Lubilee Jubilee

A long time between blogs. We'll get around to posting some photos of our new flat soon. We've got a bit of catching up to do, first of all let's up date you on our experience of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations...


Leading up to the jubilee weekend London basked in some incredible weather, 10 days of hot sunny weather. Union Jack flags and bunting were appearing in shops and outside people's homes in an unusual display of patriotism for the UK. Some photographic evidence of the great weather leading up to the jubiliee weekend:

Was so hot I had a cold drink instead of coffee at my visit to my regular coffee shop near work

Perhaps off to join the flotilla? My view from my regular coffee shop down the road from work

View of London on my way home from a meeting in town

The weekend before the jubilee weekend was the Ritherdon Road street party which is just around the corner. We went and had a look and enjoyed a German sausage and ice cream. It was a great street party with lots of people and atmosphere.

Ritherdon Road street party (or should that be road party)

The Friday before the jubilee weekend the weather packed up. On the Saturday morning I went for a jog in to town to see the preparations for the main event - the flotilla down the Thames. I ran through Battersea Park which was hosting a festival and had some prime viewing spots for the flotilla.


From Battersea Park I ran through Chelsea to Hyde Park were more preparations for various events were taking place, Kensington Palace was looking very well groomed having been closed off for quite a while as they redid the gardens and maybe prepared the palace for Kate and Will to inhabit.


All in all, there wasn't as much to see on my run as I thought but at least it dragged me out for a long run. Some sights from my run...

On Saturday afternoon we did a bit of shopping and on the way back stopped in at a street party which got us in the mood for the weekend.


On Sunday, the weather looking particularly poor, there was a Vintage Market in Balham, it's a shame the weather was so bad because there weren't too many people at this market. We stopped for tea and cake.

Scone with jam and cream, yum

Victoria sponge

The works

I headed in to town to see the flotilla (while Jackie and Theo stayed at home to pack). I think it was probably just as well the weather was a little suspect because there were so many people who turned up, I'm sure if the weather was half decent there would have been too many people.


I caught a train and then had a long walk to where I thought I might be able to get a view. Being on my own I was able to squeeze in between people and eventually got to a point where I was about 3 rows back from the river. My view was obstructed but I was happy with my spot, the people around me were quite nice, not too raucous.


There was quite a bit of waiting involved but we were entertained by big screen showing the BBC coverage of the day. It wasn't too long before the boats started coming, there was some confusion about where the Queen was amongst the flotilla with some people suggesting she was on the first fancy boat but when she did eventually arrive there was no mistaking her boat or her.


The flotilla was quite impressive but I wasn't going to hang around till the very end because I knew the trip home was probably going to be a long one.


As the bridges were all closed for the flotilla and I had got myself on to the north side of the river I needed to find a tube or train that could get me home. I found a bus stop, waited for a bus but they were all full. Eventually I crossed the road and got a bus to Victoria station which whisked me home with little fuss.

These had been at the Chelsea Flower Show but was sitting in a  car park near the river

A panorama photo of the scene by the river

My view of the big screen

My view of the river was probably better than my view of the big screen. This was the barge which had the bells ringing out. 

This was the fancy boat leading the flotilla which some people thought had the Queen on it. It didn't

The rowing boats were out front, including a waka

The Queen's boat

You prob can't see it on the screen, but when the photo is full size you can see the  Queen. 

There were some interesting boats bringing up the rear, I did stop to watch the steam boats go by

Victoria station was decked out for the Queen. 

The Monday and Tuesday were predominantly spent packing. On Tuesday we went for a great walk past lots of street parties and went and had a pint at a pub, including a Jubilee Ale and even got a photo with the Queen.

One of the street parties we saw on our walk

Jackie and Theo having a taste of the Jubilee Ale

Jackie and Theo with Liz

All in all it was a great weekend, the atmosphere across London was happy and friendly, there was a real sense of excitement. It was amazing to be a part of it all. We did wonder whether we might be hear for a coronation in the near future. Ticking off a Royal Wedding, Jubilee and Coronation would be quite a set to have!

We're on the move

It's been ages since our last blog post, sorry about that, we've had quite a bit on. I've been sorting out my visa (work in progress), I've taken on my bosses job and we've been moving. I think most people are aware we've had to move out of DCC because we needed more space, and another bedroom now that we are 3 people.

