Be a kid...

lie on your stomach on the floor while watching a dvd with a mate... you may not intend to be childish but trust me, it's hard not to be...
Try it :-)

Burnt feet!

Well, maybe it does get warm in Wellington after all! My feet got sunburnt today... bit surprising. I have two friends up visiting from Christchurch so I took them to one of my favourite breakfast cafes here in Welly in the Aro Valley this morning. Nice and sunny out though I was impressed with them putting on their suncream for their walk... it wasn't that warm! After that we walked out to Hataiti through the horrible Victoria tunnel (lots of cars - yuck) to where the guys were taking part (still are as I type) their 12 hr mountain biking event. I did put on some cream on my face for that walk but it didn't even dawn on me to put some on the bit of my feet that were exposed to the sun. Had an enjoyable hour in the sun there as it was lovely atmosphere there actually.

I spoke, for the first time since I got to NZ to my sister in PHiladephila this morning. It was great to see her again. Of course at the time it was 8:30am Sat morning here so I wouldn't say I was looking my best. For Ciara on the other hand it wasn't even 3pm Fri and she'd just been to the airport to pick up her friend who's come to visit for the week. Quite disgusting really as even Carolyn, just off long flight looked better than I did. Well, I hadn't had my coffee yet!

Off out for a meal with the girls to Cambodian restaurant I was in a few weeks back. Looking forward to that though unbelievably sleepy now and it's only 6:30pm! OH well, I'm sure the food wil perk me up :-)

So... Sydney....

I arrived home a little after 1:30am on Tues morning after a great weekend in Sydney. It was my first visit back after I moved away on October 2001 and it was lovely to see it again! It really is a fantastic city and the weather, well, what can I say? For the first time in months I was warm for more than a few minutes at a time AND it didn't require me wearing layers to be so. There were blue skies with beautiful shining sun and I reckon it was at least 21 degrees on the Sat it must have been about 24 on the Mon. It was great.

The flight over was uneventful and on arrival we jumped on train to Circular Quay so from airport to 5 min walk from our hotel in 20 mins. Brilliant stuff. Interestingly, the first thing we noticed on leavin the train station was the quality of the air. After the lovely clean air here in Wellington, you could taste the bad air in Sydney. But needless to say, we got used to that pretty quick. Our hotel, was as you might expect, quite luxurious. The room was small but to be honest we were hardly in it and we were on the 24th floor so did get a view of the opera house as we'd hoped for (well it was an Opera View Room).



I know this may seem odd to anybody in Dublin but I was quite taken aback by the price of eating out (and the bad coffee) in Sydney. I guess this is compared to Wellington prices but it did take a bit of getting used to alright! However, the breakfast at least was included in our room and it was beautiful. It was a buffet breakfast but in true Four Seasons style it was fantastic. Fresh fruit (not all mixed together, eg strawberries, pineapple, kiwi, melon etc), bagels, pastries, muffins, about 7 different types of bread, natural yoghurts, smoked salmon, and all the hot food as well. And the scrambled egg wasn't at all bad for buffet eggs! I ate big breakfasts :-)

On the Saturday, after a humungous breakfast, we got the bus up to Paddington to where I used to live and we headed in to the Paddington Markets (which again I used to frequent). It was great to be back there and then wander the boutiques (yeah, I did that one alone). Needless to say I did manage to make a few purchases along the way - a really cute green bag, shoes, shorts, t-shirt... eh, I think that's it! At the Sydney Opera House that evening I was sitting beside this older woman who I heard say, "I can't believe it" a number of times. I actually thought that she was pissed off at me for taking a photo of hte organ and stage (obviously before the concert started!) but it turns out that she literally just couldn't believe she was there and was just a bit excited :-) And just look at that organ... I play the organ but only in a little church. It was really very sweet as she was so genuine. The performances were lovely (all Rachmaninov - conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazy) but I particularly enjoyed the last composition though I was so so exhausted that I couldn't wait for it to be over so I could go to sleep! But I still enjoyed it.

Sunday we did the Bondi-Coogee coastal walk. A little crowded (that's an understatment btw) due to the coastal sculpture exhiition that was going on. But it was a great stroll anyway, and exhibition finished by Tamarama Beach so wasn't too bad.

And after that... well we headed back to Paddington for Arthurs Pizza! Yum. Arthur's Pizza has been somewhat refurbished since I was there last but pizza's still as good! I would have loved a meal in Mickey's just up the road but we didn't get back - well not quite next door to where we were staying. That evening we hooked up with Colleen and some other work folk. V enjoyable evening hearing about new life in Sydney. And after my fab sleep the night before I was awake and alert for it and all :-)

Our last day was Mon and we had until about 4pm before we had to collect luggage and head to the airport. So, ferry across to Manly, where in fairness there isn't all that much to do! But wandered down to the beach at the other side of hte peninulsa which is a well known surf beach (apparently) but no good surfers there! Had a lovely lunch of mezza and turkish bread with a rather nice glass of riesling back at the Opera Bar at Opera Quays on our return. Well I had mezze, the rather good fish & chips were had by Dave. I got the "you'll never eat all that" when it arrived to which I retorted "watch me!". Eh... well, I didn't. I couldn't! We spent the rest of hte afternoon in The Domain and Botanical Gardens before heading off to the airport. I could list all we saw in there (including the tree with loads of flying foxes (bats) hanging from trees sleeping! Don't know where I heard/thought that they liked the dark... this was in bright sun light on the hottest day yet! Pretty funky though.



