgian Beer & Munich

Belgian beer is very strong! Nic and I found that out the fun way at Delerium Cafe in Brussels. We also had our first two days in Munich where we went to the Andechs Monastary and had lunch and to the famous Haufbrau House. Although Nic is having a hard time finding enough to eat at times. The germans love their sausage, beef, and pork.

Travel & The Damage

So Nic and I are chilling in our Hotel room in Amsterdam for the moment. We are about to head to Brussels for a night, and then off to Munich for several days!. Yesterday was a pretty rough 30hours or so of travel for me.

I started in Sacramento Airport flew to Denver, flew to london, took an hour long tube ride to the train station, took a 3 hour train to Brussels and then a 3 hour train to Amsterdam, and now I am heading back to Brussels :) Yeah, not how the original plan was supposed to go, but we are just winging the first part of the trip.

Nic's pay as you go phone didn't work and the bank blocked his ATM card. So he had to email me to tell me where he was, and transfer money through Western Mutual with a nice fee.

10am != 10pm

Proving that airheadedness doesn't decrease with age, I missed my initial flight on my way to Germany. All week I thought I was flying out on Friday at 10pm, but turns out it was 10am. A call from my brother at 9 made me realize my mistake, and I packed and got to the gate at 9:55, without enough time to check-in and get on the flight. The united service lady behind the desk was very helpful though, and booked me a new international flight getting in a few hours later tomorrow (Saturday). Although this time I connect in London, where I will likely get off and meet up with Nic in Amsterdam. I will try to update with photos and more information later. We are kind of winging the initial part of our trip, so stay tuned for more mishaps.

How healthy is your Chipotle Burrito?  My standard Carnitas Burrito - 1058 Calories.  http://www.chipotlefan.com/index.php?id=nutrition_calculator

Chris & Stephanie's Australia Trip

Here is their Blog - I am taking notes for sabbatical http://stephchrisberry.blogspot.com/

Twitter

I setup a twitter account so that I can update easily from my new iPhone :)
http://www.twitter.com/jpbischo

Flickr Library of Congress

Flickr is running a bunch of photo's from the Library of Congress, pretty interesting to see some of this old WW2 pictures. Library of Congress on Flickr

Kiva

You may have heard of this site: Kiva. It has been getting a lot of publicity lately, but it is a very interesting site. Basically you can lend out as little as $25 to entrepreneurs in developing countries. There are oppurtunities all over asia, south america, and africa. There currently is no earned interest on the loans, but I still think it is a very cool idea. Hopefully it can eventually expand to where you can make a little bit of money providing this small microloans.

4 Things

Following the strict internet rules regarding "tagging" I am posting my 4 Things post:

Four places I've lived:
1. SLC, Utah
2. Naperville, IL
3. Sacramento, CA
4. Denver, Co

Four jobs I've had:
1. Store Clerk at Osco Drug
2. Lawn Mower/Baby Sitter
3. Product Engineer for Flash
4. Graphics Driver Programmer

Four things I'd like to do before I die:
1. Go to a World Cup Game
2. Travel to Africa/Australia/Asia
3. Live in another country
4. Have kids

Four favorite desserts:
1. Sugar Cookies from Home
2. Special K Balls
3. Sherbert, Rasberries, 7-UP
4. Cinnamon Apple Crisp

4 interesting facts about me:
1. I have never broken a bone
2. I tore my ACL
3. I had cancer
4. I had Bell's Palsy

Four favorite t.v shows:
1. The Office
2. Avatar
3. Daily Show
4. ..I watch those online, I don't really have TV.

Half Dome

I hiked Half Dome this weekend with Robbie, Romo, and Judy. It kicked my butt. I will post another picture with the four of us in it :).

Birthdays & Paintings

I finally got Mike's painting shipped from Utah (Thanks MOM, Star, and Mike!). It was very nicely packaged by UPS. I will post another photo when I have it up on my wall. I love the colors of the desert and the sky, it will look great over my desk.


My Birthday is coming right up (Oct 2nd). If anyone is looking for an easy gift, you could buy me something from my brand new Amazon Wishlist!

Lexicography - Erin McKean - Google

Here is a very interested video, YouTube - Erin McKean: Redefining the dictionary it is actually about lexicography and it is very interesting. Erin comes to some interesting suggestions in the end about building a better database of words from the web.



In response to this I made a little quick and dirty search that shows the search's # of hits on the various google search databases (google, video, images, scholar, etc). And it makes a little bar graph, I might add more later.

Try it out!

Word Search

-Justin

Dinner with the Big Six

Here is a picture of my brother and grandfather when the little boys got to crash the dinner for the big six (Mom,Dad,Grams,Pops,Claudia,David). We enjoyed the fine dining of the Outback Steakhouse. My brother with the sleek glasses is just back from Iraq and quickly readjusting to the easy life :)

Andrew Bird Concert

www.myspace.com/andrewbird

I finally saw Andrew Bird at Harlows in Sacramento.  His live concert is a lot more exciting than the CD sounds.  The recorded tracks sound really mellow, but its much more vibrant and interesting live.

May is Bike to work month, but I haven't yet biked to work in May.  My allergies are killing me, but I might give it a go tomorrow anyway.  I need to start getting some regular excersize in, hopefully to lose weight.  I played volleyball on Tuesday which was the first sport I have played since my knee surgery, almost exactly 6mo after surgery.

Matrix Themed Halo, Metroid Mashup.

This is a pretty awesome mashup video Halo vs Metroid.

http://www.gametrailers.com/umwatcher.php?id=57998

Also, if you have a lot of free time, checkout the TED talks videos on YouTube.

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=TEDtalksDirector

I am headed off to Naperville tomorrow for Garrett's wedding! It should be a lot of fun, especially since I haven't been back to Naperville in like 4 years.

How To Meet New People

1) Your Brother's roomate goes to Kenya on a Safari Tour
2) Roomate meets a fine Brittish Lass in the tundra
3) Brittish Lass visits Sacramento meets your brother
4) You move to Philadelphia where Brittish Lass's Friends are and voila!

Running Map - Sacramento to Folsom - Bike Trail (Sacramento, California)

Running Map - Sacramento to Folsom - Bike Trail (Sacramento, California)

I biked to work today, all the way from Sacramento. I wasn't exactly "fast" but at least I made it :)

Saturday Bike Ride

I took the American River Bike Trail to Sunrise today. I took the light rail most of the way back, but it still ended up being about 25 miles of biking.