3rd September 2009: Coming home

Our time in New Zealand is sadly over. I am writing this from Bangkok airport, halfway back to the UK. We've had a fantastic year, with lots of excellent memories that will doubtless stay with us for the rest of our lives.

In the last few months, one of the questions kiwis tended to ask me a lot was "so, have you decided to stay yet?" I came out here with the knowledge that many who move here never leave. We always intended to return to the UK, but we were open-minded and I think I now understand why so many stay. With our background being the UK, I think there are three major draws:

Firstly, the weather. There's plenty of sun in Auckland, yet it never gets too hot. The temperature is consistently pleasant across a lot of the year. It certainly rains quite a lot but only in short sharp bursts, after which the sun will be out. You never get those days of grey drizzle that London is infamous for.

Secondly, the space. Auckland is a busy city, but once you leave that the rest of the country is remarkably unpopulated. New Zealand has an embarrasment of deserted beaches, remote walks and open vistas. I've lost count of the number of times we've been on day-long walks without seeing another soul.

Thirdly, the people. I've been to no other country where the people are so consistently friendly and helpful. The kiwis are rightly proud of their country, and their pride shows through in the way they love to help visitors and each other alike.

Ultimately though, we're coming home, even though we had the option of staying longer. It comes down to a combination of wanting to be near friends & family, and where the jobs are. One of New Zealand's biggest selling points, its isolation, is also what is driving us home.

We'll miss you, New Zealand. It's been fun!

30th August 2009: Kitesurfing Lesson Four

It's my last weekend in NZ and I was supposed to be packing up the flat. The weather this morning was good though, so I couldn't resist one last kitesurfing lesson before I head back to the start of a UK winter.

The wind was a bit light early on, and I was stuggling to get moving. When you're learning you tend to drift downwind as you're trying to get going, and then you have to trudge back up though waist deep water with a massive kite pulling you the other way. That isn't much fun.

The wind filled in a bit later, and you know what? I can now kite surf! I was able to blast back and forth quite a few times and even stay upwind. The feeling, when you get it right, is truly awesome. You lean back against the power of the kite and just fly. It's amazingly fast, and almost effortless. The only comparison I can make is that it's a bit like sailing a fast dinghy with a big spinnaker up - I guess that's why spinnakers are often called "kites".

I definitely need to get more into this sport when I get back to the UK...

If anyone's reading this and looking for kitesurfing instruction in the Auckland area, I would definitely recommend Reuben at Wings & Waves.

22nd-23rd August 2009: Snowboarding on Mount Ruapehu

I'm fast running out of weekends before I go home, but Ken was insistent on a trip down to Mount Ruapehu for some snowboarding. Obviously I had to keep him company, so I agreed to go too.

Sophie and I had visited the Turoa ski area in October last year, so this time we headed to Whakapapa, on the other side of the volcano. I'm not sure how fair the comparison is, but Ken's and my impressions were that it's nowhere near as good as the stuff around Queenstown. It's certainly a lot bigger, with 10+ lifts instead of 2-3, but the snow quality wasn't as good and it was packed with too many people. We spent a lot of time queueing for aged and slow lifts, and then avoiding others on the slopes.

Mount Ruapehu

Still, we had a really good time. It wasn't busy the whole time and when the clouds cleared the views of the surroundings and Ngauruhoe in particular were fantastic. Skiing on an active volcano also adds a certain something to the day!

Ngauruhoe, from the road to Whakapapa

On Saturday night we headed to a busy bar to watch the Tri Nations All Blacks-Wallabies game. It turned out to be a bit of a thriller which the Kiwis won 19-18 with a last-minute penalty. I've definitely become a bit of an All Blacks fan since coming here: the locals take it so seriously it's hard not to get dragged in. Was it inevitable?

15th -16th August 2009: Waitawheta Hut

Saturday in Auckland dawned grey and rainy, and there was a severe weather warning for heavy rain in the Kaimai Ranges. This wasn't quite what we had hoped for, since I had planned a two-day walk there to the Waitawheta Hut with Ken and Mark. Despite it plainly being a day best spent in a warm pub, we set off anyway. We did make one concession: instead of taking the flattish route with 6 substantial river crossings, we opted for the high route in over the top from Te Aroha.

We started the walk at about noon with a 2-hour ascent up the Te Aroha mountain which, at 952m, would count as a Munro were it Scotland. With the car at 15m this was a sizeable start to the day, and it was impressively steep and muddy.

From the top, we then had 4 hours of tramping on some outrageously muddy tracks, undulating over valleys and crossing swollen streams. It was so wet, even the possums were giving up - we found one dying on the track (presumably poisoned). We had not really done our sums on the timings or we would have realised a bit sooner that we were going to get to the hut after dark. Once we did cotton on we sped up quite a bit, and by the time we'd had three stream crossings come up to our knees we were definitely getting the hang of them: there was no time for niceties like taking your boots off, we just had to wade through. We were just discussing (by torchlight) the remaining half-hour of walking we thought we had left when the hut appeared around a corner. I have rarely been quite so relieved to see a shelter.

