So this weekend was a long one for Waitangi Day. Had a great night on the Thursday at Sparks in the Park.. classical music and fireworks. Excellent. This time (sans camera) set to the William Tell overture (the won wot the young boy stands while his dad shoots an arrow through an apple)… quite good in fireworks.

Anyway – then Friday morning headed off with Steve & Michelle, Andrew, Amy, Maaike and I. Cedar Flats is over on the West Coast of New Zealand close to Hokitika. I should put a map in but I’m afraid I’m feeling lazy (as you would be after the amount of walking we did on Saturday!)

The first day is a 4 hour walk up a valley to reach the huts (no pics). There were quite a few people so we elected to camp… much the best choice as it meant we were a swingbridge closer to the hot pools.

From time to time the wind blows more than at others. I’m even reading a book on it called ‘The New Zealand Weather Book’… climate change modellers must be *quite* clever. Hopefully. Anyway – there were a few trees down to slow progress, but still, all good. We saw (left) the biggest moss in the world (wikipedia quote below)… and a weevil too. Oooohhh

The tallest land moss, a member of the Polytrichidae is probably Dawsonia superba, a native to New Zealand and other parts of Australasia.

So yes, a lovely well earned soak in the hot pools that night. I *love* being able to walk 4 hours, put up a tent, make some yum food (blue cheese, bacon, sour cream, and couscous) and then walk 10 mins to Gods own bath (if He/She/They had one). Honestly.. it’s magic..

(second nights dinner – well, Steve’s lot – Maaike and I had curry)

The next day was the long one – off up to Mullins Creek hut. Seemed like it should have been an easy one (certainly how Steve sold it ;) But ended up being a 9 hour walk – which is old enough for my thirtysomething bones. Sigh. Lovely little hut though..

So that was it really… quite looking forward to a more relaxed few days, and then Billy Connolly on Friday.. should be really excellent. Well, hopefully, he is getting on ;)

P.S. Hope I’m not putting in toooo many pictures?

Maaike was determined that I should do something new for my birthday.. I chose horse riding (from that or surfing). Stupidly opting for the 2.5 hour trip rather than the one hour. 10 day meditation course instead of a 3 day… you think you’d learn?!?

On the way there was to be a competitive element to the weekend (I learned on the way there) and Maaike had found out the location of Dutch Golf, one thinks she was trying to give herself the edge. Heh.

Basically it’s golf, played in a field, with a 4 inch diameter ball with the clubs head being shaped like a clog.

Maaike did manage to take the ladies title… but still wasn’t *quite* enough ;)

Next it was on to horse riding. Now, there is a reason I’ve never tried this ‘sport’ – or whatever it is.. and I didn’t know that Maaike had taken lessons for two years and was really quite comfortable with the beasties.

Anyway.. my horse, named Katie, was a nice enough beast. Quite content to follow along behind the leader. She did, at a pretty regular basis jerk her head sharply downwards to try and get the rains out of my hand. This was so that she could then eat away uninterrupted (above).

Katie did like to attack any horses that got close to her – so had to be quite careful that she didn’t see anyone passing her ..

About 4.5 seconds into the trip, the leader (a lovely German lady) said “Would you like to trot”.. and Maaike, after looking at my terrified face shouted “Yes please, that would be just great”. Or something like that, I’ve tried to blot the painful memory from my almost damaged head.

I was rubbish at trotting. Did not get the rhythm at all. At all. I felt quite sorry for Katie.. in fact, that’s what I really didn’t like about horse riding.. it just didn’t seem fair putting my 85kg ish lump on an animals back and cruising about in 35 degree heat. Poor things.

The picture above of Maaike on her own was hilarious. She was given a last opportunity to canter – and off she went, pointed the horse uphill, and did the whole clicky thumpy thing.. and her horse (Sultami sp?) quite refused to move. For at least 2 minutes. Ish.

We were lucky to get to go riding at all – as Hanmer has been quite dry.

So dry that the forests have been closed and we weren’t able to go mountain biking. Probably an escape for me – I wilt in the heat.

Did manage to get another game of mini-golf in though..

I dunno how bad her family must be if Maaike is the family champ. Depressing really. ;)

Oh – and my blog is now XHTML Transitional. So there. (from this point on.. no, can’t be bothered re doing all the posts).

update
I have been threatened with disembowelment if I don’t mention this. I was walking back to the van ready to drive back to ChCh when Maaike said “Do you want the good news or the bad news”. Opting to get the bad news out of the way ASAP, she brought me over to the van and pointed to the keys, locked on the inside. I thought she was joking – but after trying all the windows and doors it seemed she really had locked them inside.

Then she started laughing.. and showed me that she had taken my key off the keyring, put another in it’s place, and then put it in the van (so it looked like the distinctive van keyring was there).

It was, moderately amusing.

Well I think this would have to go down as one of my favourite parties to date. The theme was ‘formalish garden party’ – and it was a joint celebration of my friend Michelle and I (we both share January 21st as our birthday).

I had absolutely no backup plan if the weather turned bad, and it was thunder and lightning about 10 days before so I was a tad nervous.

