MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU ALL

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Well a ‘Ring a Ding Ding and a very happy ding dong merrily on festive ho ho bloomin ho with a bit of Decking the Halls with Bows of folly lolly holly and some root petooting Christmas Love to you all’…….as Mr Blackadder once said.

It’s here at last and both Karen and I would like to wish you all a very merry and happy Christmas and a simply wonderful New Year. The coming 12 months are probably going to see quite a change in most peoples lives so the very best wishes to everyone at this special time of year…..so enough with all the nice stuff as anyone would think I’m actually feeling festive this year……Bah Bumbug I say!

Okay so a fairly  brief set of stories this time as no doubt most people reading it will be struggling to read along with a large glass of Pino and what’s left of a Mince Pie or a cold Turkey sandwich. So here goes.

Our good friend Cameron and his lovely wife Amanda are down here from our home town for a month so we have got to meet up with them and have spent Christmas Day with them on Cameron’s parents farm, and quite a farm it is. A few days ago we took a drive around the farm to see ’stuff’ and, well, we got stuck, very stuck, very very stuck, in poo, deep poo, deep smelly poo. So being as though I am growing a beard and have a Hugh Jackman hat, I stripped off and got to grips with digging the Landcruiser out, phewwwwey is all I can say. Back on the farm Cameron then had to hose me down in the Urban Bath. This is an outside bath that you light a bonfire under and then sit there Robbie Williams stylie, just looking out at the countryside, and no one cares if they see your bum!

Oh here’s a quick weird one, Budgerigars are all over the place here so as you are driving down the roads trying not to kill more than 3 kamikaze birds in one day you also have to avoid suicidal budgerigars!

Now this one is going to difficult to express just how funny it was to watch. We were shopping in Invercargill the other day when after a small rain shower people were emerging from doorways and various places of shelter when suddenly a young guy of about 25 runs across the road wearing shorts and flip-flops. As he jumps up onto the kerb, disaster struck! The poor unfortunate fool suffered a crushing mishap. Suffering from what Police later described as a ‘High speed Flip-Flop bow out incident’ the guys buckled. One flip flop footed foot (try saying that 4 times over), well one foot bent over to a very nasty angle whilst the other foot shot out at right angles and he basically performed a very well executed splits manoeuvre except for the fact that one leg went up and under his bottom and behind the kerb, essentially if one was in an Olympic Hurdles final then it would have been wonderful but he was at about 3″ from the ground at this point as was hurdling a kerb.

To add insult to quite a nasty injury, the only thing to grab at this point was the bonnet of a parked car (which he duly slithered past and shot off) before thrusting out an arm in blind panic and grabbing, yes, get this, none other than a parking metre bollard, but with his momentum, in hysterical slow speed, at full stretch, he headbutted the post! Full on he clattered into and landed in a heap at our feet. As we went to grab him he leapt up and ran/hobbled up the street before falling into the bank with what I guess was a very badly broken ankle. Then as we were walking up the road laughing with a women and her kids, one of her daughters stamped on the shoe laces of her 10 year old brother, and he too went down like a felled tree and rolled straight into a huge puddle. I have never laughed so much.

We met up here with the Maaske family who we met in Peru a few months ago on Lake Titikaka (they are the Canadian family travelling with 4 kids under 13!!!!!) Well we met them at a deserted beach here called Curio Bay. It is really quite a magical place. With huge waves crashing and smashing their way into the bay over the outer reef wall you find on the inside a haven of tranquility. Such calmness from waves attracts breeding Hector’s Dolphins, Yellow Eyed Penguins (about 3000 left in the world) and of course Fur Seals. So as you sit on the beach chilling and getting very very sun burned, you get surrounded by these watery creatures. The Seals are great fun but they get a bit ‘twitchy’ if you get a bit too close.

The Moraeki Bolders were a bizarre sight. They sit on a patch of beach miles from anywhere and for some incredible reason these rocks have, well, just sort of ended up there. We sat and pondered lots of things that could have happened and the simple answer is, as the bloke in the shop said, ‘They just is mate’. So we headed on South to Invercargill and the legendary Burt Monroe Beach. For(Deep Sheep Shearing Voice required)  those of you who have seen the movie ‘The World’s Fastest Indian’ starring Anthony Hopkins you will know what I mean but for those of you that haven’t seen it pop yourselves along to a DVD store and get a copy as that is where we are (and its a treat of a film). The 1920 bikes are in a hardware store here and I even got to touch the actual Indian that Burt and Anthony used!!!! Incredible to think that Burt managed to get 187mph out of a 60mph bike.

