Don't Worry Be Happy

Murawai, Pakuranga, and Akarana. Those are the 3 courses we played and if my golf wasn't that great at least I learned how to pronounce (and spell) the names of the courses which was a bit of a challenge! Despite ending up somewhere in the middle of the pack (of about 120) the golfing was a lot of fun and all the participants were exceptionally nice. Most were from Australia, New Zealand or Canada with only a handful from anywhere else. One of the Vernon women made it to the final round - congrats to Nancy K. We've had a bit of time exploring some of the sights Auckland has to offer. It's quite hilly but has lots of nice vistas and tree-lined streets. Many of them have tree-tunnels like this: ANZAC day celebrations were on Tuesday (much like our Remembrance Day) which included a fly over with some (I'm going to guess) fighter planes. You can tell from the sky colour that our weather has taken a turn for the better. We had 3 glorious days for golfing. Lots of ...

The World Masters Games is the largest multi-sport participatory event with 28,000 people from over 100 countries. The inaugural one was held in Toronto in 1985. The oldest competitor is a 101 year old woman from India competing in 100m, 200m, javelin and shot put. She took up athletics at age 93 and her 79 year old son is also competing. There's hope for us all! I'm not sure if the staff are congratulating us or mocking us: Here are the 3 of us decked out waiting for the opening ceremonies to begin - apparently there are 2000 Canadians here and they were very prevalent.  The opening ceremonies included the requisite music, Maori dancing, fireworks, laser lights, etc.  And don't think these games aren't classy - just look at the port-a-potties! It was pretty cool to see all the people dressed in either team or national colours. It's quite a big event for the city and much like the Olympics in Vancouver, everyone's in a friendly, talkative...

Actually it's Wellington. And not just windy but a bit chilly too. We've had to do quite a bit of bundling up in our woolies since we got here. I guess those shorts I packed aren't going to see much use. Of course, Wellington, the capital of New Zealand, is a port city. Unfortunately, the last big earthquake in November 2016 damaged a lot of the wharf area and cranes so the large ships aren't able to come in to the port at the moment. At 7.8 it was the 2nd largest earthquake to hit NZ. There are a few interesting things to do in Wellington and I think we did most of them. Up the cable car to the top of the hill where you get a good view of the bay. Wandered back down through the fabulous botanical garden where we spotted this lovely toadstool. Visited the local museum that had an impressive display of Gallipoli - a long fought battle by the New Zealand army in WW1. They had a lot of huge replicas of soldiers and scenes, created by Peter Jackson's (think...

Yes it seems kind of cheesy and touristy but our visit to the Shire/Hobbiton was very pleasant. As we left Rotorua the sun was shining and all the surrounding hills transformed to a bright, emerald green. A rainbow even appeared as we headed out on the bus. This movie set location was one of 150+ different ones that were used for the Lord of the Rings. After they finished filming, the set was removed but when Peter Jackson made the Hobbit movies, he rebuilt the set as permanent structures. At that time many tourists were already coming to the farm near Matamata where the filming had taken place and now Hobbiton is a major employer in the area (including 5 full time gardeners). There are 44 hobbit houses and Linda and I decided we'd see if any hobbits were home. Actually, none of the houses have anything in them - only the front. You open the door and see a wall! This is part of Bag End, where the Baggins lived. Atop the house is a beautiful tree - fake with thousands of fa...

I hate bugs. And spiders. And wormy, crawly things. So what's the deal with glow worms. They are quite literally the larvae of a beetle that happens to have bioluminescence. The reason for their luminosity? To entice their prey.  Yes, these worms are predators - just like lions and sharks! And still, I went on a tour to see them. Thursday night Cyclone Cook was scheduled to make landfall and a few areas of the country experienced flooding, slips (land slides) and extremely high winds. In Rotorua, things were just very rainy and a bit windy. So on Friday morning we woke to high cloud cover with some blue sky actually poking through - our first since we arrived in NZ. We hopped on a bus for the 2 hour ride to Waitomo where the Glow Worm Caves are. Glow worms are only found in NZ and Australia. Most of this area consists of green, rolling hills, a lot of sheep, cattle, deer, a few ostriches, and horses. I wouldn't have been surprised to see Bilbo Baggins wandering about. W...

If you like sulphur pools, hot springs and bubbling mud pools, then Rotorua is the place for you. Much like Yellowstone Park in Wyoming, Rotorua is built on a geothermal hotspot and there is evidence of activity pretty much everywhere. Apparently there's a geyser here too that goes off regularly but I think it costs $40 to get into the area. We landed in Rotorua (after our long flights) and despite the dreary weather had a little tour of the place from a friend of Nancy's who lives in Vancouver but has lived here (thanks Lee!). We walked along the edge of the sulphur lake and through the park with fenced areas of steaming, bubbling water areas. The difference from Yellowstone is that this is all right in the middle of town as opposed to a wilderness area. In the afternoon we grabbed our swimwear, headed to the Polynesian Spa and made our way through about 8 different pools with varying temperatures and degrees of acidity/alkalinity. It's a huge hot springs development i...