Yay, just back from a week travelling around the S.Island with Lorcan (Special Guest Spot post from Lorcan coming soon…) but yay – Steve&Yvonne;&Warick;&Michelle; are going to go climbing in Thailand for 3 weeks – meeting on the 15th Nov… So excited.. I’ll prob just join for 2 of the 3 weeks.. but it’s just so great.. any Irish climbers tempted to come too ;)

So on Friday we launched a piece of software I’ve been working on for the last couple of months.. (when I’ve not been holidaying somewhere ;) It’s a system for logging calls in the contact centre – classifying the call with respect to ‘what the call was about’ ‘who called’ ‘what was done with it’ etc.. and then if there’s follow up action to be taken it’s easy to log a request..

Aaanyway – it seems to have gone well and that’s kinda satisfactory..

Then my college friend Lorcan arrived. No rest for the wicked… arranged a party in his honour.. pretty much ;) well, good excuse anyway. Mulled wine + mince pie – my favourite. Really fun night – though I’m not sure how the next morning was for everyone ;)

At the party my friend Marcel said he was heading out sea-kayaking in Akaroa – and Lorcan got an invite. Lucky thing… well, I think after 2 hours paddling back against the tide he wasn’t quite sure how lucky he was…. :)

I was planning on tidying the house and getting ready for a road trip – but easily persuadable as I am.. I headed off snow boarding with Dave, Emma and Sarah.. lots of fun – once I managed to get the hang of nut-crackers again .. I spent about 30 mins – at least – trying to grab on and falling onto my bum.. still, once I got the hang of it again I was happy enough on the slopes. Though I do seem to have issues going from toes -> heels.. ahh well, will get there eventually.

This pic was off castle hill as we drove by..

Then back to watch the lions loose again – though a much better match. And now, off in the BMW again – up through Lewis Pass, and back down via the glaciers and Wanaka.. well.. that’s the plan anyway!! :)

map.swf

The map is kinda fun, you can zoom in and stuff on it too – I’m going to spruce it up a wee bit – but you can test it out here. I actually bought this application (for $5) it’s called Indy Junior. You can add links etc. to it.. quite fun.

Well, this is the rough plan. Africa is out now as it was quite a bit more expensive – but more than that, I’ll be seeing mum and dad in Dublin for christmas anyway, so it doesn’t really make too much sense. I’ll get there before they finish up with their aid work though.

6 months I have decided is simply not long enough to travel.. OZ is getting a more thorough looking over, and then a 2 1/2 month trip through Asia.. not long enough – but enough to see a bit I guess :)

Still, it’s really exciting stuff.. It’s SO much fun planning it all. And then back to ChCh in Febuary – to make this residence stuff permanent.. hopefully there’ll be a job for me too…

Finally, on my last day in Northlands – I took the Fullers Cream Trip. A long time ago (in a galaxy far fa – no – in New Zealand actually) the islands in the Bay Of Islands started dairy farming. They needed a boat to come around the islands and collect the milk and cream (and drop off supplies, collect mail etc) and so the Cream Trip started.

Again, lucky with both the size of the group and the guide (Andrew this time).. we saw rays, all sorts of fish, penguins, two pods of dolphins..

If anyone is feeling rich – this small island was recently put up for sale.

It didn’t reach the price they wanted, so it’s still up for grabs. And no, I didn’t find out (did ask) how much it was going for.. There are some very rich people with holiday homes around here – though fortunately most of the islands are either NZ owned, or state owned.. which isn’t always (sadly) the way of nice NZ property.. :(

So yes, went cruising around the bay

we went out as far as The Hole in the Rock (Cape Brett) so big that you can steer a boat through it. Apparently a boat got stuck in there once.. and even more incredibly (to me) the entire cave can fill up with water in a big swell. That’s insane… it’s HUGE.

Met some lovely ozzies on the boat though, from Brisbane (where I fly into Oz) so that’s kinda cool.. maybe even with climbing contacts..

Then back to get my plane. It was the smallest commercial plane I’ve ever been on – everyone had a window seat ;) But it was good to be back in ChCh and see my breath again! (oh it is cold here! why don’t kiwis believe in insulation and central heating..)

Then on Sunday I took the Dune Rider trip up to Cape Reinga. We were totally lucky with our guide Paul. He was really excellent, knew all the local knowledge, and was happy to make extra stops along the way. Admittedly I planted myself behind the drivers seat and didn’t stop asking questions for 9 hours. But I’m sure he appreciated it ;)

So we stopped at a Kauri grove on the way up. These are massive massive trees – now protected. The can grow to be about oh – 13m in diameter – or something mental like that. Unfortunately the most impressive groves are about 2 hours out of the way – so I’ll HAVE to come back up and visit. They grow incredibly straight, and thus were highly prized for building, ship masts, waka’s etc. So while they were once very extensive, there aren’t so many left now. On the way back (but I’ll put it in now) we visited a kauri woodturning shop. There’s a staircase through the middle of a trunk.. and this is a small one!

Anyway – we visited and old Pa on the way up (wouldn’t usually..) Kinda Celtic in a way – classic fort with ditches + palisade + important buildings inside. Course it all had to change once foreigners came along with their guns..

It was a pretty drive up to cape Reinga.

Now Cape Reinga is the place where spirits travel to before they leave New Zealand and head off to Hawaiki.. (the afterworld). There’s a pahutakawa (spelling?) tree, which is the last place they visit before diving off into the ocean – and here it is.

Just off Cape Reinga is where the Tasman and Pacific Oceans meet – you can see a line (ish) where the two bodies (moving in opposite directions?! / speeds?) meet.

Then it was off to go sandboarding on the giant sand dunes. Paul didn’t initially want to take us to the steepest one, but he changed his mind (we were all pretty keen really). There’s a 3 meg video of sandboarding here

Then we drove down 90 mile beach (officially a road). It’s actually just 64 miles long, but farmers used to bring their cattle to market walking down the beach, and they reckoned they walked 30 miles a day.. hence 90 mile beach..

WE stopped (just like my hero Billy ;) on 90 mile beach and searched in the sand for Tuatua a shellfish. You can (and we did) eat them raw, though I took a few and cooked them up in the evening too.

So yes, all in all an excellent excellent day.. really informative and fun – thanks Paul.