After blitzing East Coast Australia in nine days it was on to the next stage of the adventure. Another slightly silly indirect flight via Melbourne (flight 3/9) and mad dash through the airport to find the international terminal and make the bag drop for us onto our first long flight (flight 4/9) to Honolulu. I’d been having sleepless nights about this flight as Ethan and my passports only have three months left on them and despite checking in advance I wasn’t 100% sure we’d be allowed to board the plane to the USA or not, plus the connection time was very tight in Melbourne but we made it just in time and could sit back and watch some movies and enjoy some tasty airline food which has definitely improved loads since I was a kid. Being a ten hour night flight plan was a couple of movies then lots of sleep but different family members had different approaches, Zach slept most of the flight in the excellent baby crib and we enjoyed the leg room in the front row, Ethan and I got a few hours sleep but Em and the girls pretty much none so quite a lot of tiredness and high emotions on arriving in the heat of Honolulu and the retro looking airport. Immigration took pity on us with Iona throwing a loud temper tantrum and fast tracked us, welcome to The good ‘ole USA, super easy!

In typical fashion I had an over ambitious plan for our single day on Oahu, seeing as we’d crossed the international dateline and arrived at 6am I suggested putting most of our bags (at great expense) into left luggage and getting a bus over to the famous Waikiki beach for a surf. Google maps said 18 minutes but the bus took 45 mins and we got off too soon requiring a painfully hot and sweaty walk down endless big hotel dead ends or impassable wave lashed boardwalks. It was now 10am and everyone was tired, hot and bothered and hungry, we found a nice cafe and had the most expensive breakfast ever at 60$US but this was the turning point as with somewhere to sit down and eat and watch the waves and with some food in our bellies things started to look up, despite the heavy tropical rain showers rolling in.

We hired a board and all jumped into the pleasantly warm sea (no westsuits needed, bonus!) for a rubbish surf but great atmosphere with the crowds and cool to see the high rise backed Waikiki beach if only for a day, though maybe one day is more than enough! Back onto the bus for an even slower bus ride back and was looking like we were going to miss our flight to Maui, cue another mad dash through the airport and got to the bag drop just as it closed. Luckily the Hawaiian airlines staff are super helpful and they helped us get the bags labelled quickly and we pegged it through to the gate, of course the flight was delayed anyway but another flight made (5/9, over halfway!!) Again we arrived late in Maui (pattern emerging here) but sadly one bag hadn’t made it and being the one with all the sleeping bags and mats in meant no home for the night either. Luckily it came on the next flight but it meant by the time we’d got the hire car, some food and essentials we were once again trying to find our campsite and putting up the tent in the dark with four tired children, ouch!

First stop the next day was Lahaina, a cool looking beach town to hire a surf board for a few days, then we headed to Lahaina Beach which had some nice mellow waves peeling off the reef near the harbour wall and the kids finally got to get back on the SUP which they haven’t managed to do for ages as it was winter in NZ and too windy or cold in Oz. Far too hot though on the beach so we beat a retreat in the mid afternoon and headed further up the coast to the famous snorkelling beach of Honolua –  a lovely walk-in with tasty ice creams in hand, through dense rainforest but sadly the snorkelling was fairly average with recent stormy seas and we got another tropical heavy rain soaking for our troubles. So far Hawaii a bit underwhelming for a “tropical paradise”, much busier than NZ and Oz both on the roads and beaches and the campsites lack useful facilities like kitchens, the current one is an overpriced hot sweaty dust bowl at times, you can hardly survive without the AC in the car to revive you at times.

The next day was much better though, we headed over to the famous North Shore of Maui and stopped at windy Hookipa beach for a better surf, this time complete with loads of giant turtles in the line up and on the beach and some great  snorkelling and splash pools for the kids. Having surfed with lots of seals and dolphins before this was quite the novelty and they were massive and swam right under you. The water clarity means the turtles and reef looks really close which makes you concentrate hard on your surfing! In the heat of the day we headed further east along the famous Road to Hana which was super windy to drive but got more scenic the further you went, plenty of waterfalls and coastal views and some impressive rainforest and crashing waves on the Ke’ Anae Peninsula where we decided to turn around and head for home via some amazing roadside banana bread , freshly squeezed lemonade and coconut ice creams to revive us and a swim (and big jump!) at the popular Twin Falls. Our best day in Hawaii yet and hopefully more to come! 

Time for a proper adventure so we headed up the crazy road to Haleakala volcano and it’s impressive Martian landscape which is in complete contrast to the dripping rainforest of the Road to Hana. Haleakala rises an impressive 3000m (10,000ft) in only 37 miles taking you from sea level to the very summit above the clouds. The summit itself has an average view but as you descend on the Sliding Sands trail towards the crater the view gets better and better. I had itchy feet and got bored of the kids dragging their feet so  I ran ahead to drop a bit further down, going a bit off piste to check out some of the caldera and big rocks in the crater. We all met up again for the long, hot climb out again and I was really feeling the altitude unlike Ethan who was jogging uphill no problems! The clouds followed us back up the hill so we were very lucky with the weather all in all. The visitor centre was excellent too with a helpful ranger who made all three kids junior rangers once they’d made three pledges to care for the environment. A stunning place to visit, very reminiscent of the Tongariro crossing in NZ but a much more family friendly option.

Our last full day in Maui and you’ve guessed it, time to pack in all the things we’d missed, we headed over to the South Shore region which is home to some more stunning beaches and after a much needed visit to the Laundromat – mental note, travelling with baby and muddy/hot and dusty camping is a tough combo!!) we tried to find a nice beach for the day, beach 1 was behind a posh hotel so very busy and the kids did their best to drown me on an ill-advised wave washed snorkel attempt. We bailed soon after and headed further south to escape the crowds, beach 2 (Makela) was beautiful but equally busy and after driving to the volcanic super rocky road end we finally settled on Annie’s Bay which was a great find with sheltered snorkelling and tons of colourful fish and coral to look at.  Still time for one more beach (maybe) according to daddy so we headed back to Lahaina for a quick surf at Launiupoko beach which is another lovely palm backed beach with great waves for surfing and SUP rides and a chilled vibe, with music playing under the swaying palms. Definitely time to taste the local cuisine so we headed out for some expensive and fairly average pizzas in a restaurant with a great view of the sunset, washed down with the famous shave ice for dessert. 

Time to catch another afternoon flight but keen to get our money’s worth out of the hire board we headed back to Launiupoko for our best surf in Hawaii yet, super shallow reef but super mellow peeling waves meant it felt easy to get long rides across the reef and onto the beach. We heard a car alarm go off but little did we know disaster had struck, some nasty and selfish person(s) had stolen five of our bags out of the car which annoyingly didn’t seem to lock properly. Luckily they didn’t like the look of Ethan’s toys or my day pack with waterproofs in so chucked these on the roadside down the road but we were still missing our tent, a couple of sleeping bags and all of Ethan and my clothes and my running gear. We returned the board, then went to the police station and filed a report and then had our usual mad dash to the airport to catch our next flight to Kaua’i, we made it of course but were all a bit in shock about what had just happened, after so many trouble free adventures this was hard to take. The stuff in the bags is pretty much worthless to others but has real value to us and can’t all be replaced easily. Bizarrely they left all expensive electrical items and seemed more interested in old tents and clothes?

Keen to get the trip back on course we went to Walmart and bought plenty of cool Hawaiian clothes, a couple of cheap tents, a mat and sleeping bag and a budget stove, a few days later we added in head torches and a decent camp stove and so apart from daddy’s sleeping bag we were back on track. To be honest it’s so hot here we’d been lying on top of the sleeping bags anyway so I figured I’d cope! First stop was Anahola Beach Park where we set up camp under the palm trees and hoped our luck would change. Not long after I was arguing with the ranger about whether I had a permit or not, in the rush to leave I’d not been able to print out a paper copy which he wanted to see. Eventually I managed to show him the bank transaction for payment but more negative energy threatening to pop the happy bubble! The rangers didn’t seem to care if you are travelling with a baby, they just want to move you on. The joy riders on quad bikes doing laps up and down the beach at all hours wasn’t great either. We were also now super paranoid about getting robbed again and did lots of moving of stuff between car and tent to keep it close. 

I’d only been able to get permits for the world famous Kalalau Trail for the first two days on Kaua’i so no time to rest and catch our breath before we were off to the stunning North Shore and the ever impressive views driving west past Hanalei Bay to the trailhead at Ke’e beach. More issues with permits and we had to drive back 25 minutes to get wifi to gain access to the car park but we made it in the end and were told by a friendly ranger lady we could come and go as many times as we liked in the next two days. Em fancied a run first so the kids and I walked over the hill to some fun caves on pretty Hanakapi’ai beach while Em ran over the next hill to get some great coastal views and plenty of river swims to cool off. It was  26-28 degrees which is hot for running but the high humidity made it feel even worse, I was knackered just carrying a bag and baby over one hill! Em did 14 miles! Back to camp where you’ve guessed it the same ranger needed to see our permit again despite seeing it the night before and worst of all insisted we move our tent to the other side of the toilet block !! More madness!

We didn’t have time to both have a run on the Kalalau Trail that day so  came back the next day only to meet another grumpy ranger who said we had wrong permit etc etc, another trip outside park to get wifi and another stressful experience easily saved if they went paperfree or kept a record on a computer, for such a modern country America is pretty backward at times. They even let me in and then wouldn’t let Em and kids back in later, sheer madness! Anyway the good news is once I finally got to do my run that I’d booked months ago it totally lived up to the hype with amazing coastal scenery and vivid colours in the red rocks, lush green trees and sparkling turquoise waters, some cool exposed rocky traverses too and the only limiting factor was the extreme heat, which I coped with by drinking over six litres of water and swimming in every available stream. Despite this at times I felt worryingly close to heat stroke and had to stop and hydrate in the shade a few times. 22 hilly technical miles and a well deserved slap up feed followed of the local “plate meal” aka two scoops of rice, one scoop of macaroni cheese and lots of tasty seafood, fish and chips over at Hanalei Bay, which has amazing tropical mountain views while you eat. The kids (once they’d finally been allowed back into the car park) had a fun afternoon snorkelling and SUPping in Ke’e Bay and we headed back to camp to find a different ranger had written us an angry note and collapsed our tents, honestly you can’t make this stuff up! Lesson learnt, in America always print out your permit, photocopy many times and display all over your car and tent at all times, in fact go crazy, turn your permit into a badge or tattoo it into your face? Enough ranting, I’ll let the stunning scenery do the talking!

Clearly time to leave that frustrating campsite and have a quieter time, though we actually finished with a really positive experience there, a great snorkel on the empty beach and a fun family talent show before heading west into the mountains. First we needed a better stove and some gas which turned out to be hard to source on the island but we got there in the end. I filled the car with petrol and was alarmed to see lots flooding out the bottom of the car but was reassured that it stopped shortly after so might be a leak in the petrol cap? Can anything else go wrong on this trip? Hopefully not! Fingers well and truly crossed!

From Waimea town we drove inland for a change, up the well positioned Waimea Canyon Road and thought we’d try one of the walks into the scenic canyon, as it sounds on paper it is very much a mini version of the Grand Canyon. We chose the Kukui Trail which claimed to be a mile down and a mile back, how hard could it be? The views were great on every turn despite the clouds building up and then light rain became heavy then torrential, we all felt a bit silly leaving all the waterproofs in the car for sure! Ethan ran on down to find some trees for shelter but went far too far down so we we had a long wet walk back up, Iona and I were at the back and my tired legs from the Kalalau Trail weren’t great for carrying but I did my best as she told me she hated everything and this was the worst day of her life! She wants to go “home” to Christchurch which makes me a little sad, hopefully she’ll bounce back like she always does! After we’d changed into drier clothes and turned the car into a wet dog smelling drying room we headed further into the hills into Kokee State Park which had a really nice campsite for a change with grassy pitches and friendly campers. We checked out some more of the Iamazing viewpoints the next day, the highest ones were sadly in the cloud but views down to the Kalalau Trail and into the Waimea canyon from below the cloud line were pretty spectacular.  Overall a great place to spend a few nights and to escape the crowds and heat of the coastal areas. I regretted not having a sleeping bag and warm clothes though and shivered in my party shirt and Hawaiian shorts most of the night!

