A visit to another country (South Is) Day 5-6

Day 5 Te Anau to Christchurch May 23
Drove leisurely back to Queenstown to catch our flight back to Christchurch, stopping on the way at a lovely new coffee shop at Five Rivers. They asked if we had any change, since it was a very long way to the nearest bank! The weather did seem quite gloomy, low cloud, but by the time we got back to QT it seemed brighter. There was lots of snow on the Cardrona peaks, and it was noticeably colder. We walked around the shops for a while, Hilary wanted to go to Minus 5, which was an Ice Bar, but it didn’t open till 3 and we had to get to the airport for our 4.40 p.m. flight. She bought a merino wool cardigan & I bought a pair of possum wool socks (for David), we’ll fit it all in somehow! Took the car back and received the staff discount OK, had emailed Delia and she had very kindly got someone in HR to fax a letter to CHC Airport. I promised I wouldn’t do it again! Sat in the airport with a glass of wine (bit early but no more driving to do!) and watched 2 planes go out (Air NZ) & a couple of little ones come in. Terminal at QT is new, all that Asian money I suppose, so very pleasant, but the way out did look a little scary, all those mountains. We weren’t able to check-in for our Jet Connect (Qantas cheapie) flight because they weren’t sure whether it would be cancelled or not, and guess what, it was! The incoming flight was diverted to Invercargill, about 2.5 hours drive away, but Qantas have no security to take off from there, so the plane flew back empty to CHC & we went by bus! We drove all through the High Country on practically the same route we had taken down, just not over the Cardrona mountains! Couldn’t see much though, because dark by 6, only that it looked as if it had snowed there. We learnt later that QT airport only operates in daylight hours, it has to get the last flight out by 5.15 at this time of year. Also that Air NZ fly 90% of the time to the correct destination, Qantas only about 50%! Useful to know next time, though I doubt we’ll come so late again unless it’s to go ski-ing (I’m joking, I don’t ski, Hilary does, but doesn’t like it!). We stopped for a hot meal at Lake Tekapo, then drove into the centre of Christchurch to drop off a tour group staying at the Millenium Hotel. Had we known that our final destination was the other side of town from the airport, we would have got off there too & got a taxi, but instead we went back to the airport & were then dropped off outside a very closed domestic terminal. Then had to walk round the international terminal to find the hotel shuttle buses, all at about 00:30, we were not happy bunnies!
Fortunately a shuttle bus was just ready to leave, so we eventually got to our YHA Old CouuntryHouse accommodation at about 01:00. We had hoped for an evening in Christchurch, but I have been before, so it wasn’t so disappointing. CHC has a problem with boy racers, I didn’t believe Hilary when she told me about it, when we saw a large group of young men & souped up cars by a park while we were on the coach. We heard them later though, at about 2 a.m! Lots of the roads in CHC are very wide & tree-lined, so I guess it lends itself a bit. Too much money obviously.
Day 6 Christchurch to Wellington May 24
Only saw the street outside the YHA (very nice, our bit looked new and central heating by radiators, practically unheard of in NZ!). Had booked a shuttle back to the airport, which arrived promptly, & fortunately our flight back was fine. Ali met us so all very easy. I stayed for lunch & then drove up the coast to ‘home’. I must say it felt rather odd to return, despite the beach & the views I felt ‘down in the dumps’, I suppose we’d had such a great time & talked lots. I am closer to my sister now than I ever been I think, good news for both of us, since there’s only us and one cousin still in contact on ‘our’ side of the family.
Came home to find that the cat (Wizzer) was very sick, possible pneumonia, and Erola needed my help to give him his medicine. He’s practically a wild cat, he went missing for 7 months and fended for himself, so she has to hold him tight in a blanket while I shoot the ‘pen’ thing down his throat. We have both been viciously clawed, I want danger money! He’s a big Tom cat (neutered fortunately), and Erola is only little, so catching him & holding on to him is not easy. I couldn’t do it, too scared!
Thoughts re South Is
Wild & woolly, & not just the landscape! Very beautiful, very open, I think about 1 million people live there in total, less than a quarter of NZ’s population but the land area is much larger than the North island. A quarter of it is the Fiordland National park, which we just visited a very tiny part of at Milford Sound. It is a ‘different country’, but not just to look at, it feels different too. In North Is, it is difficult to imagine what it must have been like for the early pioneers, down South they still live there! We hardly saw a Maori or a Pacific Islander, it is very European. CHC is English, but as the town names imply (Invercargill, Dunedin,Fairlie), further south it is definitely Scottish. However, it does look like it is changing, from an upland sheep-farming place to dairy farming. I’m sure it’s the ‘land of opportunity’ if you are a multi-skilled handyman & don’t mind the cold. We did get ‘beauty overload’, around every bend is still more stunning scenery & after a while it does become a little mind-numbing. However, it’s great to know that in the Western world such places do still exist, long may it remain so.

