Onward we go! but will we be back??

As an FYI to our parents and such, we've booked our onward flights for the next leg of our journey.
We opted out of visiting California/Arizona since it'll be quite hot in the desert in June, or July when we were considering going. Since flights to Quito from LA seemed to be constantly routing us through Miami, Julie wanted to take advantage of being so close to her sister and go visit. So after spending the last week researching myriad of flight routings, we've got 'er all booked! And then I get this email from my recruiter "F&P: please call me asap". What the hell...? Turns out after shooting myself in the foot at the first interview by casually mentioning how we're looking forward to next section of our travels (to which the interviewers replied "oh? you're not staying in NZ?) I'm back in the running for an Operations Engineer position at Fisher & Paykael Health, here in Auckland. www.fph.co.nz The second interview went quite well, spending 3 hours being interviewed and then given a plant tour. Switching industries from the big, loud, dirty factory of MacDon to the spotless, quiet, small item manufacturing system of F&P will be interesting. Not to mention that if an offer results out of the whole thing that the entire prospect of relocating to NZ will be sort of a big deal. I've given them an estimated availability (after completing said travel plans) of September.

As for the immediate travel plans, here's the details.

Date: Wednesday, June 10
Flight: DL 2078
Departs: Los Angeles Int'l, CA (LAX) at 12:20AM
Arrives: Atlanta-Hartsfield Int'l, GA (ATL) at 7:46AM

Date: Wednesday, June 10
Flight: DL 656
Departs: Atlanta-Hartsfield Int'l, GA (ATL) at 11:00AM
Arrives: Bermuda Int'l, NH (BDA) at 2:59PM

Spend a grand few days catching some sun on the beach. New concern is that Julie's sister will even be there given her volleyball tournament schedule.

Date: Monday, June 15
Flight: DL 657
Departs: Bermuda Int'l, NH (BDA) at 4:00PM
Arrives: Atlanta-Hartsfield Int'l, GA (ATL) at 6:05PM

Flight: DL 2001
Departs: Atlanta-Hartsfield Int'l, GA (ATL) at 7:30PM
Arrives: Miami-Int'l, FL (MIA) at 9:27PM

Overnight in Miami. Anyone suggest a good hotel?

Date: Tuesday, June 16
Flight: American Airlines #931
Departs: Miami-Int'l, FL (MIA) at 3:25 PM
Arrives: QUITO, EC, (UIO) at 6:25 PM

Spend a wild 3 weeks exploring Ecuador and visiting Julie's cousin Ryan in Quito.

Date: Wednesday, July 8
Flight: American Airlines # 966
Departs: Quito, EC (UIO) at 9:30 AM
Arrives: Miami, FL (MIA) at 2:35 PM

Flight: American Airlines #231
Departs: Miami, FL (MIA) at 6:20 PM
Arrives: Los Angeles, CA (LAX) at 8:33 PM

Date: Thursday, July 9
Flight: United Airlines #814/6158
Departs: Los Angeles, CA (LAX) at 10:40 AM
Arrives: Winnipeg, MB (YWG) via DENVER at 8:15 PM
*this last flight may still change*
Bids will now be accepted as to whom will be fortunate enough to pick our tired butts up at the airport!

If anyone wants anything from New Zealand, speak up cuz we'll be shipping home a big box of stuff pretty soon.
Julie's got one week of work left at Genesis, and is frantically trying to get everything completed. Then it's the weekend and our turn to have a going-away party. We've been attending 1 every 2 weeks for other friends whom have repatriated themselves back home.

Lamenting the end of summer

Well, it’s happened. Winnipeg has just become warmer than where we are right now.  Granted you were at your peak afternoon temperature while we were warming up to our high of 20, but still, the intersection point between our two temperatures is nearing!

