Category Archives: Countries

Countries visited

Seagulls

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For some time now I have thought seagulls were not too intelligent. The ones I remember from when I lived in the UK seemed to be large and thuggish. More brawn than brains. I had no way to prove this until today.

Sat looking out across Opito Bay in the north of the North Island of New Zealand I was finally proved correct in my thoughts.

The owner of the house we are house sitting at the moment has put out some sweet water for the Tui’s to drink. Now these birds also look a bit scatty. When they fly they seem to have no direction and flutter randomly across the sky. But the know a free lunch when they see one. After taking a drink of nectar from the flowers in the garden they top up with a nice sweet drink.

After them the common sparrow shows that he too also recognises a good opportunity to refuel. Having seen the Tui have his top up Mr & Mrs Sparrow also descend on to the drinking bowl and take their fill.

All this time a seagull has been watching from the roof top above. He swoops down gracefully hovering over the balustrade and finally lands both feet in the feeding bowl. He takes a look around to see what the others had been up to. He fails to see the free drink available, so flies off still thirsty and with sticky feet.

Buddy Walk

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We are house sitting in Keri Keri again and although this is  only a short walk for us, after Buddy has chased after his ball up and down the beach several times, he ends up walking over 3 times as far as us.

This walk is a pleaseant stroll over the rocks to a beach and then onto more rocks and the headland to the south east of the bay.

 

3:13 a.m.

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I emerge from my slumber.

Mike, can you hear that.

No I’m asleeep.

Mike, wake up, there’s someone upstairs. Now fully half awake I listen for some strange sound but I can’t hear anything. Jo gets up and takes a listen from the adjoining room.

We’re currently house sitting in the middle of nowhere and Jo thinks we have a burgular, surely the dog we are sitting would have something to say if someone was breaking in. Maybe not, his owners did say he was frightened of bangs and bumps.

Jo returns. There’s definitely someone moving upstairs, go take a look. But put some clothes on first.

I slowly get out of bed, put on my shorts and make my way up the first flight of stairs. The dog emerges from his bed tail wagging. If there is someone about he doesn’t seem that bothered. I continued up the stairs to the lounge door.

At last I can hear something. There are a couple of bumps and a noise similar to a winch motor. It must be from someone outside on the boat ramp. But we didn’t leave the patio doors open so how come the sound is so clear.

I go to open the door. Jo’s nervous voice behind me tells me to stop and not to go in. I slowly open the fly door, then slightly open the lounge door. The dog plods in. I open the door further an can see a flashing light. I reach in and turn on the light, the dog has sneeked onto his bean bag. Is he hiding from the intruder.

I slowly enter the room and take a quick scan round, the patio doors are still closed, so the winch theory is wrong. I quietly step through the doorway and there on the carpet is the culprit. The terrifying burglar that has come to murder us in our beds. He is rotund and fearless, going about the living room as if he owned it, the robot hoover was going about his nightly duty of cleaning up the floor after us.

Travelling NZ

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Over the next few weeks / months we will be travelling the length and breadth of the North Island. Some journeys will be short trips and others much longer.

Some trips will be for pleasure and others not so pleasurable. The first of these trips was a return trip from Hamilton to Wellington (well Mana actually). This was a not for pleasure trip.

The drive is between 6 – 6.5 hours. Although a lot of the drive is quite boring at least we get to see the mountain and at this time of year the roads are clear and the mountain is still wearing it’s winter coat of snow.

While at Wellington, between siting on the deck with a wine enjoying the view, we spent a couple of busy days clearing the garages and back patio of rubbish and old timber. This was the final good bye to our old kitchen wall and wood panelling from the entrance hall. No longer to be kept for firewood but destined now to landfill.

Then it was back in the car for the return trip to Hamilton to ensure we were eback in time for the first of our house sits since getting back from Europe.

Kerikeri

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After the long hot and humid days in Hamilton the weather final broke and the rain started falling just as we were about to leave for our latest house sit in Kerikeri.

The house we are due to stay at is situated opposite the beach at Opito Bay in the Bay of Islands. Hopefully the weather will improve by the time we get there.

We decide to leave Hamilton at 10:00 a.m. and as per usual without much planning we had managed to get packed and loaded the car just in time to be able to pull away on the stoke of 10:00. I’m not sure how we manage it but no matter how long we leave to pack and get organised we always seem to fill the time to the last minute.