Em... I'm sure there's lots more I could say and of course in a more interesting way but eh, well, I won't! Pictures will be up on flickr on http://www.flickr.com/photos/eefa

At last!

I have my internet connection set up at home! Unfortunately I'm too tired to write anything this evening (plane only landed at midnight last night so it was late to bed!). But soon hopefully :-)

Sydney!

When we were booking flights for Sydney it seemed like ages away, and yet, suddenly it's not. Flight this afternoon (nearly a 4 hr flight mind you!) and while Australia may be just across "the ditch" it's still a 3hrs 40mins flight! V much looking forward to it however and hopefully not too much rain while there :-)

I'll update next week.. maybe on Tues evening once I successfully connect my new funky little MacBook to my new broadband set up at home!

Later...

Moving Away from the Dark Side...

I'm still here. And now that I've just gone and ordered my new MacBook I have a major driver to get my arse in gear and get a broadband connection set up at home.

For those of you who know some of the folk down here in the NZ office I would like to point out that the decision to buy a MacBook is mine. And mine alone. I have not been influenced by the fact that I am surrounded by a serious number of Apple fans. I am not, and will not become one of those people who has to buy the latest Apple iPod Nano or iPod Touch just because, well just because it's new and looks good... although the iPod Touch does have some funky new features admittedly. Honest. I promise! The fact that there a serious number of Apple fans here (at least one of whom should probably be earning commission from Apple for converting the others) may have been the reason why I was in an Apple reseller store on Sat.. and how I ended up playing with a MacBook and thinking that it was really quite beautiful and fun. I would have gone down to store today to purchase (I've been informed that walking out of that store with your purchase is a great feeling) but they're out of stock. So I've ordered online.

I headed out to Dick Smith at lunch time to try to decide whether I would be happy with the white or if I wanted to pay the Black Tax to get the black one. But to be honest, I prefer the white... so I guess I've saved myself the cost of my, as yet to be purchased, thermarest. Anyway, all the apples are off on their 5 year lunch so there's nobody here to get all excited over my order. Then again I think that suits me fine as I almost, but not quite, feel bad that I can't muster up the same excitement over Apple products that these guys do. Then again... I am looking forward to the arrival of my new MacBook :-)

Packs and things

No, still no internet at home so scribbling this at work. Had lovely 3 day long weekend for the weekend just past. I was pretty whacked by Fri so I had a lovely early night on Fri evening after a dose of Morse. Saturday I headed off my long planned day in the spa where I thoroughly enjoyed my massage followed by facial followed by body exfoliation followed by Vichy shower. Lunch after that and then manicure and pedicure. I could live without the latter two treatments. I mean I go to these things not to come out looking good but for the pure relaxation of it all and that was obtained from the pre-lunch treatments. The back massage was much needed but I believe that I really need some more serious treatment on neck/back. I'm really missing my regular visits to Carolyn my physical therapist back in Dublin :-( Probably doesn't help that I haven't found a decent pilates class to attend yet either.

Sunday was a really glorious day. Got lots done like buying apartment stuff (basic things like a lighter so I could light candles!), nice bedroom stuff, a vase (so flowers no longer in hiking flask etc :-) ). I even got a bit red in the face just from my walk in the morning and pottering about outside in the afternoon. A work colleague invited a bunch of us over for dinner on Sun evening where we had some wonderful Indian vegetarian food. I left there quite full :-)

Mon was just lazy. Read lots. Bought some lamps bla bla. Nothing exciting. Oh, what I did do though was finally buy a rucksack so I can't put off going tramping any longer! Jeez I had no idea that these things were quie so technical! I had been advised to do at least two things:

• Buy a Macpac brand
• Make sure it's got a good harness

So, in I go in to one of the numerous outdoor shops here in Wellington. I explain that I haven't owned a proper rucksack for tramping before (i.e. I've no idea what i'm doing or how to use the harness properly) but I need to get one. Mac (well after 45 mins I knew his name) shows me the Esprit which is designed specifically for women. Macpac have just updated their range of packs so new materials, harnesses etc so new prices too. So where as I? Oh yes, Mac shows me pack and then goes but this is a bit expensive (at $575 I didn't disagree) but look there's one of the old range and it's a size 2 and it's 70L. Yes, apparently I'm a size 2 in rucksacks. Spend about 15 mins adjusting, putting weights in walking about etc an dcome to the conclusion that it's not for me. Shoulders hurting within mins of weights going in yet apparently it's correctly adjusted. Mac then says that he thinks I'd be better off with a smaller pack because of my petite frame (I'm not sure that at 173cm I can be described as petite but hey I wasn't complaining), say something like 60L. The problem is that on tramps you have to carry your own gear and some shared gear so that just wouldn't be big enough. End up trying on the one he initially pointed out (that's 65L) - just to compare, and well, the difference was phenomenal! Seriously! Even with the weights in it was so much more comfortable. So, to cut a much longer story a bit shorter, I ended up getting that but I did get a 10% discount so happy enough. As I said to him, I wasn't going to buy the first one no matter what as it wasn't comfortable and if my shoulder was hurting with 7kg in after 10 mins how would I feel after a day with 15-20kg! We both had a good laugh at the fact that the new harness can carry a load of up to 40kg before comfort is affected... as if I'd even get it off the ground - almost as heavy as me for God's sake!! So at the end of the day the newbie has one of the latest packs on the market. Hoping to put it to good use on non club tramp with Dave weekend after next. Apparently I'll have to carry my "fair share" which I don't dispute but it's good to know that should it all get too much for me...

Second tango class this evening....
End of ramble!