Christmas Greetings

While it's still just about Christmas Day the Americas, we're well into Boxing Day here in NZ and enjoying being very lazy. So semi-belated Christmas Greetings to you all. In typical antipodean style, we celebrated our first southern hemisphere Christmas with a BBQ after having been to church in the morning.

Christmas could have been a difficult time, being so far from family and old friends. Indeed we have all felt fragile at times over the last week, but yesterday turned out to be fantastic. We'd been invited to join the Smith family from Woodford (who we'd stayed with when we first arrived in August) and their extended family and in-laws. Add in a family of Australian guests and there must have been about fifty of us at South Brigton Park for the afternoon. In a sheltered glade among the pines, the BBQ and tressle tables filled with food as everyone 'brought a plate', while the kids (of all ages!!) played. The sun shone!

We then spent the evening back at the Smith's opening presents, playing games and eating more food. The chocolate fountain proved a great hit with all ages, though I'm sure that chocolate covered crisps (chips) will ever have universal appeal. We eventually arrived home at 10.30pm, thirteen hours after having left home in the morning. A long but thouroughly enjoyable day, followed by a good night's sleep and a lie-in.

Unlike Mary and Joseph there was 'room for us at the inn' this Christmas as even though we were a long way from home the Smiths and Buxtons welcomed us into their family with open arms. It was a real honour to spend the day with them all and proved once again that the best present at Christmas is love, whether it be from person to person or from our Father in heaven.

And so with that thought, I wish you you all peace at this time and thank you for your thoughts and prayers during what has been an amazing year for the Laws.

Season's Greetings & the world's wackiest airport

I hear that it is Christmas in a couple of weeks time. It certainly seems strange to be preparing for the holiday as the days get longer and the tomatoes are flowering on the patio. Fortunately, Ali's organised and we manged to send our Christmas cards to the other three corners of the world in time. It's been great to receive cards and letters from family and friends. To all of you, we hope that you will know peace this Christmas wherever you are.

The weather has been unseasonal here today, with low cloud and a bit of rain in the air. How different from earlier in the week when I was on the North Island for three days. The sun shone down as I spent long days working on one of the rivers in the Bay of Plenty. Two days on a jet boat and yet we didn't get anywhere near any rapids, just lots of water quality monitoring in an estuary! Still, it beat being in the office and gave me a chance to top up the tan.

I flew home yesterday from what must be one of the most bizarre airport 'terminals' in the world. Yes, that really is Whakatane (fa-ka-ta-ne) airport building the picture below. I think this is time to start a little competition. Can anyone else propose a better candidate for the title of World's Wackiest Airport?

The flight to Auckland was on the smallest plane in Air New Zealands's fleet. It's the only time I've looked out of front window of a plane on a scheduled flight and been able to watch every move by the pilot.

While work's been busy for me, the rest of the family have also been incredibly busy. Both the boys have had end of year trips with school to outdoor swimming pools. And last Sunday was a busy day for cubs and scouts. Josh went sailing in Lyttleton Harbour while Matt cycled 23 km along the Little River rail trail.

Lots of people have asked us if we've been surprised by anything in New Zealand. The answer is nothing major, but there are a few little things that took a bit or working out or that we hadn't expected. So here are two of them:

• Traffic lights turn straight from red to green, with no amber to warn you that they are about to change.

• Department stores have 'Manchester' department, which sells bed linen, towels, etc.

With that next to useless information I will leave you to your Christmas preparations. Bye

The most beautiful view in the world...

... was not on show when I went to see it on Monday. I was extremely fortunate to have to go to Milford Sound with work, but unfortuantely it rained heavily all day and the cloud was low, so the famed view of Mitre Peak (http://tiny.cc/6Q73l) was nowhere to be seen. However the water streaming off the valley sides was spectacular in its own right and probably far more useful for me to see as a hydrologist! And I did get my first ever ride in a helicopter.

Maybe I'll have to go back again, but take Ali and the boys with me next time. I've been very lucky to see so much of the country with work, but it would be lovely to share the experience with the family. Under the current arrangement, I'm charged with having to bring back a badge each for the boys, which Ali then has to sew onto their blankets. She gets the rough end of this deal!