We’ve chased summer for nearly a year now, having caught up to it here in the southern hemisphere and basking in it’s warmth. But now summer’s taken off north and left us with this mind-boggling experience called “cold”. I’m consoled by the fact that you folks in Winnipeg are still in world of whiteness and are getting side-swiped by massive ice jams (you made the news in NZ yesterday!) while everything’s still nice and green here and on nice days I can get away with shorts. Except for last Thursday when I was out for a run…

Allow me to set the scene: It was a rainy day, but around noon the sun came out and I reckoned I could sneak in a little jog by the harbour. I had a nice tailwind for the 3km out and noticed the dark clouds just over the hills on the horizon, thinking that they were from the day’s earlier showers. Turning back I faced a strong head wind but it was OK and the other joggers were out in force during their lunch hours. Then, about 1km from home a couple rain drops started to fall and it got real cool and windy. And then something peculiar happened. The rain was getting quite hard and was stinging as it hit my skin. About the time that I finally realized that the rain drops were not splashing on the ground but rather bouncing and rolling away was when a full-out storm broke loose. Pea-sized hail zooming in at a 45° angle pelted me in my shorts and tank top forcing me to seek shelter under a tree. Unfortunately due to the hail’s angle of trajectory the tree’s canopy didn’t provide any relief and I found myself contorting to the bends of the tree trunk in order to save myself from the onslaught. As the ground, and my hands, turned white I found myself thinking of that ever-popular quote from the Simpsons - “that’s it – back to Winnipeg!”. But then I thought, “no, I'm a Winnipegger and I can run through this dammit!” so I took off through the hail storm trying not to “do a Lipper” on the pebbly ground. A fellow jogger across the road was also making a go of it, making some comment that I could not hear over the din. The traffic had all pulled over and stopped during the few minutes of this hailstorm and as quickly as it came it left. At a light a cyclist pulled up and said that the hail was hammering his head through the vents in his helmet (sorta funny cuz he was bald under there). As I arrived home the signs of the hail were all gone except for the piles of white stuff at the bottoms of the eaves spouts.

Other signs of us being wimps in the cooler weather, I bought a toque (beanie, whatever it is) and Julie & I have caved in and nabbed ourselves a flash heated blanket that’s not so much a blanket but a mattress cover. Toasty as...

Haere Mai to South Island!

New Zealand markets itself to the world using South Island like Canada markets itself using BC. So, after much hype and anticipation I finally got to experience the New Zealand that Julie’s been in love with for the past 4 years. Her feelings are justifiable – this place is amazing. The grandeur, the serenity and quiet awesomeness of the place makes you wish you knew more synonyms for “awesome”, because after a couple days of saying “wow, that’s awesome” a whole heckuva lot you begin to search for more words. And after a couple hundred pictures of mountains, fjords, rivers and lakes you reckon you should stop, but at every turn there’s another fantastic postcard-worthy view that begs to be framed.

Day 1: Friday 6 March

Julie & I arrived in Christchurch from Auckland via Quantas Air on Friday afternoon. We checked in to the Stonehurst mega-hostel and were soon re-united with my mom who made her own way down south. A popular Thai restaurant was our dinner destination. We hesitated claiming a table until we noticed two large groups of people converging on us on the sidewalk, aiming for the restaurant. Julie quickly ducked inside and asked for a table before they were all given away. We landed a small table by the window and promptly noticed that the place was a BYO (Bring-Your-Own [wine] licensed establishments are fairly common down here). I passed along my order and volunteered to fetch us a bottle of wine. Little did I know that the nearest wine shop was nearly 1km away; over 1km after factoring in the various directions I went trying to find it! In the end the Thai food did not disappoint (rarely does!) and put me into another spice-induced sweat. After dinner we wandered around Cathedral Square taking in some of the sights that mom had seen during the day. She was quite excited to show off the town she had explored only a few hours before.

Day 2: Saturday 7 March

Our friends Megan & Ted were flying in from Melbourne this arvo, so in the meantime we took a quick tour of CHC. There’s a neat little tram that rides around the downtown that gives you a pretty good taste of the city. With the tram ticket we got ourselves a punting ride too. Now I’m still not quite sure what the term “punting” means: the guy driving our boat said he was a “punter” because he was taking us Punting on the Avon. But the term “punter” is commonly used down here to describe a person at a football game or at a bar (basically a customer of some sort). The ride down the river was quite pleasant in the sun, gliding through a large park, watching the ducks in the water.

