The England rugby boys have been let loose in Queenstown in New Zealand's south island, the unofficial home of extreme sports, and in the past 24 hours the players have been like kids in a candy store.
Amongst the various ski-ing and 4x4 opportunities many, such as Dylan Hartley, Chris Ashton and Ben Foden, have had a go at the "Big 4" in a day - namely helicoptering over the New Zealand Alps, white water rafting, jet-boating and the Nevis bungy jump.
Right now they will be fast asleep, tired but contented, after the kind of day any boy would die for. I mention all this because I, too, know Queenstown pretty well, and have had a go at most of the above, although my abiding memories of the jewel of the Southern Alps is two days trekking in the mountains with a photographer friend of mine called Michael Thomas.
On day one we summitted Ben Lomond, which is just under 6,000 feet tall. It was a stiff old climb and took some doing, which is why we hugged like Hillary and Tenzing when we reached the top and, through the mist and clouds, surveyed the view.
Tired we slumped to our haunches panting but the silence was interrupted by the sound of another climber who turned out to be an English girl who was practically running up the mountain side. I offered her some chocolate, only to then discover she had a rather large friend behind her who took the remaining slab from my bar.
Somehow our "achievement" had been somewhat diluted. The next day Mike and I went on a 8-hour trek through a mountain range but were rather optimistic about our pace and ended up lost, tired and increasingly concerned as the dusk turned to night. Thankfully Mike's wife, Meg, came to the rescue in her 4x4 as we shone our mobile phones in her direction from across a mountain river.
Mike and I would later get to walk for 8 hours along the Great Wall of China during the Beijing Olympics with a local guide called George who ended up lagging 100 metres behind us and ended the day by stating that he had dishonoured himself. It wasn't George's fault. It was those two girls on Ben Lomond!
