Photo Update

I've been lazy with photos.

I don't have a camera. Travis has a camera. Mine got lost en route to Auckland. Sad, sad Amy.

There are photos on Travis's hard drive that I have just recently found - some of them dating from May 30. I did not have these on MY computer, hence, did not post them on the blog. Now I've got some... I'm still missing quite a few, but here's a start to tide you over.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

First Camping Weekend in New Zealand

We took off on Friday, Oct 10 to Urititi Campground.

It was great.

There were no fire pits or bbqs... it was good that we had a camp stove so we could cook our food. And cook we did!

Our tent is huge - just the right size for us. ;) The air mattress also works great. Sleeping bags were good, too. I started off being too hot, but then, as always, got too cold. The next night I started off wearing my new wool sweater and socks, and I was much better throughout the night.

We were about 35m from the beach, on the other side of a sand dune. SO AWESOME. We were smack-dab in the middle of a 5km long beach. We would walk about 2.5km of sand in either direction. And we did. In bare feet. My feet got sand flea bites ALL over them. (Today is Oct 27, and they're not itchy anymore, but there are scars where I was bitten).

Hopefully we'll be able to go camping for a night next weekend after Travis returns from China. He probably won't want to go anywhere, though.

(I don't have photos from this weekend on my computer - they're on Trav's hard drive that he took with him to China. Those will get posted at a later date).

Aotearoa Music

Travis and I watched the NZ Music Awards last night. I had heard of all of the nominees, which was a bonus. I had even heard most of the music. I'm especially loving Anika Moa right now. There are a list of albums I need to buy in the next little while. Here's a short list of some NZ artists you might want to check out: Tiki Taane, Liam Finn, Shapeshifter, Kora, Katchafire, Salmonella Dub, Cut off Your Hands, OpShop, Scribe, Savage (and Decepticons), Shihad, Flight of the Conchords (obviously), Anika Moa, Julia Deans, and Straitjacket Fits (think Pixies, R.E.M., Sonic Youth, Nirvana, you know, late 80s stuff - AWESOME).

The highlight of the night, for me, was the opening of the show and the performance by Tiki Taane. I don't think there's a youtube video up yet of last night's performance, but here's the album version of the song TANGAROA - god of the sea.



Enjoy. Check out all the other Tiki videos, and Straitjacket Fits, too. :)

One, Two, Skip a Few, What Happened to September?

I managed to skip the month of September. September has never been a good month for me. VERY strange memories of September. I can pretend I have a good September memory, but it is usually trumped by a bad one. September of 2008 felt different than any other I have ever experienced, due to the fact that I am in New Zealand, and school does not begin in September. (all of my bad memories are school/university related)

September 2008 was full of parties, friends, loneliness, running, running, hurting, netball, significant netball losses, last cast glass class, Skype, recurrence of painful skin problems, and planning for this spring season. Travis was away for the month of September, and came home on the 28th, so there wasn't any exploring with him. However, I did get to see more of the country without him: Bethells Beach one weekend with Sarah and Dragana, and hiking The Pinnacles with Paul and Caoilinn.

Travis and I went on an adventure on Saturday as a warm-up for springtime camping. We drove around the Firth of Thames, ate some fish & chips, stopped to walk around at Karangahake Gorge, and ended up at Waihi Beach. It's a really long beach. I'd love to go back when it's not cloudy.

This weekend, weather permitting, we will be heading north of Auckland (somewhere) to test our our new camping gear. We bought two sleeping bags and a 4-man tent online last week. They're not really "hiking" gear... more like "car camping" gear. Conveniently, we have a car to carry our gear around. Inconveniently, our car isn't as good on gas as we hoped. It's good we don't use the car to get around the city that often - everything we need is within walking distance. I drive to get a large load of groceries once a week (since the Lim Chhour across the street usually has dodgy, picked over crap and a null selection of western-style food. Excellent selection of Asian food, though!) Back on topic - camping. I'm really excited to head out of the city for an entire weekend of outdoor bliss. I really hope the weather cooperates.

Future posting with more regularity - I promise.