We’re liking CHC more and more, especially with the great weather we had today adding to the ambiance. There was a little market on near the museum, with buskers spread out all along the block and jazz bands and classical quartets tucked into courtyards of the Arts Centre.

When Megan & Ted showed up we greeted them with some custom pizzas from a “pizza bar” called Winnie Bagoes (pretty good – I recommend it) before packing their rental car full and taking off. Mom was left on her own once again to make her way North while we ventured further south to the opposite coast.

Christchurch is picturesquely set in a plain surrounded by mountains. It makes for a very scenic drive. The area is also home to a lot of agriculture and we drove through the little town of Ashburton where MacDon has its sole Kiwi dealer. (It was after hours so I didn’t stop in to say hello.) After that it’s valley after beautiful valley until you’re suddenly up in the mountains and our first overnight stop – Lake Tekapo (pronounced tee-ka-poo). Ted whipped up his special dish of tuna & rice for dinner, so we all huddled around eating outside since their hostel was extremely quiet and we felt a bit self-conscious. Julie & I were staying up the road at a holiday park in a fancy cabin, happy to have a heated blanket to keep us warm. We were dressed improperly coming from the +27 in CHC to the +15 here!

Day 3: Sunday 8 March

An amazing sunrise over the mountains and Lake Tekapo greeted us this morning. Julie reprimanded me for laughing at the “peasants” below us trudging to the showers in the morning while we sat on our balcony drinking coffee. (The campervan spots were just below us on the hill so it was all the backpacker kids.)

Today was all driving, hours and hours of driving. Granted it’s all quite scenic and grand, but after seeing mountains and valleys for a long time it still gets boring. We stopped at lake Pukaki to take a gander over to New Zealand’s tallest mountain, Mount Cook (Aoraki in Maori) at 3754m. Depending upon who got to drive provided either more entertainment to some (Megan & I) or unsettling nausea for others (Julie & Ted) since many roads down here are quite curvy. All of us put the Mazda 6 through its paces.

Our destination today was Milford Sound, located on the western side of the country in the wild and dramatic Fiordland World Heritage Area. Popping out through the Homer Tunnel we were greeted with heavy grey skies and drizzle – quite a contrast to the sunshine we had entering the tunnel.

We checked in to the Milford Sound Lodge and hoped for good weather tomorrow.

Day 4: Monday 9 March

A skiff of snow covered the mountain tops this morning – the season’s first! But better than that was the clear sunny sky illuminating that fresh snow. Tara from Fiordland Sea Kayaks met us at the lodge to take us to the water. It’s obviously a lot cooler here than it was the last time we went kayaking up in the Coromandel, so we all got a lesson in humility as we donned long johns, fleeces and splash skirts. Heading out on to the still waters the awesomeness of the place hits you as you try to take it all in. The vertical walls of the towering mountains rise straight out of the water; waterfalls sprout from some of the cliffs; and an occasional bird call disrupts the silence as you paddle along. The size of the place distorts your perception. A waterfall that looks like it’s only a mile away is in fact 7km! this is because everything else is so big that you don’t realize that the waterfall is also that big. The only problem about kayaking for an entire morning in an area that doesn't have much of a shoreline is that toilet-breaks are few’n’far between. Unfortunately one of our heroes in this story fell victim to this and had to make a hasty dash for the beach, almost tipping over in his rush.

Milford Sound is in fact a fiord; carved by glaciers not by rivers and this is very evident in the polished sides of the mountains and lends to the majesty of the place. The water is also quite deep, but since it contains so much particulate matter (the water is the colour of tea) it fools deep-water creatures into thinking they’re deep down where they’re not. As such, divers like the sound since it allows them to view these creatures without having to go so deep. We didn’t do any scuba diving though. The 4 hours of kayaking tired us out enough!