Two weeks ago, we had another long weekend to celebrate our regional Canterbury Day. Friday was a statutory day off work at the end of 'Cup and Show Week', so we planned to go to the Royal New Zealand Show, which is held about two miles from home. Unseasonal gales and wind put paid to our plans and so we had a lazy day at home.

The good thing about Christchurch's variable weather is that the rest of the weekend had good weather. So on the Saturday we took the foot ferry across Lyttleton Harbour to Diamond Harbour and had a good day with friends walking and playing games. Then on Sunday we popped over the hill to our local beach at Corsair Bay. It's a lovely sheltered cove with a gentle slopeing beach and places to jump into deeper water further round. The perfect spot for a Sunday teatime.

That Saturday night also saw me and the boys cheering on the 'All Whites' from the comfort of the sofa as they won through to next year's football World Cup. Suddenly, this rugby mad country was talking about football. Normal service resumed last weekend as the All Blacks took on England at Twickenham and won. It would be telling to say who was cheering for who as we watched the replay during breakfast on Sunday.

Ali has continued to pick up some supply/relief teaching work at the boys' school, which is giving her some good experience. She enjoys being back in the classroom and the challenge of adapting her British resources for the Kiwi curriculem. Talking of school, Matthew brought home a lovely Maori-design fish hook that he'd carved from soap. He was able to tell us the meaning behind the different symbols he'd carved.

I joined Josh and the rest of his cub pack on Saturday for an afternoon's climbing up at Rapaki Rock on the Port Hills. A warm wind blew and the sun shone on a great afternoon where all the boys had a go at some quite tricky climbs. I spent the afternoon on the other end of a rope, belaying the intrepid boys. Josh gave it a good go, even trusting me to belay him on one climb! We then walked back down into the city down a valley that could easily have been in the Pennines. At the bottom of the vally, we were met by the unmistakably smells of that Kiwi institution - a sausage sizzle - that Ali and Matthew had helped set up.



We were all out with cubs again last night as parent helpers on a cycle ride to one of the local parks. It was like herding cats!

So that's an update of the last two weeks. It's been busy but fun. And thank you for those that have been asking for an update. It's nice to know that I'm not just writing for myself. Bye.

Hubble Bubble & Fireworks

It's been a busy couple of weeks. In the week after we got back from Tekapo, we all felt a bit down. Was it homesickness for the UK or just one of those lulls in the vibrancy of life. Something we've learnt is to take stock and find the real reason if things seem bad. It's so easy to jump to the conclusion that it's because we're in NZ and it's easy to forget that we all had bad days in the UK. But I'd be lying if I said that there weren't days when we miss people, places and things.

One thing that we certainly haven't missed has been Halloween. I always found it a dark period and hated the piles of tacky evil merchandise in the stores. Fortunately, Halloween was very low key here in Christchurch. There was hardly anything in the shops, a bit of a debate on its growing influence in the paper and (Hallelujah!) no 'trick or treaters'.

On Thursday, I was up in Rotorua on the North Island. Fortunately, the timing of my flight home gave me chance to have a quick look at the thermal pools in the city centre park. While the video clips will give you and idea of the sights, you are fortunate that 'smellyvision' isn't yet available. The eggy sulpherous smell around the park and at various other places in the city certainly leaves an impression. The only other time I've smelt anything similar was near a chemical works in Rotherham!



Bonfire night is celebrated here and we missed no opportunity to share the news that old Guido Fawkes was a son of York and had been baptised at St Mike's. Oh, why do we celebrate proximity to notoriety? Ali and the boys picked me up from the airport and we whizzed round to the beach suburb of New Brighton along with half of Christchurch to watch the City Council's firework display on the pier. It seemed strange to be walking along the beach to watch fireworks. The other difference is that we had to wait until 9pm for it to be dark enough for the fireworks as we are now in southern hemisphere summer.


Having settled me and the boys into work and school respectively, Ali got the chance to return to the classroom for paid employment this week. Having volunteered two days per week at the boy's school for the last few weeks, she applied to go on the supply teacher list and almost immediately was asked to cover Wednesday afternoon. A phonecall at 7.30 on Wednesday morning saw her teaching all of Wednesday and then again on Friday. Class and teacher survived!

Anyway, it's Saturday morning and there's a lawn that needs cutting, so I'll bid you farewell and look forward to hearing from you with your news.