A visit to another country (South Is) Day 4

Day 4 Te Anau to Milford Sound May 22

The promised rain/snow happened overnight, fortunately for us not actually in Te Anau, though there were warnings on the road to Milford, & more later.

We went on an organised trip in a minibus, 'Trips 'n' Tramps', which Wendy Laws had recommended to me. She went on a bus which delivered the mail on the way, & so got to hear lots of local stories. Unfortunately 2 buses went today, and the mail bus, we later discovered, was the other one! It didn't matter, our driver/guide Chris was very good, & we did get to do one mail drop. She was a real Southern lady, very outdoorsy, Hilary said the right thing when she said how insignificant we felt when we made our first stop, in a wide valley surrounded by very high snow-capped mountains. It was raining quite heavily then, but not really cold. We then stopped at Cobbs something, where we saw a DVD about the avalanches which occur regularly on the Milford Road, fortunately we are too early for them! A couple in our bus were staying with one of the helicopter pilots who goes out to 'bomb' the snow to generate an avalanche deliberately, so they can try & keep the road clear, i.e. in a controlled fashion. People have some great jobs down here don't they?

We stopped at an old settlement called Gunns Camp with the mail, down a remote valley on the Hollyford River. We heard stories about the building of the Homer Tunnel, pictured above, which took many years to hack out with pickaxes in the 1930s-40s. These pioneers, not so long ago, were a different breed entirely from us Northern softies!

As you can see, it was snowing by the time we got to the Homer Tunnel. It was originally single track, and you still have to wait for your turn, but it has now been widened so it's every man for himself in avalanche season. On April 1 every year, the local youngsters race naked up through the tunnel (it's a 1 in 10), given a choice of a torch or a pair of shoes. Funnily enough, most boys choose the torch!!!

We also stopped at 'The Chasm', which we thought was one of the best bits, where a narrow fast river has formed remarkable 'sculptures' of rocks down through the narrow cleft. However, this is where we realised that our Milford Sound cruise would be taken with hundreds of Asian tourists, bussed from Queenstown, a long way in one day, since they also stopped here. Remarkably, Queenstown is only 30 odd kms from Milford Sound as the crow flies, but nearly 200kms by road. So there are plans afoot to build a gondola (long-distance cable car) over the intervening mountains and right through the National Park 'over my dead body' according to Chris. It'll be interesting to see if it ever happens.

We were a little disappointed in the actual Milford Sound cruise, probably because of the weather, which was grey and cold, but at least we could see the top of the famous Mitre Peak. The fiord was not as long as we had anticipated, & we didn't see any seals or dolphins. However, we had added on a trip to the Underwater Observatory, to our amazement the boat we were on carrying about 220 people stopped just for Hilary & I to get off! We joined 2 others down below with a very young, very knowledgeable marine biologist, and saw some fascinating fish and coral, the only place you can see black coral in NZ (it's white). A few others joined us later, but it seems a pity so few do take the option.

We all dozed on the trip back I think, there were 10 of us, mostly middle-aged/pensioners like us, but also a young French couple who were always the first to want to get back in the bus, we think they must have been from the South of France and were therefore cold!

We had our first (and only) 'posh' meal that night, just as well when I get to tomorrow, in a restaurant very close to the hostel. Expensive, well in NZ terms, $50+ each i.e. about 20 pounds for 2 courses including wine!

A visit to another country (South Is) Day 3

Day 3 Queenstown to Te Anau May 23

Couldn't afford to stay in QT for very long, just found the Airport (where I'm going to return the car) and next to it was a new retail park, so we thought we'd take a look! Only went to a coffee shop (run by Asians of course) and to the most up-market branch of 'The Warehouse' which we'd ever seen. The Warehouse is a cut-price store, red in colour (usually) selling lots of cheap stuff made in China mainly, useful occasionally of course. This one was unique in that it was built from 'schist', the local grey stone, as used in the Church of the Good Shepherd. We meant to take a photo, but forgot!