It was just so great having lots of friends over, and everyone got into the spirit of things – playing croquet and pétanque and hoop-la.

Thanks to Andreas Baumgaertner for most of these pictures!

My cousin Thomas brought over 2 bottles of Pimms for me, and Maaike too on her way back from Australia. This was a good basis for a garden party I thought!. Steve had 2 brilliant ideas which were to plonk a spare fridge in the garden and fill it with ice. In effect a giant cool box. Brilliant. The other great idea was to hook up some lights so that we could go on playing volleyball and chatting into the night. Brilliantly brilliant.

And now, in no particular order, pictures from the party.

And on into the night it went… it was a really warm evening so the tough people amongst us were able to stay in t-shirts ;) Croquet also seemed to get more interesting for some people after a few drinks and Magnus’ excellent instruction earlier in the day! Glynn and Jayne were also down for the party which was really kind of them. Mhairi was over from Melbourne where she had been attending a conference at the Australian Open. I get the feeling she is more than a little tempted to move back to this hemisphere – if career opportunities allow.

So yes, a really lovely party – had so much fun.. if I’m lucky enough to be still in this house (Mrs. Bennett – our 83 year old landlady also came out for a glass of Pimms (and stayed for two))… then I think this might have to be done again.

Just before Christmas DOC bought a large tract of land North of Hamner Springs – for NZ$60m I think? Something like that… adding a lot more land onto what is the St. James Walkway National Parky-ish Area. Anyway.. we thought we’d head in there for a tramp.

Maaike had a visiting Dutch friend – super fun and sporty – Veronique, who came along with us.

It was quite an interesting area really.. seemed like steep valleys all over the place (which I completely forgot to take pictures of ;)

Along the way Steve would periodically look under rocks, as in an entomologists want, and we did see this quite cool transition of a centipede? shedding its old skin (the orange) and coming out blue.

Along the way we introduced Veronique to river crossings. I have pretty much given up on even bothering to think about hoping to have a chance of maybe keeping my feet try on tramps. I would imagine that the number of tramps I have been on where my feet haven’t got wet is a lot less than a quite small number.

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-4334415523266204539]

After much merrymaking we got to Lake Guyon hut. It is a 4 bunk hut, and as we’d not seen anyone (but a few mountain bikers) for the day we hoped it would be ours. But no, the Belgians had invaded. Nice people though… they had taken 2 1/2 years off. 2 1/2 years. Nice… (though I would go… mental?! ;) ehem, and were spending a lot of their time tramping through the South Island. Also there is a picture of Steve with our cheesecake desert!, and a poem.

And a video of the hut.

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=9204198569098935457]

So had a fun evening there, and the next day started the same tramp back out. We thought about heading back over a different saddle but unfortunately, as we were crossing over a small (but quite slippery) stream, Veronique fell awkwardly.. and my 3rd trip involving a helicopter was about to start.

We all stopped, and while Maaike was quite heroic bandaging up her ankle – Steve showed me these really cool active-predator spiders. They can swim, and don’t make webs (except as a nursery). Should have made a video. Anyway… we started walking out (for about 20m) before it became obvious that even if we could get out – it wouldn’t be until 3am.

So Steve and I hiked back to the car, drove into Hamner, called the police on the way, and quite soon after that a helicopter was organised. So Maaike ended up with a free $2.5K helicopter ride as she got to accompany Veronique back in it.

If you are ever unfortunate enough to get into an accident in New Zealand.. then ACC is the free state accident insurance cover, and it will look after you. The heli trip, A&E;, etc. etc. is *all free*. For New Zealanders (not sure about the rest) your salary is also paid (up to 80%). It also means, basically, that there is very little personal litigation – though unfortunately it is trying to creep in.

So, if you walk down the street / across my garden / in the hills, trip, break your leg you can’t sue anyone! ACC will pick you up, dust you off, and put you back together. It’s a magic system. And it works for anyone who is on NZ soil *regardless of nationality or reciprocity. So there. Another great reason to move / live here. No lawyers.. or few. Deadly.

Oh, and before any Kiwi’s think we were frivolous calling the helicopter.. it turned out to be a compound fracture of the ankle – and really was just an unlucky accident. The doctors said it was a really good thing we stopped and called a heli as if she’d walked far on it, it definitely would have been far more serious to fix.

Also, Sylvia is back visiting from Scotland, she was given a bottle of wine with her family name on it.. and looks quite happy about it :)

Hopefully she and Mark move back soon.

Ok, so stole this (again) from Marcel (thanks Marcel).. A couple of countdowns.. one.. to when I turn ancient. Get a zero in my age. Yes, I know most of you are thinking this is pathetic… but you try turning 30 if you haven’t already. I think you’ll find it’s very hard to either

• Turn 30 again
• Turn 30 any quicker

.

So leave the commentary to me. Please. Actually don’t ;)

Anyway… in [countdown will appear here] amount of time I will turn 30.. (roughly – always find timezones a bit tricksy) but 08:30 on the 21st..

And in [countdown will appear here] is when I am having a party (on the sat).. please Skype if you get the chance :) Be only lovely to hear from you!