Daffodil Festival

This last weekend we visited the Daffodil Festival which has been held in Carterton for many years. 

It was our first time and we enjoyed picking the flowers.

It was seriously exhausting work so we felt justified in retiring to the local winery for refreshments.

On our return to Wellington we did a walk up the Te Whiti Riser. It’s a serious bit of work and has some lovely views from the top. Here is the Hutt Valley looking west

and north towards the Tararuas. 

We were the other side of those mountains earlier in the day.

In other news, Sam and Bex have moved back to Wellington. It will be good to have them closer. Sam has got a job with the Phoenix. Here he is in his shiny new kit before his first trip to Oz with the team.

Vancouver

We stopped off in Vancouver on our way back from the Northern Hemisphere. It was an enjoyable stay and has been added to our list of good places to have a stopover in. Set around a large natural harbour the city has developed as the major port on the Canadian Pacific coast. Given how far north it is I was surprised at how warm it was. There are some wonderful places to eat and drink and nearby are many natural attractions.

This is a very random selection of images, concentrating on transport and places we visited.

First up, a panorama of the city waterfront from Stanley Park. We hired bicycles and rode around it on our first afternoon. 

 This is Engine 374 which brought the first passenger train across Canada to Vancouver in 1887.

An hour north of the city is the community of Squamish. We travelled up by cable car to the top of the mountain for this view over the town and Howe Sound.

There are several walking tracks and we wandered round for a couple of hours. This is the view looking back to the summit lodge.

The next day we went on a boat cruise up Vancouver harbour. This is Canada Place with the seaplane base and visiting cruise ships.

Seaplanes come and go every few minutes. The harbour is busy with planes, ferries and freight ships. The two peaks on the skyline are the Lions Peaks.

The cruise was up to Indian Arm

and passed islands

and some precarious looking houses. Most of these have no road access or mains electricity.

I was pleased to see that trolley buses are still in use, including articulated ones.

On our last day we went up Grouse Mountain. They had a bird show and I know Jenny will love this barn owl.

We went up the higher chair lift which gave stunning panoramic views over the harbour and city.

Finally another item for Jen (and Ed). We made good use of the driverless trains on the Canada Line.

Significant Birthdays

We are in the  (dis)United Kingdom to help celebrate some special milestones of family members.

First up Kathy was 80. Apologies for the blurry photo but the cake is very sparkly!

All her children, grandchildren (except Sam) and assorted hangers-on converged on a country pub near Warminster for Sunday lunch.

This weekend, my brother marked his 65th with a Plod or Pootle around the Pembrokeshire Perimeter. A goodly selection of extended whanau turned up

for the walk to the Blue Lagoon

along the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path. We ended up at Porthgain

where we had a magnificent meal of fish and chips before returning home to Maenclochog. 

Seals, Sheep and Surf

Our last weekend before another trip to the Disunited Kingdom saw us venturing to the coast south of Wainuiomata. We walked out to Turakirae Head. I was last there in 2009 with Sam.

It was a fine day in Wellington but squally showers were about the south coast.

It’s an almost lunar landscape with rocky outcrops that were under the sea until being lifted up by successive earthquakes.

Rainbows over the distant Wairarapa coast

but the rocks lit up in stark relief when the sun came out.

The vegetation is slowly making inroads into the rocky terrain.

The seals were relaxing in their comfortable positions.

A big fellow keeping an eye on us.

The coast is quite popular with surfers

and they were getting a few good waves.

Finally to complete the alliterative topic here are some woolly creatures, or possible seals in disguise.

This time next week we should be with favourite daughter Jen in London. Posts will follow dependent on internet access and motivation.

Brisbane

Alternative title – Birds, Boats and Trains. To wrap up our recent visit to Queensland here are a few pictures from our last weekend which we spent in Brisbane with our friend Linda.

She lives down by Moreton Bay. There is a footpath that follows the bay around with these handy aids to keeping fit that Noreen had to try out.

This plover (or lapwing – known in New Zealand as the spur-tailed plover) was fossicking around the mangrove roots at the water’s edge.

As was this ibis.

We spotted a (slightly out of focus - my fault, not the bird's!) kookaburra in an old gum tree.

We were intrigued by this multi storey park for boats. Probably safer than the water in a cyclone.

We walked as far as the Lota creek

then caught the train back to Wynnum. This is the suburban line that links the south of Brisbane to the centre.

Whitsundays

After our sojourn in Dunedin we caught a direct flight to Brisbane and then up to Hamilton Island where we boarded the boat for Hayman Island. Noreen decided to start as she meant to go on.

It’s an hour’s journey north – the Whitsunday islands on the left here, the mainland on the right.

We stayed at the fairly luxurious One and Only resort.

Did I mention it was luxurious? This was our modest digs.

Sulphur crested cockatoos abound in the area and were a constant cheeky presence. They can be very destructive if they get in your room and breakfast in the outdoors is an interesting time as the cockatoos come down and take the sugar sachets from the tables. They have learnt to open them neatly and ingest the contents. The other hazard was seagulls swooping down and taking food off your plate. Noreen lost a tasty pastry to a marauding bird.

Cockatoos roosting in a palm tree.

Other better behaved birds included this dusky moorhen. 

I loved the rainbow lorikeets. Unfortunately they dart about quickly high in the canopy so this is the best photo I got. I’m told it’s the haematodus subspecies.

The water lilies were colourful.

One morning we went on an expedition to go snorkelling at Blue Pearl Bay.

It was a lovely experience with the coral starting a few metres off the beach and a varied selection of fishes, clams and coral.

We saw many of these little lizards, some only a few centimetres long.

I walked up to the highest point on the island (about 500m but quite a grunt in the heat) and got this panorama looking toward Hook Island

plus an aerial view of the resort.