We headed back down the next day to the heat and visited Poipu beach on the south coast which is pretty epic for snorkelling and surfing, the surf looked far too big and scary for us but the snorkelling was like being in an aquarium with large, colourful and friendly fish everywhere and great vis. The currents were pretty strong though so we had to keep an eye on the intrepid mini team who have taken really well to snorkelling especially Ethan. There was also a mini island you could swim out to complete with turtles and dolphins so all in all a great find. Onto our final campsite Lydgate State Park and we nervously looked for thieves, boy racers and angry rangers but were pleasantly surprised to find none, only camping right on the beach, a colourful toilet block and the sound of waves to lull you to sleep, night night, sleep tight….

After all the hiking and snorkelling there was definitely a need for some Kaua’i surfing so we went to Kalapaki beach which we had spotted en route to the campsite, this turned out to be a lovely find with a great reef break just offshore and we hired a fun 10ft longboard (proper Hawaiian style) which got every wave going, big smiles all around and the kids loved jumping the waves and SUPing round the bay. All the surfers were super friendly and shared the waves and all ages from about 3 up to grannies in their 60s/70s, all far better than us! After getting hot and bothered doing some shopping we went to scenic Wailua Falls to cool off. The approach was extreme to say the least with a vertical root section but no problem for our mini flip-flop wearing climbers! The falls were stunning too and a great swimming hole. Refreshing for sure. I ventured behind the falls but bottled the jump back into the plunge pool! We finished with fresh coconuts in the car park which was a nice touch. Back to camp for a final bbq on the beach, still no sign of a ranger, yay!

Our final full day in Hawaii, which we’re actually sad about leaving after a great week on Kaua’i and we decided to go for the big stuff, first stop “the best play park in Hawaii” which was pretty cool and very artistically built out of wood followed by “the worlds best beach” Hanalei Bay for some more surfing, the setting is quite ridiculous with tropical mountain views backing the perfect crescent shaped beach and we hired another 10ft longboard as the waves looked tiny. Turned out to be perfect size for Iona and Sara to practice their surfing and Ethan took Iona on a SUP adventure under the scenic pier and back. Best of all after a very long paddle past the shallow reef there was a great point break with sizeable, fun and glassy waves to play on before the long arm busting paddle back, time for a slap up dinner of Mexican food in a road side food market to round off a great day nicely.

And all too quickly it was time to say Mahalo and goodbye to Hawaii, it definitely grew on us in the last week, and the final morning was a nice touch when a friendly, I repeat friendly!!!, ranger drove up to ask us how our night was. The last campsite was a lovely spot to finish our trip and Kaua’i has some gems like the Kalalau Trail, Waimea Canyon and Hanalei Bay. Just time for a quick play on the amazing play bridge at the campsite and a swim at Kalapaki Beach before the inevitable hot and sweaty queues to get through security and onto our flight to Los Angeles (7/9, getting home slowly!), strange being a domestic flight yet five hours across the Pacific. Worryingly once again the car leaked quite a bit of petrol when filling it up and warning lights started coming on, so glad to hand that one back to be honest! You’d think if you pay over NZ$2000 for a hire car it might work a bit better, we all got fed up with the crazy electric doors and boot by the end! Onto Los Angeles to meet new baby Annabelle and reclaim our cuddly toys that Iona left at the campsite in Maui and we got shipped to LA at great expense! 

This may well be the final blog post for the Harrison Family Adventures so if it is thanks for reading this far, we only went to NZ for a year so thought it would have finished ages ago! Onto new jobs, old friends and haunts and no doubt plenty more adventures, hope your life is full of happiness and adventures too, one final key piece of advice I’ve learnt in the last few weeks….

Life’s a journey, travel light!   (or get half your possessions stolen, that’s an easy way to lighten your load) 

BONUS SECTION Cousin & Kiln Farm Family Catch Ups and back home in time for the fun of the Ferry Fair….

AND FINALLY………..IT REALLY IS……………THE END

If you’ve read this far a huge well done! Bonus marks if you read every single blog post over the last 2 years and 8 months! 🙂 Chad over and and out……

After much deliberation on which way to fly home from NZ we had decided to start our trip in Australia, somewhere I’d lived way back in 2003 (an amazing 19 years earlier, I am getting old!!) and I was keen to show the kids a few highlights, they were predictably excited to look for koalas and kangaroos up close too. Sadly couldn’t quite fit Fiji in this time, but good to leave something to come back for!! Flying into Brisbane seemed the best option, then we could do a one way road trip down the coast to Sydney, but would the weather be kind enough for “winter” camping? Despite selling all our furniture and the car to raise funds, finances had been well and truly blown on the 9 flights and crazily priced car hire (apparently during COVID they sold half their fleet and hence prices have doubled) so camping only viable option left with Em on maternity leave! Annoyingly the surf at Sumner on the last pack up and cleaning day looked better than I’d ever seen it but too busy to catch a ride and boards all packed up for a 3 month shipping journey home too. The final pack up was a back breaking, box loading, house tidying marathon and Em pulled an all nighter again to get the house shipshape, I had a few hours sleep huddled under the heat pump on the living room floor, not quite the Hilton experience for our final night in NZ. We squeezed into Becky and Michaela’s cars with our usual mountain of luggage and after a mad dash to the bus stop on Ferry Road we said our goodbyes and boarded the airport bus to the airport and the start of the very long journey back to Scotland.

First flights (1/9 and 2/9) were a two leg flight to Brisbane via Melbourne (half the price but possibly not worth it for the hassle?) and an all too quick hello to an old friend Peetie Poo who kindly came to the airport to hold the baby and say hi while we frantically tried to make our domestic connection to Brisvegas.  After a very long, tiring day of the final pack up of our lovely house at 304 Cannon Hill Crescent, in the aptly named Mount Pleasant, and endless travelling we finally made it to Ellie’s house at 10pm (midnight NZ time!) for a well deserved sleep. Strange not being in New Zealand in our trusty Nissan Serena but somewhat exciting to be somewhere new for a change! We had a slow, lazy start the next day sharing family travel tips and testing out all their exciting toys then headed down the coast, stopping at Coolangatta for a massive feed at the bakery, lunch on the beach and a quick look at Snapper Rocks for some surfing, bit too busy for our liking! Onto Byron Bay instead and the stunningly situated Reflections Campsite, our home for the next four nights and top left in the first picture:-

We had a rude awakening on our arrival as massive storm clouds rolled in and just when I had the tent half up we were hit with strong winds, torrential rain and bullet hail stones! We all cowered in the car while the poor tent was by now three inches under water and then of course being winter it got pitch dark too! Less than ideal, but Em and the kids legged it to the kitchen to knock up dinner and I tipped as much water out of the tent as I could, then towel dried the inside and fashioned a dryish home for the gang. Luckily this turned out to be one of only two wet days on the trip to Oz so not a sign of bad things to come! The campsite was like living in the rainforest with an amazing beach below and Em and I enjoyed surfing with dolphins at The Pass which is a world famous point break. We surfed here four times and each time the wind was less and the waves were better. Nearby Wategos beach also had great surfing and friendly dolphins nearby and was much quieter. The classic coastal walk to Cape Byron Lighthouse was as good as I remembered it and the kids and I enjoyed climbing the steps to the very top of the lighthouse. Sadly the excellent Piggery Flicks is no more but the amazing pizzas at Belongil Treehouse were great on the last night. The wildlife in the campsite was pretty good with dolphins on the beach, plenty of parakeets and some friendly kookaburras but we went to Macadamia Castle wildlife park to get up close and personal with some more exotic ones, as well as of course eating the best macadamia nuts money can buy!  The kids got to feed kangaroos, stroke giant snakes and blue-tongued lizards and see koalas and wombats as well as the usual farmyard animals, chicks and rabbits to stroke and cuddle and we even had time for a final second surf of the day on the way home which was a nice touch though shoulders telling me we’re not surf fit at the moment! Only slight hitch was a flat battery in the car just as the parking ticket ran out but luckily a friendly surf bum came to the rescue, turned out he’d just bought jump leads yesterday, ideal timing!

Sadly all good things come to an end and it was time to move on from the ever lovely Byron Bay, great to come back to somewhere after nearly 20 years and find not much has changed! We headed on south for a big driving day down to Port Macquarie and stopped at Bongil Bongil National Park near Coff’s Harbour, home of the big banana and still a sprawling mess. The “rainforest” walk was disappointing (NZ and Byron a tough act to follow) but as soon as we short cutted to the wild remote beach we were far more impressed and followed this back to the car instead. Got to the campsite in Port Macquarie just as the sun was setting and it looked decent enough though the unpowered sites were miles from the camp kitchen, play park and pool sadly. With only two nights and one day we packed in the fun to one busy day, Em ran the scenic coastal 9km path to Lighthouse beach while I drove over via a surf board hire shop, then after a fun surf and lunch, I got to enjoy the run back to camp which had some great views and plenty of scrambling on the many boulders along the way. Back in time for a quick dip in the icy pool with Sara (no heated pools in Oz!) and a feast of fish and chips just off the coloured graffiti rocks of the Breakwater, complete with resident pelicans and a great sunset. A really nice place to break the drive to Sydney and conveniently exactly half way down…

 We’re on the road again….Another big driving day followed, this time we took the slower coastal route through Booti Booti National park which has some great lakes and beaches on both sides of a narrow peninsula. We started with  a short leg stretcher up to Cape Hawke Lookout which had a great view from the tree tops up the coast. Nearby Boomerang Bay was a perfect lunch and swimming spot and even Zach enjoyed a quick paddle before the long drive to our next campsite on the Northern Beaches of Sydney, a place I knew well from living and teaching for three months in 2003. The temperature had been dropping steadily as we travelled south and the last two nights in the tent were cold and damp and we all longed for the return of the sun!

Our final day in Oz was all very Scottish with wind and sideways rain but we went into full tourist mode and got the Manly ferry over to Circular Quay (free parking in Manly if you hunt around and a great way to arrive downtown!) via some bouncy waves. The rain had eased off slightly so we walked through town to check out the sights, small town kids were amazed by all the skyscrapers and we even blagged a ride on an express glass fronted elevator in one cool looking building. Next stop was a picnic in Darling Harbour and a visit to the excellent aquarium with some impressive sharks, perky penguins, giant rays and the mysterious lettuce munching Dugong. Super expensive but actually well worth it. The rain was back so we opted for a tram back to the Manly ferry and beat a hasty retreat to our sodden tent for a final cold damp night of broken sleep, in retrospect a hostel might have worked better in Sydney, further North was fine for winter camping but not this far South. This made all our bags very heavy for the next flight but we somehow juggled the weight around and got away with no extra charges from Jetstar, travelling with a baby is the way forward, the buggy bag takes loads of extras and airport staff are generally much kinder and more helpful to you. Em and I must have carried 4/5 bags each onto the plane in the end and no one minded! Our whistle-stop tour of Oz was over but in usual fashion we managed to squeeze plenty in and nice for me to take a trip down memory lane and see some old haunts. Next stop, somewhere new and hopefully equally fun, Aloha Hawaii…..

Sad times indeed reaching the final few months in lovely New Zealand but we weren’t going to go down without a fight rest assured viewers! Kids were all a bit exhausted after the fun South Island road trip in the last holidays, and they found the return to school a bit tiring, so we started with a fairly gentle weekend for Mother’s Day by our standards. A surf with the crowds at Sumner, fun on the old trains and trams at the Heritage Park Night Market and a spin round one of our favourites Bottle Lake Forest, after breakfast in bed for mummy, Zach seemed to enjoy seeing the sights, starting to take an interest in the world around him finally!

After a rare rainy Sunday of Clip n Climb action, I managed to sneak out of work early one day for another surf with mummy and Zach, before watching Ethan enjoying his school cross country round the Heathcote reserve, pretty long run for small kids and Ethan was a bit overdressed so taking his time! Next day was even sunnier so took the long way home over the hills for more #bestcommmuteintheworld sunset selfies and silliness! This time of year is still very pleasant and sunny until the sun sets and the mercury plummets, as we found out watching the Canterbury Crusaders play Fijian Drura at Orangetheory Stadium. We figured you can’t really live in New Zealand and not see a live rugby game and time was running out. I also had very fond memories of seeing the Crusaders play in 2004 complete with knights on horseback and castles with flames shooting out. Someone had told me since the mosque attacks they weren’t allowed to do that anymore, so I got a very pleasant surprise when the horses galloped out (more cowboys than knights now) and the flames roared! Great atmosphere at the stadium and despite having to explain the rules of rugby to the whole family we all had a great night with flags to wave, tries right in front of us, trying to catch balls in the crowd and even a half-time show.