On the way we had to stop off quickly on the outskirts of Auckland as we had to drop off a camera lens we had just sold. Even with this stop we made good progress and with another stop for a leg stretch and coffee we still made it to Kerikeri by 4:00 p.m.

Gary and Roes are both very nice and provided us with dinner. Buddy there dog is cute and will keep us occupied while we are here.

 

Holiday 2015

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Well we are off on holiday today.
This morning started a bit disorganized. Before completing our packing we had to post off some photos from our last two photo shoots.
I raced upto the post office only to find that my notes on my phone hadn’t updated and I didn’t have the addresses.
Thank goodness for mobile data.
On return to Bryce and Jean’s I had to finish packing and load anything we weren’t taking into the car. The car was being dropped off at Jennys.
We both jumped into the car and I pulled out of the drive. As I stated to pull away jo and I looked at each other and said ‘aren’t you supposed to be driving dad’s car’ .
Cars sorted and Bessy picked up we arrived back at Jean’s to find she had made sandwiches for us.

Well the morning raced by and all too soon the minibus arrived to take us to the airport.

Was it the driver or the seats that smelt of b.o. I’m not too sure but the smell kept wafting by the whole trip.

On arrival at check-in we found out that jo had 2 requests for an upgrade,  while I had none.  So off to the service desk to try and get it sorted.

Well it turned out for the best in the end as we both got upgraded to business class despite there being 14 people waiting.

Next was getting through customs and security.

I managed ok but jo was pulled over

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Well we managed it to the lounge and a well earned beer.

To Ride or Not

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We are currently house sitting for sister Jenny. This entails feeding Bessy the dog, the chucks, horse and calves. Also making sure there are still ten (or was it 11) sheep, two cows and a bull.

Having completed our chores our time is free.

After several coffees and time wasting we decide to go for a bike ride. he sun has been out all mornng but is now threatening to hide behind some clouds.

Having wasted a few more minutes getting changed it is off we go. Turning right out of the gate we head off down the road. Having only got a few metres it starts to spit with rain. I stop to put on my jacket just as it starts to rain slightly more heavily. We decide to head back and just manage to get the bikes into the garage before the sky opens up.

Not wanting to waste the day after the rain stops and we have had lunch we decide to have another try at getting ot on our bikes.

We head off gently cycling along, it’s not long before I start to treat it as a bit of a work out and start pushing myself a bit more. I soon left Jo behind.

I rode to the end of the road and admired the view while I waited for her.

The view at the end of the road

The view at the end of the road

While I was waiting I heard a dog barking. I wasn’t sure where it was as I didn’t see or hear any dogs as I rode along. The dog barked angrily for several minutes before stopping.

Eventually Jo appeared.

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“Why on earth did you ride off and leave my fending off that dog. I thought it was going to attack me” she shouted at me. “I had to ump off my bike and get it between me and the dog, the owner eventually came out and called it off.”

Ooops. I must remember to look back and check where Jo is when we are out cycling.

We turned around and headed back. Thank goodness there was no sign of the dog.

Here is the track of the completed ride.

Birthday Bike Ride

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Well my birthday is here again, yet another year to tick off.

To celebrate, seeing as I now have summer birthdays, we decided to go to Queen Elizabeth Park and take a look & have a little ride.

We took the beach side route along the sand dunes, although there is a track it is quite steep in places as it goes over the sand dunes. Although it was only a short ride we both felt that we had a good work out.

The only thing I would do different next time would be to stop along the way and have a swim.

Rimutaka Rail Trail

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As it’s a long week-end and a fine Saturday morning we decided to get up and travel over the hill to the Hutt Valley and cycle the Rimutaka Rail Trail.

We have been saying for some time that we must do this ride.

Following an old railway line there is a steady incline, we cycled to the summit tunnel, but decided to turn around and head back as it had started to rain slightly.

Thecycle back although down hill was nearly as hard as the cycle up due to the strong head wind.

On the way back home the weather changed and we drove through a very heavy downpour. Lucky we didn’t carry on cycling otherwise we would have got very wet.

 

Back Home

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All too soon we have to say good bye to Mich and take her to Auckland airport.

This has been a slower more relaxed visit, hopefully, compared to the see all, do all, visit of two years ago. Hopefully Mich enjoyed herself and will be coming back again. We’ve alrady started planning the great Northland trip to see the top end of NZ and a drive along 90 mile beach.