After a long and intriguing trip across the world, we had finally arrived in New Zealand and the trip commenced! The settlement into the house went smooth but the next day the forces of nature prevented us from shredding. After a few days of shred-delay, we finally made it to Cardrona resort. We took it easy that day but the weather was beautiful and a perfect jump line was accessible, by the end of the day the whole group was throwing down. Over the next few days, we shredded jumps, pipes, rails and the ever-glorious POW! After several days of AMAZING yet strenuous riding, we decided to rest for a day. On our day off we drove to Queenstown but took a few detours. We stopped at a shooting range, some shot .22 rifles, others shot shotguns and 1 shot a bow and arrow. Our next detour was bungee jumping 3 kids jumped and we all had a blast. The final part of our day off was the skate plaza of Queenstown. We all stepped up our skate game while at this amazing skatepark. After our day off, we returned to the awesome shredtacular mountain of Cardrona where the New Zealand open had started. Over 15 pros had showed up and each were throwing down. Sadly on the day of Slopestyle practice Stewie overshot a 60 foot jump and tore his MCL and possibly ACL. Only Eric competed in the slopestyle but came out with a good result of 47th. The next day Alex, Chris and Sam competed in pipe, although we do not recall our results we all felt we did very well for ourselves. As the trip winds down the thought of returning home is bittersweet. We are all sad to not be shredding anymore, but we will be happy to see our family and friends.
Eric Verillo and
Sam Hammer