Em tried her hand at Stand Up Paddleboard surfing the next day at South New Brighton which is a welcome break from the crowds of Sumner and Iona got stuck up yet another high tree! Sunday we did some Mountain Bike Orienteering back at Bottle Lake but all agreed we preferred the biking part to the flag hunting! Ethan belatedly picked up his trophy for being the family Triathlon champion and we all got very psyched to see the new Top Gun Maverick film, okay mostly me, I’d spent weeks reading reviews and listening to the soundtrack and was like a kid in the run up to Christmas. The film itself lived up to the hype and was well worth the 36 year wait for a sequel, even Zach seemed to enjoy the experience especially the epic flying scenes on the monster cinema screen.

After a couple of local weekends we were ready for some proper weekends away and started with an old friend Hanmer Springs with even older friends (kidding!) Duncan and Heather and family. A perfect, cheap five bedroom house with cosy log burning stove was an ideal base and we started in style with pizza and beer at Amberley Brewery on the way up. We changed the order slightly with the hot pools first to avoid the crowds and then biking second, but this was a foolish plan as of course the kids were reluctant to go biking in the afternoon. With glorious alpine sunshine there was no way they were having a quiet one though so we headed up over Jacks Pass to try the Homestead Run, 2pm a pretty late start in winter for a 13km mountain loop and we soon ground to a halt in thick mud rather than fast farm tracks we’d hoped for. After much walking and whining we reached the summit though and enjoyed the long gentle downhill racing the sunset back to the car and headed back to the ranch for a slap up bbq dinner.

Sunday we checked out some of the forest trails including the excellent Tombstone which is a great addition with some steep technical rocks and roots to keep you entertained. I took five children round Easyrider and luckily Zach stayed asleep while the mummies had a spin and we finished the weekend with some baked goodness, you -can’t really go wrong with Hanmer’s hot pool and all-weather biking combo and nice to get into the high mountains this time too just before the snow arrives. Two days later was another glorious 20 degree “winter’s” day in town so another trip up Cass Peak on the commute was in order. Got home to find Zach and the girls had been busy baking too, yum yum!

Next up for school cross country was Sara and Iona and both ran really strongly, especially Iona who despite stopping to talk to Ethan at one point managed to get the win, she’s a real natural runner that one (and biker/climber/skier etc!). Em had one final New Zealand tick she really wanted to do – Avalanche Peak in Arthur’s Pass and time was ticking with snow appearing on the hills. Avalanche Peak at 1850m gets plenty throughout the winter, the clue is in the name! Forecast looked good for one day only out of a three day Queen’s Birthday weekend, so we booked into the YHA in Arthur’s Pass which had a perfect family room and by co-incidence was run by an ex-Villa girl which gave lots of banter and threatened price hikes as she was in Ennis house and I am head of McAuley house! We drove up Saturday morning and Em and Zach headed up the steeper Avalanche Peak Track while the kids and I headed up slightly easier Scott’s track. You are soon rewarded with great views across the valley to Punchbowl Falls and we enjoyed playing school on the way up with Maths, English, Science, Te Reo and of course plenty of PE on the steep walk! After lots and lots of snack stops and high quality learning and teaching we finally cleared the bushline and reached a scenic cairn high on the ridge at 1500m which was a logical stopping point. I could see Em coming down the ridge from the summit higher up so opted to swap with her and do a quick run to the summit in the balmy afternoon sunshine. The final ridge was a little exciting and snowy so I was glad to hear Zach and her had turned back just before the exposed section though Em felt sad she hadn’t quite made it to the summit yet had got so close. Without axe and crampons I think she made the right choice, everyone else I met on the summit was equipped with these and it would only take one slip to have a nasty fall. I took many pictures then enjoyed the steep, technical run back down to catch up with the others, what an amazing treat to be up in the hills this late in the year. If we had started earlier in the day and earlier in the year I have no doubt we would have got the whole team to the top but a worthy trip even part way up a mighty mountain and a slap up feed in the Bealey Hotel was well deserved by the whole gang.

The next day started cloudy but bad weather was clearly coming so we wandered up the Bealey Valley to get some good views of Mount Rolleston looming overhead and practised our technical stream crossings. Back to the YHA for a lazy afternoon of cake, movies and board games while the rain bucketed down, Em and Sara enjoyed the walk down the valley back to town which is much better than it looks on the map. I went out for a damp but fun run up to Temple Basin ski resort but had a great tailwind and downhill back to base. Arthur’s Pass is a great place to stay and a proper little mountain town with big peaks in all directions.

Sadly the long weekend was coming to an end all too quickly but we had time to squeeze in another old favourite of Castle Hill for some bouldering on the way back, Zach turned out to be a natural boulderer and the kids did multiple laps of their favourite problems and lots of games of hide and seek with Milo and Torren who happened to be there too. Iona is rapidly becoming our handstand champion and will be better than me in no time, must keep practicing! I had a great session bouldering but couldn’t quite get the classic Beautiful Edges, one move from the top and a long drop to the tiny yellow mat! Excuses, excuses!

Next weekend we all fancied a trip to Akaroa and a night in Becky’s bach again, the weekend started with some head banging in the Port Hills and some great cuddles with Zach. We went to the Giant’s house first which was as magical as ever and the colours looked extra vibrant on a sunny day compared to our last rainy visit.

The afternoon’s activity was the excellent bike trails above town, Em cycled up and we drove up and got the bikes ready for the fun downhill, we all did the windy Bermilicious, Em and Ethan did Blue Steel, Midlife Crisis and Party Line which is an amazing link up with massive jumps everywhere and the girls and I enjoyed Scenic Cruise, then we swapped over and I got a go on the fun stuff. The newest line Cake by the Ocean has some really fun bits too. A really impressive bit of scenic local trail building and it will no doubt become very popular in future years so get out there and beat the rush people! A great finish cruising down into town past the lighthouse for tasty fish and chips and back to the bach for a long soak in the hot tub on the deck under the stars, magic place to stay and we’ve not had a bad trip to Akaroa (or Hanmer or Golden Bay or Wanaka or Fiordland or….sigh, focus Chad focus!)

Sadly Sunday couldn’t quite match Saturday’s magic as I took the team to Magnet Bay for hopefully some last classic point break action but today there was no swell and only howling winds and dust storms. Clearly not an ideal combo for braving the rocky surf, after a quick play on the rope swing we bailed for home stopping only to take some pictures of the cool rainbows on Birdlings Flat beach. Worth a look but probably not worth the big drive over the hills to the Southern Bays.

A forth weekend away in a row beckoned, fatigue maybe starting to set in? Back to Hanmer with Em’s awesome mummy friends, only this time the snow had arrived so maybe, just maybe we could get some skiing in? The access road at Hanmer is normally 4WD only and I’d looked at shuttle prices ($210 for whole family!) and even renting a 4WD but had given up the ghost, only to notice they’d changed their access the day before to 2WD with chains, worth a look? We headed up the steepest, rockiest road we’d ever taken the car and somehow made it to the carpark only to find the Poma wasn’t running so we’d all have to use the dreaded nutcracker lift, yikes! Luckily Ethan got the hang of it pretty quickly and Em and I could tow the girls, poor Em also had to carry Zach too but after a few warm up laps, we managed to get everyone to the top for some great skiing and awesome views. A lovely place to ski and the sledging wasn’t bad either! Back down the scary, steep road and back to the hotpools (definitely better later in the day!) for a nice soak and lots of slides.

Sunday was more local biking and the sculpture trail, a bit greasier than last time but still great fun, only had the four kids on Easy Rider this time so we did a fun variant finish on the North of the road while Em whizzed round the harder stuff. Home for a rest after lots of adventures as everyone was starting to look a bit broken.

Sure enough most of the families from the weekend away came down with various illnesses from covid through to the nasty winter vomiting bug that we ended up with, followed by two weeks of coughing, vomiting children and not much school action. The big shame was we actually had a four day weekend for Mataraki in the middle as I’d managed to wangle a day off work for doing lots of cover, but spent the day on the sofa cuddling sick children instead, doh! Reluctant to admit I was ill I surfed some giant waves at Sumner and probably didn’t help myself much, biking up Mt Pleasant two days later was also a bit of a struggle but there is only so much blue skies, snowy mountains and sunshine I can take from the sofa! Our plans to get some more skiing in before we left sadly had to be changed but we did manage to make it to the school production of High School Muscial 2 which was a great night out and the kids are finally starting to feel themselves again, quite a year of illness with covid as well, hopefully Scotland will bring less germs in our direction! In other exciting news Iona has started losing teeth left, right and centre and now sports some impressive gaps.

Just in time for Ethan’s birthday we all felt a bit more human again and I could enjoy a few final Port Hills sunsets on the commute in amongst slowly packing up the house. We kicked off the birthday weekend with some fun bowling and arcade action at Zone Bowling and even (just!) had time to fit in a couple of laps of the adventure park in the afternoon though the tired girls whined the whole way down which detracted from the last descent somewhat! Sunday was a perfect alpine day so we headed up to Mount Hutt for our second and final day of the ski season. We did our usual blagging to get into the top car park and everyone including baby Zach enjoyed multiple laps from the summit. The lifties after a few runs said we couldn’t take a baby to the top and we said we already had a few times so they let us go up again! I ventured off the back for some off-piste fun off North Peak and found every type of snow imaginable, pockets of packed powder, wind slab and plenty of sheet ice too, not ideal but still fun to be exploring the hills on skis. I came back over South Peak and enjoyed the steep Towers descent which Em also enjoyed as a final NZ ski descent. We headed back to town for some excellent Burgerfuel burgers and the final week of term.

The last week was a fitting end to our time in New Zealand, lots of very kind goodbyes from students and staff, lots of tasty kiwi treats to eat and lots of second thoughts about leaving! We were pretty busy too selling all our furniture and the car and it all came down to the final weekend where in between the dreadful winter weather people came and picked things up and helped clean the place up. Heather was amazing and took all our kids horse riding for the day which helped out loads and we did manage to watch the Matariki fireworks from Kama’s place in between the endless packing and tidying. With a day to go someone finally bought the car, an American family from Dunedin also with 4 kids just arrived in the country. which was a fitting home for our trusty Nissan Serena which had done 50,000km in New Zealand with very little fuss. I finished my time at Villa with a moving speech stressing how much the staff and students meant to me and I sang a few lines of the classic Pepeha by Six60 which definitely summed up my time here, without doubt some of the kindest people I’ve worked with and the head of house has been really enjoyable too, something I hope to continue at some point in the future….

Ko mana toku maunga, Ko Aroha te moana, Ko Whanau toku waka, ko au e tu atu nei…

Mana (spirit) is my mountain and Aroha(love) is my sea, Whanau (family) is my waka (boat) and all of that is me….

Luckily with so much going on it was hard to stop and look at the view one last time and feel emotional about leaving such a lovely place, more a case of all hands on deck and trying to get the boxes packed, house cleaned and holiday luggage down to a manageable amount! Predictably the surf at Sumner while we were packing was as good as I’d ever seen it but the boards are all packed up luckily for the long journey in a boat to Scotland. The kids were still attending fun parties right till the end but the next stop for the mini team is Australia to hunt down some koalas and kangaroos, see you all there….

We finally reached week 11 of a very long term with for once zero plans for the two week Easter holiday ahead – we had optimistically hoped Zach’s first passport would show up in time for a trip to Australia. Instead we checked the long-range forecast to see if a New Zealand road trip was on the cards. Sadly this may well end up being the last road trip of our epic New Zealand adventure, as after much deliberation we had decided to return to Scotland in July in time for the start of the new school year there. New Zealand is an absolutely perfect place for our outdoor lifestyle and leaving behind our schools, jobs and house that we love isn’t going to be easy! Forecast looked good though so we pieced together a fun active adventure, packed the car very carefully (turns out fitting in 4 children, three surf boards and 5 bikes is no walk in the park!) and headed North in search of sunshine, surf and hopefully warm camping, late Autumn always a bit of a gamble for spending time in a tent, this time last year we had ice on the tent in North island – yikes! Also we’d never camped with baby Zach in a tent so it all had the potential to go very wrong, very quickly!!

