NZ - Land of the Long Wet Cold!

Hi!

Well. Here we are, Sunday afternoon.... Checking in way late, missed last week (had a wicked cold) and the week before, but there was a good reason for it - Adventure! But here we are, Sunday afternoon, the day is perfect - lovely and bright and warm with a huge blue sky with just a few clouds to speak of; the birds have been out there all morning chittering happily away; am a bit early even for the strange show tunes show and the jazz show, but that's ok, borrowing some cool blues tunes from another station to go with the glass of the stand-by Semillon-Sav Blanc - life is good!

So. Work. Yep. Had the previous week off for Easter and Labor Day, so that's been a nice long break. But just before that I got to help with the beginnings of what could be a 2 billion dollar bid, so far the customer liked our response enough to get the folks down to Canberra to present more info, which is a god sign, but we won't know until they give us the nod and that could take months and months if not a year or so. But, I got to be involved at the beginning so hopefully if they keep going with it I can help along the way and see what happens. Otherwise all's well, just happy to have a job and any editing to do!

And then there was Adventure to New Zealand to be had! Flew out first thing Friday morning on the 22nd. Pretty quick flight, only 2 hours and 20 minutes. Such a nice change from the standard 15+ hour flights! And because I'm not used to such short flights, I brought way too much entertainment in my carry-on that I barely used! Hooray for the eReader tho, used that a lot during the trip, so that was a good investment. Flew with Emirates, never been with them before. It was fine. Food was ok for airplane food. Lots of movies to watch but by the time they fed us and I figured out how to work the screen, I only had an hour or so left. So I got through the first half of "Red", I quite liked it. Which reminds me I have got to write that script for Bruce Willis....

So Auckland. Not much has really changed in the 6 & 1/2 years since I last set foot on the place. I was there 8 days, it rained for 6. Tho I was told repeatedly that it hasn't rained like that since last winter. Well, seeing as that's all it did for the 4 years I was there, I found that rather hard to believe. But regardless, got out to see the place. Stayed the first few days in Mt. Eden with Catherine and Paul and their two lovely Birman cats Fud and Sam. That was quite nice. They've done a bit of work to their house so it was warmer and drier than it used to be. Those old villas were built with no insulation, double-glazing or protection from the damp, so you have to go in and do it yourself if you can't take it anymore. I hear they're building them now with insulation and double-glazing, guess all those home improvement shows finally sunk in. We drove around a fair bit to have a good look around the place, stopped for some quick shopping at ShellShock (my favorite funky jewelery shop) and a few others in Ponsonby, an old haunt (scene of some good pub crawls back in the day). Ponsonby reminds me a bit of where I'm living now in Paddington... Hmmm. Next day we went out to Clevedon, which is a good 45 minutes or so out of town (south-ish I think) and where all the horse people live on huge properties, so it's pretty Fancy Pants. We had a quick look though the two shops that were open, one shop where I bought a couple things (including a lovely soft and warm wool wrap with a possum fur collar!) was the Clevedon Wool Shed. Eh, otherwise, not much else was open as it was Easter Sunday. And then we had a nice spot of lunch at the Clevedon Cafe, and it was really pretty good. It was actually quite a nice day in that it didn't rain until later. Bonus!

And while Catherine and Paul were at work, I spent the next couple of days wandering around Mt. Eden and surrounds. Stopped by one of my favorite shell shops, Crystal Cave, and picked up a bag of lovely loose Paua shells to use in jewelery or art. It's a good but baaaad shop - my marine biologist friend says a lot of the shells they sell are basically illegal to take off the beaches where they used to live. So either the guy knows the right people or he has masses in stock. And they're expensive, as I suppose they should be. Beautiful shells, like Nautilus and big starfish, but I'd feel so guilty...... Kind of makes me want to buy all of them and thrown them back into the sea for new fishies to move in to! Also stopped in to a couple pubs I used to frequent - Galbraith's Alehouse, where they brew their own really good beer (Bellringer's Bitter was always my favorite), and the Horse and Trap. And now since I've been back I can not for the life of me find a pub like those two. I've asked the locals and basically the response is that Brisbane just doesn't have the rotten climate to necessitate warm and cozy British-style pubs with blazing fireplaces and little nooks to sit in. They just do loud cavernous bars, or 'hotels' as the locals call them. Harumph.

