A friend at the Ministry has just started a blog about her cooking exploits. I've already had a few chances to enjoy her creations, which have all been excellent.
For a team lunch last week she made some amazing NZ themed cupcakes. Read more and see a pic here on her blog .
Carina is also who I'm running the half-marathon with on Saturday, which is lucky as I need that much exercise to work off the number of cupcakes I devoured.
Monday, 28 March 2011
Road-trip 1 - Napier
This weekend I ventured out of Wellington for the first time since I arrived. I decided to hire a car and drive up the North Island to a town called Napier.
View Larger Map
The journey starts out on one of the few 3 lane motorways in the country. This quickly gives way to a narrow road that winds it's way back and forth up and then over the Rimutaka mountain range. Then the road passes through a series of towns, including an unexpected Norwegian settlement called Norsewood. As it gets to the Hawkes Bay region it gets noticeably warmer and the road passes by plenty of vineyards. Without someone else to do the driving I decided this wasn't the right trip for a wine tour. I did stop off briefly at the Tui Brewery on the way up, but it was still Saturday morning and Tui are more popular for their adverts than their beer, I didn't find it hard to resist a sample.
Napier
The town is famous because it was largely destroyed in a huge earthquake in the early 1930s and when it was rebuilt many of the buildings were designed in an Art Deco style. The town centre is the most comprehensive example of Art Deco (so my Rough Guide says). The town is right on the shore and has a long waterfront called Ocean Parade, which feels like an English seaside town, except for the palm trees.
The weather was pretty grotty on the Saturday afternoon when I arrived, but I took my camera out and about and got some photos around the town. Here are a few of them -
Around the town
On the Sunday I started out with a tour round Napier prison. Luckily it shut down in the mid-90s and now runs as a tourist attraction and even has a few hostel beds for people who are looking for somewhere a bit different to stay. Given there is a hanging yard out the back, I can't say I felt tempted.
I then headed out of town to follow up the recommendations of the bar staff from the Irish bar I'd been drinking in the night before. Despite the doubtful source of these tips, they turned out to be good. I headed up Te Mata, a peak that gave a fantastic view over miles of the landscape -
On the drive back I stopped in to visit a friend from work at her parent's house in Woodville. That led to the highlight of the whole trip, the Woodville Windfarm. If you've never stood right underneath a wind turbine while the blades are turning, it's a pretty trippy experience.
I made it back to Wellington about 8pm on Sunday, absolutely knackered but otherwise a happy travelling Duck.
View Larger Map
The journey starts out on one of the few 3 lane motorways in the country. This quickly gives way to a narrow road that winds it's way back and forth up and then over the Rimutaka mountain range. Then the road passes through a series of towns, including an unexpected Norwegian settlement called Norsewood. As it gets to the Hawkes Bay region it gets noticeably warmer and the road passes by plenty of vineyards. Without someone else to do the driving I decided this wasn't the right trip for a wine tour. I did stop off briefly at the Tui Brewery on the way up, but it was still Saturday morning and Tui are more popular for their adverts than their beer, I didn't find it hard to resist a sample.
Napier
The town is famous because it was largely destroyed in a huge earthquake in the early 1930s and when it was rebuilt many of the buildings were designed in an Art Deco style. The town centre is the most comprehensive example of Art Deco (so my Rough Guide says). The town is right on the shore and has a long waterfront called Ocean Parade, which feels like an English seaside town, except for the palm trees.
The weather was pretty grotty on the Saturday afternoon when I arrived, but I took my camera out and about and got some photos around the town. Here are a few of them -
Around the town
On the Sunday I started out with a tour round Napier prison. Luckily it shut down in the mid-90s and now runs as a tourist attraction and even has a few hostel beds for people who are looking for somewhere a bit different to stay. Given there is a hanging yard out the back, I can't say I felt tempted.
I then headed out of town to follow up the recommendations of the bar staff from the Irish bar I'd been drinking in the night before. Despite the doubtful source of these tips, they turned out to be good. I headed up Te Mata, a peak that gave a fantastic view over miles of the landscape -
 |
 |
| Just to prove I was there! |
On the drive back I stopped in to visit a friend from work at her parent's house in Woodville. That led to the highlight of the whole trip, the Woodville Windfarm. If you've never stood right underneath a wind turbine while the blades are turning, it's a pretty trippy experience.