Jackie spent ages looking at flat, schlepping around south west London looking at all sorts of flats, some decent, some disgusting. The place we have ended up in is huge compared to our small but well laid out 1 bedroom flat in the DCC.

We've moved to an area called furzedown, which apparently isn't a suburb in its own right but an area within Streatham (pronounced stret-him). It's a nice residential area, with a few shops, a playground with bowling green and tennis courts at the end of the road and plenty of young families around. The biggest drawback with the new place is that it is a long way from any tube or trains. We were very fortunate in Balham to have both train and tube very near by. It is going to take some adjusting but I'm sure we'll get used to it.

The place we're in is a 2 bedroom Victorian conversion. Our landlord lives on the first floor, we've got the second and third floors. We think the landlord did some of the conversion himself because it's a bit rough in places but that's fine by us. We're a little worried about how cold it might get upstairs, where the bedrooms are, because it is a loft conversion, so not the same level of insulation but it's something we're going to have to deal with. Theo has loads of woollen clothes and blankets and if we have to spend a bit more on heating then so be it.

Coinciding with us moving flats, Theo has started crawling, which is great fun, although caused a few problems while trying to pack, move and unpack. We've had to get stair guards and get used to closing doors so Theo doesn't disappear, he really can motor now and he's quite cheeky because he will crawl away, look back knowing he shouldn't be going where he is going and then carry on crawling. He's also pulling himself up on couches, coffee tables and anything else that takes his fancy, this often results in an ungraceful and painful fall but he'll figure it out soon enough.

That's all for now, once we're unpacked we'll take photos of the place to give you a guided tour. Also other blogs we need to do include one of our London in 50 walks and Jubilee Weekend. Hopefully we can get those done before Wimbledon and the Olympics!

The trilogy concludes, finally

Sorry, I promised a trilogy of posts about our trip to NZ in March and April, with the final instalment about our time in Abu Dhabi. It's been a while coming but here goes...

We flew in to Dubai, this was my first long haul flight with Theo, he was settled for the flight although had a big vomit while we were in transit at Brisbane airport.

Theo and Jackie were able to get quite a bit of sleep on the plane. I didn't sleep so much.

We arrived in to Dubai, it was something like 5am local time when we arrived. At immigration we were probably looking a bit unsure about where to go. I think Jackie must have been wearing Theo in the front pack, she was approached by an official to ask what passport we were travelling on. I thought here we go, time for the interrogation. But instead, when we said we're on NZ passports, he said, "Well, this must be the future king of NZ, follow me" and he promptly took us to the first class lane where we didn't have to wait and were processed by a friendly immigration officer.

Picked up our bags and met our driver who drove us to Dubai. The driver was very nice, I've forgotten his name, he pointed out all the sights and we talked about cricket and football, he's from Kerala in India so a big fan of both sports. The journey was probably close to 2 hours, I'm not sure if I stayed awake the whole time.

We got to the Parson's residence, had a nice coffee, breakfast and showers making us feel slightly normal.  It was still quite early so we headed out for a walk but it was already hot, 30+ degrees so we didn't stay out for long.

A view of the Abu Dhabi skyline on our walk

We drove to a mall for lunch and to pick up some groceries, as I've mentioned before we love going to supermarkets in different countries so this was quite fun for us. The most unusual thing we saw was massive bags of milk powder, we decided they put that in their baths to have milk baths.

The boys just hanging out together

Jackie went for a swim while me and Theo caught up on some sleep.

View from the Parson's apartment

Delicious home made meal for dinner and to bed, we were zonked.

The next day we drove to Yas Island where the F1 is held. We had lunch at Stars and Bars, which is a restaurant/bar the original is based in Monaco which we went to with Kate many years ago.

Money

Stars 'n' bars, the place to take kids for lunch

More boats and fancy buildings at Yas Island

We were given a grand tour of Abu Dhabi on the drive back, including stopping for take away coffee and cake from Jones the Grocer, which is apparently a well known Australian cafe, their coffee and cake was very good.

The next day we drove back to Dubai, stopping at Lime Tree cafe before going to the airport. Lime Tree cafe is a NZ style cafe, we had nice coffee, juice and cake.

The flight back was relatively uneventful, we got home on a Saturday which gave us a couple of days to recover before returning to work after Easter Monday.

