Extreme Sports, Kiwi Style

We had heard that New Zealand is a haven for extreme sports enthusiasts, and we can confirm that this is true.  First signs of this might have been the public parks, any of which have these terrific "flying foxes" - zip lines that are completely accessible without warnings or official monitoring to the public.  Here is a video of Jen taking the flying fox at our local beach park.  This particular biplane is probably 60 meters in length, goes over a flowing river, and, though it's not exactly dangerous, the thought of having one of these zip-lines non-regulated in the US is laughable given some of the inherent risks.

Then, as summer thankfully began to come around, we started hearing the sounds of motorbikes from the motorbike track in the hills across the river, and seeing increased speedboat traffic on the river.  It wasn't until after Christmas that we really got a good taste of this thirst for speed, however.

First, on Boxng Day, was the international motorbike race called the Cemetary Circuit, which has been taking place annually since 1951 and attracts the best motorcyclists in the world!  The Circuit is a 1 and a half kilometer track that is so named because it circumnavigates the town Cemetery as well as parts of downtown.  There are numerous small hills and hairpin and S turns on the track, and it makes for a very challenging and tight track for the riders.  There were eight race classifications.  The race started with the locals category where everyone from Harley's to dirt bikes to crotch rockets raced around.  There was a "pre-1989 bike" race and even a F1 Superbike race, which featured the world's fastest motorbikes, which can accelerate from 0 to 100 km/hr (60 mph) in 2.5 seconds!  It was really fun to watch those guys on the longest straightaway, during which the riders had to lean way forward just to make sure their front wheels didn't come too far off the ground from all the force of the acceleration.

Our favorite classification were the two sidecar competitions - classic sidecars (think 1950s motorcycles) and also Superbike Sidecars (crotch rockets with a super sleek sidecar).  The driver races at top speed while his sidekick throws himself from side to side on the car, leaning fully out on either side to help balance the bike and keep it from tipping as it careened around tight corners.  To put it simply, these guys are totally nuts.  At one point we saw a bike almost tip, then realized it had no passenger.  Later, we asked a race volunteer what had happened, and she said rather matter of factly that the passenger had been lost on the previous turn, but he was OK, not to worry, and he would be back in the next race.  Uhhh. OK. Jen got more great pics of the sidecars as well.

Two days later was the speed boating championship in the Wanganui River, but we all decided to take a pass on that one.  The brochure showed speed boats airborne and in very compromised positions, so I can only assume it was as classic as the Cemetery Circuit.

At any rate, this must have given our girls a bit of a taste for adventure.  In a subsequent post, we will detail some of their own extreme sports adventures...bungee jumping in the place that lays claim as the original bungee jump, and taking the "Shotover" jet speedboat bouncing and twirling its way through a narrow river gorge, both of which took place down in Queenstown on the South Island.  Stay tuned for more posts...