Operation: $$ accumulation

photos and stories to come in a week or two once i'm back in New Zealand. For now i'm chilling in the Austrian hills, Zillertal It snowed last night and rained today so not much room to get any rock climbing done - fingers crossed for tomorrow

i'm not in europe anymore toto.

first couple of weeks were spent hanging out in and around bonn and aachen, catching up with friends + girlfriend's family. Plus a wedding that was somewhere in belgium i think (dunno, was a lot of drinking). Then it was paris -> hang out with a friend -> fontainebleau and a week of sandstone bouldering paradise. Next some time in Lyon. Somehow i don't have photos from this first part of the trip, i'm hoping the missing memory card is in germany somewhere... From Lyon it was off to the mountains near grenoble (just up the hill from la grave in valle de romanche). Spent a week chilling/climbing/hiking up there.

here is a picture of a mountain taken from my tent. I didn't climb it. A bunch of people died up there one day while i was drinking beer next to my tent . Drinking beer obviously >>> climbing mountains with french without a clue



here is my tent. I like my tent. I have spent over 500 nights in my tent. My tent is getting old and may need to be replaced soon.



this was the only beer we could buy close to where we were staying. A nice dog tried to steal it. Better luck next time buddy



I went for a walk. Saw heaps of marmots. Didn't catch any. Got a pic though



My girlfriend came walking too. I have a cool orange hat. She doesn't like it.



i saw a glacier and lake and mountains and stones



and cool flowers that look like cotton candy icecreams!

anyway, then grenoble and some climbing in criminal heat. Too hot. Up to Annecy for a planned short stay that evolved into almost two weeks. We went climbing about 20 days on the trip, and took pretty much no climbing photos - not sure how that happened. Here is my girlfriend and her shadow coming back down from a climb somewhere around annecy.



i saw this bottomfeeder and thought instantly of shortstacks back when they infested the 100bb games



then i took a photo of the bottomfeeder and baby bottomfeeder in the context of a cliche holiday photo in some european resort town next to a lake



time to move again, and best graffiti all trip, shame i was wearing my pack when i saw it and didn't think to take it off for the photo



Then we ended up with some friends in the Zillertal valley in Austria. Plan was to do heaps of climbing. It snowed while we were there, and rained. We got a few days in, but mostly ate and drank and complained about the weather. Here's some cheap organic austrian beer from a super-discount supermarket. In the background the ingredients to a classic french old-man-drinking-in-a-cafe-mid-morning drink, creme de cassis + cheap white wine = kir (second in popularity after pastis based on my observations)



then germany and another pretty flower, this time somewhere up the hill from an alpine botanic garden and a crazy bavarian wooden castle thing



the servants quarters from the old castle are now a restaurant, so we ate tasty beer and goulash and more



and then i found some playing cards, what's up with those queens?



from there it was back to munich, a train to frankfurt (arrived midnight), met some people (canadians), started drinking, stopped drinking around 9am to have breakfast, spent the day using coffee to stay awake while i explored frankfurt, off to the airport for my 8pm flight, 10hrs later i was stopping over in seoul, 3hrs later i was getting onto another flight, 12hrs later i was having problems at customs at Auckland airport in NZ, 3hrs later i was in christchurch. Fun ride.

and now, ten weeks since i left the winter and i'm sitting back in NZ. FTP still isn't up and running so it's time to try and remember my poker stars account details. I think there might be $50 sitting in neteller from a slow process test withdrawal after FTP -> neteller stopped working so well, otherwise i'll have to load up from life money.

Things are good.

so, turns out I had some money left online. One of the neteller test withdrawals i had been running every few days after black friday hadn't processed until after i left the country. So, I have an online bankroll of $50. I'll run that up on stars starting at the bottom. If i get bored doing that (likely) I'll simply make a deposit I guess.

watch out 2nl!

cool pics

must have been one hell of a trip

Originally Posted by daven

so, turns out I had some money left online.I have an online bankroll of $50. I'll run that up on stars starting at the bottom. If i get bored doing that (likely) I'll simply make a deposit I guess.

watch out 2nl!

i don't like the stars interface as much as ftp's. I started working on some mods, but realised that it's going to take far too long to be worthwhile. Anyone use the tiltbusters mods that have an increased font size?

I do like that stars isn't busto (unlike so many poker sites). $50 has grown slowly at da 2enelles, I moved up once i'd made 20bi at the stake. There is some promotion running that will mean i'll be platinum star in a few days which means i'll earn some fpps once i get a roll going. I haven't bought any bonus or earned any stellar rewards yet, but i'm playing 5nl well rolled and i guess i'll look at moving up to 10nl at $180? Supernova from $50 in 5 months? could be tight.
ahh, grinding a roll from the bottom. Kinda fun, kinda boring, kinda perversely satisfying.

in b4 "fucking nit, just deposit $2k and get on with it"