Rowan's Round of Days

So we have been in Christchurch for a couple of days. There isn't any great event or sight about which to write. We have seen the Cathedral (our hotel is right off Cathedral Square). There is a crafts market in the square which has some interesting artists. Today they had some young "street artists" doing a mural together as part of a city program.

Yesterday morning I had a long chat with one of the greenstone carvers at the craft market. He sells his carved stones but he also sells a lot of bone carvings and such. He says he designs those but has them carved elsewhere so they are affordable (relatively!). I bought a bone Taniwha that spoke to me. The carver said it is the fresh water kind and I think that it fits in with the water advocacy work I have been doing to have a guardian Taniwha pendant. In the afternoon yesterday, I did a fair bit of shopping for greenstone bits and finally found the triple twist earrings I had been wanting. So shopping is finished too.

I have gotten a couple of caches (and DNF'd one). We went walking in the Botanical Gardens (mostly to get a cache). All the TBs and geocoins are now dispersed and I left off carrying my caching bag to lighten my load today.

We decided not to take a punting tour down the river (they don't let you wield the pole yourself but have a professional chauffeurs in a straw boater and striped coat to pole you along) since the river looked unshaded and not so interesting. It was almost 80F today and in the sun it was very hot.

This afternoon we went up the gondola to the top of a mountain. It was fairly hazy though so I doubt our pictures amount to much. But we ate at the cafe and took in the views. I found a some cards and then a book by Gerar Toye, the "Global Gypsy". I love his work!

We grabbed dinner at a souvlaki place. As usual I was disappointed - my souvlaki tastes were educated at Icarus/Hector's in DC/VA and I think if I really want to have it like I like it I am going to have to learn to make it. I plan to start forthwith. Well, soon, once I'm back in my own kitchen. The fact that my area is deficit in Greek food means that I don't get that button pushed very often.

Then we went to the cinema and saw Juno which we had been meaning to do and it was really quite good. I would never have made her choices, but I believed in the character's integrity and spirit a great deal. I think my parents feared that I would show up pregnant at that age. I wouldn't have, my wildness went in other directions, but that was a fear my mother had for sure. I loved the conversation between the parents after she had told them. I think I will be thinking about this movie for a long time.

So, tomorrow we fly from Christchurch to Auckland and then Auckland to home. We will travel for many hours and get home before we started. Somehow I doubt that will make us feel less tired. I can't wait to get inworld. I suspect sleeping and Second Life will be in competition when I get home. There is a big literary event going on inworld that I have carefully not volunteered for anything around but if I am up to it I hope to attend. I am sure both my avatar's IMs are capped by now. It has been sooooo frustrating!

So after a morning of trying to do something in SL that had been rescheduled to the next day, I joined Russell for a 12km segway tour. It was a total blast. I had to do the segway barefoot because in my sandals I was holding my feet funny. We toured around the harbour area and then by Old St. Paul's church (which is a wooden gothic church and very cool looking) and around the Houses of Parliament. It was interesting the reactions we got - some people thought it was cool, some heckled us for being lazy, kids wanted to know if they could "have a go". It was indeed intuitive, though I think this is a very new model and a bit moreso than the one I tried at the IEEE reception a couple of years ago. This was my first extended ride and I really liked it. I want to take the tour of SF when I get home.

We went up to the top of the hill on the cable car to see the views and grab a bite to eat. But despite the assurances of the ticket office the restaurant was actually closed. The views were amazing. But I was in the "haven't eaten since breakfast, it is after 4pm and I've gone from hunger into stupity mode". It being Sunday night here, nothing is open so we have retreated to the hotel for room service. Which will hopefully be here soon.

The last couple of days we have wandered around the Hawke's Bay area. Yesterday we wandered around looking at the Art Deco architecture (and getting clues for a multicache) and today we went on a bus tour of wineries and a cider house. The do some nice wines here but other than a bottle of Brookfield Gewertzstraminer and a couple of late harvest reislings from Matariki Winery we didn't buy any. We're only in-country another week after all. :-)

Okay, I admit we bought a six pack of Kingston cider and a couple of bottles of Ginger Spin which is an amazing traditional cider with ginger in just the right proportion. The Filter Room, the cider house, had a choice of six tastes for $9 and I tasted six different ciders - Kingston, Ginger Spin, Ballydooly Scrumpy, Ballydooly Red Cider, Ballydooly Grannypash (an Granny Smith apple and passionfruit cider!) and Ballydooly Ballydooly cider. I liked them all but the last which had a strange aftertaste. I am going to try and bring a bottle of Ginger Spin home. I wonder if Ace would consider making something like it? Hmmm. Nah, it will never last until the next time I'm in Sebastopol. *grin*

Tomorrow we drive to Wellington and so will be out of touch until evening probably. Hopefully our hotel there will have reasonable internet and I won't be dependent on Esquires and Starbuck's.

So we had a lovely dinner with taltosdama at the Orbit Restaurant Monday night. There were absolutely no views as we were socked in with clouds (and the tower was high enough to be shrouded. But the company was excellent and I'm really glad we had the chance to visit. We talked so late she missed her bus and her family had to come collect her! Ooops.

Tuesday morning we headed out for a harbour cruise and tooled around seeing the sights from the water. After that we took the ferry to Devonport to walk around looking at Victorians but Cyclone Funa struck again with torrential rains. As they slacked off I was able to charge out with my umbrella and get a cache before the tourists had left their huddle under awnings, so that was okay with me. *grin* We had lunch at the Devonport Mecca and I discovered the local Brightstone Dry Cider which I like very much. Not as dry as Strongbow and a bit light and fruity but quite acceptable. Since there is no diet Dr. Pepper to be found anywhere it is good to find *something* I like to drink!

Today we are heading off to Napier, a long drive across the island. (Somewhere between 5-1/2 and 7 hours depending on who you believe). I've scoped out a couple of caches on the way. *grin* We'll see what connectivity is like there. Hopefully, I'll report in a dozen hours or so.

Hmm. I notice that Lj is doing California time. I'm a day ahead, of course.

After a crazy Friday of running errands and using the PC at Russell's office to download some open source maps of NZ to my GPS we caught our shuttle at 3pm for the airport. The Air New Zealand flight was 13 hours along (12:12 in the air and the rest mostly taxing around SFO *sigh*). The movies in the back of the seat in front of one rock - I saw The Jane Austen Book Club which was a consumate chick flick and I loved it, Ratatouille which hasn't as embarrasing as I had feared, I started Across the Universe but lost interest and went on to New Zealand travel show episodes before falling into a doze at about 10pm my time.

The plane got into Auckland at 5am Sunday morning (losing Saturday altogether from our point of view). We dropped our bags at the hotel and wandered around the harbour a bit before catching a sightseeing bus. It dropped us at the museum to catch a satellite bus to the zoo but we had an hour to kill and saw some hot house gardens. Finally we reached the Auckland Zoo. The zoo reminded us a lot of the Oakland Zoo in size and style. We didn't see many native critters as the focus seemed to be largely African. There was a rainforest area but it was inaccessible do to a concert set-up going on for music at the zoo tonight. We took a tram to the transport museum (MOTAT) and saw all sorts of things including an exihit on the history of computing that was very reminiscent of the Computer History Museum trip a few days ago. There was an area of historic Victorian buildings, a collection of historic trams and an exhibit on special effects in the movies which had a lot of blue screen set-ups which the kids were enjoying acting in front of immensely.

We got back to the hotel and checked in at 4pm. It seem much later! We are trying to be on local time. I am dragging a bit though, I admit! I assume we'll find dinner somewhere and try to stay up to a reasonable bed time. It is a theory anyway.