First stop on the adventure was Lewis Pass to break the long drive to Westport and after quite a few stops for Zach to have yet another feed, we headed up through the dense bush trying to get above the trees for some mountain views. Ethan and Sara seemed very jaded after a long term and covid, and were not their normal sprightly selves, but Iona can always be counted on to set a good pace and we finally cleared the trees and arrived high on the ridge for some great views of the Southern Alps. Having driven through here so many times it was nice to finally see it from above, the late afternoon light was also spectacular and it was a shame to not have more time to explore the hills above. We headed down for a tasty fish and chips dinner in Reefton before arriving super late to Westport and getting the tent up in the dark, but everyone slept well so a great start to the trip all in all…

Great little Kiwi Holiday Park campsite in Westport to wake up, with a mini-golf, play park and plenty of cheeky weka trying to nick your food, but we pretty much had the campsite to ourselves despite being the school holidays. All keen for some surfing we headed down to Tauranga Bay which unfortunately had massive 10-15ft waves slamming into the bay and not a dolphin in sight. Still a beautiful spot though and we managed some fun body-boarding and used a rip to sneak into the back of the waves for some very long, bouncy rides back to the beach with an occasional blue face to play on. In the afternoon Em took us to a secret beach she’d found while running last time and this was a great find with dramatic arches, pinnacles and endless giant mussels to pick, no prizes for guessing what we feasted on for dinner that night! A cracking first day on the ever stunning, rugged west coast which never disappoints…

After a good pummelling from the giant waves we all fancied a quieter day for Easter Sunday so headed down the coast to Punakaiki which turned out to be a great choice at high tide with more enormous waves slamming into the coast causing the blowholes to be firing, creating cool rainbows in the spray. Sea far too dangerous to swim or surf today but we had an ice cream and a play on Allan’s beach on the way back – Em and I braved the mad dash to the off-shore pinnacle between waves, not a child-friendly option! Back to camp for a fun game of mini-golf and an Easter Egg hunt…

Last sunny morning in Westport and we headed down to the river mouth in town which had some great little waves coming into a pretty driftwood covered beach, not at all bad for a town beach, and a very hard place to leave and get back in the car for our next destination Nelson Lakes where we hoped to see some mountains up close by staying in a mountain hut.

With the forecast set to deteriorate, we juggled our plans around a bit and spent one night in the Alpine Lodge in St Arnaud before setting off on the Mount Roberts circuit hoping to stay in Bushline Hut. I’d read online that the 14 bunk hut fills up quickly and it’s first come first served, so I raced ahead up Paddy’s track with an enormous bag containing five sleeping bags to try and beat the rush and bag the beds. I met people walking out who told me you could actually book the hut and amazingly there were still four beds left so with relief I booked them and carried on steeply up, clearing the bush and getting some nice views of Lake Rotoiti and St Arnaud far below. Ditching the bag at the hut felt amazing as I switched to lightweight running mode and continued along Roberts Ridge which gets rockier and more interesting as you go before dropping down to the nicely situated Angelus Hut for a quick lunch break. Decision time, the sensible person would have headed back here to meet the others at the hut but with mighty Angelus Peak looming overhead I opted for the steep rock and scree approach to the summit and was rewarded with some stunning mountain views for my troubles and a fast scree run descent and refreshing cold water swim in the lake near the hut. The return journey along the ridge was long and painful and took far longer than I hoped, but 19 miles and over 2000m was never going to feel easy! Also lost quite a few daddy brownie points as Em had the children for a large chunk of the day but I really did appreciate the solitude and epic scenery. Em and the kids had made it up onto the ridge for some great views too, so fingers crossed weather holds for Em to have a decent walk with Zach up here tomorrow. Another friendly family in the hut with a 6 and an 8 year old so lots of fun card games and amusement for the little people. Not the comfiest beds but a cracking place to stay and well worth the effort of getting everyone up there.

We woke to cloud inversions below and low cloud above and after a tasty porridge breakfast, we bravely set out and continued the loop up over Mount Roberts and down the steep pinchgut track back to the car. Em had left the hut early and pushed on up the ridge in rain and dense cloud so not quite the experience she was looking for, she had some well-deserved choice words for me at the car park which I won’t share on this family-friendly blog post! Weather in the valley was better so Em went to check out the bike trails for a couple of (long!) hours as was only fair and I struggled to entertain a grumpy baby and three wild children back at the lodge. Mid-afternoon the weather completely deteriorated with heavy rain all day and night and we were all very glad to be safely inside and not camping, the following morning involved packing the car in heavy rain and bailing for the coast but we did well to sneak in some mountain fun before the heavens opened, a nice contrast with the west coast for sure…

The rain continued to tumble down, which apart from poor daddy packing the car was alright for a travelling day, so the only logical thing to do was go underground or inside – the excellent Ngarua caves on Takaka Hill were the obvious choice, well lit, dripping stalactites and plenty of cool rock formations to look at, though the walk back across the hill after was pretty exposed and brutal! You can get horizontal rain in New Zealand too, not just a Scottish phenomenon! We spend the day repeatedly changing our minds about whether to take the softer yet more expensive campsite option of a family cabin or just try and get the tent up quickly between rain showers. We arrived at the campsite at Pohara beach in Golden Bay just as the rain stopped and cancelled the cabin booking but of course the heaviest rain arrived as I put the tent up, once it was up though it was fine and had four days to dry out slowly!

We awoke to sunshine streaming into the tent and plenty of condensation and dripping from all the rain but were keen to get back to Abel Tasman so drove over the windy hill to Totaranui and this time headed south of the beach armed with swimsuits and a SUP. The kids and Em walked over the hill to the beautiful white sands of Goat Bay and I SUPped round to meet them doing a few headstands and handstands along the way to impress the local wildlife! After a very long wait at the other end (turns out a landslip means a long diversion over the top) we swapped over and Zach and I walked back over enjoying the views while Em taxied the kids back on the SUP, this works really well as walking the hill twice would have been tough. We all had one last swim on the golden sands of Totoranui Beach before leaving, amazingly we were the only people on the beach apart from a few sandflies, gotta love NZ before the borders open to tourists again!

Next day we ventured North to another old favourite, Farewell Spit and the white sands of Wharariki Beach, we dropped Em at the spit and her and Zach walked the cliff-top 10km over to the beach while we carried in a SUP and bodyboards to the beach. Despite the “flat” surf forecast, massive waves were crashing in (theme emerging here!) and we opted for cave and pinnacle exploration instead washed down with a bit of crazy dune jumping and running instead and before we knew it Em had shown up plus some of our friends we’d made at the campsite. A few of us braved the waves for a quick bodyboard and then I ran back the coastal way enjoying the great views along the way, still my favourite short run in NZ and I can see the benefits of running more than once in a while as legs felt sprightly after my Nelson Lakes “warm up” run. There can only be one finish to a perfect day in Golden Bay and it was of course a slap-up feed of mussels and (vegan – yay!) garlic bread at the world-famous Mussel Inn.

Top that Pohara? We hadn’t used the bikes much on this trip so far and the chains were all going rusty from all the rain so we oiled them up and strapping the baby on tightly we set out for Zach’s first ever bike ride, a few nice flat coastal kilometers west of camp that lead to an amazing find, lovingly hand-crafted single track perfection in the woods at the west end of Pohara beach with a variety of trails for all skill levels. I whizzed back to camp to get the car and we then squeezed in Ethan’s choice of exploring the funky Labyrinth rocks and a late afternoon SUP at lovely Tata beach which had some great islands and caves to explore complete with seal residents to say hi to. Ethan and I went first and Em and Sara went second while Iona and I had endless handstand competitions on the beach. The wind and waves picked up and we were relieved to see the girls safely back on dry land. Another great day of holiday adventures and another campsite we are going to find it very hard to leave, you could easily just come to Pohara for two weeks and have a great trip! I finished the trip with an online lesson on Series and Parallel circuits at 11pm (originally 2.30am!!) to try and get a job in Edinburgh which seemed to go well, testing it on Ethan is always a good plan, he has a great scientific brain for age 9!

But like all classic road trips we had to move on to our next stop which was somewhat predictably the Marlborough Sounds and again Zach was determined to make a long drive even longer with some essential milk feeds needed at regular intervals. We had a roadside stop in busy Nelson at a mini-golf and ice cream cafe but basically spent the whole day driving the windy roads of Takaka Hill, Havelock, Nelson and the Sounds. So windy in fact that Ethan managed to vomit an impressive amount of projectile vomit all over the car requiring another stop and an emergency RAT test in case he had covid – this was his main symptom last time so we thought it sensible to make sure. Luckily negative and once again we arrived late at camp at Mistletoe Bay and set up the tent in the fading light…

Mistletoe Bay is a great location, right on the beach in the sounds for kayaking, SUP and pier jumping adventures which the kids loved but also you are right next to the Queen Charlotte track for walking and biking trips too. Our first day we needed a quiet one after the big drive yesterday so had lunch and a swim at the well-named Picnic Bay on Kenepuru Sound and dropped Em at Portage for a bike ride home over the tops where she enjoyed some steep ascents and descents and the amazing view from Onahau Lookout on the way back. The kids and I rented kayaks and Zach and I watched as the other three paddled round like pros and even cruised under the pier a few times. I now had the panel interview part of my online interview and after getting children to bed, begging the owner of the campsite to let me use his personal wifi, pleading with the other campers to stay out of the kitchen and dressing half in jeans, half in a suit I think I sold myself pretty well at interview at 8pm at night all things considered, time will tell!

One problem we encountered was the massive storms and flooding from last year had damaged the road badly, so the main road to the campsite was shut most of each day between 8 and 5 which meant leaving on day trips was not going to be easy! I left early the next day for my own biking adventure on the Nydia Track. I had a bike shuttle to the start booked for 10am but had to drive through before 8am so with two hours to kill I figured I might as well do a warm-up ride from Havelock! En route I got a phone call from Scotland and with atmospheric mist swirling below me and an awesome sunrise, I was very pleased to hear I’d got the job at George Watson’s College starting in August, guess the return to Edinburgh is official now then! The Te Aroroa trail from Havelock is a lovely bit of track above the road and I carried on up the spur to the obvious pylon above to get above the cloud and see some great views of the sounds from above. A cracking long descent back to town was rewarded with a great bakery for a steak and cheese pie and brownie. Most people would call it a day after a hilly nearly 2-hour ride, but I was keen to get my money’s worth out of a day off! Car relocation is a great way to do remote one-way trails like the Nydia Track in NZ, they drive you in your car to the start, drop you off and leave your car waiting for you at the end. This one started at the highest point on the Opouri saddle where you are straight into the action with some tricky grade 4 (black) technical action on the Opouri Bridle Path descent to Duncan Bay. Glad I’d had a warm-up ride on some easier ground, some of the exposed slips were a bit exciting and after an early fall down a rocky bank, I took my time and enjoyed the descent. Duncan’s Bay leads you round to the start of the 27km Nydia track proper and some intensely technical roots and rocks on the long climb to Nydia Saddle, 90% rideable but even the walking bits aren’t so bad. The descent starts equally rocky and rooty and unrideable in places but gets better and more flowy as you go down, and I stopped at remote Nydia Bay for lunch and a swim out to a buoy which was definitely further than it looked in the cold water!

I took a while to warm up again after lunch and headed up the long climb to Kaiuma Saddle, definitely starting to feel it in my legs now after so many big hills in one day! Met a nice family at the saddle who were impressed I was riding what they deemed a tough walking trail. It’s not manufactured single track but it’s definitely a proper adventure and a good honest test of your bike skills and stamina. A couple of great descents later I reached the car at 4pm after 5 hours (+2) of riding, and just had the long gravel road drive home to go, via the shops of Havelock for some badly needed supplies such as nappies and Easter chocolate! Not quite in the class of the Old Ghost Road, Paparoa and Heaphy but still a really fun day out on a bike and certainly a technical challenge if you like rocks and roots galore…

Last day in the Sounds and it was the kid’s turn for a bike adventure on the Queen Charlotte Track, they’ve done this section before but are now all that bit older and better on two wheels. Te Mahia saddle start gives you a short gentle up and then a really nice long scenic and flowing descent to Anakiwa via a few picturesque lookouts and remote beaches. After finding some silly technical challenges near the pier, I whizzed back up to get the car which was hard work with tired legs from yesterday (Em thought about doing it but with road closures we figured Zach might miss her for the length of time she’d need away?) and the others explored the cafe, library and beach options at Anakiwa while I brought the car round. We finished with a tasty dinner in the friendly and quirky pub in Linkwater before another painfully slow drive back to camp with a grumpy baby!

