The tent is drying!

It's been brought to my attention that it's three weeks since I last updated the blog. Apologies to the Facebook generation, but I've been busy in a 'holiday' kind of way so there haven't been any updates.

As you can probably guess from the title, we've just got back from camping and the weather didn't behave itself! We spent four days just outside Hanmer Springs at New Wine NZ a Christian conference/festival. We'd been to New Wine UK in 2008 and all thoroughly enjoyed (and were challenged by) the teaching, worship and seminars so thought we'd give the Kiwi version a go. Hanmer was on a much smaller scale (450 as a opposed to 5000+ attending) but we are glad we went and the boys have come back buzzing having made new friends and explored our faith at their own pace and level.


As with any conference, Ali and I got more out of some sessions than others and preferred some speakers to others. For me, I particular learnt a lot from the main speaker David Parker of Desert Vineyard church in Los Angeles County.

Despite the weather being a bit grey, damp and... well, how can I put this... English, Hanmer was a great place to stay. We spent Thursday afternoon in the hot pools (the hottest and smelliest being a sulphurous 41oC), unexpectedly bumping into some Australian friends from Christchurch. Ali had a minor panic when she realised the sulphur had tarnished all her silver necklaces to a dark grey colour. It's obviously a common occurrance as the girls on the Reception desk produced a tin of 'silvo' and restored them to their original colour!

On Friday morning, I took my bike for a 25km trip over Jollies Pass and down to the Clarence River, then back over Jack's Pass to Hanmer Springs. I freely admit to having to walk part of the way up Jollies Pass, which tops out at 800m. But the scenery and isolation were stunning as I bounced along dirt roads, through fords and back down the bone jarring descent from Jack's Pass (photo below is from the summit of the pass).
On a personal note, going for the cycle ride gave me a chance to draw a line under an interesting three and a half years. In June 2006, I had a great weekend doing the English Coast to Coast cycle with a friend Steve and a group from his Round Table Club. It was the last time I'd done a challenging ride and I'd thoroughly enjoyed it and the camaraderie.

But that weekend marked the start of a period of big changes for relationships with family and friends and at work. I'll spare you the details but could I have seen these things coming and could... should I have acted before? I'll probably never know the answers, but it was the culmination of these things in 2008 that led us to re-evaluate what we should be doing with our lives and make the decision to come to New Zealand.

New Wine NZ and getting on my bike over Jollies Pass has allowed me to draw a line under this period and move on without regret or bitterness. Though I deeply miss seeing many of you, moving to New Zealand has been fantastic. I just love the country. So that's the heavy stuff over with. Let's get back to the usual 'wish you were here' kind of stuff...

I'd enjoyed going over to the Clarence River so much that I persuaded Ali and the boys to throw a picnic in the car and retrace my tyre tracks. As you'll see below, Ali doesn't hold back when behind the wheel.



It had been a mixture of work and play between Christmas and New Wine. I was at work fromthe 5th-8th Jan, but before that we'd alternated between days at home and days away to the zoo, Okains Bay and Glentui. The picture below is of cloud 'dolphins' at Okains Bay.

At the zoo, I particularly liked the kea enclosure where we could get up close to New Zealand's cheeky alpine (they use their peak as an ice axe!) parrots. Here one 'man-handles' a log.



Last weekend, we had to put up with the minor inconvenience of temporary road closures as the National Road Race Cycling Championships were staged in our part of Christchurch. Below, Ali and the boys look on as the elite women's race streams past the house on their first lap. We are well used to cyclists passing the house as every mornin, evening and weekend hundreds of road and mountain bikers pass on there circuits of the 'Long Bays' (around Lyttleton Harbour and over Gebbies & Sumner passes) or heading up onto the Port Hills.


Just when I need a lie-in after four nights in a tent it's back to work tomorrow. And finally... I'm not a bit jealous of all the snow that there's been in the UK. OK, I lied and I am jealous. Take care and God Bless.