Decided to drive straight to Te Anau, since heavy rain/snow was forecast and we didn't know what the road was like. Fortunately it was very good, a bit bendy to begin with along the shores of the lake, but a surprise to us, the countryside around was really green and lush (all that rain of course). Cold though, we are definitely getting nearer to Antartictica! Took the Scenic Route again via Lake Manapouri, the deepest lake in NZ, it actually goes 276m below sea level, quite odd when you think about it. 34 islands on it too, very pretty. It was saved from flooding in the 90s, they wanted to put in another dam for hydro-electrics. Now used as a starting point for trips to Doubtful Sound. Later in the hostel we heard about an overnighter on a boat there, I would like to do that some time, but in warmer weather! Expensive too, so on my pension I probably can't afford it. Notable event was the car filling up with pesky sandflies when we left the door open while looking at the map, they bite! Even Captain Cook had trouble with them.

Te Anau was very different from Queenstown, a definite Kiwi town. We did find one dept store, & guess what, my sister lived up to her reputation and bought a pair of shoes (she has 70+ pairs already)! I did too, only problem is how to get them back, we have both brought too many clothes, though the layers are proving essential. We went to a lovely film in the little local cinema, which was really a helicopter view of the Fiordland National park set to music, amazing and very moving.

YHA Hostel practically new, lots of very young foreign students, dirty kitchen, fortunately we ate out at the local Indian so not a problem!

A visit to another country (South Is) Day 2

Day 2 Twizel to Queenstown May 20
Travelled on through the High Country, very few ‘stations’ as the farms are known, as in Australia. Very brown countryside all around. Went through the Lindis Pass, very dramatic and stark. Again, full of admiration for those early pioneers who found these routes, how did they do it? Struck lucky again when we stopped for brunch in the middle of nowhere, a tiny place called Tarras but I recommend it if you’re passing! Had an up-market clothing shop attached, very strange really but I guess it’s on a tourist route so they must make money. Hilary really loved a merino wool cardigan, very stylish and a bit unusual but she reckoned there would be more choice in Queenstown. Wrongly as it turned out, she never saw something similar again and is still regretting not buying it at the time! Arrived in Wanaka, where we stopped for a brief walk round, and experienced the delight of the only heated public toilets I have ever come across, right on the lake-front. Wanaka is an up-market resort now, apparently on their first trip around NZ when they arrived 14 years ago,my ex brother-in-law wanted to buy a motel here, pity they didn’t really, would’ve made lots of money. However, as Hilary says, Gordon isn’t a handyman & guess who’d have ended up doing all the work? Also, she was very much in culture shock, having lived in cities all her life, & at the time South Island was even more basic than it is now. We saw one lonely penguin sitting on the wharf, I guess all his buddies had gone South already!
Took an unforgettable road from Wanaka to Queenstown, through Cardrona. We hadn’t realised we were so high up, until we came to a scenic look-out which definitely had spectacular views of the mountains & valleys all around. Fortunately Hilary said just drive on to me, because knowing my fear of heights it also had a view of the road we were about to go down, and I probably wouldn’t have been able to do it! We were incredibly high up, and coming down that through one hairpin bend after another with sheer drops at the side is not an experience I wish to repeat in a hurry! However, at least there were safety barriers (ALMOST all the way down!) & the snow didn’t arrive till that night. When we returned to Queenstown on Friday the mountains were covered in it, so that would’ve been ten times worse.
We visited Arrowtown, originally a goldrush town, now very ‘twee’ and expensive. Erola remembers the river here as a beautiful blue, it was only a trickle when we were there. She had told us that Queenstown had been taken over by Asians, and she was right. Every business seemed to be run by Japanese/Chinese, and there were loads of Far Eastern tourists. I continue to be extremely surprised by the blatant prejudice of Kiwis, I have to say I can understand their resentment that one of their towns has been virtually ‘taken over’, but then they were slow to see the potential. We stayed overnight in a Backpackers, which was en-suite but not so good as Twizel and much more expensive. We ate out at one of the oldest restaurants in town, also expensive! QT is full of young people, for all the adventure activities I suppose, and not really our sort of place. I would've liked to take a trip on the SS Earlshaw, pictured above, but the timing wasn't right. I will be back I'm sure. Didn't go up the gondola either, that fear of heights again, & Hilary has already done it.