Sadly fast running out of days in the holidays now but just time for one final stop at the kid’s favourite NZ campsite in Kaikoura for a couple of nights, we surfed the mighty Mangamaunu in the morning, which wasn’t quite as clean as we’ve had on earlier trips, before heading back to camp for a quality afternoon of swimming in the outdoor pool (Zach’s first time in a pool!), bouncing on the bouncy pillow, go-karting round the campsite and best of all soaking in the hot tub before a memorable dinner of fish and chips on the beach in honour of Great Granny Grace, who very sadly passed away earlier in the week, her spirit and passion definitely lives on in young Iona Grace though and we all shared our happy memories of a truly great granny…

Just time on the last day for a final stop at Gore Bay for another surf, the kids tried their hardest to get three stood up on the SUP at once, and Em and I got a few rides for our troubles, it’s a really nice spot with cliffs framing the southern end of the beach and pleased to be back on sand again after the slippy, sharp rocks in Kaikoura. Back to work and school we go, tired and happy but the first week went by in a flash and was filled with super fun events like house sports (more yellow!), where I got to dress up again, run the 800m and compete in the sack race and gumboot (welly) throwing competitions. I clearly take these head of house roles very seriously! Finished the week with an amazing sunset ride home over the Port Hills over my two favourite hills, Cass Peak and Sugarloaf, which started well but then get better and better as a cloud inversion rolled in with the red glow of the Southern Alps beyond and the sun dropping away. I could hardly tear myself away and head down into the cloud for dinner it was that good! Em summed it up well when she said “And why do you want to leave this place?” Well all good things do have to come to an end as they say and now I get to plan the next fun global holiday to get us back to Scotland for a long-overdue catch up with friends and family. We know Aotearea is a magical place and will all definitely be back one day if only for a long holiday…the amount of scenery and memories we’ve seen in only two weeks will live long in the mind – mihi mo nga mea katoa Aotearoa, kia tutaki ano tatou!

Having gambled successfully with two brilliant road trips round South Island with a heavily pregnant Emily it was time to be a bit more sensible and stay closer to home! We gradually reduced our distance from home (and hospital!) starting with an old favourite Tumbledown Bay for some great surfing and Bottle Lake for some mountain biking, Em doing well to still be riding the waves and popping the jumps at 8.5 months! As we got closer to B-day the kids all wanted solo adventures with daddy so Ethan and I had fun doing all the blue runs at a slightly greasy Adventure Park, a great warm up was cycling up summit road to Mount Vernon for a nice long descent via Bowenvale Traverse, Gumtrees and Loess Rider and we finished with the excellent and tricky Gung Ho and Captain Torpedo. Sara was up next and fancied a ride on the gondola so we walked up the pipe to the top and got some sweet treats before getting the gondola back down. Iona took the whole family to Kindie for her graduation which was a lovely little ceremony and she looked very proud to be starting shortly at the big school.

Still no sign of the baby and still plenty of surf and sunshine so we opted for the usual Sumner surf and ice cream winning combo and some fun SUP/walk adventures from Cass Bay to Corsair Bay which worked well as we could swap half way and all get a turn. I headed back to work for a couple of days to try and get my head round how Head of House works and enjoyed catching up with work colleagues. A fun time was had at Jeremy’s birthday party complete with massive bouncy castle and another Ethan (and Iona!) magic show and we finished the pre-baby summer on the 30th January with a last surf at Waikuku beach and Em getting her final pregnant body board in….

…and then finally the contractions started, annoyingly at 2.15am on Monday 31st January while I was dreaming about riding another perfect wave. Without any family in New Zealand we had all the neighbours on standby but they were proving hard to wake up via phone and even when I climbed over the fence and banged on the windows! Being baby number four we knew it was going to be a quick one and mild panic was setting in, but luckily a sleepy Becky came round and Em and I shot off to the hospital where Zachary Michael Christopher Harrison was born at 3.30am with very little fuss and another very memorable experience for all involved. Family finally complete and nicely balanced now with two boys and two girls. We debated going home and waking up with the family but common sense prevailed and I went home to relieve Becky (a very excited Sara was awake at 5am playing games with Becky!) and try and get some sleep and we all drove in late morning to reunite the whole family and take Zach back to Cannon Hill Crescent…

Being an outdoors type Zach was keen for the beach on day 1 so we went back to a grey Sumner for some more surfing and then the next day was the first day of school for the older three which I was lucky to be in attendance for too and we got to show off Zach to lots of excited teachers. Iona did brilliantly for her first day despite so much going on at home and I even made it into work for the afternoon to meet my new classes. After three days of school we were all relieved to make it to a three day weekend -Waitangi Day weekend, a great invention having such an early bank holiday to ease you into the term, especially with a new-born in tow!

Zach’s first proper adventure was a mini coasteering trip to Lyttleton harbour with some great caves and scrambling along the way and we also went up to Woodend beach where Zach got covered in sand so required his first ever bath, which he seemed to enjoy after an initial grumble. Kids all enjoying Zach but Sara especially loves him to bits and can’t stop cuddling him. The tiredness was starting to get to me so I wisely set up a bed on the floor in Ethan’s room to try and get some more sleep. This meant I could get into work a bit more without the blurry haze and also start enjoying the longer commutes home over the hills and plenty more fun surfing at the usual local hotspots. Also with Autumn arriving on the scene we found plenty of blackberries at Bottle Lake to go with the usual excellent biking fun on offer….

After 6 weeks of local adventures the lure of an away weekend was getting bigger and we made plans to try camping (yikes) at Akaroa on the Banks Peninsula, but luckily at the last minute Becky next door revealed she had a bach (kiwi holiday cottage) in Akaroa we could use, no brainer really and turned out to be in a stunning location above town complete with an outdoor bath and plenty of bedrooms and games for all the noisy children! Saturday we went over to remote Hickory Bay for some exciting big wave surfing (not the best gentle re-introduction to surfing for Em!) and great body boarding for the kids. Over to the bach for some hot tub on the deck action and a tasty bbq dinner in the hot sun, summer not quite finished yet it seems!

Sunday was going to be a hot one so in typical fashion I thought a hilly bike ride would be a great idea! Em and the kids enjoyed finding all the animals on the scenic Children’s Bay walk and I slogged up the 600m hill to summit road for some great views and a lovely long downhill back to town marred only by an idiot boy racer trying to kill me by overtaking and then swearing at me in town about how bad a cyclist I was?!?! The locals even came out of the shops to check I was okay he was shouting so loudly! Reunited with the less sweary family we enjoyed a long afternoon of swimming and SUP action with all of us managing to shoot the pier which is a fun mini paddle. First weekend away a great success even without the camping part….

Another watersport weekend followed with surfing some enormous waves at New Brighton on Saturday, great for bodyboarding but frustrating for surfing as neither Em or I could make it out the back to the good stuff and battled with masses of white foam instead. The locals jumped off the pier which in retrospect we should have tried to save a lot of wasted energy. Sunday was the Sumner Sea to Sky Triathlon which we all enjoyed last year so were keen to try again. I cycled down in the dark to be greeted by an amazing purple sunrise and once again the sea was massive with amazing lines of giant swell rolling in but much cleaner than a year ago. Would really rather be surfing such perfect swell not attempting to swim in it but I set out in my covid-restriction wave and had a reasonable steady swim all in all. The hilly cycle into the Port Hills and scenic Godley Head run went pretty well too and I overtook the usual amount of people and enjoyed racing the mini team down the beach to finish. Iona and Sara did the aquathlon with Sara loving it more but Iona going the fastest. Ethan stepped up to a full duathlon and did very well with 3km of running and 9km of cycling. The other kids all had tri-suits and fast road bikes and were aged 9-15 but Ethan is determined and great he made it to the end winning his age class (easy when you’re the only one! 🙂 ) After watching such perfect waves Em and I were both very happy to finally get in the surf and though the swell had dropped it was still pretty nice, amazing what you can pack in before lunchtime if you start early! The girls caught some great blue rides on the SUPs, they are really getting into surfing both solo and tandem…

Sadly midweek things took a downturn as Ethan was sent home from school with some strange symptoms. After a day of vomiting he tested positive for covid so after avoiding it in New Zealand for so long we all entered a minimum of seven days isolation aka lockdown 3. I read the small print about daily exercise and looked promising though as although you can’t enter shops, gyms, pools etc you were allowed to do biking, walking, surfing etc so maybe it wouldn’t be so bad? After two excellent days surfing on quiet Sumner beach though I too caught Covid, maybe sharing with Ethan to avoid Zach waking up in the night hadn’t been such a good move after all. Like Ethan I had odd symptoms compared to most but generally felt pretty rough in a man-flu kind of way and was ever hopeful it wouldn’t last too long. What was surprising was the variety of symptoms with the kids vomiting and recovering quickly, Iona was totally asymptomatic lucky thing, whereas Em and I had typical head colds and dry cough, which all went on for much longer than we’d hoped. The local adventures kept us sane and it just felt like a third lockdown all in all but with bonus goodies from kind neighbours! Social distancing on busy beaches or narrow footpaths was the biggest challenge and we chose our routes and surf venues accordingly. I returned to work after 10 days off but it was a real struggle the first week back and even cycling slowly was a battle, I had to admit defeat and get lifts with my workmates. Definitely no triathlons this week!

Once we were all recovered and allowed back into society we headed into the hills for a badly needed weekend away and stayed at Springfield for the classic double of biking on the Craigieburn trails and bouldering at Castle Hill, we chose the longer walk to Flock Hill which is a stunning location high on a hill and an amazing selection of bouldering and caves to explore and play on. Almost too hot at times, endless summer seems a theme in New Zealand! Sunday we all enjoyed various bike trails, I started with the classic Luge, climbed Helicoptor Hill for the views and steep scree descent before finishing with Dracophyllum Flat and Cuckoo Creek and Em took over to finish over the mega classic Hogs Back while I took the kids to the epic water slide in Castle Hill village, an old favourite, everyone agreeing it was great to be (mostly) recovered from covid and resuming normal outdoor adventures!

Lots of fun back at school too with our first house events for the year starting with school cross country so a chance to wear silly outfits and cheer on the runners. Em and I scored a rare date night to the wonderful Fisherman’s Wharf in Lyttleton, Zach didn’t quite behave as we’d hoped and Em ate a lot standing up but definitely great to have some adult chat for a refreshing change! Liv did amazing at babysitting though and had the older three all whipped into shape and into bed when we returned! Finished the term with a great surf double at Sumner and Waikuku beach, the rare off-shore breeze giving some magic lines to play on and kids taking full advantage of long wetsuits, still warm water and a fleet of boards to play with! Great to finally be recovered from covid and enjoying the long rides home over the Port Hills and start thinking about the Easter holidays, only one week to go and still no plan! Yikes! Happy Easter when it comes and watch out the scary pink dinosaur baby Zach!

First we had to get through Term 4 which as always has a habit of grinding to a halt and taking way longer than a 9 week term with most students on study leave should. Sara reached the impressive age of seven (and the impressive height of 29 pizza boxes!) and we celebrated in style with a birthday surf at Sumner and some tasty pizza. We also had our biggest birthday party yet – about 25 of the little treasures who enjoyed the pirate/mermaid/dinosaur theme including the usual party games, a fun treasure hunt and best of all Ethan did a captivating magic show to wow the little ones. Em did her usual magic with the cake and we all needed a lie down afterwards and a quieter day on Sunday cruising round Mcleans Island. The next weekend was a fun double of biking and orienteering at Bottle Lake for the Canterbury schools championships with Ethan doing really well coming 5th against kids two years older than him.