Back at the lodge the group of us went out for an evening stroll to check out some glow worms. We saw some of these little larvae glowing away, but we also spotted a big “weta”.

Day 5: Tuesday 10 March

The weather was totally different today; heavy rains created waterfalls everywhere on the cliffs around the lodge and churned up the rivers. Poor Megan & Ted got a little wet in their small tent out in the storm overnight but got a lot wet while trying to pack it all up in the morning!

Just up the road from our lodge, the Cleddau River has carved unique formations in the rock to form “the Chasm”. It’s super cool, and something that a camera just cannot capture as the water plunges through the rock that now resembles Swiss cheese. The rainforest around here reminds me of Vancouver Island, and Megan and I tried to capture any of the small waterfalls splashing in the forest. After this we hit the road for the 2.5hr drive from Milford Sound to Te Anau, taking in the scenery as it changed from rain-soaked mountains, alpine meadows, and then down into rolling hills and sheep pastures. All the while we’re wondering if the snow line is going to come down to our level…

In the town of Te Anau, a keen helicopter pilot has created a film about the Fiordlands area and with it built a special movie theatre to show it. It’s a great film and pretty much captures the essence of the area (we’ve got a copy of it and are taking it back to Canada). Funny thing! So you can buy snacks at the theatre and Julie was hungry so she got some chips and dip. The film is pretty quiet (birds chirping and such) so I’m sitting beside Julie and all I can hear is “crr-runch, crunch, crunch, crunch” as she chomps on the chips! I’m trying to lean away from her (“I don’t know this inconsiderate person munching away!”) and I’m pretty sure she missed some of the show, but nowhere near as much as the Asian couple behind us who fell asleep waiting for the show to start and I'm sure slept right on through most of the show.

Day 6: Wednesday 11 March

We stayed at the Te Anau Lakefront Backpackers last night (nice place!) and headed to Queenstown. There’s this burger joint in QT called Ferg Burger – super popular, and rightly so. The burgers are pretty damned good! Megan and Ted went back here numerous times during our stay here.

There are heaps of treks around here – we picked the Rob Roy Track in Mt.Aspiring National Park near Wanaka. It took us a while to get out there and had to hustle up the mountain in order to get up and down before dark. At the top you get a great view of the Rob Roy Glacier hanging above a big cliff.

The climb up here is a good challenge but it’s still easy, and I had to take it as an appeasement of my desire to the grand Milford Track walk which takes days to do. The scenery around here is amazing: the big valleys, the herds of sheep on the roads, the glacier-fed rivers, the forests and then the snow-capped mountains. Did I mention we got the New Zealand experience by driving through a herd of sheep being ‘mustered’ down the road? yeah. pretty neat. And then we did it again!

Day 7: Thursday 12 March

What happened today?

Julie went to the spa. She had a great time, had a great massage, but can’t remember the name of the lady who did it so couldn’t recommend it to anyone.

Megan & Ted jumped off the Nevis highwire bungy jump. At 134m it’s the highest in NZ. Megan jumped off no problem – she’s some sort of adrenaline freak we reckon. Ted was rightly scared of it but tipped of the edge with minimal encouragement.

Andrew took the car up and down the switch-back roads around the hills, tossing the car around but relishing in the fact that nobody was telling him to slow down.

We reconvened in town and discovered a wine tasting store. This place is brilliant: there are these little dispenser machines around the store for each variety of wine. You get a glass and a little swipe-card. You go around to these dispensers and select which wine you’d like to taste. The system then charges your card an amount according to which wine you tasted. You can sit in the arm chairs, have a snack, basically chill-out while tasting the wines at your leisure. Julie discovered what would become one of her favourite wines: Rockburn Pinot Noir from Central Otago.

Day 8: Friday 13 March

It’s Friday the thirteenth – would you jump out of a plane today? I did. bloody awesome i tell ya. WOW!

Today was adventure day! Megan & Andrew went skydiving and Julie went hang-gliding. Ted got a tattoo.

