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Here’s our hire car, if you are interested in that sort of thing. This place is called Paradise. Yes, it’s true.

Well, we have enjoyed Glenorchy so much we drove there again to explore a bit more. This time we drove further to the start of the Routeburn Track, which is a very famous tramp and takes a couple of days and you have to spend the night in a bunk house and carry all your own stuff.

We just did the first bit of it, but enjoyed watching other walkers getting ready and heaving on their backpacks for a big walk. Also it was nice to see people finishing, who had walked it the other way.

Lots of wild life, including this South Island robin.

On the way back we stopped at someone’s garden, where you could walk round their unusual statues and then have a cup of tea.

They had a very eco toilet

Church this morning early as we were trying out some new speakers which i think were mostly successful.

this afternoon kezia had a friend over then had her flippa ball game.  they lost 4-0 i think, but the other team were a bunch of bruisers and injured three of kezia’s team!  i think her team is now in the next league up which is why the games have got harder since easter.

esther went shopping with jane for shoes but didn’t get any.  but she did get a nice jumper

jane has been busy doing school stuff and shopping with esther

and i’ve been working on fibre.org.nz  i’ve been meaning to get this going for ages.  i think i’ve done all the hard work of getting it set up, so it should now be easier to feed on a weekly basis (and some of it feeds itself)

there were also various skypings

gorgeous day again today.  lovely and warm in the day (but ‘chully as’ at night – though our house is nice and warm)

we walked up a volcano today.  that happens a lot in auckland.  today’s volcano was one tree hill (as sung about by U2). it’s in Cornwall Park

we went there to do a story walk created by my cousin Chris, but unfortunately we got a bit lost and esther and i made our separate way to the summit a very cross country way whilst jane and kezia went up the road

 

we started with a picnic though

jane did a handstand before we set off

we saw some people sweeping up dirt and leaves under a tree.  that’s a job for life that is.

this stone is king of the kumaras

autumn is finally reaching auckland

 

that’s one tree hill.  no tree any more.  just an obelisk these days

great views from the top.  last time we were here was at dawn break nearly two years ago for maori new year

the time before that was when we first got off the plane three years ago on our rekey trip of new zealand before we moved here

the photo above is interesting.  not only does it show you the volcano cone, but you can see the two oceans which don’t quite meet on either side of auckland.  on the top left is the Tasman and top right is the pacific.

  

this morning jane went in to school for an hour to do some moderating learning and the girls and i did home work and music practice.  this evening esther has gone out for some video watching at amy’s house and jane and kezia have gone shopping

i had lunch with buzz today. always excellent to catch up and have some food with a good chum.  we didn’t feed the birds

the weather has been excellent again this week, although it’s getting chilly at night.  it was 6 degrees when i left home this morning and 21degrees on the way home

jane had a couple of lessons at kristin which went ok then did some shoe shopping

the girls had school then went to swimming, meanwhile jane went to the gym

 

i pass this peeling man hole cover most days.  it always reminds me of the britain (roughly)

if you fancy some free music you could do worse than download this nice sampler album from an NZ music label:

http://listento.lilchiefrecords.com/album/these-shaky-isles

kezia had her first rippa rugby training today which went well.  apparently she did a good catch.

esther had her first netball game.  and that went well too i think

jane had a full day at kristin so was quite exhausted

i had a strange day at work with a three hour meeting nearly cancelled as it looked like one side of the negotiation table had decided to boycott the meeting.  later it turned out they were just having their own workshop and had forgotten to ask to cancel our meeting.  or was it just a good excuse.  anyway, made for a fun first hour of confusion.

this evening jane’s out at her crafty chicks meeting and i had a meeting of the 7 sound blokes to discuss equipment and the like

 

photos today are from my walk to work.

Whoops! Sorry I forgot to do the family blog yesterday. Busy day for me. Mainly Music and then lots of teaching prep as I have lots of supply this week. The girls had swimming and violin after school.

jane had her morning in the church office doing her media stuff, and then went straight to her afternoon at school. after that they went to Esther’s new tennis lesson (with just a small group of 3 others girls) and then on to kezia’s swimming lesson via home.

esther had science at school which sounded fun.  kezia hurt her finger at school whilst playing rugby with her friends at lunch and got kicked in the finger. typical new zealander behaviour i think.

 

i had an opticians appointment which went well and my prescription remains the same.

when i was about to leave the optician said “ok, you can put your specs back on”. i did so and she burst out laughing and said ‘your glasses are all wonky’ and carried on laughing. she then showed me to her colleague who also laughed and they adjusted my arms. so that was nice. i’m now fully dewonked.

sorry photos are a bit rubbish today.  bottom one is a bad attempt at capturing a rainbow just outside my window at work.

just usual stuff today although i came home with a blinding headache so skipped lunch and had a sleep instead.  see to be ok now. 

good turn out again for life group.  yay.

here’s kezia’s Frankenstein doll

Dave and  I were both in the band today so an earlyish start for all. The girls amused themselves with technology while waiting.

Esther had to do some food related homework. So she decided she would cook Granny’s ginger biscuits as she had some interesting things to say about them. Yum

 

we skyped jane’s  parents this morning then went out to long bay for a walk

we managed to avoid rain showers at long bay, but did see lots of cows

 

this one was showing off

a big section of the old path at Long Bay has been moved back from the cliff due to erosion

we then had morning tea

kezia had a sausage role.  it was served rather fancily

 

what is it with kids and chairs

quick trip to church to help get the desk in to its new home

then this evening Nga, bruce, fleur and family came round for dinner, chat and laughing.