Unfortunately by the time we got home Theo had become quite unwell, he wasn't keeping his food down at all, always throwing it up in dramatic fashion. He was also a bit out of sorts generally and was coughing quite a bit. Turns out he had a bout of pneumonia, well so the doctor said. He was prescribed some antibiotics and recovered quite quickly. I suspect the combination of busy, long flights and drastic changes in temperature were the cause.

Thoughts on Abu Dhabi... I don't get it. There are lots of big buildings, wide streets, fancy cars but it felt a bit like the Truman Show where so much seemed staged.

Burj Khalifi, the tallest building in the world, in Dubai

EXCUSE ME, are you listening?

New Zealand March/April 2012 - North Island

Friday morning in Patumahoe we had a sad start to the day as we heard that Jackie's Aunty Brenda had passed away. While this was very sad news it wasn't altogether unexpected and it was good that Jackie was in the country to say farewell to her Aunty.

Saturday we went to see our good friends Bec and Calum at their lovely home in Stanmore Bay. A great bacon and egg pie, some yum beer and big walk along the beach.

Our walk along the beach at Stanmore Bay, weather wasn't the  best but was great to be walking along a rugged NZ beach

Sunday I took part in the Anderson Family golf day. After a very wet start to the day it turned out to be a hot and sunny day. The format was ambrose, I was a team captain, I think Phil had built me up a bit. My team (Josh and Kieran) managed to do quite well with a creditable second place, absolutely no thanks to me, my golf was atrocious, and while I don't like blaming the equipment I did have a monster drive on the last hole with someone else's driver. After golf was an Anderson family lunch, with ladies bringing a plate. I'm getting used to these gatherings.

On Monday we ran a few errands and took a drive out to Beachlands, a suburb/town I would like to live in one day. We had a yum bakery lunch by the beach. The sun was out, it was hard not to fall in love with this place.

Beachlands in the sun, we drove around looking at all the houses there picking out the ones we liked. 

Tuesday I flew down to Gisborne in the morning with Theo, Jackie stayed back for Aunty Brenda's funeral. It was a tough decision to make for me to go ahead with Theo but given the gorge into Gisborne was blocked there was limited availability for us to change flights and all be on the same flight. So off I went with Theo to the airport, Jackie and I were both more than a little nervous. As I got on the plane I walked to the back with Theo, I could see the fear and confusion in the other passengers eyes - "Is this tiny baby going to scream all the way!?", "And where on earth is his mother!?". Well no one needed to worry. Theo sat quietly for take off. During the flight he gave everyone the glad eye and he decided to doze off for landing. What a relief! We did still have to get through the day feeding with a bottle but Grandma had that covered and Theo was a little gem.

Out for a walk with Grandma and Granddad, beautiful weather so time for a snooze

We were all pleased though when Jackie turned up later that day.

A glass of wine as the sun goes down in Gisborne

We had some great weather in Gisborne. We had a lovely lunch at the Marina restaurant where mum had her 60th birthday party. We did some errands, Jackie did some shopping, we went for walks around the vineyard and around Gisborne and caught up with a good friend who lives in Gisborne. All in all it was a great relaxing few days, Theo loved the attention and loved his play pen that was set up for him with copious toys.

Theo's play pen was great, he loved hanging out in here

From Gisborne we drove down to Havelock North for the weekend where we met up with my Aunty Heather and went to a wedding.

Time to pack up again, Theo was used to it by now.

Havelock North is a lovely town. We went out for a nice meal on the Friday  night. On Saturday we looked around town, mum bought shoes. On Saturday afternoon Jackie and I went to the wedding, leaving Theo with mum, Heather and dad, who when dropping us off at the wedding let it slip that they were planning on heading out to do some wine tasting that afternoon with Theo - not what we expected of responsible baby sitters!! We did manage to relax and enjoy ourselves at the wedding, which was at Craggy Range winery and was a spectacular event, definitely one of the best weddings we've been too with so much thought going into the whole day.

Jackie looking gorgeous at Craggy Range,  with a refreshing Epic Pale Ale , I think this was my beer that Jackie had confiscated. 

We were relieved to find Theo still alive when we got back to the motel, he was hungry but other than it seems he was well looked after. Sunday morning we went to a great cafe called At E's, if you're ever in Havelock North it's definitely worth hunting out.

At E's Cafe, great spot in Havelock North

After brunch and a walk along the parade in Napier it was to the airport for our last internal flight, back up to Auckland.