A visit to another country (South Is) Day 1

Day 1 Wellington to Twizel May 19
Hilary & I flew Pacific Blue airline to Christchurch at 08:15, so an early start. When we landed, it was a ‘balmy’ 0 degrees, quite a shock to the system but we were prepared with our hats & boots. Picked up the hire car, but realised I’d forgotten my all-important letter authorising my staff discount. Resolved to email Delia later to try & rectify the problem, otherwise would be much too expensive. We hired a manual car, which was cheaper, which meant I had to do all the driving, since Hilary can no longer remember how to drive a manual. Strange that manuals are still cheaper here, given that most Kiwis drive automatics so they must be much more plentiful. Drove straight out of CHC along Highway 1 until we reached ‘the Inland Scenic Route’ turn-off for Geraldine. I have to say the Canterbury Plain was very boring, not much to see at all until we reached Geraldine, where we had a very pleasant stop for coffee. After that the road started to climb slowly through Burkes Pass towards the snow-capped mountains, through the beginning of the ‘High Country’. I am full of admiration for the pioneers who made, & continue to make, a living from this rough pastureland, which is Mackenzie Country, and does look very much like Scotland. However, we didn’t see many sheep at all, apparently there are now ‘only’ 30 million in NZ, where there used to be 50 million. A lot of farmers have converted to dairy, because there is so much more money to be made. Certainly dairy products are very expensive here, cheese is now so dear it is out of the range of the poorest families and those of us who can sort of afford it wait for ‘Specials’. Lots of late autumn colour, but we are a little late for the true beauty, mostly golds rather than browns and reds as in the UK, but very unlike the North Is, where the seasons hardly show at all in the trees. We headed for Lake Tekapo, where we visited the Church of the Good Shepherd, built in the 1930s out of local stone as a gathering place for those hardy souls, with a spectacular view from the window over the altar out over the lake. Hilary took a picture but you weren’t supposed to, so I’ve only got the outside view, being a law-abiding Brit! Then we journeyed on to Lake Pukahi with spectacular views of Mount Cook, the highest mountain in NZ, my picture doesn’t do it justice, it is the sort of 2 pronged roof-like one! It’s Maori name is Aoraki, which coincidentally is the name of the road where my house is going to be built, mine will be 11 Aoraki Rise. Aoraki was a Maori God apparently. Kept seeing the same people along the way, roads very empty, this is the ‘in-between’ time, too late for Summer and too early for ski-ing, though we passed lots of ski areas along the way. Ended up late Monday afternoon in Twizel, which was closed! Erola & friends did laugh at us staying in Twizel, it is a ‘new’ town, only built in the 1960s to house workers building the nearby dam system. I didn’t realise before today that the vast majority of NZ power is hydro-electric, will definitely be a problem this winter because there is very little water in the rivers after a very long hot summer, so there will be power cuts. In fact our YHA room was the best we encountered on our trip, the heater was already on, there was a fridge, ensuite, tea & coffee maker & a TV, definitely spoilt! I think we were the only people in the place, which was huge, there may have been a couple of others! We had to go to the local pub for our evening meal, it being the only place open, my introduction to the male South Islander. A rough tough breed indeed, I think Hilary caused a bit of a stir with her coiffured hair & red-painted nails! The meal was fine though, & we were lovely & warm next to the wood-burner, & slept very well in our nice warm room afterwards.