So after those few days I moved over to the Hilton hotel at the Viaduct. I must say it was niiiiiiiiice and all the staff were really friendly and helpful. The room was good sized and comfortable. I got my deal from Lastminute.com - I can't recommend them highly enough, because my deal included a free room upgrade and full breakfast every morning for just AU$166 a night (compared with the $400+ for their standard room!). And it's only one of a whole two 5 star hotels in the city! It was totally awesome, duuude!!!!

So basically, I just had a good wander around the place because most of the things on my "To Do" list involved being outside for hours at a stretch. Needless to say I didn't get to do half of the things I wanted to, but on the 2 days that were sunny I managed to sail on an America's Cup yacht NZL41 around the harbor (photo on the left isn't the boat I sailed on, but sort of similar, sort of) - couldn't take pictures as they told me not to bring anything as it'll either get soaked or fall off! Of course when I get there folks not only have cameras but multiple lenses! Even still, it was really pretty cool. Would totally do it again. Went up the Sky Tower, had a good look and took lots of photos on the wrong setting, so they've all come out with a blue twinge (and I can't be bothered tidying them up in Photoshop, yet). Hmm. And I tried to go on a ghost tour, but when I had the Concierge call the number on the brochure, he was told that all tours are off because "all the ghosts have left town." Concierge thanked them, hung up and told me that company gets terrible reviews anyways. I had to laugh and thank the guy for saving me $50 bucks! So instead of going on a lousy tour to see ghosts that couldn't even be bothered staying town, I stayed in, had an awesome bath with local bath salts and mud (note to self: when choosing next apartment, must come with bath tub) and watched the royal wedding. Thankfully the hotel had BBC so I could know what all was going on (as if it wasn't entirely obvious given the bride, groom and church.....). It was nice. Good for them! Hope it works out better than Charles and Diana did!!!

And, basically, sadly, that pretty much sums up the trip. Instead of going for 8 whole days I probably should've just gone for maybe 4 days, and then gone back in another 6 months or a year. But never mind, it was so good to get out and go and see Catherine and Paul (and their cats) and to check the place out. I tell ya, it's a fine enough place to visit for a short time but get out and see the rest of the country! And no, in case you were wondering, it did not in any way, shape or form inspire or motivate me to move back. Not ever. So there you are! Now, if any of you want to come down here for a visit and hop across the Tasman Sea to have a look, I'd be more than happy to be your tour guide! And I promise we'll have a much better time than I did - because I think I'd've had more fun if I had someone to run around with. Am just sayin'!

And then upon my return, well actually before my return, I came down with a really nasty cold (thank you NZ), of which I'm just now kicking. Wow, I haven't been sick in ages. I tried really hard to check in last week but by the time I got a couple paragraphs in, I think I was hallucinating and had to lie down. But thanks to a climate-controlled week at work, I managed to kick it. Whew! Oh, and I have to say, am sooo proud, Kona is a Big Cat now - he caught a juvenile rat! And he was so good at it that there wasn't a drop of blood, just a small-ish dead rat in the middle of my kitchen floor! Such a good boy. That only took him 5 years! Here's hoping he'll catch more (god forbid there actually be many around here, sigh). So there you have it. An Adventure was had, a rat was caught and a cold was kicked. All in all it was a success! So like I said, if you find yourself with a few extra days during your visit down thisaway, I'd be more than happy to show you around the Land of the Long Wet Cloud (ok, technically it's Land of the Long White Cloud, but seeing as it rained for 4+ years straight, my friend and I dubbed it Wet.....)! So c'mon down!

BYE!
J!