I teamed up with another fellow we’d met in Borneo who happened to be a skydive instructor here in Queenstown. JP’s a cool guy and took Megan & I up to 15,000ft to plunge earthwards at terminal velocity. When you first drop out of the plane your senses are totally overwhelmed: your stomach hits your throat, the cold tenses you up and the wind takes your breath away. About 5-10 seconds later your body comes to its senses and realizes you’re OK and you begin to enjoy the ride. That’s a normal jump. Mine went a bit different. After JP released us from the plane (I’m sure he let go on “2” instead of “3”) the wind immediately removed the goggles from my face. As such I totally forgot the position I was to hold in order to improve manoeuvrability – a reverse banana. Instead, my legs are stuck straight out and my arms are waving around my head trying to figure out where my goggles went. Luckily I had asked JP to fall backwards away from the plane and even without goggles I managed to view the plane flying away from us – uber cool. And when we’d got into the freefall position JP noticed that it was my goggles flapping in his face and put them back on for me, thus saving my eyes and permitting me to enjoy the view. And what a view!!! The skies cleared up for us and the Remarkables were remarkable, Lake Wakatipu was so blue, and the fields stretched out like the familiar quilt of back home. Then, suddenly, your groin gets squeezed as the chute opens and the harness takes hold and the world comes to a peaceful stop. You can ask your instructor to take you down nice and slow, or to do some spins to add some excitement. Naturally I picked “spins”. The trick here is to make the chute turn you around so you can see everything around you, instead of just one direction. But then at the of the spin, the instructor can close (open? dunno) the chute and drop you a few feet, throwing your stomach back into your throat, just when you’d got it back into normal operating position. Freakin’ sweet. After about 100 seconds, you’re back safely on terra firma and sporting a grin the size of the Southern Alps.

We spent the rest of the day enjoying the sunny day on the deck of our sweet-as penthouse crib at Reaver’s Lodge. Went for a short walk out at Bob’s Cove before zipping back to town for a BBQ at JP’s to meet his fiancée Clare. It was a great way to wrap up our week here on the South Island.

This place is AWESOME!!

Mom in Kiwiland: day 4 - The hippie island of Waiheke

Unfortunately the weather did not cooperate with our plans of going to popular Waiheke Island: the big island of 26 wineries and great beaches that's just a 35min ferry ride from downtown Auckland. It used to be the home of hippies to tried to get away from the corporate city, but now they've been invaded by the uber-corporate types who've built massive million-dollar homes on the hills with magnificent views of Waitamata harbour.

We let mom browse the craft shops in the town of Oneroa where surprisingly the only thing she bought was a shirt in the surf shop. [?!?!] Then it was off to the vineyards. Mudbrick was recommended: not sure about the wines but it's garden terraces and the views from them are wonderful. Now I know where I get my cluelessness about wine tasting: mom just drinks it and makes a sour face. As such, Julie and I paid the $5 for a tasting while mom wandered and took in the grounds.

We took a ferry to the island, obviously, and rented a car once there. With big plans of seeing the whole island we barely made it halfway to the big Onetangi beach. And we didn't taste much wine either. Most places want you to pay for the tasting so that takes a lot of the fun out of it.
Regardless of the uppity wine types, the island is very scenic in typical NZ fashion and many of the houses over here showcase some interesting architecture. Mom kept asking me to take pictures of houses to send to Jayson - so Jay, expect a big email.

Mom in Kiwiland: day 2

[click title for link to pictures]

My initial thought was to take mom out to Piha Beach, but Julie got to reading and noticed that there was a scenic drive through the Waitakere Ranges. Julie plotted us onto the Scenic Drive - that's the name of the road - that would take us from Titirangi (stopped for a coffee & bank machine) along the eastern fringe of the ranges through to Swanson. Mom has been quite entertaining in her search for regular drip coffee. Very few coffee shops serve the stuff as down here (Auz included) as they are all quite keen on the espresso stuff. So we keep telling her to get a "flat white" which is espresso with milk as far as I can tell. She finally found one shop on Waiheke Island but the result was such a strong coffee that she'd have been better off with the flat white. :^)

Upon entering the ranges via the narrow twisty road, we stopped at the visitor info centre which looks remarkable BC-ish with its totem pole in front. Not so BC-ish with its "well-hung" Maori carved figurines inside. Julie figures that if you're going to carve an image of yourself, you might as well make it complimentary.