Paekok May11-18

I think Erola was rather upset when I accepted an invitation from Ali & Adam to spend Mothers’ Day with them at Hilary’s. Erola had assumed that we would be doing stuff together, but of course I would rather be with my family, after all it is the reason I’m over here at all! I hope her son Ginner does contact her from Sydney, but not sure the date is the same in Oz, so she may be disappointed.
Obviously I stayed over Saturday night, & in fact stayed Sunday night too, because I had a few glasses of wine and was not legal to drive home. Adam cooked Cottage Pie for the main course, Ali & Junior did a prawn with chilli salsa starter & a scrumptious (should that be yummy?) chocolate mousse for dessert. We were very spoilt, and it was lovely to be part of the celebration. Ali wrote me a lovely card, and gave me flowers and a photo picture under glass of Wellington, which was very generous. It was interesting after dinner to learn what Adam remembered of his life in UK before emigrating here, he remembers quite a lot, though he was 14 when they came out so I suppose that’s understandable. I hope David will be able to come over with me or at some time early next year so they can renew their friendship. Although Adam has mild Asperger’s syndrome, a mild form of autism, he manages to hold down a job and look after himself in his own flat. They always got on very well as children, Hilary used to have David every holiday for a week or so because she was a stay-at-home Mum & I was working, so they do know each other pretty well. Of course he’s now an adult (well almost, for a man!) so things will not be quite the same.
Wednesday night has become ‘my evening with Hilary’. We were watching ‘Five Days’ on TV, an English drama which I didn’t see when it was on there, though it has now finished. NZ TV is generally speaking dire, I am resolved to record any and every decent programme on to DVD once I’m back & then bring them here to watch at my leisure next year. I have even become a fan of Coronation St, which I didn’t watch at all back home. We are now watching Tracy Barlow’s trial, some way back from the English timeline I believe, so don’t anybody spoil it! ‘Bleak House’ aired recently, very late on a Sunday evening for some reason, I would’ve watched it again and Erola would’ve enjoyed it too, but much too late when she gets up at 5.30 on a Monday!!!!
Saturday Erola & I went to the Wellington Food Show in the Westpac Stadium (nicknamed the Cake Tin, because it looks just like a giant one). It was very good, we both spent too much on stuff we don’t really need! Last year apparently there were loads of free samples, so I was looking forward to the free chocolate, but this year there wasn’t much at all, signs of the times of course. Things seem to be getting worse here, lots of jobs being lost, hope is that interest rates will be cut, I hope so since I have tied up the funds for the house in short term deposits which pay a high rate of interest by UK standards, and once it’s gone on the house I won’t care. Also, anything which will help improve the exchange rate of the £ to the NZD will be very welcome, it’s been appalling since I got here.

The weather has been fantastic again a couple of days this week, cold at night but warm during the day, see the kids playing on the beach in T-shirts above, remarkable for 'mid-November'. I know South island will be colder, though I think we have have gone OTT with our thermal undies and boots, but there was snow there a week ago so you can't be too careful!

Tricia & Hils’ visit May 4-10

Had a phone call from Tricia last Wednesday, they are coming to see me for a couple of days on their way north, having spent 2 months in South Island. They planned to get the ferry from Picton at 2 on Sunday, & I had invited Hilary to come up as well for dinner, but the ferry was cancelled because of engine failure so they didn’t arrive till the Monday. The weather has turned extremely cold, with strong southeriies, so they had an ‘interesting’ crossing! They are staying in the local Backpackers, which is very cold, so I lit the fire ‘early’ & we had a long chat on Monday. Since Erola & I had cleaned the house all day on a very cold Sunday, 12, with NO heating, I didn’t feel at all guilty!
On Tuesday we planned to go into Wellington, but by the time I had taken them to see my section, called in on Hilary at work and gone to her house where they had a lovely chat with Ali (still off work sick), we decided to come back & walk along the beach because it was a beautiful day. I picked up a bag of kindling and successfully kit the fire with it.
On Wednesday I drove to the South Wellington coast, where we hoped to see seals, but the tourist facilities are being re-built and the path was blocked. But it is an amazing bleak landscape, really wild & woolly, with a capital city literally just round the corner. We watched the aeroplanes wobbling into the airport, and picked Paua shell from a little secluded beach, then had a very late lunch in Oriental Bay. It was a lovely day, and I have never been to that area, so it was really good.
On Thursday we went into town by train, a bargain at $20 return for all 3 of us on a Group ticket. We went on a tour of the NZ Parliament buildings, I have been before but it is free (!very important where ‘the girls’ are concerned!) & well worth doing. We saw the earthquake protection which has been put in place, very impressive. Does bring it to mind again though, I have only felt one very minor ‘tremble’ since I have been here luckily. The Parliament buildings are only 400m from the major fault line, so they do have to be very careful. We had lunch in the old BNZ building, the vaults have been converted to a Food Court, & then went up to the Botanic Gardens on the Cable Car, a ‘must do’. There is a lovely view from the top, & lots of nice, if hilly, walks, we only went a short way because we were all tired by then and it was getting chilly, once the sun goes down it is noticeably autumn now.
I had various things to do in Paraparam on Friday, so first Erola invited us to a special performance by her Taiko Performing group, at 8 a.m. i.e. before school, it was lovely but a bit early on our holidays! After that we went to the Nga Manu Wildlife reserve in Waikanae, I had no idea Kiwis were so big, the size of chickens. We saw 2 really close up, it was great. There is also a lovely bushwalk, it is very easy to see how difficult it must have been for the first explorers, very dense forest, really quite jungle-like, & this one was swampy, fortunately with a boardwalk above it. Although it is quite a small area, we all thought it was well worth the $10 entrance fee, particularly as I had a one get in free voucher from Hilary!
The ladies left early on Saturday morning, so I got up to have breakfast with them beforehand. I have really enjoyed their company again, think I had got into a bit of a rut & last week I was definitely homesick, so it was great to get out & about and see more of the local area. Of course it all costs, & I am watching my pennies, particularly before our trip to South Island which is coming up very soon.
The relationship between the ladies & Erola was interesting to watch! Tricia is very much ‘in command’ and has absolutely nothing in common with someone who believes in astrology, clairvoyance etc. I cooked for them all here every night, apart from Friday when we had fish and chips, so they spent quite a lot of time here. After they left Erola told me she was rather glad they’d left, she’d had enough!