Monday we did some jobs, went and saw some people and headed into town for dinner at a friend's house. Tuesday was our last day, lots of packing and dinner with the family.

Hanging out with the cousins the night before flying out

Wow, loads of territory covered and lots done. Sorry there isn't much in the way of interesting stories or detail it's been busy here so it's taken a while to get this written and with me having a memory like a sieve I might have missed some out!

Anyway, stay tuned for part 3 in the trilogy coming soon.

New Zealand March/April 2012 - South Island

We arrived back in London yesterday after a great but exhausting holiday in NZ with a tactical and enjoyable stop over in Abu Dhabi on the way home.

It's been over 3 weeks (longer for Jackie) so I'm going to split the blogs in to South Island (the first bit) and North Island (the second bit) and Abu Dhabi (the last bit) - a trilogy, a bit like Lord of the Rings - (long and a bit pointless but great entertainment nonetheless) 

Without further adieu here goes...

I arrived in to Christchurch as fresh as can be expected after 30 hours of flying and airports. My last couple of legs of the flight I had four seats to my self so was able to sleep. I picked up Jackie from the airport later that day. After settling in our motel we went down to the mall to pick up some food and kiwi treats. Next morning before heading off I went for a jog. We didn't see too much earthquake damage.

Packing up for road trip to Akaroa

Drive to Akaroa, had to ask at the info centre in Akaroa where Marsh and Fee's wedding was, being NZ they knew of course. The venue was amazing, the accommodation very good. I got there in time for a pie and the rehearsal. BBQ on the Friday night was a great opportunity to catch up with many friends.

Our view of the action at Akaroa

Sat morning, Marsh and Fee's big day. I started with a run which was a bit stupid because we were up a very steep hill which was hard enough to run down. I ran to the lighthouse and back seeing more of Akaroa town along the way. It was an amazing morning for a run in Akaroa, such a picturesque place. I struggled up the hill, and we managed to drive into town for some brunch and a coffee - the food was ok, coffee alright, service was very friendly but it took ages! I was getting nervous about not getting back to the venue in time to perform my best man duties.

I did get back in time, it was a great day, pretty much everything went off without a hitch and the weather was spectacular. Theo behaved reasonably well for Jackie and she had some help from our friends who were there.

The next day, after a final catch up with many friends we hit the road to drive to Dunedin. It was a great road trip, Theo was reasonably good. By the time we got to Dunedin the weather had turned quite bad and it was pouring down. It was great to see Jill and family, they were all very excited to meet Theo.

Aunty Jill and cousin Alex getting to know Theo

Having a snooze with cousin Millie

Looking happy and smart with the rellies 

Monday the kids had the day off school and we met with Rua for lunch at Customhouse restaurant by the wharf.

Tuesday Jill, Jackie, Theo and myself walked down to St Kilda for lunch at Starfish Cafe which was great, photos below. Highlights included Emerson's Pale Ale, Cheese Roll, Flat White, Kumara Cakes, the sun, chilling out with good company. I managed to get a bit too much sun while enjoying my time here.

Emerson's Pale Ale and family

Ginger Crunch

Cheese Roll. My first experience, it was good, we probably should have ordered one each because I got left with the smallest bit. 

Just chilling in the sun at Starfish cafe

Down the road from the cafe at St Kilda beach

Wednesday we went to the local bakery, picked up some lunch and drove out to Port Chalmers and Aromoana. The town of Aramoana is famous for the David Gray massacre of 1990 but the town is a very picturesque, rugged spot, shame it's got such a negative association for many. The weather was clear again although quite breezy. We found a great sheltered spot on a deserted beach to have our lunch. In Port Chalmers we found a great cafe for coffee and cake before heading back to Dunedin.

Beach at Aramoana, it was extremely windy but that doesn't really come across in the photo

Lunch spot on the road from Aramoana to Pt Chalmers

An idyllic spot, Jill even dipped her toe in the water

Bakery lunch on the beach, nice

This photo probaby gives the best idea of the fact that it was still pretty cold and windy

At a cafe in Pt Chalmers

Citrus slice and 'Tan' slice

Thursday was road trip back to Chch and flight to Auckland, which all went quite smoothly. Lunch (pie) in Timaru.


So that is the end of Part 1 in this trilogy. Stay tuned for part 2 (and 3) I'll try and get them posted asap so you don't have to be kept in suspense.