Daddy’s birthday was up next (most important one of the year?!) and I managed to fit in a quick surf with dolphins (Em is starting to doubt all my dolphin sightings but there were some there promise!!) and a soak in the excellent hot pools at New Brighton, before a tasty burger and sushi dinner on the estuary, all in all not at all bad for a school night! We had a long weekend to follow so took advantage and teamed up with some of Em’s mummy friends for a trip to Twizel and Tekapo. Good friends to have as they all have boats so we got plenty of doughnut/biscuit action and daddy had a go at single ski water skiing which involved 4 or 5 spectacular wipeouts before finally getting the hang of it! Weather was a bit hit and miss despite the photos, with some high winds and rain at times, so we bailed to the Tekapo hot pools one day and an excellent walk up Mt John above town which had great views and some cool boulders to play on…

We actually ended up with an extra long long weekend as Em was offered an obscene amount of money to work the following monday and was too tempting not to take up this offer. With Jasmine off sick I got the day off work too and the kids and I enjoyed the sunshine and the ever excellent Margaret Mahy playground with it’s usual cookies, ice creams, mini golf and fun karting ride to finish. Starting to feel like summer now for sure with all the outdoor water play and shade hunting around noon!

Time for a proper adventure and we’d booked the huts well in advance for a round the mountain tramp at Mount Somers and it didn’t disappoint. We left my work sharpish at 3.30pm and drove down to Woolshed Creek carpark for a quick dinner of Mexican wraps in the car park and a lovely three hour scenic bimble up to the well situated Woolshed Creek Hut. With Em now seven months pregnant (why stop at three?!), the only problem was sherpa daddy had an impressively heavy rucksack to carry but luckily friends lent me a proper bag for the job…

We got to the hut to find we would somewhat ironically be sharing the room with a very small baby but the baby slept really well luckily and we got a decent night’s sleep, I raced the sunset up a few hills (top tip, take a headtorch!) and just about got down before pitch black arrived! The second day was a hilly one over the saddle and down to Pinnacle Hut but we took plenty of breaks and enjoyed the water caves, chilly swimming holes and some evening (mildly terrifying!) bouldering near to the hut. A smaller, cosier hut and a good double for the kids. All that was left was the long walk downhill following the river back to Sharplin Falls carpark. I ran ahead of the mini team and followed the south summit path back round the mountain to complete the loop and get the car back. Overall a memorable and pretty hilly 12km multi-day adventure for the gang and the ice creams in rustic Staveley cafe were very well deserved by the whole team.

A rare wet weather weekend followed but not to miss out we of course went swimming in Corsair Bay anyway and did some more fun bouldering at Uprising as the rain hammered down on the roof. The following week was a camp double for daddy, firstly Year 10 school camp at Boyle River and then cub camp at Cheeseman Forest lodge in the Craigieburn Ranges, yikes! I can honestly say it was the most exhausted I’d felt since climbing the mighty Walker Spur on the Grandes Jorasses in 2010! Year 10 camp was a lot of fun and reminded me of a former outdoor instructor lifestyle I used to lead, only this time I wasn’t organising or leading, I just got to go along for the ride and enjoy the kids abseiling, camping, nightlining, high ropes etc. The best bits were the river tubing down pretty extreme rapids which of course I had to join in with and the overnight campsite complete with fire, endless marshmallows and about two hours of singing classic songs, being a girls’ school there are plenty of amazing singers to produce some lovely harmonies. Definitely worth the effort of hiking three miles carrying a guitar! I also took the chance one afternoon to sneak off and go for a “short” three hour mountain run up the mighty Mount Faust and Mephistopheles looming high above camp, great ridge running and apart from a shortish section of extreme bush bashing when I lost the path (top tip, NEVER try direct routes in NZ bush, stick to the path!) it made a great loop though should have probably told the other teachers where I was going as they looked a tad worried/relieved when I finally returned from the bush!

And so after three exhausting days at camp I found myself cycling home in the rain to repack and head straight out the next morning for cub camp (luckily only one night this time!) which continued the theme – hide and seek, bouldering and archery at Castle Hill and then some excellent biking near to the lodge. The second day was very wet so a quick walk between showers was all we could fit in. The leaders do their best but the cubs are pumped full of sugar and meat from dawn till dusk and are totally hyper and barely sleep so all in all it’s a challenging experience, after three of them in two years I reckon it must be Em’s turn to go to camp! Detox week of healthy fruit and veg for me and plenty of much needed sleep…

Big excitements back at the ranch as Iona got to try on her new school uniform and take her first two half days at the “big” school which she loved, she is already fairly proficient at numbers up to 100, reading and even writing so we don’t think she’ll find school too taxing! More rain meant more biking adventures so we braved the Wharfedale again and this time managed to get a decent way up the track and back to the car before the worst of the downpour arrived, Em and Ethan pushed on a bit further and it’s a great downhill on the way back but maybe a bit extreme for five year olds with small wheels and no gears!? Sunday was a great little orienteering event at Taylor’s Mistake which Ethan and I teamed up for and managed to get the win! Great double with surfing in the afternoon on some glassy waves and I’m really starting to get the hang of SUP surfing as a fun new spin on surfing. Awesome too that all three kids love being in the water and are confident in big surf – double overhead for Iona anyway! Em and Iona had a fun overnight mid week adventure to Quail Island despite some dreadful weather they explored the whole island and Dad Chad held the fort at home without too much chaos!

And before we knew it we’d made it to the end of term and the endless prize givings, farewells and goodbyes for me from one of the nicest and brightest Year 13 classes I’ve ever taught, full of future doctors, engineers, but most importantly really nice people. I also managed to get a promotion to be the Head of House of McAuley house, which meant saying goodbye to Claver house and my C1 Ako group who I’ve bonded well with over the last two years. Nice to take on a new challenge and push myself a little and work with different staff and students. But enough about work, let’s get 6 week holiday planning! With a new baby on the scene at the end of the holiday we were keen to get some road trips in early on and with the usual wet weather forecast we set out on a three week trip to the cooler and quieter parts of south island, with covid and warm weather inching it’s way southwards we were keen to try some new places…

First stop on the adventure was Mount Cook village where the girls enjoyed the classic Hooker Valley walk once the weather cleared, while Ethan and I went up the 2200 steep steps to Sealey tarns and onwards and upwards to the amazingly situated Mueller Hut for the night, a cracking place to stay. Views in all directions of snowy mountains and freezing temps and snow flurries not at all feeling like summer! We awoke to a perfect alpine morning and headed up Mt Ollivier which perches above the hut, giving great scrambling on mostly solid rock and a fun bumslide back down afterwards. I tried to teach Ethan the dark art of glissading on the steep snow, but then regretted it as he shot off down the hill on his bum at great speed, luckily stopping before the rocks! Back on solid ground we then enjoyed the run back down to find the girls with big smiles after their day out in the Hooker valley. The campsite in Mount Cook might be windy and have no showers, but the location is world class with massive seracs above you and Mount Cook glinting in the sunshine, what a start to the holidays!

After a quick boulder at the Pukaki boulders the next stop on the trip was Wanaka, another old favourite and this time we opted to camp at scenic Lake Hawea to avoid the crowds of Wanaka and Queenstown, we needn’t have worried, before Christmas the campsites were almost empty without international tourists and with kiwis preferring to holiday after Christmas. First adventure at Wanaka was a nice hill walk at Diamond Lake and Rocky Mountain, the lake part was fine but the wind and driving rain on the summit was pretty brutal and we were all glad to make it back down again to the safety of the valley…

The following day we headed south to Cromwell to cycle the new Lake Dunstane trail billed as the “best day ride in NZ” which with a description like that would always attract us like moths to a flame! It actually lives up to the hype with bridges, mountain passes and some cool board walk bolted onto the cliffs. It even has a unique floating cafe near the start for ice creams. At 25km though it is pretty long and hilly for the little people so the plan had been that I’d leave the car at the finish, shuttle back to the start and catch the others up to help with the hills. The shuttle took a painfully long time and I ended up 2.5 hours behind so (a now fairly pregnant) Emily did amazingly well to get the kids over Cairnmuir Ladder, the biggest hill on the route and I caught them up for lunch and the second hill. We had a great tailwind but it was a hot one and we were all glad to reach a swimming hole near the end to cool off and then finally reach Clyde dam and the true finish, though poor Iona must have been exhausted as she fell asleep on the bike on the final road descent and went off the road down a steep grassy bank and was woken up suddenly! Luckily no injuries and she was persuaded back onto her bike. Ice creams all round, a great day out!

Most people would have a rest day after that one, but with only one day left in Wanaka and so much good biking to choose from we went for a gentle spin round the excellent Deans Bank track near to Albert Town, only 11km this time but much more technical, flowing single track to keep you on your toes, while having lunch we met a bloody mountain biker with a broken bike which is always concerning but it was way easier than he made out!

Time to get really remote (that baby is a long way off right?!) and head down to Fiordland which is completely off the grid, but with stunning mountains all around who is complaining? Only downside is the weather and hideous sandflies but we seemed to get lucky and only have rain at night-time and the sandflies seem to love Ethan and Emily and leave the rest of us alone and they’re only really unbearable in the morning and evening so you can usually cope. Our first day Christmas Eve was supposedly the best weather so we were disappointed to wake to low cloud and light drizzle but pushed on anyway. The mini team headed up Gertrude Saddle with Em and I set off up towards the Homer Saddle above Homer tunnel to try the classic McPherson-Talbot ridge high above. I was fully prepared to back off if need be but once I committed to the airy Talbots ladder scramble I wasn’t going to go back down and this lead to a cool snow ridge up to the first summit. Sheltering from a snow blizzard in a cave to eat some lunch I was wondering what I was doing up there in the cloud but pushed on anyway and then the clouds rolled back and I started to get the Fiordland views I’d heard so much about. Mount Talbot had a really fun rocky ridge to scramble along and I finished with a fast snow glissade/run down to Gertrude Saddle and a technical (ie super rocky) run back to the carpark, the last bit was flooded and was slow work jumping the many streams. Without phone reception and no family in the carpark I opted to hitch back to Cascade Creek, but unbeknown to me the others had bailed on Gertrude Saddle, walked up to Marian Lake instead and drove round looking for me for hours, doh! A late dinner and an even later sandfly infested present wrapping and stocking hanging session got us to bed later than planned as….

..as you’ve guessed it, the mini team were up ridiculously early to open their presents! We had squeezed as many presents as we could fit into the fully packed car but had left a few at home for later and of course typically the weather was now perfect, so we set off to Milford Sound for a cheery Christmas cruise taking in all the sights of the fiord. It may be a tourist hotspot but is very quiet on Christmas day – maybe 10-20 people in the terminal and a similar amount on our boat, all asian families in designer gear taking impressive selfies, we were definitely the odd ones out! Highlights were reaching the open ocean at the far end, getting soaked as the boat got up close to the waterfalls and just generally soaking up the stunning scenery. Final stop of the day was the great swimming hole at the Chasm which was as “refreshing” (ie baltic!) as always. Back to camp for a sausage sizzle, party hats and even a mini tree, bad Santa impressions and some more presents. Not your typical northern hemisphere Christmas but certainly a memorable one!

Managed to scrape a minimal internet signal at Milford to get the latest patchy weather forecast and we opted to sit tight and spend a final two days in Fiordland, which worked out very well as we had an excellent paddle on the Lower Eglinton river down a fun rocky gorge, marred only by the well-named “Flipper” rapid which managed to flip the whole canoe and tip all of us into a deep pool. Luckily the kids loved it, “can we do that again!!?” and it really is the very first time we have flipped the boat so worth practising wet exits to be honest, and we were back right way up and on our way in no time. Final day we all went up Gertrude Saddle together which is a brilliant day walk through some more stunning scenery – Em, Ethan and Sara made it all the way to the saddle and a slightly off colour Iona and I made it up to Black Lake and did some great bouldering on the way back down instead.

I think we were all ready for some civilisation after that and a quick game of mini golf at Te Anau was just what we needed on the next stage of the journey as we headed down to Bluff to catch the notoriously choppy ferry to Stewart Island, we thought we had plenty of time to repack but it was all a bit of a rush getting fish and chips and getting all our stuff onto the passenger ferry that we managed to leave a few key things like air mattresses and thermarests behind, doh! At least we made the boat and it was certainly a bouncy one with some impressive white horses and big waves to cross in the Foveaux strait. You land in picturesque Halfmoon Bay and Oban which as it sounds is all very reminiscent of the Scottish Isles. Speaking of Scotland I’d met a friendly Scottish mountaineer on the ferry called Kenny who insisted on driving all our stuff to the campsite for us, all of 600m but did make it much more pleasant, the tent alone is 20kg! The backpackers campsite is on lush green grass with the chatter of many birds and is a great place to stay. Stewart Island or Rakiura is home to one of New Zealands ten great walks, the Rakiura Track so we decided to walk the first day of the track and then Em and the kids could get a water taxi back to town and I could run the last two days of the track. Kenny gave us another free lift to the start at Lee Bay (earning plenty of beers from me!) and this worked well as a plan as the first day is far and away the best with beautiful beaches and coastal views. Day 2 is a mudfest through the middle of the island and 100% in the trees and day 3 is somewhere in the middle with some views but some dull bits. I opted to do a longer finish via the excellent Ryans Creek track and had a well deserved swim after 20 hot hilly miles of running.

