I BROKE MY ARM :(

Last week I rented a mountain bike to ride through some of the mountain bike trails in a place called Rotorua on the North Island of New Zealand. 

There were different trails we could ride on and some were more tricky than others. I had a great time but unfortunately, I went a bit too fast down one of the slopes and lost control of my bike as it took off over a mound (see below). I was thrown off my bike as it landed which was very, very painful - I had not experienced that much pain in a long time! Luckily, I was wearing my helmet because it actually cracked down the side from the impact of my fall but it stopped me from hurting my head.

top: the moment just as I was thrown off my bike

bottom: the moment after

I went to the hospital and had an ultrasound because I had a lot of pain in my stomach and the doctors were worried that I had damaged one of my internal organs. Ultrasounds show an image of your insides and are usually used to show babies inside their mother's stomach. I also had some X-rays on my left knee and left arm as they hurt so much I could barely move them!

The doctors found out that I had fractured my radius, which is one of the bones in your forearm and luckily, I only suffered from severe bruising on my knee and stomach. The fracture occurred when I put my arm down to try and break my fall when I fell off my bike.

My arm is now in a cast to allow the bone to heal, which should take about 6 weeks. It has been a painful experience but I am lucky because it could have been a lot worse! It seems injuries are quite common - I bumped into another guy who was staying at my hostel who had exactly the same injury from mountain biking as me:

It is very inconvenient having only one arm that I can use but at least it was my left arm- typing this blog post has taken ages with one hand! I am also annoyed because I am now on the South Island in a place called Queenstown and everywhere you go there are adverts for amazing activities like rafting, bungy jumping, sky diving, canyon swings etc. but I won't be able to do them until I have recovered :( Hopefully, as soon as I am better, I can book some cool things to do and show you some of videos!

Pics from Waiheke Island, New Zealand

The owner of the house I stayed in was Maori. Hemi taught me about some Maori culture and showed me a taiaha, which is a fighting stick:

Hemi's family:

I was invited to visit Tiana and Keanu's school. They go to a different kind of school to Strand (it is called a Steiner school). There are a lot of outdoors activities and there aren't many children in each class:

At the house, I was responsible for feeding the chickens and collecting eggs every day. We got to eat a lot of omelettes!

Waiheke island is known for its vineyards, where wine is made:

The skeleton mask I made for Halloween:

It was very sad leaving Waiheke island but we have promised to come back to visit Hemi and his family before we leave New Zealand in January. We are now driving South to visit other parts of the North island of New Zealand!