With the car repaired in time, we headed down to Roundhill for part of the school holidays. It’s a nice little field for kids. We were hoping that Anna would make it to the top of the t-bar, and, indeed she did! We had a bit of excitement on the way down as we stopped at Dobson for the afternoon. Anna had somewhat forgotten how to turn, and so turned into a little bullet heading downhill fast. Maaike eventually crashed into her to get her to stop. After that we had a recap about turning across/up the hill, and then things went a lot better ;)

It was great that our friend Kate was able to come with her two kids, as it totally made for a more fun time. Well, I mean Maaike and I are very cool,but, other kids are cooler for sure.

At Roundhill itself we got Anna a lesson and the instructor took her up the t-bar (as we’d hoped he might). She did a couple of runs, but, the conditions were somewhat icy “spring conditions (already)!!”, so, she just did a few runs over the next few days and opted to have a more fun time on the beginners slope. I do enjoy skiing, it’s great to catch some sun and be up in the hills over winter. I also feel that climate change is really beginning to affect the viability here in NZ. I’d be amazed if within the next 10 years most of the club fields haven’t closed.

Firstly, car sat down. Power steering died.

Putting on my sad face, it was a little nervy because we were due to go skiing the following week. However, on the bright side – it was a quick and easy fix and far better there than down at Roundhill.

Anyway, on to Matariki. It’s SO good that NZ finally has public holidays to celebrate the Māori festivals (which are much more aligned with what you’d expect – a festival of light during the middle of winter). Anyway, market, heaps of art around the place..

There was also a midwinter bike around the park. That was so much fun, we’ll definitely be doing that again. Our friends Ian & Ali & Amelie came along, and while it was definitely cold, it wasn’t too bad. Anna biked the whole thing I was so impressed!

There was also a fireworks display out at New Brighton. We went out for a nice dinner at Malc’s place and then just walked down the beach (neatly avoiding most of the car-hassles as it’s very popular). It was Anna’s first fireworks display and she was suitably impressed.

Maaike is studying Te Reo this year (and probably ongoing), as a part of that they have noho-marae, which is a stay on a marae for the weekend. So, that was this weekend, and so Anna and I headed up to Palmy for the weekend to hang out with cousins. On the way up we had a really weird optical trick. The moon (I think) was up, but, also the sunset was happening, so, we could see (I think) the moon a reddish colour from the sunset. I dunno, it was either that or the lights of the plane doing something weird, but, pretty sure it was the moon.

We had a lovely time. Played mini-golf, had a lovely time at the big old playground there, delicious dinner at Mary’s.. just a good time.

All too soon time to head home again. AirNZ have this thing where they give out hard-boiled sweets on landing. Kids sometimes do it. Anna has been picked a few times, and she asked me to let the air hostesses know that she’d be available to give them out ;) Anna let me know that some people just take massive handfulls of them… I’ve always been polite and just taken one or maybe two! definitely feel like I’m missing out on a trick there (or maybe not, tragedy of the commons if everyone started doing that I suspect)

I headed up to Wellington earlier in the week to see Foil Arms and Hogg. It’s annoying that they don’t come down to ChCh, but, a great excuse to get up to Wellington.

I caught up with my team which was lovely.  I do really enjoy the walk down from Glynn’s to the co-working space… even if the normal route was closed due to slips.

And had a very nice evening in the Belgian Beer cafe before the gig. I got to see my old primary school friend Ronan who was looking very well and making an exciting career change – looking forward to hearing how that goes (he’s always been very switched on has Ronan)

Then off to the gig with cousin Thomas and Glynn and Jayne.  They were as excellent as ever – really fun evening.

On the Saturday we headed off to Paraparaumu where my cousin (from the Davey side) Jon lives with his kiwi wife Amelia. They’ve just had a baby so we headed up to meet her, and to have a tour around the station. Pretty cool spot to grow up in that’s for sure.

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.