Hop, skip and a leap

Although the correct phrase is hop, skip and a jump, I felt the use of leap fits in nicely.
Another month has passed and we are nearly into March. Where has time gone?
All I remember from my last 4 weeks is work; pretty sad I know but its just one of those months where you put your head down and get on with it.

Summer this year in Wellington has not been the greatest. In fact, all round New Zealand has been gloomy. Some even call it "New Zealand's worst summer". I thought it was great! Maybe the weather wasn't the best to go out in T-shirt, shorts and jandals (aka flip-flops, thongs) but all I had to do was wear a hoodie (aka sweatshirt with a hood). For the past 2 months, all I wore in the weekends were my jandals so it can't have been that cold.
But nothing is ever good enough for kiwis; its always too hot or too cold, too windy or too wet. We tend to spend too much time comparing our weather to Australia.
As a social experiment, the next sunny day, ask a kiwi how the weather is and they will probably tell you that its beautiful but they will also throw in a little kicker like "but a bit too hot" or "but a bit too windy"

Chris and Cher's son Kwayde turned 1 this month. He was so happy and showered with gifts. I didn't end up taking too many photos as I was too busy indulging in the candy; I was in candy heaven!
The great thing about kids parties is that they have all the different types of candy which you can pick away at.

Fairy Bread - Shape cut buttered bread covered with hundreds & thousands
Chocolate Muffins - with hundreds and thousands
Fruit Sherbet - Fruit flavoured sherbet enclosed in plastic fruits
Mars Bar Slice - Melted Mars bars and rice bubbles
Ice Cream Cake - Cookies and cream ice-cream in a cone.
Rocky Road - Marshmallow covered in chocolate, brilliant!

And loads more candy pieces. I honestly had so much energy that night, I went to the gym at 11pm to run it off.

Lastly, I attended a Twenty20 cricket match at the Cake Tin between the New Zealand Black Caps and South African Proteas. We won but it was really just an excuse to spend an evening in the Sun drinking beers.

Bad camera work, but do you see all the candy?

Kwayde more interested in the wrapping

Summer does exist in Wellington

Token Saffer

Laing putting jeans on because its getting cold

The South African Flash!

Happy 2012!

It is always great to be back home for New Years. The suns out, jandals on and steaks on the Barbie.
We celebrated New Year's Eve at Richard Dalton's place with a BBQ. Although it is summer, it was raining cats and dogs but yet the barbie still went ahead; we do love our barbies. New Year came and went as we were kicked out of the party at 1:30am due to drunken spillage of drinks. Although funny now, the atmosphere was tense at the time.

A few days later, Mois, Gillies and Grammy went for a 80min drive to Lake Ferry to go camping and swimming. By camping, I meant sleeping in cabins, by swimming, I meant drinking.
All was not lost as we also went for a 3 hour walk to see the Putangirua Pinnacles. I really don't know too much about how they were formed but Wikipedia editors reckon no later than 125,000 years ago. 125,000 years ago! Thats some special number. Oh and scenes from Lord of the Rings were also filmed here.

I'm going skip a week as I'm too lazy to share. Its basically golfing in Taupo, dinner, golf, dinner golf,

The beauty of living in Suburbia is all the amazing walking tracks right on your doorstep. Of late, I've been going for bush walks in search of lookouts. This may all sound lame and boring but its actually very invigorating.

Through bush and around the hills with a sunset, gay yeh? Wrong, Amazing!
Top of the hill at 420m surrounded by boulders, girly eh? Wrong, Epic!
Into the wild and across a creek to see a waterfall, poof aye? Wrong, Brilliant!
Wellington NYE 2011 photos here
Lake Ferry photos here
Taupo photos here
Wellington 2012 photos here

Lower Hutt Waterfall - 8.7 MB

Bec's going wild on Wii

Under Shelter

Before spillage

Life as it is

Yes this is what the whole of NZ looks like

Awesome walk

The Pinnacles

.......

Bonfire

Different Dinner

Different Bonfire

Nakedness

Pro Golfers

Someones Backyard

Dirty Old Men

Dirty old men sitting in the corner

Sunset From The Hills

View from Boulder Hill

Ryan The English Tourist

Niagara Falls

Merry Christmas, time to relax

Merry Christmas everyone and I am glad Christmas is finally over so I can start enjoying my holidays. Don't get me wrong, I love Christmas; to see the joy of kids faces when they open their presents, visiting friends & family and having a good laugh over expensive alcohol and great food. But its now time to kick back, help mum and dad out around the house, watch some tele and try to enjoy that extra 8 hours in our day. Christmas is all about giving and I even received a gift from New Zealand Police. They sent me a cheque for $120 for going 66 km/h in a 50 km/h zone. Thank you NZ Police.

My camera has been sitting dormant for the last few weeks. I just haven't gotten into the mood of taking pictures; maybe its been the stress of living at home or maybe I have not felt challenged. Either way, not many interesting shots this month.

