Oh it's starting to fell a lot like Christmas......NOT!

It's almost the longest day and summer seems to be making itself at home here in New Zealand (with the odd cold Southerly blowing in just to keep you on your toes!)
I've spotted Santa wandering around Merivale Mall a few times when I've popped in to Fresh Choice for some more Salmon Keebabs for the BBQ! I'm sure he's sweating buckets under that outfit and his nylon beard.

Brendan, Steffi and Olivia arrived safely last weekend after their long journey from Germany. They seemed to have prepared fantastically for the time difference as they showed no signs of jet lag - lucky devils. So we got straight onto city tours and meanders around the botanical gardens - Brendan had to climb a few trees!


They appeared to have brought some Northern Hemisphere weather with them on the Monday as the clouds and rain rolled in - spoiling our planned afternoon on Sumner beach. Bren and Steffi braved a rainy walk in the Port Hills, nonetheless before we gathered along with Matt and Lou for a great family nosh up at Desmond Street.


The tourists have now headed off on a grand south island tour - planning on visits to Tekapo, Wanaka, Queenstown and Milford before heading back up the West Coast and joining us near to Nelson on Boxing Day for some beach-side camping in the sun.

The previous weekend, Maria, Sarah and I had spent a great day in Christchurch city centre watching the Festival of Cycling plus the Santa Parade. The former was a series of criteriums staged around a circuit along "the strip" in the heart of downtown Christchurch.
It was a really good event with some great cycling on show. The Parade was an annual feature that has been happening for years....a Christmas Carnival parade along Colombo street which seemed to attract even more crowds that the cycling!


We also went along to the Solid Energy (one of Maria's employers) family Christmas Party at Ferrymead Heritage Park last Sunday - before Bren arrived. Sarah had invited her friend Taylor along. It was an interesting few hours - riding vintage trams and trains and waiting for Santa to arrive on one of the aforementioned trams!

Sarah finished school on Tuesday - that's her done with Heaton Intermediate School - next February she starts at the Girls High School here in Christchurch. It's about 400 metres away from where we are living - so very handy and no need for a school run any more! The previous week, Sarah had attended the Heaton Leavers Party at the Chateau on the Park and she had a really good time. She looked very grown up in her little black number!


I went out for a bike ride last weekend with a small group of cyclist - we did the Short Bays circuit "in reverse" - which involves cycling up Evans Pass and then up from Governors Bay to the Sign of the Kiwi. This probably means nothing to most of you, but to those who know, it's a tough ride - particularly when you are on a heavy bike with high gearing, ie ME! All the others were riding with compact gears and left me standing on the hills....it was a real case of mind over matter just to not get off the bike at times! I think it almost compared to my cycle up Llanberis Pass with Painey a few years ago.

Maria and I have enjoyed a couple of more sedate cycles out to Sumner, the last one on Wednesday just gone after Maria had finished work. Sarah was away at a friends having a sleep over so we had the opportunity to get out for an evening ride.

Not much mention of Chris so far......well he's still working a few nights a week at MacDonalds and spending most days in bed.....great life!! He disappears off to his mates on his days off and we hear him clattering about on his return. His car is still broke and he's now starting to mumble that it was probably a mistake buying it because it's going to cost him money to fix.... Let's hope that he is taking all these learning experiences in!

We've had a nice relaxing day today - chilling out at home, in the garden and in the pool. The sun has been shining and the wind has been light (no nor'wester today). We have been trying out the "endless pool" - the switches were fixed this week - so we put the wetsuits on and did some swimming - though not for long - mainly floated about on inflatables. BBQ in the evening and Maria and Sarah have pitched a tent for a camp-out this evening - getting some practice in for next weekend at Nelson.

Deck the hall with boughs of holly.....

Hi blog readers....sorry about the 3 week delay since the last one. Time flies when you're trying to build a business!

So Ashley departed on the Sunday and Maria and I continued the long weekend by tripping up to Hanmer Springs for a day - enjoying a nice walm soak in the sulphur pools. Sarah was away at school camp over at Purau Bay doing interesting stuff like kayaking, rock-climbing and bush-skills - should prove handy when she's a celebrity and facing bush-tucker trials!

I had the pleasure of meeting a guy called Jason Barrell who had an amazing story to tell. A professional Rugby Union player who suffered a broken neck and then a brain tumour to add insult to injury. He's an inspiration to us all.

I also had the pleasure of meeting up with Bill Southgate again and we had another great lunchtime run in the Port Hills. It sounds like he's had a great few weeks travelling around the South Island and will take back some great memories. He's also been to few places I've not visited myself yet and I was interested to hear hie stories and recommendations.

We suffered some serious pool-algae due to me letting the chlorine supply run dry! The water was greener than the lawn and we've had to get the pool experts in to recover the situation! Good news is that we have now discovered that we have an endless pool with water jets at one end which mean we can do all the swimming training we want without having to venture beyond our front gate! I've also been shown how to operate the heat pump so it might become increasingly inticing to go for a dip!
The garden is looking quite nice now - looking forward to hosting some BBQ's when our visitors arrive.

Chris has bought himself a car - a Honda Civic shuttle. It's older than he is. And he's crashed it already!!! Some dendrites are hard to change.

There was a Christmas concert in Hagley Park last weekend - Coca-Cola Christmas in the Park - which Maria, Sarah and i ventured out to. We only joined the festivities for the last quarter of the proceedings but it was quite a good show what we saw of it. Very popular with the locals - which I guess includes us!

The night before, Maria and I had been invited to the Safe and Sound (Maria's employer) Christmas BBQ at the business owner's (Charles) place. I can honestly say that I have never seen a piece of fillet steak quite so large in all of my life that I witnessed on the BBQ. And when my slice was served up and consumed, I was of the opinion that I'd never before tasted such a succulent and tasty steak. It was delicious. And as for the cray fish and Akaroa cod........Yum!

We took a turn at hosting a Xmas party ourselves this week. My BNI group came around for eats and drinks. Everyone brought a plate and their own booze. It's a NZ tradition and it works fantastically. We collectively served up a feast.

Maria was due to do her 3rd triathlon tomorrow (Sunday) but she's not really been doing any training since the last one. She thinks that she had a virus when she competed in the last event and it knocked her back a bit - she felt tired and lethargic for the best part of a fortnight. It could have something to do with the 4-day weeks that she has been putting in, mind you!

She is enjoying walking around the Botanical Gardens though - we sometimes pop across the road after dinner for a brief walk around before they shut up for the evening. It really is a beautiful place.


Maria, Sarah and I ventured out to Bottle Lake Forest and New Brighton today - it was a lovely sunny day. We had a brief stroll through the pine forest before venturing along to the beach - watching the sand artists, the surf school, the kite-buggy racing.

It's also been the day for putting up the Christmas tree - though we're waiting for it to go dark before we can appreciate the full effect of the lights!