I made it back to Wellington about 8pm on Sunday, absolutely knackered but otherwise a happy travelling Duck.
Sunday, 27 March 2011
Run, English Boy, Run
So, in a foolish moment I've signed up to run a half marathon with someone from work...next Saturday!
I've been out running a couple of times a week since I got here, but mostly little 3 or 4 mile runs (the half marathon is about 13 miles). I'm pretty sure I'll manage to finish it and that's really my only goal. On Thursday, the day I signed myself up, I managed a 9 mile run after work, so fingers crossed.
If I have the energy left after the run I'll put up a post about how it went next weekend. Hopefully some photos too.
PS - I've just got back from a weekend road-trip to a town called Napier. I'll be posting about the trip and putting photos up, but am knackered now so will probably be on Monday.
I've been out running a couple of times a week since I got here, but mostly little 3 or 4 mile runs (the half marathon is about 13 miles). I'm pretty sure I'll manage to finish it and that's really my only goal. On Thursday, the day I signed myself up, I managed a 9 mile run after work, so fingers crossed.
If I have the energy left after the run I'll put up a post about how it went next weekend. Hopefully some photos too.
PS - I've just got back from a weekend road-trip to a town called Napier. I'll be posting about the trip and putting photos up, but am knackered now so will probably be on Monday.
Friday, 18 March 2011
Do you know this man?
We came across this guy at the bar last night. We're sure he's (a bit) famous and Angela, who's also in the photo, thinks he featured in an action film that starred Clive Owen. Later on in the night he was upset about his white suede shoes having got dirty!
If you know who it is then post his name in the comments! There might be a prize in it...
 |
Thursday, 17 March 2011
St Paddy's Day
Went out last night to celebrate St Patrick's day in the usual traditional and culturally sensitive way...
...getting up for work today wasn't quite as painful as expected
 |
| The bar |
 |
| The marquee (which took over half the street outside) |
...getting up for work today wasn't quite as painful as expected
Wednesday, 16 March 2011
It just is cricket
To bolster my Englishman abroad credentials I went along to a cricket match on Sunday at the Wellington Basin. It's a lovely ground with grass banks around most of the boundary where you can sit with a picnic and enjoy the game.
The match was a twenty20 invitational game to raise funds for the Christchurch earthquake appeal. Most of the players were retired cricket legends, but there were also a couple of former All Blacks thrown in as well. Russell Crowe and Jamie Nesbitt were each coaching a side, there was a hobit umpire (Martin Freeman) and there were more celebs wandering amongst the crowd collecting donations.
It wasn't a serious match, but it was entertaining and they were boundaries a plenty, with a company donating NZ$1,000 for every six hit.
Fujitsu put up a donation of NZ$100,000 (around £50,000), which led to this -
That's Shane Warne bowling to the PM, John Key, who had to hit a boundary for the $100k to go to charity. The square leg umpire in the deck chair is Sir Ian Mckellen, who had to dive out of the way for one of the shots. Key managed to hit the boundary - Warne was plenty gentle, at least until the PM started sledging him about Liz Hurley.
All in the day raised over NZ$500,000 and we had a spiffing good time with it!
The match was a twenty20 invitational game to raise funds for the Christchurch earthquake appeal. Most of the players were retired cricket legends, but there were also a couple of former All Blacks thrown in as well. Russell Crowe and Jamie Nesbitt were each coaching a side, there was a hobit umpire (Martin Freeman) and there were more celebs wandering amongst the crowd collecting donations.
It wasn't a serious match, but it was entertaining and they were boundaries a plenty, with a company donating NZ$1,000 for every six hit.
Fujitsu put up a donation of NZ$100,000 (around £50,000), which led to this -
That's Shane Warne bowling to the PM, John Key, who had to hit a boundary for the $100k to go to charity. The square leg umpire in the deck chair is Sir Ian Mckellen, who had to dive out of the way for one of the shots. Key managed to hit the boundary - Warne was plenty gentle, at least until the PM started sledging him about Liz Hurley.
All in the day raised over NZ$500,000 and we had a spiffing good time with it!