On Saturday Hilary & I went to the theatre in Wellington, 3 plays back-to-back which were ‘The Pick of the Fringe’. The first one was incomprehensible & not at all funny (to us), the mostly student audience seem to find it so! The second play was the best, a sort of modern morality play complete with Chorus, much better acted & very funny. The last was ‘2b or not 2b’, which as the title suggests had very close references to Hamlet and other very famous plays, so it was fun to try & spot the original dialogue within a modern tale of teenagers with angst. Afterwards we went to the Sushi Bar nearby where I was introduced to sushi by Hilary last year, I really like it, though I don’t eat it at home!

Paekok Apr 27-May 3

Went to see the builder again this week, since really have to get my head round the dates. It looks as though I may just be back in time to be back here when the electrics go in. Regardless, I am getting the electrical plan, & will then specify my changes. Hilary has very kindly offered to check that they get it right if it does all start to happen before Christmas. Plan now is to start the earthworks at beginning of October, with ‘slab down’ being week beginning Oct 17. The roof will go on 5 weeks later, & the roof shortly after. ‘Lock-up’ should be shortly before Christmas. Fortunately they have summer holidays round Christmas so things may at least slow down for a couple of weeks. The whole thing should be finished in early March. Since I plan to come out immediately after Christmas & then stay next year till early June this will be fine, gives me a little time to live in it before I hopefully rent it out till the end of 2009, when I’ll be back again hopefully.
I have been using the ‘TradeMe’ site (NZ eBay equivalent) to buy yet more wool to keep myself occupied. I plan to knit myself a ‘wrap’ in brown shades for my theatre visits chiefly, and then a striped cardigan for Erola, because she admired Elisha’s. I will bring this wool home to do, it will be a surprise for her when I come back, a late Christmas present. I finally finished Charlie’s ‘Sonic’ jumper, & Elisha’s pink striped cardigan & sent them home, hope they arrive, I STILL have NO post at all from UK, despite Emma sending me 2 packets in late February. Nobody seems to know where they’ve gone, my sister bought some shoes when last in the UK (surprise, surprise, she has over 70 pairs!) and they took 6 months to arrive, so I’m not giving up hope yet. It is rather strange but very restful not getting any bills! Fortunately everything is handled by Direct Debit so should be OK. But I might have won big on Premium Bonds & not know! (unlikely, but I do win the odd £50 from time to time). Emma is now empowered to open anything of a possible ‘joint’ nature, since it seems pointless sending stuff which is never going to arrive.
There was a big storm on Tuesday night, & the next day the beach was covered in driftwood, some of which was huge, see above. I am going to collect some of the smaller stuff for kindling, then we won’t have to buy any, it is quite dry & like balsa wood. Here, you are allowed to take anything from the beach, I believe this is not true in the UK .
Erola’s friend Judith Fuge owns a dance school in Paraparamu & one of her groups was performing in Coastlands Mall on Friday, so we watched, they are very good, hip-hop style. We were invited to go to her house for the evening, to watch the final of ‘So you Think you can Dance?’, an Aussie sort of Pop Idol for dancers, which Erola (& by default, I) have been glued to for the past few weeks. The right person won, a guy called Jack who was at the same Sydney dance school as Erola’s son, Ginner, it’s such a small world out here!
The Wellington International Comedy Festival is on right now, so on Saturday evening Hilary, Ali,Erola & I went to a performance by ‘The Lady Bunch’, 3 NZ comediennes who were actually really funny, we all enjoyed it.