Day 2 on Rakiura and we headed over to pest-species free Ulva island which means it is home to an impressive amount of friendly birdlife. The rustic old boat and friendly captain is an experience in itself and we had only been on the island five minutes before we saw a saddleback and then many other birds such as NZ robins (who come very close), fantails, kaka, kereru and even a giant sealion and her pup hiding in the bush. We finished our visit with a refreshing swim with plenty of cheeky weka running along the beach, looked out for Iona Island on the way back and even saw a penguin swimming past. A great day trip and a nice contrast with the Rakiura track, rounded off nicely with a slap up feed at the South Sea Hotel on the high street.

With a late ferry back to Bluff on the final day we had time to explore a bit more of the island despite the dodgy weather, a coastal path was a bit disappointing but the giant chess set in town and the amazing Bathing Beach were much better and the latter was too nice not to swim even in heavy rain! Needless to say we were the only ones swimming, weather all very Scottish so we were fine! Sad to leave Stewart Island but thankfully the ferry back was a wee bit smoother, still with a few wild sections, you can see why some people opt to fly instead! Em and Iona spent the crossing on deck getting hit with giant waves going over the top of the boat – one way to avoid motion sickness!

The final destination on our tour was another old favourite, the rugged cliffs and beaches of the Catlins. We stayed at Curio Bay campsite which is perched at the top of a petrified forest rocky cove and has the sweeping sandy Porpoise bay on the other side. Was great to finally use the surfboard and bodyboards again and there were plenty of dolphins in the bay to swim with too. Em and I wandered out at sunset to look for yellow eyed penguins and though we didn’t see any, the colours in the sky were impressive enough. Waipapa Point lighthouse was a nice break from the waves and three nights flew by so we moved on to the scenic DOC campsite at Purakaunui for the last couple of nights, via a SUP and swim at Tautuku Beach which had a cool offshore blowhole (Rere Kohu/spouting cave) to check out.

Purakaunui Bay was as pretty as we’d remembered from an earlier visit but unlike the last visit this time the sea was “almost” calm, very rare on this stretch of coast, so we opted for a boat trip under the impressive caves you can see from the campsite. After an exciting entrance requiring two attempts to get past the breaking waves we had a great paddle with plenty of caves and sea arches to explore en route, finished in style with a campfire and marshmallows on the beach. Definitely a contender for our most scenic place to eat breakfast too, again right on the beach, and we clearly picked the room with a view to pitch our tent for sure!

Sadly it was nearly time to tear ourselves away from the Catlins and head homewards but rather than the long boring 6 hour drive to Christchurch we opted to break the drive in Oamaru. En route we visited Tunnels Beach, Dunedin which involves a steep walk down to a stunning rocky cove with pillars and arches galore. When we arrived it was blue skies and fairly calm seas, so after some bouldering and exploring I set out on a SUP adventure round the coast, the weather turned dramatically though with strong winds and heavy rain and it wasn’t long before I was kneeling on the SUP, then lying down, paddling hard to get back to shore! Just had time to shoot through the cool arch feature and then try and time my beach landing between the massive shore dump breakers, and then we found a cave to shelter in, we’d of course left all the waterproofs in the car due to the sunshine! After a good soak in the campsite’s hot pool we did some fun bouldering at Elephant rocks on the final leg of the journey, a nice end to another epic New Zealand road trip, and despite the poor weather forecast we seemed to find sun nearly everywhere we went!

We tried relaxing at home but it wasn’t really our scene to be honest! Still no sign of the stork either so after two days getting through the big piles of washing and car unpacking we figured we were ready for another shorter adventure, and this time headed north for a mini loop via the west coast. First stop was Reefton which had some great biking above town, after a warm up lap from the campsite round the Pumphouse loop the day we arrived, the mini team did really well the next day on the long uphill of the Murray Creek Track (400m vertical!) but were rewarded with an equally long downhill back to the car, I pushed on a bit further over the saddle and found the brilliant technical descent of the Konini track which is a great ride leading you directly back to town. Lots of old gold mines and scree sections interspersed with twisty roots to test your skills. Right behind the campsite is a great swimming hole, good for cooling off after a hot ride.

From Reefton we headed over to Westport and stocked up on supplies before heading northwards towards remote Karamea. Granity beach was a great stop for a true west coast beach experience – big swirly waves for some scary surfing and plenty of rocks to climb on and pick mussels. Then a windy road leads you over a high pass and down to Karamea and a great holiday park full of cheeky weka jumping into your tent and car at every opportunity.

Karamea is famous for it’s caves and arches so we made an ambitious plan to see as many as we could the next day, first up were the Crazy Paving and more impressive Box Canyon caves, but they paled in comparison with the next two – the sizeable Oparara Arch and picturesque Moria Gate Arch which is straight out of the film set of Lord of the Rings. From there I opted to run the Oparara Valley track, a nice runnable 12km link to our last tick, the Fenian caves. The plan was the mini team were going to drive round and walk the 10km loop to these caves and meet me there, but you’ve guessed it with no phone reception the plan again fell apart. I ran most of the way to the car expecting to meet them and when I didn’t I assumed I’d missed them so ran round the caves loop looking for them, then back to the car and then finally round the caves loop one final time where thankfully I found them, my 12km run had somehow become a 20 mile run! That’s gonna hurt tomorrow! They also walked at least a hilly 12km which was a good effort and the Tunnel cave was probably the best of the bunch – a 100m stalactite infested tunnel which you have to take as there is no other route. The mini team seem to love being underground, I think caving is easier the smaller you are as less stooping and crawling. I prefer the fresh air and sunshine above ground myself especially after two arches and eight caves!

Another Karamea highlight is being so close to the end of the famous Heaphy track, and I was keen to show the mini team some of the highlights after biking it earlier in the year. It didn’t disappoint with Nikau palm groves, rainforest spilling down the hillsides to the white sand beaches and we had a nice walk up the coast past a suspension bridge and plenty of scenic viewpoints, but predictably we spent most of the time playing on Scott’s beach which had a great pinnacle to climb on. Only negative was the sea was super dangerous with a nasty shore-dump and undertow so we could only lie in the shallows and not swim sadly. Back to the Kohaihai river lagoon for a swim and SUP to finish, nice to go upriver under the suspension bridge and the sandflies (described as some of the worst in New Zealand) were tolerable. Off to the Last Resort restaurant for a well deserved slap up meal after two days of tramping in some pretty scenic surroundings.

We headed back south the next day for a night in Westport, first stop was Tauranga Bay for some epic surfing – there was a surf competition on as I found out when over the tannoy I heard “Could the guy on the blue board please surf further up the beach as this is a national competition!”. The 4-6 feet pounding waves were pretty big and exciting, but I enjoyed pushing my comfort zone and as they say if you’re not flying you’re not trying! I was well and truly shown up by the dolphins though, who were enjoying themselves with an acrobatic display out the back, and we all got some great rides before heading up to the campsite for our exciting first night in a cabin of the trip. Turns out they didn’t get my booking so might have to be the tent again, doh! Luckily found a similar size last minute cabin in quaint Charleston twenty minutes further down the coast, which gave us a nice cliff-top walk the following morning and a swim in the warm waters of pretty Constant Bay, good way to wake up on another scorcher. After braving the wild seas and crashing waves of Allan’s Bay for lunch, we headed down to Punakaiki and quickly aborted the plan of doing the pancake rocks walk. It was far too hot for that, so we opted for the coolness of Punakaiki Cavern, cold drinks and ice creams instead, before heading to our final destination, Hokitika.

Great to be back in Hokitika again, but first impressions weren’t great, scenery just not as stunning as further north and the campsite was a bit souless too – dry, stony and no shade and not a patch on Karamea, but the kids loved it of course being re-united with a bouncy pillow, playground and they even had a mini bike park in the campsite. We surfed at Hokitika beach the next day which had a really nice point break/sand bar but a bit too extreme for the mini team – poor Iona got shore dumped onto the shingle beach pretty hard so we took the bodyboards inland to the cool blue waters of the Hokitika Gorge instead and refreshed ourselves while giant dragonflies flew in to see what all the splashy fun was. There is a new scenic walkway which winds up the gorge and I SUPed back down the gorge posing for photos and trying not to fall into the fast flowing water!

Last day in Hokitika we thought we’d finish the trip as we started with a bike ride and did a great 9km section along a historic water race from Lake Kaniere to Huranui Jacks, we sent pregnant lady back along the road to get the car while we had a picnic by the river, just kidding she wanted the exercise! Another hot one so we all enjoyed jumping off the pier into Lake Kaniere and Iona who has never dived before thought she’d give it a go from the height of the pier three times, I’ll let you be the judge! We finished the day loving Hokitika all over again with fish and chips on the beach and a driftwood campfire (mildly exciting in strong winds!) in the evening sun and a final soak in the ocean.

Heading homewards once more, this time over Arthur’s Pass hopefully with some bouldering at Castle Hill to finish the trip, but once again the sun was beating down, so underground Cave Stream was the obvious choice, we didn’t have Em’s parents with us this time but we did have some precious cargo on board, so we were well prepared this time with three torches and all in wetsuits. Mixed reaction in that Ethan, Sara and daddy enjoyed it, but Em and Iona were less impressed, the strong current is hard work when you are five and climbing up waterfalls in the dark isn’t easy when eight months pregnant but we made it and cooled off in the stream to finish. Home for yet more unpacking and waiting…

Another two days passed and I thought I’d squeeze in a one final mountain run for the holiday so borrowed Heather and Duncan’s car and headed back up to Arthur’s Pass to explore the high hills above town. Rome Ridge was a fun warm up – steep scrambling leading you towards the mighty Mount Rolleston, which I thought I might be able to climb to the top of but was repelled by a tricky exposed gap in the loose rocky ridge and retreated with my tail between my legs! I followed the scrambly ridge south over the well-situated Avalanche Peak (safe in summer!) and over to Mount Bealey with great views of the Crow Valley and glacier and Mount Rolleston behind. A steep, fast scree descent dropped me into the aptly named Rough Creek which had lots of rock hopping and stream crossings but did give me two nice swimming holes under waterfalls for my troubles. Only a 10 mile run but 3000m of climb and took the best part of 6 hours due to the technical terrain so a big day out for sure, but a fitting end to a great summer of adventures, our last as a team of five, will be interesting to see if the newest one likes the great outdoors too, let’s hope so! Ka kite anō! Haere rā….

We’re all still big fans of the Goldilocks climate in Springtime in New Zealand, not too hot, not too cold and just perfect for spring snow skiing and warm sun on the beach for the start of the surfing season. We bought the kids longer wetsuits for the cooler water temps and the girls especially were super excited to be back in the water bodyboarding again after many months off. It wasn’t long into Term 3 before the tricky Delta variant of the Covid-19 virus found it’s way into New Zealand and once again we were on a level 4 and then level 3 lockdown – fortunately for us the weather was very kind once more, making the local adventures plenty to keep us amused for the three weeks of lockdown. Lots of fun was had making another silly song which you can watch here if you missed it…

Home learning was a bit tougher this time with Em basically carrying on work as normal at the hospital so I had to shout loudly at the children a few times for interrupting my online lessons but we got there in the end. It definitely works well removing the commute and having a more balanced day of work and family time but you miss the face to face contact with students at school and I was still glad when we returned to school to get back to normal, face masks at school lasted a day or two before everyone gave up – with no cases on South Island (touch wood) it did seem a little OTT! The lockdown got everyone panicked though and vaccination rates went through the roof from almost no-one to 80% of the over 12 population in a couple of months, pretty impressive stuff!

