back to adventuring

to be honest, we’re not very good at sitting around at home.  so it was great to be back adventuring today.

the day started with jane going for an early morning run with a new friend from church.  and that went very well !

then we took the girls to orchestra during which jane and i went for our saturday morning ‘date’.  we found a nice cafe which sold pain au chocolates which of course i chose.  however, it wasn’t great as it had jam on it.  (why oh why ?)

we then whizzed back home, dropped of the violins and picked up the picnic before hitting state highway 1 to go to the zealandia sculpture park.

it’s a lovely place which mainly displays the work of new zealand’s most famous sculpturer Terry Stringer.   he lives and works there and he kindly let me take a picture

he was quite shy but really lovely and asked if we wanted him to take a picture of us, so we jumped at the chance

here are the two pictures we took.  i might start asking famous people to take my photo in future.

anyway, we had a private guided tour by Terry’s partner Tim because we were the only people there for the 11am tour.

we got to learn loads more about the sculptures than we would have just by wandering around.  for example this mammoth work was so well balanced it could rock back and forward with a gentle touch

and here’s one of the works which has just been delivered back from the metal place

 

there was a lovely walk through a kauri forest which contained a life size sculpture of jesus in a box

and a bizarre very high stepping stone thing you were allowed to walk on

when we arrived we could hear organ music.  it was coming from this little shed which contained an organ. 

we’re not entirely sure, but the chap who was playing it might be a world famous organist who is in new zealand to play recitals on the Auckland town hall organ which has recently been renovated.  he was certainly visiting the house the night before anyway

included in the entrance price was a cup of tea or coffee or juice which we took on the veranda.  kezia took the picture below

 

 

 

after we’d finished up in the sculpture place we drove down to the local reserve for a picnic.  this is the place we went to on new year’s with the ‘gang’ and it was lovely to be there again on a quieter, but just as hot day.

jane and i sat on the picnic blanket whilst the girls chucked themselves about in the sea.  i’ve got a pile of photos of that which i’ll post on a quiet day !

then we headed to a little town called Puhoi (pronounced ‘poo-hoy’).  which reminds me, i saw a t-shirt with the slogan ‘waipu ?  wainot !’  heh.

anyway, it’s a historic town and is really interesting.  you can read more here. 

after we’d had a look round the church, the local canoe centre (which we’ll revisit in a canoeing capacity at some point, and the local old-skool museum, we walked up a hill to a lookout point

it was a short sharp climb to get there, but was well worth it for the view

 

in the museum there was a lady mending old teddy bears and she recommended we visit ‘The Art of Cheese’ which is a cheese making plant just up the road. 

there’s a cafe there and a rather green lake.  you can see the small cheese factory in the background.

the local church was a rather catholic so there were some great statues.

 

the puhoi settlers originally came from a place called Bohemia in what is now the Czech republic and had a rather different experience when they arrived in New Zealand to what we have.

 

Puhoi also contains the smallest library in new zealand according to the locals. but it’s not uncommon for every town to claim it has the ‘smallest’ or ‘biggest’ something in new zealand and most are unsubstantiated.

oh, and the local village town pub was a biker pub and had some amazing internal decoration (including a bra chucked over a moose head)

 

after all that fun we came back home to play scrabble then it was bed.

the rest of this evening has been spent skyping (now on the big telly in the living room thanks to a new webcam).

we’re quite pleased with what we got done today, but i think tomorrow might be a bit slower (not least because i’m at church 7am-1pm doing sound at the morning services)