Tekapo Time

Our first 'bank holiday' weekend and we headed south to Lake Tekapo. The journey took about three hours in a car laden down by four bikes. We were staying in a 'bach' (or holiday home) with another Christchurch family and their two boys. Tekapo is famous for one of the views of the South Island. On the edge of the village and at the southern end of the lake stands the diminutive church of the Good Shepherd. There's no need for stained glass in this church as the panoramic window takes in the full glory of creation
.

Naturally enough, every tour bus between Queenstown and Christchurch disgorges its load who swarm around the church. So early morning and evening were the times to visit and wallow in the splendour of the setting. Close to the church is a bronze statue of a collie dog, honouring those tireless workers whose help was essential in opening up the MacKenzie region during the 1800's.

We climbed to the top of neighbouring Mt St John on Saturday and had a drink at the summit cafe, which is part of the University of Canterbury Observatory which sits atop the mountain and makes best use of the crystal clear night skies. An unsuccessful attempt to catch a couple of trout finished off a fantastic day. Sunday was a lazier day, spent partly at MacGregor Lake (below) and partly at the hot outdoor pools by Lake Tekapo.


A cycle ride past the hydro-electric scheme (busman's holiday?) on Monday was followed by lunch and packing the car. We left as the first drops of rain started to fall. It rained continuously until we were back in Christchurch, but at least that saved me from having to cut the grass once we were home (so it wasn't all bad!).

Sorry, folks but you've got a piccy of me to finish with, this time.

Time passes quickly and our first 'road trip'

Is it really over two weeks since I posted an update?

The boys have been on holdiay from school for the last two weeks, so Ali's been busy arranging days out and meeting up with friends. The boys had a sleep over last weekend and we then went to the Christchurch model railway exhibition, which was brilliant and included slot car dragster racing, which Matt won (Josh having taken the honours in the Scalextric racing.

On the middle Sunday of the holiday we revisited Ilam Baptist Church and are keen to get involved there. It's very friendly and reminds us of G2 (our church in York that was part of St Michael-le-Belfrey) in many ways.

I had a couple of days in Auckland last week with work, which gave me chance to explore the 'big city' in the evening. In typical fashion, I escaped the bright lights and took a ferry out to Waiheke Island in the gulf for the evening.

This weekend we headed up to Nelson at the top of the South Island to visit friends, Jo and Andrew. We'd planned to go there via Lewis Pass (894m), but with snow forecast down to 200m we took the coast road via Kaikora and Blenheim. The weather was atrocious as we drove through alternating snow and lashing rain. But at least it gave us chance to see the seals just north of Kaikora as we huddled in the car eating our pies (a great NZ institution).



Fortunately the weather on Saturday and Sunday was brilliant and so we spent Saturday morning at the arts & crafts market in Nelson and the afternoon on the beach at Rabbit Island. A leisurely Sunday morning at the 'hands on' aquarium in Mapua was followed by a stunning drive home that included a quick snow ball fight at the summit of Lewis Pass.

The Flying Fox of Spencer Park

A fairly quiet week and the good weather finally broke. Maybe it was with good timing that I'd planted a few vegetables in the garden as we got a bit of rain. Fortunately, we missed the remnants of the Australian dust storms that had engulfed Sydney and Brisbane. They affected Auckland and the North Island a bit. The boys have broken up for school for two weeks and we've had a busy week socially. Someone had a birthday during the week, but as the video shows, she's not acting her age!!



We discovered Spencer Park reserve yesterday to the north of the city. It had great climbing frames (as seems typical of Christchurch playgrounds), but also three long 'flying foxes' or aerial runways that we all had a go on. A five minute walk through the forest and we were on the beach with the surf crashing in. As per usual, someone had to go for a paddle.


Today was a good day, in that we might have found a church that suits us all and is relatively near. Only time will tell. It's also been good to entertain guests and be invited out by friends this week. It's the relationships that will really help us settle. We feel blessed.

And finally, another pretty picture of the valley just up from home. A less pretty picture yesterday afternoon was my panting face as I tackled the steep climb to the right of the picture on my bike for the first time. Dodgy gears and a lack of fitness dashed my hopes for next year's mountain stages of the Tour de France. Still, the challenge has been laid down and my goal is to climb Worsley Road (check it out on Street View, it's steep!)

Until next time, Bye