R I P

Some dear friends of mine died recently. They were on the back seat of my car when it was callously torched 🙁

This is Muncher, he was born at the Cookie Time factory and lived a short but exciting life, taken around the West Coast of New Zealand with Anna and myself. He also made excursions to the Catlins and Invercargill.

Muncher

This is Cartman, he lived most of his life in the rear window of my old Honda Civic. He then camped out in my parents basement on top of their TV set while I went to Canada and then inhabited my Toyota Corolla till his brutal death. Cartman visited most of New Zealand including Palmerston North, Wellington, the West Coast, and every ice and inline hockey rink in the South Island. He was well known for wearing the pimp hat which Mary Mintel and Kerry Perkins made for me.

Cartman

The hat is an interesting story in itself! Mary, Kerry and I hunted high and low for a suitable feather to stick in it for me to use as part of my pimp costume for Stephen Brassett’s 21st party. Luckily we found one in a very nice feather duster.

Burnt Car

Some $&*%# decided it would be nice idea to break into my car, take it for a joy ride, get drunk whilst at it, then drive it to the top of Signal Hill in Dunedin, put the handbrake on and floor it till the rims hit the tarmac then once it wouldn’t move any further set it on fire!!! Luckilly I was insured, so I only lost $50 on the car.

Outside of my burnt car

Inside of my burnt car

Here’s what it looked like before they got hold of it.

Ryan Hellyer’s Toyota Corolla

Download video

Interviewer was Geoff Yorston.

Silverpeaks tramp

Mark Hareb, my flatmate Dars and myself went tramping on the Silverpeaks route, just out of Dunedin. Things started badly when my giant three liter bottle of water split only half an hour into the tramp. I carried it in for another hour and ditched at the turnoff where we would be arriving back to later in the day.

View over the Silver peaks

The route is quite old and hasn’t been maintained in a long time so picking out where you’re supposed to go was tricky. We didn’t get lost though 🙂 However, later in the day the wind picked up incredibly strong. We were getting knocked off our feet all the time and we started to run out of water!

Mark Hareb on the Silverpeaks route

After much cursing from Dars and me getting quite dehydrated, we eventually made our way off the ridges, hence away from the wind and back to the water bottle I ditched earlier in the day.

Dars standing beside a cute little lamb

All up it took us just over 13 hours to complete the tramp. En route I twisted my ankle a few times which I didn’t think was a major drama, however a week later was when I twisted the same ankle again and broke my leg 🙁

Mark and Dars tramping on the Silverpeaks route

Rally of Otago

I went to see some of the special stages of the Rally of Otago with Scott and Marthah (my brother and his fiance). Lots of sideways action, dust, noise and excitement. The photos didn’t turn out too well, my camera lens got quite dirty and I didn’t realise till after I uploaded them 🙁

Rally of Otago 2006

Rally of Otago 2006