As you know, I went off to Queenstown for 2 nights. It’s not a very long time to go away, but the time we were there was pretty action packed with a full schedule of things to look at, and do. We didn’t just go to Queenstown, we also travelled to the surrounding towns and attractions nearby. The journey starts off on Sunday late afternoon, when I went up to school with all my gear and got on the bus with about 30 other students to go off to Queenstown on a geography field trip.

The bus left school at 5pm, on the dot. Everyone managed to get there before five so no one was left behind. Then it was off to Queenstown. It was a long ride, and it started getting darker, and in about an hour of travelling, it was pitch black. We did however stop in Alexandra for dinner, which was after 7pm. I had KFC, which didn’t taste that nice. It was greasy and the chicken was tasteless. The chips were too salty for my liking. The potato and gravy was edible and so was the bread. Then we went back on the road and off to our destination.

At 9:30, we were at our destination. We were staying at Lakeland Park Camp in Kelvin Heights, which is about 30 minutes out of Queenstown. There we settled in an were in bed and lights out at 11pm. I found it difficult to get to sleep, and ended up having a horrible night. I was really tired in the morning, but a nice hot shower sorted me out. We had to get ready to leave to go into town and needed to be on the bus at quarter past nine.

From there, our first stop was Frankton, which is 6km out of Queenstown. There we first went and had a look at the Queenstown Airport, and took a lot of pictures of various things there. Next we went to the Remarkables Park shopping center. Here we had the opportunity to have a look around the shops and buy food and other things if we wanted. After that, we got back on the bus and made our way to Queenstown.

Here we just drove around the town looking at places in the town, and then we made our way to the gondola. Everyone went up the hill in the gondola and at the top there, drew a sketch of the Queenstown area as well as taking pictures of the area from the top of the hill. After that, we got to go on the Luge. It was awesome! Then we made our way down the hill and back onto the bus at quarter past twelve.

Then we went and drove up to Arrowtown. We had a look around the town, and had food there. There is not much in the town, not many shops and stuff. I had lunch there and got a Mince Pie and a Pepsi, which was damn expensive, and cost me $5.90. Rip off! It was a good pie though and it didn’t come out of my pocket so I was alright with it. Then we went back on the road.

We went to the Bungy jumping bridge and there was watched a quick video while the people going for a jump got set up. Out of all of us, only 3 of our group jumped, one was my geography teacher, and the other two did a double tandem jump. It was really cold out there but it was interesting to see people jump. It looked scary. It’s something I can never see myself doing, ever! Then we went back towards Queenstown and to the wharf so people that wanted to go on the jetboat could. I decided not to go on it.

Then it was back to camp to do whatever until it was dinner time. At 7pm, everyone got onto the bus and we went into Queenstown to have our dinner. Me and my mates walked around Queenstown for 15 minutes looking for a pizza place, but we had no luck so weended up going back and going into the mall and having McDonalds. I had a $10 voucher so I ended up getting more that I would want. I got a Large Quarter Pounder combo, a hamburger, and a chocolate ice cream sundae. After eating all of that, I was pretty full. I do however regret eating the sundae, because it was damn cold and I was frozen for ages.

Then we made it back to the camp where we watch 2 movies that we hired. The first one was Jumper, which I happened to have seen in the weekend on DVD at home. It was interesting watching it a second time, but that’s a story for another post. I decided not to watch the second movie, Chuck and Larry, because I had seen it before and it wasn’t that interesting. I went into my cabin and the group of use talked for a while and eventually went to sleep.

In the morning, it was time to pack. I stuffed all my gear in my bag, which didn’t fit as perfectly as it did when I packed to come on the trip, but I managed to get it all in anyway. Then it was time to clean. I ended up vacuuming 3 of the boys cabins which wasn’t that bad because it warmed me up. Then were were on the bus and started travelling.

We did make a stop at the Millbrook Resort, where one of the guys there gave us a quick tour of the place. We had a look at some of the buildings, the eating facilities, and one of the rooms. It was really fancy, and expensive to own. The guy also told us a little about when Bill Gates was staying there. No one ever saw him, but they had stories about his body guards and what room he stayed and what he did.

Then it was time to head back home to Dunedin. The trip back was longer and more boring than the trip there. We stopped again in Alexandra, this time for Lunch at 1pm. This time I had Subway. The nice old lady behind the register talked me into getting more than I intended. I had a meatball sub with a drink and 2 cookies. It was quite nice, much better than KFC by a long shot. Then it was a 3 hour journey back to Dunedin.

