January 2013

After only six days in Queenstown I had to go to a thinking conference in Wellington. Although it wasn't easy leaving everyone behind this was a great way to meet all the staff at Remarkables. The conference was excellent too, although a lot of it flew very high over my head! I also sneaked a visit into the Embassy Theatre, Peter Jackson designed the sound system, to see The Hobbit.

The boys were on their best behaviour and things went pretty well whilst I was away, although I was asked to speak to 'your son' towards the end of the week.

Since we have been here it has been made obvious that the summer in Queenstown is all about cycling so before I left we made sure that we had everything necessary. Subsequently Fran was brave enough to go on one of the fifty tracks in and around Queenstown with the boys. They loved it but Tom had a few issues with his bike, hence the phone call.

Hanmer Springs Thermal Pools and Spa

As Alex and I were on our morning duties, getting mummy her morning coffee, we had a quick nose at the 'famous' pools.

Alex gaped at its awesomeness! It was well beyond our expectations with slides we went on in America! Unfortunately this led to the boys asking us to go every five minutes! We eventually headed down quite late to avoid the crowds and it wasn't too bad.

Interestingly Alex's favourite aspect of the two days we had there was the independence he was given. The pools were not too large and we trusted them to stay together and they were allowed to venture independently to the main slides.
Our favourite aspect was that they were knackered at the end of it and went to straight to bed, unfortunately we quickly followed!

Wellington

Here some extra shots. Te Papa has an amazing google earth type map to walk on and it was perfect to explain how far our road trip actually is!

We were all hoping for The Hobbit stuff to be around and the trolls at Te Papa looked amazing. There was one of the black riders in Whitcoulls!?

Later in the evening we went for a ride in the cable car and a lovely stroll through the botanical gardens and play area.

Whilst in Te Papa Oli was able to purchase mini Squidy! Very exciting.

Interislander - Wellington to Picton and driving to Hanmer Springs

After arriving just in time for the ferry our trip started on a high note with a little blue penguin swimming near us. As we said goodbye to Wellington it was a fairly calm day which was a huge bonus considering all the nightmare stories of horrendous trips shared with us.

As the ferry left the wind farm it got noticeably rougher with high winds but the ferry coped well and Fran wasn't sick so all good. As we entered the fjords heading towards Picton there were no passengers inside anymore, everyone was out taking photos. It really was worth the trip, not sure Fran would agree as she spent most of the time on fruit ninja!

We briefly grabbed a subway in Picton and headed off sharpish as we had a four journey ahead of us. We head an amazing toilet stop off at the Nelson lakes and after that it became a very long scenic journey through the mountains. Too long. We didn't get to Hanmer Springs until 8.30! Fran was not impressed as she hates driving but fortunately Hanmer Springs looked great and the Bach was also good. Phew.

Wellington

New blog whilst old one is corrupted with error 403, any help much appreciated.

On our Road Trip we had a fantastic time in Wellington. We stayed at the Novotel which was central and we visited Te Papa which had an excellent video games exhibition.