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Wednesday, 12 July 2006 (New Zealand) - There's no place like home!

		From the balmy sunset of Brisbane last night to a (blurry) high-altitude shot of Christchurch (it's bloody hard taking long-exposure shots in a turbulent plane!). Fuck it's nice to be home! Unfortunately this will probably be the last time I'll be here for quite some time if I do end up relocating to Toronto or the UK at the end of August :(
I had a fairly quiet one today - no train smashes or anything like last time hehe, oh well. I took Joe (my greyhound) for a wander around the neighbouring suburb of Kaiapoi, along a track that meanders past this lake and leads to Woodford Glen Speedway. There's no action here during winter but this place really draws the petrol-heads over summer!

Thursday, 13 July 2006 (New Zealand)

Our view from the front of our house looking west towards the mountains. Pretty :)
At the moment we've just got the two horses on the property. This is Linus, a one-year-old colt with his balls still attached, which makes him randy and means he has to be kept away from...		...Star, a filly who's more interested in eating anything she can than being taken from behind.

Friday, 14 July 2006 (New Zealand)

Quiet night for a Friday - I couldn't seem to bloody find anyone! Here's a couple of shots of the Christchurch Cathedral and Chalice in Cathedral Square. While I was taking these there was a guy standing about 20 metres behind me with a weird posture doing (what appeared to be) nothing in front of three cops. Three of his (very drunk) mates were yelling back at him, "You dirty bastard! You sick dirty bastard!" Long story short, he was standing there deliberately pissing his pants in front of the police hahaha! If I knew what was going on I would've got a shot of it - priceless!
I did happen to be in exactly the right place at the right time to see this though, courtesy of my police scanner. This is the result of a 60-second police pursuit of this hunk-of-junk Toyota that ended up with the driver (sole occupant) losing it on this corner and nearly finishing up in the living room of this house. I got here 30 seconds later when the boys in blue were stuffing the little bastard into the back of their car. This is in Wainoni/Aranui - not the suburbs in which you really want to be wandering around by yourself at night. While I was there a bunch of Maoris emerged to see what was going on, and I left as soon as the cops did hehe.

Saturday, 15 July 2006 (New Zealand) - Anybody got some diesel handy?

I had more luck meeting up with people tonight (not these people shown here), but before that a quick detour on the way into town lead me here - the boy-racer diesels hehe. It's been a long while since I've seen this! Back in the day the 'diesels' were (illegal) weekly gatherings on a Friday/Saturday night whose location spread quickly via text messages (out in the middle of nowhere). Back then some clown would pour a heap of diesel on the road and people would take turns to pull up, get the wheels spinning, do a few doughnuts or whatever, and either hoon off or keep the wheels smoking until the tyres went bang - great entertainment! Not a lot has changed, except now somebody pulls up, gets the wheels smoking, and a whole bunch of people hold on to the back (left shot) and get dragged along (right shot) hahaha!
I knew the diesels were here thanks to the police scanner (there were reports of about 50 cars involved but it was more like 100), hence not long after I arrived so too did the fuzz. Just like back in the day, everybody sprinted back to their vehicles and got the hell out of there (one big traffic jam). If anybody happened to be on the diesel at the time they got arrested. Amid the chaos I just stood there enjoying the show. Within five minutes of the cops' arrival the place was empty hehe.

Sunday, 16 July 2006 (New Zealand) - To Hanmer, hooray!

Hanmer Springs is a gorgeous little alpine town 90 minutes north of Christchurch. Aside from the mountainous walking tracks, mountain bike trails, and the myriad of other things there are to do here and in the vicinity, the main attraction is the thermal pools (below). I used to come here several times a year, mostly in winter for the pools but also for the occasional weekend piss-up over summer. I absolutely love it here and frankly it's one of the things I miss most about home.

These photos aren't my own , but they give some idea of the pool complex. The shot on the right is how the pools can look in the middle of winter after a good dumping of the white stuff; unfortunately there was none of it today (my brother and I used to have great snowball fights!). Fucking pretty huh! 35 to 43 degrees in the pools, and just a few degrees outside the pools.