The maps we got at the centre weren't all that condusive to precise navigation - buy a better map, where I don't know. [Later that night I finally downloaded all of the required software and got us set up with some flash NZ GPS maps courtesy of http://www.nzopengps.org/. Sweet as]

First stop was a short little walk (Auckland City Walk - sponsored by) through a NZ rainforest. It's a nice short walk (just over an hour) nestled in a valley below a nice-looking golf course. We got to see the big kauri trees and palms and ferns and other pines. Pretty nice. Mom's getting her baptism by fire in terms of learning to walk up and down hills.

I made a bad call on trying to head for Bethels Beach for lunch instead of having it here. We hit construction on the one road in and got sent off on a gravel road that put us backwards a few km. Finally after driving up another hill only to find the trail was 7km long I declared that we were going to eat our lunch off of the car's bonnet. Julie wasn't impressed with the digs but mom and I thought it was a choice place to snack on jalapeno hummus and crackers and fruit.

We did make it to Bethels beach and mom was in awe of the wildness of the place: the crashing surf, the wind-whipped shoreline grasses and the towering hills above.

We ignorantly defaulted on our rental car's return time as we realized we wouldn't get back to Auckland in time to return it. Thus Julie reckoned we should take one more walk. The brochure says it's a nice little walk to a nice little lake tucked in amongst the sand dunes. Sounded good. But it didn't mention how long the "little" walk took nor that it was through a stream for 80% of the way. After what seemed like forever (realistically it took us almost exactly the suggested walk time of 30min) we finally happened upon a little lake nestled between a massive sand dune and the green hills. Julie jumped straight in to Lake Wainamu, while I climbed up the dunes.

So funny thing for the way back! I reckoned that since we walked AROUND the dunes to get here, it'd be closer to walk OVER them on the way back. Mom said she needed a head start so I point her off in the direction that I felt was correct. Julie said I was crazy sending my mom off across what looked like a desert with no confirmation that I was right. Turns out mom went off down a little trail that I hadn't anticipated being there and hit a dead end. Fortunately she popped back out while Julie & I were scanning the horizon wondering where she went. In the end we made it back to the car with no incident and my sense of direciton was correct.

Back in Auckland we treated mom to an outdoor movie. Auckland City's Movies in Parks is neat *free* event where they showcase Kiwi films on a big inflatable movie screen in one of the many parks in the city. Tres cool. Bring a lawnchair, grab a crepe and a hot chocolate and enjoy the show. Mom got a kick out of it even though we missed most of the insider kiwi jokes.

Mom in Kiwiland: day 6 - Maori Culture Tour

Auckland has a strong service network to assist migrants in learning Kiwi culture and how to find jobs and such. Julie & I attended a job search seminar back in January and it was quite helpful in showing us how to "Kiwi-ize" our resumes plus providing some contacts to find jobs, even though we didn't give the job search much effort. Anyhow, part of the services is to show newcomers the Maori culture. A required seminar for most immigrants is a lesson on the Treaty of Waitangi - an important document signed between a few Maori chiefs and the British. Much can be said about this treaty and how it's been ignored/abused over the years, but I am not in a position to argue it as I don't know much about it.

Today's tour focused on a traditional Maori meeting place - a "marae". We went to the Orakei marae which is located near our place on Bastion Point. At the marae there is the meeting hall and the dining hall. In the meeting hall we were given a traditional welcome. You must remove your shoes before entering, then the men enter first and sit in the front row with women and children behind. Each man in the front row will have a role (quite similar to a modern board meeting) so we had a gent who volunteered to be our representative and presented a greeting on behalf of the tour group. It's all sorta neat, but other than our man's speech it was all in Maori so I'm not sure what was all said.

