Trekking again (Click photos to enlarge)

The Snow-covered NZ Alps stretch out to the North as
we approached the S Island of New Zealand

Cheryl and Barry walking through the flowering gorse at the beginning of
the Silver Peaks track near Dunedin (photo used with permission of Dianne Hendry).

Unfortunately, the Silver Peaks track deteriorated
into a slippery bog after a short distance (photo used with permission of Dianne Hendry).
















The weather forecast was for clearing showers, however what we experienced was just showers with no sign of clearing. As there have been a number of rescues in this area recently, we took the cautious option and decided to turn back after we encountered high winds on the ridges near pulpit rock (photo used with permission of Dianne Hendry).


Cheryl and I are once again in New Zealand to do some more trekking in what must be one of the world's best bush walking locations - The South Island of New Zealand. It was tremendously exciting to see the Southern Alps as we approached the coast of the South Island. We are here to do some more trekking in this bush walker's paradise.

Our good friends Barry and Di were at the airport to greet us. The original plan was to walk the Milford track before the official season started on 27 October. Unfortunately, recent heavy snow falls have created avalanche danger that has closed the track. So instead we attempted a local Dunedin walk to Jubilee Hut in the Silver Peaks area.When the weather forecast was for clearing showers we set off on our walk. It was pretty muddy for a lot of the way to Pulpit Rock and the showers continued throughout the day. Approaching Pulpit Rock the wind was similar to what we had encountered in Patagonia, blowing us off balance and absolutely freezing! After a quick conference we decided that the safest thing to do was to return to the car while we still had daylight.

Over the Radiation Hurdle and the next one looms large ahead

It has been a tough couple of weeks since I finished the 30 days of Chemo/Radiation therapy. I now have a one month break with no therapy to give my body a chance to recover. I thought that this would be an easy time, but in reality I'm finding it very hard to remain positive because I find myself in a kind of limbo. When I was working through the radiation I guess I had a clear goal and a daily routine that kept me going. Now I find that I am worrying too much about the future, about the medical expenses and every little thing. It's getting a bit out of control and even though I know it is irrational, I can't stop doing it. I have even been waking at two or three in the morning and have to read a book to get back to sleep. The shrink thinks it is a normal response under the circumstances and put me on the higher dose of anti-depressant earlier this week. I am slowly calming down but it will still take some time to return to normal. It 's another hurdle to get over so I'll just have to hang in there and sweat it out I suppose. I wonder if anyone else has experienced this after Radiation therapy?

Radiation Therapy Completed

On Friday I finally had radiation dose number 30, the final one which completed the total dose of 160 Gray of X-ray radiation exposure. In the photo you can see my positioning mask tucked under my arm. It all went remarkably well apart from a few episodes when I ran out of the anti-nausea drug zofran. I now have a one month rest from the chemo therapy and I am really looking forward to that.

The end is in sight- Only 5 days of radiation to go

As I approach the final week of the six week combined radiation and Chemo therapy, the patchy hair loss from the radiation is now obvious as you can see in the photo. I must say that this this hair loss gives me some comfort that the therapy is being effective at killing the fast growing cells. If the hair cells are dying, that makes me more hopeful that the tumour cells are also dying.

Climbing again at Kangaroo Point

Now that I have the nausea caused by the combined chemo and radiation therapy under control again with Zofran, I have found that my legs and arms are still strong enough to return to climbing. So, for the last two Wednesday evenings I have returned to the regular gang of climbers. Because there is still a small chance of having a seizure I have restricted myself to climbing only. Not belaying, because it would be too big a risk to have me controlling the rope for someone else. I completed some of the easier climbs but Kiwi, the one pictured here, was a bit too much for me at this stage. I fell at the crux and did not have the strength to complete the route. However, I'm sure it will come back after a couple more weeks of practice. It's fantastic to be back on the rock and it feels like I'm applying Lance Armstrong's "livestrong" motto. I think it should be more than "livestrong", "liveintense" seems more appropriate because you need to take your mind off the tumour and live life as intensly as possible in these circumstances.

The fine art of avoiding vomiting

I have been learning a lot about the art of anti-nausea over the last five days. On Thursday I ran out of the anti-nausea drug zofran and had to switch to Maxolon instead. Up until now I have been lucky enough to not have any vomiting problems. But Friday's visit to the radiation clinic was another story and taugh me a new lesson. While waiting in the waiting room I started to feel extremely unwell and while sitting there I was planning my emergency escape route if I needed a hurl. And sure enough, next thing I know I was sprinting for the front door then the garden. After suffering all weekend I finally got to talk to my oncologist this morning and he suggested I see my GP about getting a prescription for some more Zofran. After a very queasy morning, and a lot of help from Cheryl (she's an angel!) we finally got hold of the Zofran and the change was miraculous! Just one tablet and suddenly the nausea all went away! I don't know what it is about that drug but it sure works better than Maxolon for me...

only 17 days to go to some more good times

Here is a photo of the pretty pattern I get imprinted on my nose each day after 10 minutes of being squashed by the face mask.

I'm starting to wonder if this blog is really helping anyone? It started out being some positive stories about living with a brain tumour (something you do not normally read on brain tumour blogs), but since the second recurrence I'm afraid the harsh reality of it all has brought me back to earth and here I am reporting on surgery, chemo and radiation instead. However, that said, after completing the thirteenth day of radiation therapy on Friday, it means that there are now only 17 days to go before I get back to some serious living and reporting on something more positive! By then, I hope that the temodal and radiation will have done the job and cleaned up the tumour cells remaining after the surgery. This time I'm hoping for at least five years before another recurrance. There are so many walks to walk and cliffs to climb!