Sunday, 6 March 2011
Wellington Harbour
Still not much in the way of photos to post, but here's a picture of Wellington Harbour from a walk I took on my first day here
Finding a flat
I moved into a flat today. It's a relatively new 4 bedroom flat in Thorndon, which is the same part of town as my office. If you follow this link you can see the building on Google street view, it's the building with the wooden balcony and my room is on the bottom floor of the building. A little pleasure for me is that my address is now on Parliament Street (yes, I am that much of a geek).
Looking for the flat was a bit of an experience. There's a website where people with rooms to rent post details, much like Gumtree in England. So having seen something your interested in you get in touch and arrange a viewing and a chance to meet the existing flatmates. I had about 8 or 10 of these in the course of a few days and each one is a bit like I imagine blind dates must be. You've got to make a good impression, without creating an image that would be impossible to maintain if you end up living with the person/people. At the same time you're frantically trying to work out from a couple of minutes of small talk whether they are someone who steals milk or uses the shower from 60 minutes in the morning. Oh, and at the same time you've got to check out the room itself and decide if you like that. Actually it's the people doing the letting out who I think have it hardest, there is a lot of demand for rooms here at the moment so they all ended up seeing a stream of people back-to-back to the point where they probably all blur into one.
It's fair to say I saw a mix of different places. A couple of really nice and friendly flats and then some more memorable ones. The lowlights were probably the flat the size of a postage stamp where the flatmate made a big point of how important it was for flatmates to 'give each other space' and the guy who described himself as liking 'a couple of drinks' in his advert. His couple of drinks were neat gin and whiskey by the bottle I discovered when I visited the flat at 8pm and found him swaying and almost incoherent. Luckily, after all of that and just when I was beginning to get stressed by the whole process one of the really nice groups got in touch and invited me to move in. I'm living with 2 girls and a guy, who all seem very chilled out and I have a good feeling about living here.
Moving in was pretty easy. I seemed to have acquired a lot more than the two suitcases I flew over with a couple of weeks ago. Some of this I put down to bad packing, but I also now own exciting items like coathangers and sheets. I have no idea what it's going to be like when I try and pack up in a year's time. Despite this it was still a quick job to taxi my stuff across to the new flat and get it unpacked. I haven't got any furniture yet - I bought a bed yesterday, to be delivered on Wednesday, so I'm surviving on a flatmates airbed for the next few days.
Looking for the flat was a bit of an experience. There's a website where people with rooms to rent post details, much like Gumtree in England. So having seen something your interested in you get in touch and arrange a viewing and a chance to meet the existing flatmates. I had about 8 or 10 of these in the course of a few days and each one is a bit like I imagine blind dates must be. You've got to make a good impression, without creating an image that would be impossible to maintain if you end up living with the person/people. At the same time you're frantically trying to work out from a couple of minutes of small talk whether they are someone who steals milk or uses the shower from 60 minutes in the morning. Oh, and at the same time you've got to check out the room itself and decide if you like that. Actually it's the people doing the letting out who I think have it hardest, there is a lot of demand for rooms here at the moment so they all ended up seeing a stream of people back-to-back to the point where they probably all blur into one.
It's fair to say I saw a mix of different places. A couple of really nice and friendly flats and then some more memorable ones. The lowlights were probably the flat the size of a postage stamp where the flatmate made a big point of how important it was for flatmates to 'give each other space' and the guy who described himself as liking 'a couple of drinks' in his advert. His couple of drinks were neat gin and whiskey by the bottle I discovered when I visited the flat at 8pm and found him swaying and almost incoherent. Luckily, after all of that and just when I was beginning to get stressed by the whole process one of the really nice groups got in touch and invited me to move in. I'm living with 2 girls and a guy, who all seem very chilled out and I have a good feeling about living here.
Moving in was pretty easy. I seemed to have acquired a lot more than the two suitcases I flew over with a couple of weeks ago. Some of this I put down to bad packing, but I also now own exciting items like coathangers and sheets. I have no idea what it's going to be like when I try and pack up in a year's time. Despite this it was still a quick job to taxi my stuff across to the new flat and get it unpacked. I haven't got any furniture yet - I bought a bed yesterday, to be delivered on Wednesday, so I'm surviving on a flatmates airbed for the next few days.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)