Mike Bell and I decided to drive up to New Plymouth to visit Tristin and Kirsten. Its been 18 months since I last saw them as I was living in Toronto and they were in London.
The 4 ½ hour drive went by very quickly mainly because Mike and I spent the whole time arguing about stupid shit. We arrived to a feast of chicken tenders with roast vegetables. We chatted the night away and drank Woodstock bourbon and cola. The next day, I felt like I was poisoned by Mike; I could feel the Woodstock swishing inside my belly, I was literally sweating cola and sweetener.
We climbed Rock Paritutu as it's kind of a big deal on the New Plymouth foreshore. The rock is 200m high and somewhat challenging. I had to stop halfway to gag for a bit from Woodstock poisoning.
The 20min climb up was well worth and visit to New Plymouth.

After lunch, Mike, Tristin and I took a bromantic 10km walk across the Waiwhakaiho River and over the new Te Rewa Rewa Bridge also know as the 'Wave Bridge'. We spent the rest of the time sitting around and chillaxing.

Christmas Eve came around and my parents and I went to Buncey's place for a BBQ lunch of pork, Heineken marinated crackling, noodles and finished off with a bottle of Champagne. I gave the kids a large present all wrapped in newspaper with a piece of candy in each layer, when they got to the end, my hour of wrapping skills paid off. Video below.

So yeah, Christmas has all been about visiting people, eating and drinking heaps.
See you all in the New Year.

Sam

Christmas Present - 15.2 MB

Mike all tucked in at 1:30am

Before the Climb






GQ Man of the Year

200m up

Tristen eats like a homeless man

Wave Bridge

Was still about 26 degrees

Real Man Fruit Salad - No apples, its just a filler

Bye guys

Kwayde's new toy








Bunce working hard

Stag Do / Wedding / Sailing

10 weeks back home and what’s been happening? For one, a lot of golfing, drinking and chilling.
It was Richard Dalton’s stag do on a beautiful Saturday afternoon. The 16 of us set out to play 9 holes of golf; we also had a drink cart to ensure everyone was well hydrated. I’ve never really drank beers while playing golf and there’s probably a good reason not to do it. After the 3rd hole, hitting the ball straight was almost impossible. The afternoon ended with sunburnt skin and the evening session was just beginning.

Pub Golf was the game of the evening. What’s that you say? Well its very simple. Each pub we entered, we all had to have the same drink. Each drink is given a par value (for example, a pint of beer would be par 4 which meant you were allowed to have 4 drinks to finish off the pint).

  

Shot of Tequila – Par 1
Glass of Red Wine – Par 2
Pint of Beer – Par 4
Pint of Guinness – Par 5

  

Obviously because we were Neanderthals, everyone was gunning to finish their drinks in 1 go. To the untrained eye, I appear skittish and scared of the pint of Guinness but little do they all know that I was water birthed with Guinness and I pee black tar; 1 for me. The night carried on and by about 11pm, we had to send the stag away in a taxi as he was unable to walk.

The following weekend was Dick’s wedding. It was a tossup between flying 1 hour or saving money and driving 5 hours. I opted to fly and boy was I glad I didn’t have to drive home the next day.
The ceremony and reception was at Te Awa Winery in Napier. The outdoor wedding with its peaceful presence surrounded by friends and family was marvellous. The wine was brilliant and with good wine comes good food. They also had an instant photo booth to take silly pictures. At 12am, everyone got kicked out and it was back onto the bus to the hotel.........then it was straight to the pubs to do the funky chicken. 3:30am , lights come on and we get asked to leave, party back at the rooms we go. 5am, people started to drift off. 6am, I was passed out on the couch moments from getting pranked until Richard and Mois relocated me to their room as some turkey stole my bed.

The next day, we were all kicked out of the rooms as all the neighbours complained; some even left in the early hours of the morning. More drinks at the BBQ and a flight back into Wellington to attend the 30th birthday celebration of Rachel Turner, need I say more? I also learnt a new rule; Never wear Purple to a wedding. I am a big fan of purple when wearing a black suit as it offsets the darkness with light and bold colour but it appears everyone else also likes purple even Grandpa's. Never again........

As part of a team building exercise for work, Bunce organised for everyone to go sailing following by the BBQ and drinks. I cannot explain how awesome it was nor do I know the correct terms to use. Let’s say we were sailing at a 45 degree angle, the sea breeze, the clear skies, the hillside and almost collusion made Wellington the best City in New Zealand.
Dalton Wedding photos available here

Sam

Talking Thrash - 8.5 MB
The Departure - 4.6 MB
Here Comes The Bride - 11.4 MB
Here Goes The Bride - 9.4 MB
Here Dance The Bride - 6.6 MB
Sailing Storm - 10.3 MB

Let the games begin

Cameltoe

Shit shot

There always one

More disturbing than embarrassing

The boys looking tough

Scottish

Japan for the night

Pre-wedding jitters

Nah, pre-wedding fun

Waiting with anticipation

I Do

One Happy Family

And it begins

MMMmmmm

Last Call

Back at the Hotel

Gorgeous Archie; the baby not the boy

Jean shorts are back

Ready to sink

I like peace too

Now we're sailing

POW!