The extended Christmas weekend has been a period of stunning weather in Wellington. I’ve been forgetting what wind is like, no doubt I’ll be reminded soon enough. We took advantage on Boxing Day and took a walk up the coast at the Mackays Crossing end of Queen Elizabeth Park, specifically the Wetland Walk and the […]
Mum’s birthday and driving north
Our final day in Timaru and the main reason we’d come down, Mum’s birthday. The morning was spent preparing food and getting everything ready for brunch as a bevy of family arrived. There were copious pancakes and croissants, fruit and Christmas mince pies. And then it was time for a birthday cake to be presented. […]
Strawberry Fare
Our trip down south coincided with the Waimate Strawberry Fare, a celebration of the local crop that has become a well known event. We parked at the home of Waimate legendary teacher Mary Firth (also fantastic Aunty) and headed inside for a chat. Mary produced a suitcase full of interesting things for Alayna to play […]
Steampunk Oamaru
Oamaru was on the list of places to visit while we were down south so one morning we drove south to check out the steampunk capital of New Zealand. Our first stop, naturally enough, was at Steampunk HQ. It was simple enough to recognise where we were going, there aren’t many buildings with a strange […]
Timaru for a few days
From Hanmer Springs we continued on towards Timaru with a couple of stops in Christchurch, one to pick up some duplo we’d bid for on TradeMe and a second stop at Riccarton Mall to stretch the legs. We were looking for some new shoes for Alayna and found a pair on big discount at Rebel […]
The kiwifruit incident
We left St Arnaud in the morning with a plan to do a morning walk before lunch. This worked out quite well other than a couple of incidents, one during the walk and one afterwards. Lake Rotoroa was the first stop and we had lovely views from the pier and got to watch a swan […]
St Arnaud, Lake Rotoiti, Mount Robert and a fire alarm
Day two of our holiday and more walking in store. We again took the Black Valley walk and had a look around the lake shore. This morning’s destination was the Brunner Peninsula Nature Walk and as we neared the start point we could see a group of people congregated at the lake side taking in […]
A big boat, driving and a forest walk
Our December family holiday saw us take an early morning ferry from Wellington heading to the South Island. Earlier in the year I had won a return sailing with Bluebridge and our first journey across Cook Strait was taken on the Strait Feronia. We spent a lot of time in the family room which we […]
A Summer Holiday – Napier & Hastings
Our last three nights of our holiday were spent in Napier. Travis was also in town having spent the last few nights our tramping so we met up in Hastings at the weekly night market for some good food. There were a few craft stalls and a dozen or so food stalls from which we […]
A Summer Holiday – Whangarei
Our most northward destination was the Bainbridge home near Whangarei and we had a relaxing week with family around Christmas. From watching the daily antics of the numerous quail families, checking out the other wildlife such as the kereru after seen visiting the big puriri tree at the bottom of the front yard or the […]
A summer holiday – Hamilton
We had a couple of nights in Hamilton and we spent our free day wandering in the city and later on going for a walk to visit Adam’s school. I had told Bridget about a photo competition I am looking at entering which has a theme around tea in an urban setting. Bridget though the […]
A summer holiday – Turangi
We were to spend Christmas 2014 in Whangarei and our plan was to drive north over a few days, staying in Turangi and Hamilton to break up the journey. So first stop Turangi. We left Porirua on a Friday night with the thought that Alayna would sleep for most of the journey. I guess next […]