Ken, about to cross one of the smaller streams

We shared the large and comfortable Waitawheta Hut with a group of 13 from an Auckland tramping club. Given the weather we hadn't expected to see anyone else there, and neither had they. It wasn't as sociable as some of my previous hut visits: there was some banter but as is often the way, everyone was in their sleeping bags by 9pm. Outside, it rained, all night.

The following morning we had to retrace our steps. The rain had eased, but the mud had just gathered strength. It took us about 5 hours of battling though the stuff to get back to the Te Aroha mountain. Every step was in water or mud. We couldn't face the ascent to the top again, so we circumnavigated for a further 2 hours before finally reaching the car, totally exhausted.

Ken and Mark, on our way back on day-2

It was one of the tougher walks I've done, and certainly the muddiest. All three of us had our moments of feeling dreadful, but when you're in the middle of nowhere you've got no choice but to keep on going. It's all part of the adventure - nobody is going to come and carry you out! I also took a nice knock to the head when I walked straight into a big over-hanging branch - it's left a decent mark.

More photos here.

9th August 2009: Kitesurfing Lesson Three

I had another kitesurfing lesson on Sunday. This time I managed to stay upright for decent periods and almost stay upwind, quite a big improvement on last time.

I'm definitely getting the hang of it. The speed you can travel at is quite amazing. I'd guess it's 15-20 knots (fast over water), but when you get it right it's almost effortless - the harness takes all the load and you just blast along.

The most important thing I learnt this time is that you really have to watch the kite the whole time, not your feet. Otherwise, the kite crashes and shortly afterwards you crash too, usually resulting in sea water imbibage.

Kitesurfing has quite a reputation for being a dangerous sport, but having done it a few times I reckon it's actually probably safer than, say, snowboarding. As I understand it, the design of the kites made some big steps forwards a few years ago - the newer bow kites can be completely de-powered by simply letting go. It's clearly possible to get yourself in trouble, but following the safety instructions you get from lessons probably makes it pretty safe.

30th July - 5th August 2009: Queenstown

My employer, CHP Consulting, organises annual conferences where we get together to catch up, find out what the company's plans are and have some fun. Last year, the regional conference was in Port Douglas, Australia. This year everyone came to Queenstown, on the South Island of New Zealand.

Queenstown is the capital of adventure tourism in NZ and has the widest selection of crazy activities that I have ever seen in one place. At this time of year, it concentrates on winter sports, with four significant ski areas within reach (Coronet Peak, The Remarkables, Cardrona and Treble Cone). After the morning conference, we headed up to the Remarkables, where we all spent an hour snow tubing. This was entertaining, although to many of us it seemed like a bit of waste of valuable ski-resort time.

After the conference I stuck around in Queenstown with Ken, Tom and Amy for 5 days' snowboarding. I've been lucky enough to go to many of France's best ski resorts, as well as some American ones, so it's interesting to compare how New Zealand does things.

The biggest difference is scale. Most of these areas have two lifts, three at most. In comparison, Val d'Isère claims 94 on its website. Despite this, we didn't get bored. Many of the slopes were wide and over open terrain with no trees, so you could pick your own route down. It's also nice to get to know slopes well - where the jumps are, etc.

Getting to the resorts is different too - you have to drive through the valleys, before turning sharply uphill and ascending quickly to the snow-line. No ski-in-ski-out luxury here. The roads up are also mostly unsealed, which become entertainingly trecherous when you reach the snow. I am now an expert at the messy business of fitting and removing snow chains!

Of our 5 days, 3 had excellent conditions, with nightly fresh powder and sunshine. I don't know whether this is how it always works down there, but I was certainly impressed. The only dissapointment was our day at Treble Cone - many people had raved about it, but heavy wet snow and strong winds meant half the resort was closed and the rest wasn't much fun. It did seem to have potential though: huge open slopes, steep sections and loads of natural gullies. One for next time!

25th July 2009: Waitakere Ranges Walking

Things have quietened down a bit since Sophie left - we had been trying to squeeze as much as we could into her last weekends here, and I haven't had much planned since. I did manage another sail at Panmure Lagoon Sailing Club last weekend, but it wasn't much to write about.

With Ken now back on the CHP NZ team, things were bound to get busy again. This Saturday I was supposed to be having another kite-surfing lesson, but the day dawned calm so that was abandoned. Instead, Ken and I headed to Cascade Kauri in the Waitakere Ranges for bit of a walk.

Sophie and I have been here before - there are some excellent stands of mature Kauri in the area and I wanted to see some more of them. From the car park, we took the Lower Kauri Track ("for experienced trampers only"!) which had some entertainingly muddy and steep sections. We then went north to take the Whatitiri track back to the car park, which crosses some grassy fields offering, unusually for the Waitaks, a open view.

Somewhere around then we lost the track. This doesn't happen often in NZ - they're normally very clearly marked. I suspect it was when Ken went to 'play' with a flock of pukekos. We'd been wandering around for a while, and were just discussing how to make a tent out of fern leaves, and wondering what pukoko would be like for dinner, when we found the track again and our fun was spoilt.

We saw quite a few birds in that area: pukekos, fantails, red-crested parakeets, a wood pigeon, an NZ robin and plenty of tui. Not a bad haul. It's interesting how this year in NZ has turned me into a little bit of a twitcher. Only a bit though!