No Exit - Part 1

A little story about how Frank changed my life. Three days ago, I pulled into a little town called Wanaka looking for a bed for the night. When I called the only place in town that would possibly have a bed open, I got a busy signal. I tried again a minute later and it turned out that the phone was busy because they were booking the last bed. I can usually sleep just about anywhere, so sleeping in the car was no big deal. I wanted to find some out of the way place to park for the night, so I headed out of town down a random little road. A few minutes into the drive, I passed a sign that read, "No Exit." I figured I could park and sleep at the end of this road, wherever that was. One hour later I pulled into the most beautiful place I had ever seen.
The next morning, I found a sign that pointed to a couple of day hikes down in the valley. The surrounding views kept getting better and better as I made my way into the valley. In two hours, I reached a decent sized "hut" that had 38 bunks. It was only 11:00, so I set out on a hike that was supposed to take 2.5 hours but at the end of that trail, I came to a sign that pointed to another hut that was another two hours away. I was a little worried about the time it would take me to get back, so I decided to turn around after an hour. An hour in, I sensed that I was close to the hut, so I set my pack down and started to speed climb/ run up the trail. It was sort of a stupid decision because it was starting to rain and there was a chance I would get stuck in the dark without a light or shelter on the way back. Continuing up the trail ended up being the best stupid decision I have ever made. The views from the top were absolutely amazing. I left my camera in my pack, so none of you will ever know just how amazing, but trust me, they were amazing. The rain let up and I made it back to the hut before dark, so there was really no harm done.
This is part one of a two part description of my past few days. Part two is even better.