Wednesday, 19 July 2006 (New Zealand)

Elmo helping himself to my brunch. If we're eating it, he feels entitled to it!		Speaking of food, no one should leave Christchurch without trying a souvlaki from Costas on Armagh Street just east of Colombo Street - goddamn they're good! (And I manage to spill them down my front every time without fail.)
This is more like it - carnage! I found this on my way home around midnight: a few cop cars, a couple fire engines, crap all over the road - beautiful! It's been drizzling all day (first sign of rain since I got here) so the roads are nice and greasy! I don't know exactly what happened but there was a Subaru wagon with a munched front-right and one fucked taxi! I don't know who's fault it was either, but judging by the chick driving the Subaru pacing back and forward looking very stressed, and the taxi driver sitting on a fence having a quiet ciggy, I'm guessing it was hers hehe. Someone once told me that if you're going to hit something, don't hit a taxi - their insurance companies will take you to the cleaners!

Friday, 21 July 2006 (New Zealand)

Well the weather's really turned to crap in the last couple of days all over the country with snow here and hail there etc. Christchurch just got a lot of wind and rain and near-zero temperatures - boring.		Joe clearly enjoyed being inside in front of the fire for a change hehe.

Sunday, 23 July 2006 (New Zealand)

Hahaha!		BAAAHAHAHAHA! (Sorry Nana, love you really! ;)
Quick trip with the whanau (for the Aussies, that's Maori for 'family') out to Sumner this afternoon. This is a pretty piss-poor shot but it's looking east('ish) along the waterfront (trust me it's nice!).		Since I was last out here at Christmas, Sumner appears to have become bogan-central ('Bogan' seems to mean something different in Australia; in NZ these fullas with the suped-up cars are bogans).
Oh looking good in those pink sunnies Jared - lookin' real good ;)

I'm going to Europe! (in theory ;)
About a month ago I mentioned the possibility of me relocating to Toronto, or alternatively joining Mo around Europe during September and then relocating to the UK. Long story short, Toronto has fallen through (kind of), and Europe and the UK is looking like it's going to (finally) happen - hooray! So, in another month I will need to meet up with Mo in Edinburgh, and give myself a good week before Europe to get over the jetlag of 24-hours of flying and organise stuff. In the meantime I need to organise a UK entry visa, flights, bank accounts, replacement flatmate, selling my stuff, quitting my job, and blah blah blah. It's going to be a stressful month because if something falls through or doesn't work out (e.g. I can't get appropriate flights or my visa application is rejected etc.) then I might be screwed. But if everything goes more-or-less to plan then this website might finally have something of interest on it! ;)

Monday, 24 July 2006 (New Zealand)

Lord, give me strength!

Tuesday, 25 July 2006 - Happy birthday Jared (oh, and you too Craig)!

Back to Brisbane today, and check out our plane! Well no, but for some reason the US Air Force was in town.		I was on the wrong side of the plane to get a shot of Christchurch so this is a rather crappy one looking back over the tail.
Every time I'm busting my arse on the bike up a hill I wish Brisbane was like the Canterbury plains: flat!		The Southern Alps gave us some bloody good turbulence (love it!) and awesome views until...
...we hit the west coast, which was typically overcast.		And back in Brisbane. I may (hopefully) only be here for one more month - roll on Europe! :)

Friday, 28 July 2006 - Fucking, Austria!

Hahaha I wanna go here! Where'd you go while in Europe Aaron? I went to Fucking, Austria ;) Update: I did go here, four years later. Photos here :)

Saturday, 29 July 2006 - GO THE ALL BLACKS!

The boys have held on to the Bledisloe Cup for the fourth straight year after downing the Aussies 13-9 in the second game of the best-of-three series tonight at Suncorp Stadium. With tickets going for well over $100 I (reluctantly) decided against going in light of moving to the UK next month (I came bloody close to going broke when I moved to Australia 18 months ago and so I've got a phobia now hehe). Rokocoko scored the only try of the game and in the end it was a bloody tight finish that could've gone either way, but the Aussies threw away chance after chance and eventually the match. Stirling Mortlock (far left), who wasn't too stirling tonight, had a good cry about it afterwards while the AB's drank plonk from the cup hehe. This will give me bragging rights for my last three weeks at work ;)

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