runtothehorizon

Having parted ways with my travelling companion, Mick, I made my way to Brussels and checked into a nice hostel on one of the main thoroughfares to the centre of the city and its central square ('Le Grand Place'). Meeting a fellow solo traveller (Jon, American), we started chatting and he lets me know that he is meeting two American girls in a bar that he is doing an online course with. The live in Brussels and have invited him out, he invites me along and I obviously say yes and end up drinking at this bar: It was fucking amazing. Nobody on the planet brews beer like the Belgians. So we attempted to drink all of them. We failed dismally and the girls (a couple, as it turns out :( ) had to leave. They took us to a 'tourist bar' called Delerium which had won beer of the year for its house brew (Delerium tremmens, get some but be careful...you'll see why). It also holds the honour for having the largest beer list on the planet. It occupies an entire alley made up ...

I never intended to write a chronological blog, so fuck it; I'm not. We're skipping to the time I was travelling with my mate Mick through Europe. Thats this colourful idiot here:  We were both about 21 so of course we went to Amsterdam, got high as balls and watched in amusement as our roommates in the hostel were arrested. Wait...what? Yes. Yes indeed. We pulled into Amsterdam Centraal station after a ferry ride from London on which I insisted the very confused bartender take this photo with a tiny plush kangaroo: Upon stepping out and being a relatively seasoned cyclist at this point, I was amazed and enthralled at the sheer number of bikes. Then I got hit by one. I'd never been yelled at in Dutch before and it was quite an amazing experience, not the least because it was hurled at me by a lady in her mid-50's wearing a lovely hat who was clearly just going home from shopping. I have no idea what she said, but it was NOT 'Good day sir'. Managi...

Welcome to part 2 and cheers for making it. Grab yourself a glass of wine. Arriving in Greymouth, somewhat rattled after almost unintentionally becoming the human version of a rock thrown off of a bridge, we checked into our hostel (a technicolour wonder where literally no wall was the same colour as another, run by a friendly Israeli family) and went shopping. Then I ruined a microwave. To start with, I bought wine. I bought too much wine. I drank the wine, too much wine. Sarah decided while shopping that she wanted a baked potato with a bunch of stuff on it so we bought an assortment of stuff (I dont remember, I was focused on wine). Thus began the great cooking adventure. Being so freaked out after the uncontrollable downhill screaming incident, I immediately downed 3/4 of a bottle of wine before cooking. 'It'll be fine' I said to myself, 'it's JUST a baked potato'. I readied the toppings (I think Ham, cheese, pineapple, spring onions, garlic butt...

My friend Lia (of http://www.liaweston.com/ fame) has been telling me I should do this for quite a while now because my life is a comedy of bad judgement, good people and stories that will make you say 'how in the FUCK did you get so lucky AGAIN?!' So, lets begin with my first comically bad decision, at 19, when my girlfriend (Sarah) at the time and I decided buying mountain bikes, trailers, a tonne of gear and cycling the entirety of New Zealand's south island was a wonderful idea. It was an awful idea. But as you will learn, that has never stopped me throwing caution to the wind and just doing it anyway. Flying into Wellington and attempting to fit 80 kg of  bulky gear into a 4-door taxi resulted in this: Which, although I am smiling in the photo, left me feeling more like someone had shoved me into a washing machine more-so than ever in my life before. Sort of like this: So off we headed with our surly taxi driver guiding us to our hotel where we checked into a r...