We got back home at 4pm and Dad was waiting to pick me up there. It was a really good trip and I enjoyed it lots. I wish it was a little longer so we could look at more things and do more things as well. This is the last trip for the year, and for my high school life. I’m happy my last school trip was a great one. Oh, and not once did I think about the internet, or miss it. Although I was Plurking some of the time I was there. I took heaps of pictures, 200 (500MB) to be exact which I will slowly upload to Flickr over the next few days. Queenstown is AWESOME!

Tomorrow in the late afternoon, I will be leaving on a school field trip. I will be away all Monday and be returning Tuesday evening. We are going away to collect information about tourism for Geography. And the best New Zealand town to investigate this is of course, Queenstown. There we will have a look at different attractions and activities in and around the town and also have a look at the impacts tourism has had on this area.

It’s going to be a great trip and we will be getting 2 days off school. Here we will look at many attractions such as a gondala, the jet boats, bungy jumping and lots of other Queenstown activities. We have a really tight schedule so there probably won’t be much playing around during the day. Although at night I’m sure we will be able to do what we want.

I’ll be able to talk about what happened more once it has happened and I get back on Tuesday. Again, I will be without the internet all of Monday and most of Tuesday. Although I will be Plurking from my cellphone while I am away so if anyone wants to follow what I am up to while I am away from computer, you can follow my timeline there. This is going to be an awesome trip and I can’t wait to go. See you all later!

Yesterday in Electronics, the teacher was updating the school websites snow day page. This was so that when it snowed, the principal can ring him up and get him to put the page up so people know what is going on. This was when I first heard that we were expecting Snow today. The last time we had snow in Dunedin was 23rd July 2007, this exact time last year.

When I woke up in the morning, there had been no snow at ground level. There was a light dusting on some of the hills around Dunedin, but not enough for school to be closed, or delayed. I was a little bumed because I would have enjoyed a Snow Day. Throughout the day, it was cold and windy, but it didn’t look like there could be snow.

well to my surprise, during the afternoon the weather was starting to turn. I went on through my last classes as per usual and as I left to go home, there was a little bit of snow fall. It was not much, and it quickly passed. Then later on when I got off the bus, it started to snow again, this time a big more. Although it didn’t last very long either, but more than the previous falling. A fair bit later, it started to snow pretty kinda heavy. I managed to get the snow fall on video. This lasted a reasonably long amount of time, but the snow didn’t settle

On another note, this was the first time I have tried out Flickr for video. I still think that Flickr should be for photos only. Although this case could be an exception, where a photo wouldn’t be quite the same as a short video. I suppose short clips you have taken with your camera are alright. The video service is pretty good, nothing revolutionary, but it ties in with Flickr pretty well. I may consider using it again for video where a photograph just wouldn’t show what a video could.

Two weeks ago, during exam week, my sister got a phone call while she was at school. This phone call was from MTV and they called her to confirm her address so they could send her the prize she had won. The prize, it was a Samsung SGH-E250V phone. The next morning, there was a package on our doorstep. It was the phone. My sister had already gone for her exam and wouldn’t be home till later on in the afternoon so I wouldn’t get to see it till then.

When she did get home, she quickly opened it and there is was, a little red box with a cellphone in it. I quickly got the camera and asked her if I could unbox it and take pictures of it. She said it would be okay. I did that and then we put the phone on the charger and left it overnight. Just by looking at it, and reading the instruction manual (who reads instructions anymore) we worked out that her current LG phone is a lot better than the new Samsung, so she would let me use it till I got a real (i)Phone.

I turned it in and had a good 10 minute play with it. It doesn’t have 3G but it has a music player, bluetooth, FM radio, camera that can record video, and the other basics that a phone has. Now I needed a SIM card so I could take the phone. My sister went on for another exam that day and got me one while she was in town. Now I could actually use the phone.

Its a decent phone, I’m pretty happy with it. One of the things I have never had a good chance to play with is Bluetooth. Sending files to and from a computer using Bluetooth is amazing. Its quite quick and pretty easy to do, and the best thing about it, no wires! There is also an issue that I have with the phone. Since is it a slide phone, to access the numberpad, you need to slide the screen up. This is not a simple task, it doesn’t just glide up like the LG Chocolate, you really have to push it. On top of that, it is really hard to grip to slide it up. While this is not really a huge issue, it is really annoying, even more so if you really don’t want to touch the screen and get fingerprints on it.