Oh some news on the book front. We looked into having the images published in a form of coffee table book with a nice jacket and so but there was a small problem, well there were actually about 7320 problems and all of them were little dollars. Yup thats right. Unless people will be willing to pay about £70 each then the book is on the back burner for a while. But all is not lost. As the quality of photo travel books with a bit of fun thrown in are so hard to find, we are not giving up.

And finally, if you get a chance in addition to rent The World’s Fastest Indian, also get a copy of Happy Feet. (the one with the Penguins), Why? Just because.

Happy Christmas and a simply wonderful New Year

Love

Chris and Karen x

Invercargill, New Zealand, 2008

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Images are super low resolution to prevent theft but if you would like a full size image, just ask and I’ll let you have a copy! There are quite a lot of images this time as I am trying to keep the volume of posts to a minimum. Files 38 - 42 are new and I do hope you enjoy looking at them.

So, picture standing in a public thermal springs shower having just borrowed  Blondie’s bright pink face scrub mitts to give the old face a good scrub and in walks a huge Maori dude all covered in tattoos. He gives me ‘the guy nod’ and continues to shower. Then it happens! I drop the bloody soap and try to catch it but boot it and it spins across the floor and stops right by his size 15 feet! We just stood there and looked at each other. Fully lathered up, with pink gloves on I’m not sure who left more uncomfortable, him or me. Keeping up Anglo Brit relationships!

Okay, we are now in the South Island of New Zealand after a crossing of the Cook Straights. That was a bit of a worry I can tell you. The forecast was NW 40 knots gusting 55 knots. Sea state ‘Very Rough’ and a ‘Storm Force’ warning issued. But off we boldly headed. We sat out on deck for the whole trip with the wind beating across the deck like Horatio Hornblower rounding the Cape Of Good Hope. The Marlborough Sound is kind of like sailing through what you would think a Norwegian Fjord would look like, beautiful.

Heading South down the East Coast we stopped at Kaikoura. This place is said to have a magical air about it. It’s a headland peninsular that bizarrely is in the shape of a Whale’s tale. Off the coast, and I do mean like 6 foot from the shore line there are massive pods of Dusky Dolphins. These are the second smallest of the Dolphin world with the smallest being Hector’s Dolphins. They all live in happy harmony off this coastline (apart from when they are being hunted by Killer Whales and idiots with plastic cameras) They are fast, agile and quite happy to leap clean out of the water, spin upside down and then hump anything in sight. (Sounds like Captain Simon Plummer to me!)

We took a snorkelling trip with a local firm to go and hug a Seal and, well, as you can see, thanks to Aquapac’s cases this is what we came up with. And yes for the more eagle eyed, that is Blondie getting up close and personal with a wild Fur Seal. Captured on my Canon 40D with a 10-20mm.

We also took a Whale boat in search of a Sperm Whale who hangs around off the coast. After shoving a pole with a microphone on the end in the water and lots of general faffing about, it surfaced for about 12 minutes! Quite incredible to see a Sperm Whale in the flesh, so to speak. Add to that the fact that shortly afterwards we were surrounded by a pod of in excess of 200 Dusky Dolphins and a few Great Albatrosses, it was quite a trip. Stunning really to think that this stuff is all just under the surface of the water, er and the odd Orca thrown into the mix. That makes kiting a bit interesting I can tell you. It’s weird to think that all you have to do is shove a snorkel in your gob and and a mask on your face and away you go, it’s like snorkelling in an Aquarium.

Heading further South we stopped off with some of Blondie’s old neighbours who very kindly got us drunk and let us use their huge Jacuzzi and put us up for the night. Thanks Tessa and Don. Kilometre after kilometre rolls passed (6500km in 5 weeks) but here is a funny thing, and this is time for Audience Participation again. Okay, in the middle of what ever rubbish you watch on TV on the average evening with your loved ones/partner/family, do this, TURN OFF THE TV. Yes, I mean OFF. Now sit there for 2 hours with nothing on the box. That lost art is called ‘conversation’. We had forgotten what TV does to you when you have it all the time. Well when you don’t have it, you actually talk. Well our truck is a Japanese import so it has very few radio channels and the coverage here is sketchy to say the least, so we have hours that pass by without TV or radio as the km’s pass. Try it next time you drive into town, turn off the radio, MP3, iPod or Cd and just chat. It is actually quite fun. Although Blondie has asked me to stop chanting the Haka everyday!

