Last couple of weekends I’d been hoping to get out snowboarding like I was this time last year.. but no joy. There’s just been hardly any snow in the Cragieburn range (where most of the club fields are). Looks like when my brother Matt arrives (yay) in a month or so we’ll have to head down to Wanaka / Queenstown to find the white stuff.

So – two weekends away Dave Aubrey got back from Canada, and I suspect serious jetlag was the reason he assented to coming on a tramp! We headed on a short 2 hour tramp in the lewis pass – to the Nina hut. Good times.

Then last weekend headed up to Steve and Yvonnes lovely bach (holiday home) in Arthurs Pass. Again hoping to get out snowboarding but no joy. Went on some nice walks in the national park and had a mid-winter feast on the Saturday night. Afterwards the others stayed up and played Cranium.. I’m still getting tired really early these days (leftovers from January’s craziness!) but managed to chip in a few answers…

Well I had a lazy weekend (again – this is becoming a nasty habit!), must try to get away this weekend. I was hoping to have been able to get snowboarding, but unfortunately there was lots of warm weather and rain which has washed a lot of the snow away. Apparently down south (Wanaka/Queenstown) is good – so will probably have to head down there when my brother matt arrives. Hopefully by then there’ll be lots of snow in Canterbury too.

I also had the pleasure of celebrating the engagement of Warick and Hannah. They had a few friends over on the Saturday night and it was a really lovely evening. They’ve really make the house into a very nice home.

I also got out a copy of Harry Potter and Half Blood prince which is the last book in the harry potter series. I wanted to re-read it in anticipation of the final book which comes out in 16 days or so. I’ll probably not do much else that weekend except reading! Though I do hate finishing good books! It’s such a shame :)

Recently blogger upgraded and made everyone stop using blogger accounts and start using google accounts. Slightly irritating but not the end of the world.

Anyway, I had to make a new account so that people can still post. If you want to post a picture either create a google account and drop me an email and I can register you as a named account… or log in and post anonymously as
username : picaweek
password : 123picaweek

Last weekend I headed up to Wellington to spend a weekend with Glynn & Jayne, and to see my friends Jackie and Mairead who are also working up in Wellington. I was due to fly out on Thursday evening but unfortunately there were some nasty storms and the flight was cancelled. Not that I can complain as I was on a ‘Buddy’ ticket with my friend Matt – so the return trip only cost $80.

So flew up on the Friday morning, and Glynn and Jayne collected me from the airport. Shortly after arriving we walked 50m down the road to the local coffee & ice-cream shop. The people who work there know Glynn & Jayne by name and their usual orders off by heart! And they’ve only been living there for a couple of months! The ice-cream really was superb though.

All in all it was a pretty lazy weekend. One of the hilights for me was going to see Old St Paul’s a 19th century gothic revival church. Matt’s girlfriend Silke works there. It’s a beautiful old (for NZ) wooden building with a really peaceful feeling to it. The other highlight was playing pool in the pool hall where Stickmen was filmed.

I’m sure I put on at least a couple of kilo’s with the amount of food and drink consumed, but all in all well worth it.

No pictures I’m afriad this time, but spent a very enjoyable weekend hiking to the otahake hot springs in Arthurs Pass. It’s a 4 1/2 hour (leisurely) walk in with the reward of being able to sit in really nice hot pools surrounded by mountains beneath a blanket of stars (poetic or what?!).

I was most impressed by two of the party who brought in a 6 month old baby. He was remarkably well behaved.. great to see that having a kid doesn’t stop them getting out and about.

Looking forward to the weekend – I’m off up to Wellington to see Glynn & Jayne, Jackie (eng friend from TCD) and Mairead (another TCD friend).. should be a great weekend (if a little inebriated on Sat night!)

On a lighter note – NZ houses (in particular mine) are utterly pathetic for their lack of insulation, double glazing and central heating. I sleep on thick (flanalette) sheets, under a duvet, a down jacket with a hot water bottle with a hat on! If there’s one bad thing about NZ this would have to be it. Well, that and distance – but that’s the reason NZ is as wonderful as it is.