Other that that minor problem, I am pretty happy with the phone. It is a temporary phone until I get my hands on a Jesus Phone, aka, the Apple iPhone. I can’t wait to be able to carry around one device, a cellphone, a music player, and an internet device. If there is a downside to this phone, and many other phones, its that I expect more from them, and they just don’t deliver like the iPhone Hopefully the temporary phone is very temporary!

The latest release of the best browser ever has just come. The Mozilla crew have done a top job with this version of their Firefox web browser and there are many features that make you all warm and gooey inside. If you need some convincing, carry on reading, otherwise get out of here and go download Firefox 3! You have less than 24 hours to download it to be part of the World Record that Mozilla are trying to achieve, most downloads in 24 hours. Here goes a few reasons why the new Firefox Rocks.

Places - They have completely revamped the bookmarks and it is really fast due to the fact it is stored in a database. History and Bookmarks are accessible from here and are easy to manage in folders and even tags. They have also separated the bookmarks into Bookmarks Menu, Toolbar and Unsorted. I really like how they have done this.

Smart Bar -The address bar isn’t just a standard address bar anymore. It is a lot more powerful. You can type in terms and it will show you where they are, whether its at the start of an address URL or page title, or in the middle or end, wherever the term is, it will find it. It it very good and getting the page you want up there so its very easy to access past pages and sites you have been to with the smart bar.

User Interface -Now, no matter what Operating System you use, Firefox 3 looks unique in all 4. They have made Windows XP, Vista, Mac OS X and Linux all have different themes that make it match the system better. The browser looks more integrated visually with the operating system than looking like something thrown on top of it. It may not be a huge thing feature wise, and may not make the browser work any better, but the refreshed looks is still a big deal.

There are lots of other great features but those are 3 of the most noticeable and wonderful ones. If you are a current Firefox user, its a no brainer to upgrade to 3. Memory management is hugely improved for starters and the whole browser generally is faster and is more solid. Firefox 3 is the future so upgrade as soon as possible, upgrade now!

Over the past month, I have been using a Twitter like services called Plurk. The major difference between this and Twitter is the way they display the messages, or as they call them, Plurks. Where Twitter shows Tweets in a list form, Plurks are shown in a timeline format. At first, I found the site to be a little slow and not as good, but as soon as more of my friends jumped on the bandwagon, the ball started rolling.

One of the things that makes Plurk different from Twitter is the conversations. Replies are threaded with a Plurk, as shown by clicking on the Plurk to drop down the replies people have said. This is better than the way Twitter does it because it don’t show it as a new message, which is a little annoying at times seeing replies to other people in your tweet stream. It just doesn’t make sense.I really like the replies because it makes the site seem a lot more active and fast paced, more like IM or IRC.

Plurk is very smooth, all thanks to AJAX. There is no refreshing of pages, which is a godsend, especially when there is a new Plurk or reply every second. You would be refreshing all the time otherwise. It is also good about notifying you when there are new messages and replies, and marking them as read. I like being able to know what I have and have not read. It makes it so much easier to catch up when I have been away sleeping or at school or away from keyboard.

One of the perks with Plurk is a Karma system. This gives users a way to how they compare with other users on the site. This is much better than judging by who has the most friends or followers, as sometimes its impossible to beat web celebs with that. The karma system is more fair and is based more on messages that friends, although it still is a factor. Although having a ratings system as such does have its downsides, such as people overplurking, aka spamming. This isn’t a huge issue but it could be in the future. I hope they have ways to manage this when it does happen.

I have not had any issues with Plurk and I think it is a great service, better than Twitter in my books. Although this wouldn’t be the case if it wasn’t for my friends and the internet people that friend me and make the Plurking experience more enjoyable and real. If you don’t already have a Plurk account, make one by using my link here. By doing so will note me for your referral and we will automatically be added on each others friends lists. Plurk on my friends!

The new version of Opera came out a couple of days ago. I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to try and alternative browser that wasn’t Internet Explorer or Firefox. When I saw the news on the Digg front page, one feature really stood out. This was Opera Link. I wanted to see how well it performs and if it, along with other features was enough for me to take Opera as seriously as I do Firefox. Could this play around make me a switcher?