Here’s a bizarre chance meeting which defies any laws of coincidence. Jo and Inga who we met in Bolivia and then met again in Argentina were travelling to NZ at some point. Well how’s this for weird? We had not been in contact but knew they were in NZ for about 5 weeks. We had covered about 5000km and pulled into Wellington to get the ferry to the South Island. We tried a couple of Motels and we just about to drive back to the first one when I pulled over and dived through the front door of a motel as they were closing, and there, on the stairs, discussing a Lama Farm,were none other than, Jo and Inga! They said they had stopped on the stairs because of the Lama picture, otherwise would have gone and I would not have seen them. They gap of time of me walking in was, 5 or 6 seconds!!!!! How weird is that????? As I always say, ‘there is no such thing as coincidence and chance, it is all supposed to be….you may not understand it but that is just the way it is’. Weird though eh?

The clouds and skies here are really quite spectacular as are the vibrancy of the colours and the collection of smells that invade your thoughts as you drift along the long and often winding roads…..(oh god there I go again - awright Wordsworth steady on!)

A quick tale about a beautiful cat called ‘Dunedin’. Driving along miles from anywhere right out on the city limits, in the middle of the country at 100kmh, I saw a tiny little thing walking along the side of the grass verge. I did an emergency stop and reversed with Blondie wondering what the heck was going on. Well there, was a tiny 5 week old, beautiful blue eyed kitten that was all clean and fluffy but was walking, incredibly, back to town! We had a look around but there was nothing and no one in sight for miles. So we took it to a vets about 45kms away in Dunedin. They were fab and said they would do everything. They said it was a ‘dumped kitten’ not a wild cat. Overnight they put drips up and kept it warm, even trying to feed it a little and it even played a little with two other kittens. We went back in today to see how it was doing but the staff we really upset and said that the poor little thing didn’t make it. How cruel can people be to a defenseless little kitten by dumping it like that. But like the girl said as she choked back the tears, he died, warm, with food in his little tummy after playing with new friends, better than to die in a cold ditch on your own. At that point I pretended that I had something in my eye and had to go outside.

Here’s a funny to end on. It was a very windy and rainy morning and I was trying to put the tent away. Next to us there was a campervan with Germans in it. As I released the last tent peg I knew I was in trouble as the whole tent shot vertically into the grey sky! I was then faced with a choice, save the tent or the tent bag. The tent bounced down and rolled in a neat arc just tight enough for my bare feet to slip on the wet grass and sprawl me out at full stretch, in full view of the Gerry kids who were now laughing at the silly English man. I recovered enough to grab a handful of tent whilst yelling a very rude word before setting off after the pesky tent bag, which, in true comedy style, moved about 10 inches every time I made a grab for it. Then another choice, a) let go of tent and save important bag or b) hold tent and try to grab bag at full stretch. I went for the, drop, snatch grab and recover attempt. I failed! The tent went in the opposite direction immediately as I effected a full length dive to catch the bag landing, yes, you’ve guessed it, on natures very own manly cushion, my boll*cks.

Seriously, I’m not joking. I came in like an over weight Oohmegoolie Bird. For those of you in the dark about this bird, well it is a large bird with small wings and short legs, but unfeasibly large testicles and when it comes into land, it lifts it’s legs up, lands on its nads and is heard to cry, ‘Oohmegoolies Oohmegoolies’. Blondie then returns to the scene all clean after her shower to find me sweating, covered in mud with the tent stuffed half in and half out of the boot of the truck and the German bloke giving me a filthy look for yelling a torrent of abuse that a Scottish thumb bashing pipe welder would have been proud of! I should get a job in the UN.

Driving on the beaches here is quite fun despite all the warning. Imagine driving from Bournemouth to Brighton along the beach at 110 kmh and that’s what you can do here. There are driver warnings everywhere here that are very clever like Drink DrIvE, how clever!

Right well that’s it again for now but we will be in touch before Christmas and may we be the very first to wish you all a very Happy Easter.

Hugs to all

Chris and Karen

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