We headed biking for the long weekend (kings birthday) – an overnight trip to Spencer park. We loaded up the panniers (tent, clothes, food etc.) and headed off. The follow-me worked really well. We hooked Anna on until we reached the red-zone and then she biked all of the way through it, and then hooked on again up to Bottle Lake, and then she biked through there (with some pushing assistance from Maaike).
We met up with Ian and Amelie, and Mark + Orla and Saoirse at the campground. It was fairly chilly, but, we all survived – thrived even. The campsite was undergoing maintenance and the recent flooding hadn’t been kind, but, it all went really well all things considered. I did think the $60 for a nights camping was pretty steep to be honest. It’s kind of a shame that trips like this aren’t completely trivially affordable. Probably a DOC campsite with no showers would have been a bunch cheaper. I mean it’s fine, but, yeah, everything feels quite expensive at the moment!
The next morning, biked home again via Sue’s place in New Brighton. All in all a really excellent trip.
*OK, so, technically not a fashion competition, but, I still totally won a $50 prize for being the best dressed on pink shirt day. I coupled it with my gamblings winnings from buying TSLS a while back and bought the board game ticket-to-ride. Anna took one look at it and decided it was too complicated for now. Hey ho.
Oh, and I also gave blood for the first time. I’m A+ of course ;) NZ only recently allowed people from UK/Ireland to donate because of CJD, so, I finally got round to it. They did have nice biscuits as advertised.
Other than that, went biking, felt very unfit but had a good time.
Had a nice time at the private Physiotherapy pool at Burwood hospital that Mark has access to. That was a fun diversion on a rainy day for the kids.
Anna started playing football, in defense (apparently all Jongerius’ descendants end up in defense, it’s in the genes)
A little while ago we bought a follow-me tandem second hand on TradeMe. Our friends Nic and Leigh had one and it looked great. It basically allows attaching a kids bike onto an adults bike so that the front wheel gets lifted up and so the entire thing becomes one connected unit. Works really well.
Anyway, we did a test-ride from Kaiapoi out to Waikuku beach and back again. It was about 40km but I only recorded about half before my battery ran out.
Anna probably rode about half, maybe a bit less, and the device worked really well. It’s super fun to be able to do adventures again where we all get a bit of exercise. We’ll certainly be doing a lot more of this I’m quite sure!
My friend Darragh is exactly 10 days younger than I am. Every year on my birthday I get an email letting me know just how old and decrepit I am. I love it ;) Darragh was always the smart one in school – and has gone on to be a doctor in the US. He’s now not entirely sure about the direction of the US and was doing a little recce to NZ to see what the story was over here…
Anyway, he came and stayed for a couple of nights which was absolutely lovely. We went for a nice walk out to Taylors Mistake, had lunch at under the red verandah and then did an escape room (aptly enough, school themed, we did very well at the puzzles!)
He very kindly gave us a new game called genius square which we’ve been enjoying. It’s extremely quick to play (just a minute or two) and it’s a bit like tetris. Lots of fun and a very nicely made game.
Looking forward to the next visit.
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