There were a few surprising things I loved about Opera right off the bat. The first one being a feature called Speed Dial. This is a page displayed when you open a new tab, and it gives you access to your 9 favourite websites. You can choose what websites you put there and it had a thumbnail of the site along with the title underneath for quick access to the sites you access the most.

Another great feature of Opera is the tab preview. When you hover your mouse over a tab on the tab bar for a few seconds, a little thumbnail will display of the current page, and when you scroll your cursor over the other tabs, the thumbnail will change to the website tab hovered. This may sound a little useless but when you have quite a few tabs open, its a great way to find the webpage you are looking for in your tab bar.

On the topic of tabs, I also love the way Opera handles the Ctrl+Tab keyboard shortcut for switching tabs. Unlike in other browsers where it would switch you over to the next tab, Opera shows a little menu with all you current tabs and you can keep tabbing through them till you get to the one desired and that page will come up. It is much cleaner than having to focus half a dozen tabs to get to the one you desire. Also if you go into the options, you can incorporate tab thumbnails, so along with the titles in the menu, you also get a visual aide.

The final feature that really appealed to me was Opera Links. This is a service provided by Opera that synchronizes your browser bookmarks, speed dial and the personal bar (known as the bookmarks toolbar in Firefox.) All the information goes to the cloud and can be synchronized across browsers. And as an added bonus, you can also access your bookmarks and speed dial right from the Opera Links website. This is useful if you are using an alternative browser or a mobile browser and allows you to view all your bookmarked sites right from in the browser.

Now, my Opera experience did come with a few annoyances. One thing I did find odd is the search on the speed dial. I don’t think it is necessary to have that there due to there being a Google search tool on the address bar. I believe that it would be much more useful as a bookmarks and history search, instead of another web search. And while we are on Bookmarks, I didn’t find the bookmarks manager anywhere near as powerful as Firefox’s Places. I am so use to having my Bookmarks Toolbar, Bookmark Menu and General Bookmarks all separate, but still together in a unified place. With Opera, the Personal Bar was completely separate from the other general bookmarks, which is the same as the bookmarks menu. This is not Opera’s fault this annoyed me, I’m just so use to the new way Firefox manages bookmarks that I find the old way frustrating.

The default Opera UI is a bit of a mess compared to other browsers. I don’t understand why everyone wants to change things! Internet Explorer removed/hid the File menu, and Opera thinks that they would prefer to have the Address bar and Tab bar switched around. This is a little annoyance and should not be a problem one you get use to and familiar with it.

Being so use to the Firefox way of browsing, the pop-up password notification box is here, and annoying! Its not too bad because the website still logs on in the background and you can wait for it to successfully log in before saving your password, but I would still prefer it out of the way completely. And while we are at password saving, the Wand password manager is a little different from others. When you go to a site with a saved password, other browsers would auto-complete the username and password fields. Opera on the other hand highlights the edges. I have no idea what this means and ended up typing my username and password again. It wasn’t till a few sites later I noticed a wand icon in the address bar and clicked it and the fields filled in with my login details. It would have been nice to have a notification bubble telling me how to use it the first time this happens just so a new user like myself is aware.

My last minor gripe with Opera is Google. Yes, Google. I use a lot of Google’s services and it was a little annoying to not have them work as well as they do in Firefox, and Internet Explorer. Gmail was stripped down and didn’t have a lot of the cool display that it does in Firefox. It seemed a little stripped down. Also I couldn’t be invisible on GTalk inside Gmail and I couldn’t use any of the Gmail Lab features. I also got an error message on Google Notepad. I could still use it perfectly fine and it looks normal to me, but there was an error message there for some reason. That was just odd. My iGoogle page has quite a few gadgets and one of the gadgets didn’t like Opera, so it caused it to keep refreshing the page. This made iGoogle unusable. I am also disappointed that there is no Google Gears for Opera either. I understand that this is not really Opera’s fault, it’s Google’s, but nevertheless, I still found it to be worthwhile to mention.

In conclusion, I feel that Opera is a great browser, and with a few tweaks and a bit of getting use to, Opera could be a perfect browser. Its memory and CPU usage was as good, if not better than Firefox 3 RC1’s, and it was very stable. Did playing around with Opera 9.5 make me want to switch. No, I’m still a Firefox user and will continue to do so for a while now. But in saying that, I am going to keep Opera around. It is an amazing alternative browser, second best, and I will use it when I need to use another browser for certain tasks.