We were fortunate today to be given an impromptu cultural performance by a group of school children who are practicing for the upcoming Pasifika Festival.

After the show it was activity time: learning the haka and flaxgrass weaving. The haka is a war cry/dance. The version we learned today is one that one of the Maori tribes developed after their chief was pursued by another tribe. It's also the pre-game ritual of the New Zealand rugby team, the All Blacks. Mom & Julie got a kick out watching me learn it; I got a kick out watching the East Indian fellows trying to learn it.

Now we come to the best part of the day: lunch! A Maori "hangi" lunch is basically a roast dinner: there's beef, pork, chicken, stuffing, potatoes, kumara (a NZ sweet potato), pumpkin and bread. It's all cooked by fire-heated rocks in a hole in the ground. Super, super good. Oh, plus some fresh-cooked NZ green mussels. (One fellow diner commented that the Maori have good bone joints late into life due to the high amount of mussels in their diet.) And did I mention the steamed pudding with custard and ice cream for dessert? Sweet as, bro.

Mom was wise in opting for the haka before lunch, saving the low-impact flax grass weaving for after. Flax grass doesn't look like flax - it's actually a tall lily, but the Brits reckoned that it's fibrous leaves reminded them of fibrous flax stems so that's what they called it. The Maori term is harakeke. Our crash course in weaving produced varied results in the class. Some people complained that they just could not understand the concept and gave up; others got it quickly and produced more than one woven flower. Tooting my own horn here, I got the hang of it quite quickly and was commended on how tight and even my weave was. But once all of the flowers were complete, you couldn't tell the good from the bad - they all looked like twisted grass. And tradition stipulates that you gift your first one, so most people were jokingly glad to give away their first piece of messy weaving.

After a day of haka and flax weaving we were pretty tired. But that's not the end of our day! The Mission Bay Jazz & Blues Festival was cancelled yesterday due to the lowsy weather so it was postponed to tonight. (All we did yesterday was wander around town: rode the Link bus around central Auckland showing mom the sights.) Mission Bay is a nice part of town just a few kilometres from our place along the shore. The festival overtakes the beachside park and shuts down the main street. 19 stages are set up with the same band playing the same stage all night. To prevent too much distortion, the stages are numbered and alternate every half hour by even/odd numbers. They stretch the genre of jazz/blues, but there's a lot of good music and it's a pretty cool scene either way. This festival kicks the snot out of last weekend's Devonport Food & Wine Festival, but Julie points out that they're targeted at different folks.

Mom in Kiwiland: day 3

Yesterday was the west coast - today we went north.

Julie plotted us on a course to Whangaparaoa (in Maori, the "wh" is pronounced as an "f" sound)just about an hour north of Auckland, depending upon the motorway's traffic. Our destination was a little park called Shakespeare Park on the edge of the Hauraki Gulf. It's got a nice beach and some nice walks to take in views over the bay and gulf. Best thing was some trees that grew out of the bank and twisted and turned creating a fanned arch out over the beach. I had fun setting up the gorillapod to take some self-portraits while mom collected sea shells and Julie rested.

We skipped the walks (walked too much yesterday!) and headed back into Manly village for lunch at a cafe before checking out some more beaches.Little Manly is on the gulf side and is a bit scraggly but has a nice view of Rangitoto Island and dramatic cliffs book-ending it. Big Manly is big and sweeping and is compared to Manly Beach in Sydney, but has nowhere near the surf quality. Nonetheless it's nice so mom walked and collected more shells while Julie & I played frisbee in the sun.

We capped off the day with a BBQ of fresh salmon fillets accompanied by a Montana Marlborough Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon (J&I preferred the cheaper non-reserve version). Quite tasty!

As an aside, the salmon down here is a bit different than the BC Pacific salmon we're used to. It's a lot more fatty, but with that comes a smooth, buttery taste when it's BBQ'd.