Cox's Bay

Sunday found us wondering the streets of Auckland again; this time around Cox's Reserve, a suprisingly green oasis in the middle of a residential area, slightly west of the city centre:















We had to stop for a while to admire this awesome view at Cox's Bay, which looks out across the Waitemata Harbour:















Refreshed, we strolled on through Herne Bay gawping at the ridiculously huge houses with private swimming pools and tennis courts and meandered down to the beaches there:



Beautiful eh!

post script: true news item on local radio this a.m:
"Truck of chickens die in road accident!
A truck full of chickens died in a road accident in Christchurch this morning. Had they survived this tragic accident, they might have made it to their destination unharmed; KFC."

! :-0 !

"Rodney you plonker"

Had a great day on Saturday driving up North to Rodney (!) county with L&M. We managed to get to and explore 5 different beaches, stop for a fish & chip lunch, see some awesome landscape and swim in the Pacific ocean. L&M also managed to squeeze in some boogie-boarding!! How exhausted are we – some more than others!

Here’s some pics:

Election Fever

It's been another busy week and a quiet weekend. Getting stuck into series 4 of 24 which started here recently. Invited L&M round ours to watch the latest episode Fri, then down to the lovely Kingslander where you can order a real pint (568ml rather than 500ml) - woohoo! - a rarity in these parts it seems. A pleasant evening was had.

No other interesting news apart from the election which happened yesterday - it's not really clear who's won yet as there's still another 25,000 "special" votes to come in (from overseas and other electorate) and the "winning" party - Labour - doesn't have a majority as yet.

Labour are ahead so far, with 1 seat more than National, so they have to form a coalition with one of the other parties. No-one would say who they wanted to co-align with but I'm sure it's all been agreed months ago.

The TV3 broadcast was amusing with John Campbell - presenter extrodinaire with similarities to Jeremy Paxman but much much funnier - interviewing MPs and their over-excited supporters. Photographers waited outside Helen Clark's (current Labour PM) and Don Brash's (rival National Party leader) homes for hours waiting to see who would come out first to make a non-committal celebration/commiseration speech - weird & fascinating TV!

Talking of NZ TV - we're particularly loving the coverage of stories which wouldn't make page 38 of The Sun:

Resident Calls Police Over Neighbour's Noisy Flag Pole - the poor Dutchman was only trying to show his love for his new country by flying the New Zealand flag outside his house, and when one night, he forgot to take the flag down, his pesky neighbours called the police to report his breach of noise levels! A top item on the TV news here.

Man In Residenital Unit May or May Not Have Bomb - Major news item this week: A man was reported to have explosives on him which he was threatening to detonate unless he spoke with Prime Minister, Helen Clark. Reports throughout the day revealed.....nothing! Turns out there was no bomb. I wonder if he got to have a nice chat with Hels tho?

Also, and perhaps more importantly, the fashion choices of the news and weather presenters has to be seen to be believed! No smart monochrome with the odd snazzy tie or top under a more conservative suit here. Rachel wants to get a job as a stylist to the stars well, TV presenters anyway, and smarten them up a bit. No more bright green huge floral A-line high waisted skirts pleeeease (see Carol and Mihi here and some of these others for examples)! Jazzy clothes are fine, just not on the TV.

The election evening's excitment was interspersed with a news item about a light-aircraft stolen from a local airfield. The pilot was threatening to fly the plane into Auckland's Sky Tower all night. As a result, Sky Tower was evacuated, but the pilot eventually crashed the plane into one of the local beaches with seemingly no major injuries. It appears his motivations were more emotional than political but the timing was coincidentally appropriate. Read more of this fascinating story here!

Bye for now x

Underwater Life

pics from Kelly Tarlton's Underwater World we visited on the weekend.

We're far too busy to write anything at the moment (!) but suffice to say that Rache is artiste extraordinare right now with a canvas production line rolling out works by the day ! and Tom has decided not to do the full marathon in October (who's stupid idea was that!) and go for the half marathon instead.

All Black (Beaches)

Go All Blacks! They won of course, beating the aussies 34-24 but it was close at one point. Great atmosphere in the stadium especially sitting amongst the hoons and die hard Kiwi, Brazilian, Scandanavian and English All Blacks fans in the terraces!



Today we went on a road trip, with our new friends Lawrence and Miriam















Wow, I think we covered a fair bit of ground, out to Karekare & Piha (All Black (and shiny) volcanic sand!) beaches & Waitakere Ranges (which are all out to the west of Auckland, only 40mins drive away).



Headed to Mission Bay after, east of the city, then back for a few drinks in the Viaduct Harbour and a huuuuuuge foodhall meal. Had a lovely day but very tired now, so goodnight jon-boy :) zzzzzzzz

A few more pics...

A couple of views of Auckland, and the Sky Tower taken on Tom's route to/from work...

.... and our apartment :)















Off to see the All Blacks thrash the Wallabies (!) tonight in the final match of the Tri Nations Bleddisloe Cup tonight- should be a great game, especially with a possibility of seeing the new haka (which was released to the public last week)!

The corporate tickets we got through work last week to see Auckland vs Southland (at the same ground, Eden Park) were fabulous- much free food and drink was had! Shame this weeks tickets had to be paid for (!), but the atmosphere there should make it a good 'un.

T&R x