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Probably the best lockdown adventure was a biking/climbing link up, along scenic summit road and out along the scrambly ridge of Castle Rock which is in a great position above town. Best daddy day trips were doing a 50 miler hilly cycle loop from the house to Diamond Harbour and back, nice to be back in shorts and t-shirt again though a bit chilly in the shade of Lyttleton Harbour if truth be told! Other one was the classic 20km run round Godley Head which I really should do more often as it’s super scenic…

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After a few weeks off the slopes, we were all happy when we were back to level 2 and the ski centres opened so headed straight up to Mt Cheeseman which is a lovely friendly club field with a couple of T bars, great snow in the back bowls for backcountry fun and some cruisy pistes for the mini team. A slap up dinner in the Sheffield hotel for Em’s birthday always puts a smile on your face and we were sad to learn a few weeks later that they’d had a huge fire there and were shut for the long term. Back to Bottle Lake made for a fun birthday weekend. The girls enjoyed a prancing pony party (complete with unicorns!) the next weekend while Ethan and I enjoyed another trip to the adventure park and especially the wild rollercoaster of “Name that Trail” – not having to cycle up hill definitely has it’s merits!

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So after weeks and weeks of lockdowns and endless day trips we finally had a weekend away plan, staying in Porters Lodge but sadly the forecast was dreadful for the weekend but fortune favours the brave as they say, so we went anyway. Plan a) was to cycle the Wharfedale track but the road to the carpark had a full spate deep ford to cross so we retreated to the safety of some gentle forest tracks near to Springfield as the rain got heavier and heavier. Somewhat surprisingly we were the only people staying in the lodge that night but had the whole place to ourselves and feasted on burgers and got a good nights sleep. We woke to blue skies and fresh snow everywhere so raced up to the nearby slopes to get some skiing in, sadly the weather closed in at lunchtime but we’ll take half a day of powder and sunshine in a bad weather weekend! The next weekend was much better weather so we headed up to Mount Hutt for a final family ski of the season, a cracking backcountry trip to the North Summit for Em and I and plenty of “big air” in the jump park for the mini team who really will be better skiiers than Em and I in no time, all three finished the day by cruising red runs from the top, not bad for aged 4,6 and 9! Surfing at New Brighton on Sunday made for a memorable start of the holidays weekend and Iona is especially keen to ride the waves, long may it continue.

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What felt like the longest term ever ended and it was great to reach the October holidays and in true daddy tradition I used Jasmine our nanny to good effect to get some Daddy days off, the first one was more awful weather so I had a short, marginally miserable surf in torrential cold rain at dramatic Woodend beach (possibly not worth it?) where I had the whole beach to myself before meeting Jasmine and the kids at Uprising for a great climbing session, like surfing they will all be better than me at climbing too if I’m not careful! The next day was far, far better and despite leaving grey Christchurch behind Heather, Duncan and I popped out in the sun at Porter’s Pass for a backcountry adventure which is becoming a bit of a yearly tradition of ours to finish the ski season in the October holidays with some great skiing. Last years powder-fest at Broken River was pretty awesome but this one went even better. I have skiied the back bowls at Porters Pass many times now and always looked at the biggest mountain in the Craigieburn Ranges Mount Enys (2194m) and wished I could ski on it, luckily Heather and Duncan liked the idea of the plan so we paid the bargain $20 (ten quid) one way lift ticket to the top and set off over a few mini hills towards the impressive peak. Our first descent was a great one down a steep open face into the bowl below Enys and then after a long slog up the western ridge we reached the top which was in thick cloud but Duncan had a great plan for the descent and we dropped into the steep Y-gully directly off the summit which had spring snow and rock walls for clarity and was a great way down. A long slog took us back up to the summits above the ski centre for a final run down the ever classic Bluff Face to finish. What a day! Ginger Beer well and truly earned and I even made it home in time to have (typically slightly late!) dinner with the kids.

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The next day Em was on holiday too and despite more miserable weather forecasts (it is springtime I suppose) we set out with typically full to bursting car, on our ten day adventure to the top of South Island, keen to make the most of the holiday whatever the weather may bring. We opted to stop at Hanmer Springs the first night as the weather looked better there and we had a very pleasant walk up Conical Hill before heading to the excellent thermal baths for our usual hot tub, water slide and pizza combo. Alpine Adventure Holiday Park was a good last minute find too, much cheaper and quieter than the main ones in Hanmer and we all slept well before heading over Lewis Pass to Abel Tasman via the west coast the next day – a long drive broken up with a couple of nice walking stops near Springs Junction and at the Buller Gorge which had a cool swingbridge and flying fox to keep us entertained….we arrived at The Barn camp site at Marahau in time for dinner and settled in for a fun week….

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Last year I really enjoyed mountain biking the Old Ghost Road and the Paparoa (despite not having a bike chain on the latter!) so the obvious route to complete the trilogy is the famous Heaphy Track which is a 78km 5 day Great Walk but rideable in a few days. I debated cycling it in one long day but was so glad I went for the two day option as the last bit is sensational and not worth rushing. Getting to the start proved the most exciting bit as the shuttle from Marahau was super expensive so I (foolishly) opted to hitch to Takaka instead, not quite thinking that hitching with a bike may be tricky! I left camp at about 8am and started confidently hitching, half an hour later mild panic set in and I got a hitch but he was only going half way, second attempt from half way was much more frantic waving and desperation and I got a second hitch but they weren’t going far enough to get me to my shuttle in time, they fortunately took pity on me and drove 40 minutes out of their way to get me there in time! Phew, glorious weather and a further hour shuttle ride got me to the remote Brown Hut and time to start cycling. The first two hours were a long slog up to Perry Saddle Hut and I couldn’t see what the fuss was all about, it was alright but hardly classic riding or views? As you drop down into the remote Gouland Downs it all starts to make sense and the thing about the Heaphy (and why you should do it E-W not W-E is that it gets better and better as you go. I saw a few hikers and bikers along the way but basically had the trail to myself and took lots of pictures along the way and explored the many scenic huts. At the final high hut (James Mackay) I stopped and chatted to a couple of guys drinking beer and soaking up the sun and was starting to think I should have maybe stopped there for the night but I pushed on, the next bit was a very long descent down to the Heaphy River, lots of mini bridges to jump off but being the west coast the weather was starting to turn! After a very long day of riding (62/78km and all the climb on the track!) I was glad to reach the warm sanctuary of the cosy Heaphy Hut and after a quick “refreshing” swim in the river mouth I feasted on two portions of noodles and two portions of pasta to celebrate in style! Some great banter with a group of 8 bikers from Christchurch rounded off a memorable day.

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The second day was even better as despite the typical west coast sunshine and (heavy) showers the scenery on the last 16km is epic, the path hugs the coast, winds it’s way round headlands and sandy beaches and through Nikau palm groves and I even found a perfect pinnacle to climb on Scott’s Beach near the end. Was actually sad to reach the end it was so pleasant, though the next bit wasn’t quite as nice, a further 16km along the road to Karamea into a strong headwind and driving rain. Karamea is a real end of the road town with a few houses, a church and luckily for me an amazing cafe at the Last Resort and I ordered a frankly ridiculous amount of food and drink and spent a pleasant couple of hours drying out, warming up and waiting for my flight back to Takaka. The weather had closed in again by the time we took off and it was touch and go whether the small plane would make it, the pilot said he has to be able to see land and must be above 500m and we had to stay low over the sea and follow the west coast at 550m to make it, but as you reach Farewell Spit the weather changes and Golden Bay lives up to it’s name so we landed at Takaka in glorious sunshine to end a brilliant trip. Em and the kids had had their own bike adventures on top of Takaka Hill and it was nice to all be reunited again.

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The next day the sunshine continued so we headed out on a boating adventure using water taxis to access part of the Abel Tasman Park that we had not visited before, and had a great paddle from Bark Bay to Anchorage with lunch at the sheltered estuary of Fisherman’s Cove along the way. The water taxi took in some classic sights such as Split Apple Rock and the seals at Adele Island and the driver had a good kiwi sense of humour and laughed at the children’s silly comments. A few caves at the end to explore by boat and foot and Em enjoyed the walk back to the campsite while we took a second water taxi back to base. Great to be back in the boat for the first paddle of the year in such a stunning place too and nice to give my tired legs a rest! We are definitely at the very end of being able to fit five in the boat, pretty sure we’re over the weight limit now but it seems to work! A fitting way to see in Iona’s fifth birthday – she certainly has packed an awful lot of adventures into her first five years and has a real lust for life!

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The bad weather forecast seemed to compress into one wild sleepless night (though the kids slept through it all of course!) of wind and rain where we worried that we might not have a tent in the morning but that was it for bad weather, the rest of the week was perfect, in fact we checked the weather elsewhere and aborted our original plan of hiking in Nelson Lakes National Park and just decided to stay at the Barn campsite, you can’t really go wrong when it’s got hammocks, slacklines, marshmallow fire pit, outdoor pool table, piano, guitar and plenty more. We seemed to be the only people in the campsite though, a few other people using the cabins and a nice three generation family who we chatted to most nights but basically it seems October is out of season in New Zealand despite being as warm and pleasant as a typical hot Scottish summer! We all enjoyed the biking at Kaiteriteri Mountain Bike Park which has perfect flowing and fun trails for all ages, the girls and I did all the Green trails while Em and Ethan enjoyed the long climb of Corkscrew and the fearsome Jaws to finish and then we all headed to the beach for a swim and an ice cream. Time for a “rest day” so we got the mini ferry from Mapua over to pretty Rabbit Island and did a nice scenic flattish loop round the island admiring the impressive fresh snow in the hills from last nights storm!

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Despite abandoning the Nelson Lakes plan we were still keen for a mountain adventure so headed over to Tablelands National Park to try and stay in Mt Arthur Hut. The access road was steep, loose and exciting but we reached the chilly weka filled car park (baby weka chicks seriously cute!) at 1000m (only 1 hour from Marahau) and remained impressed (mildly concerned!) with the amount of fresh snow on the hills. You can’t book the 8 bed hut so it was a bit of a gamble whether we’d get a bed for the night but after an hours walk up to 1300m we were chuffed to find four beds free and only one other friendly family staying there. After days in a tent, the luxury of chopping wood to heat the cosy hut with a wood burning stove is pretty satisfying. We headed further up the ridge in the afternoon and bagged a couple of mini summits while Em headed up to the snowy looking main summit above. There was a great sunset and it was a lovely place to spend the night and a real contrast with the golden beaches and vegetation of the Tasman Bay which you could still see in the distance.

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Em and the kids completed the loop out the following morning along a ridge and steeply down to Flora Hut before nipping over Flora saddle back to the car but I opted for a morning run, leaving my big heavy bag at the hut I ran up the ridge to the top of Winter summit and a very snowy Mount Arthur -possibly an ice axe would have helped but the snow was softening quickly in the sun so felt very secure even on the steep bits. I found a way down a steep rocky ridge and headed up the obvious second summit of Gordon’s Pyramid to make a great 20km mountain running loop. The half hour descent to Flora Hut was not quite as fun with tired legs and what seemed like an even heavier bag than the way up! A cracking mini alpine adventure and definitely all family members are keen for more nights in the excellent NZ huts which are a big step up on Scottish bothies…

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Sadly time was nearly up in the paradise of Abel Tasman but we had one final day to play with and opted for another boat trip, this time from Kaiteriteri beach. The sea swell was a bit more exciting today, definitely “slight” rather than “ripples” and the white caps meant it was always going to be a short one so after 2km we turned and enjoyed the wind at our tails on the way back via two very scenic beaches, bouldering and caving at Honeymoon Bay and doing some fun coastal traversing and collecting fresh mussels at Breakers Bay. We sneaked back into Kaiteriteri main beach which is impressively sheltered for an afternoon of endless SUP and swim action before heading back to the campsite. Ethan has finally remembered why he loves being in the sea, great to have you back wee man!

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We broke the long drive home in scenic Kaikoura for a night, had a tasty dinner of fish, chips and (expensive) crayfish and enjoyed a walk round the peninsula seeing an impressive amount of seals and some equally impressively large impending-doom storm clouds along the way. Overall a great trip, one of our favourites in Aotearoa so far (and there have been quite a few memorable ones now for sure) and Abel Tasman remains one of our top places in South Island to go, back to rainy and windy Christchurch (I swear it used to be endlessly sunny here!) and the dreaded return to work and school but a nice short term ahead which should go quickly up to the long strange event that is the weird summer/Christmas holiday, see you there! Haere rā!

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Stop press, summer has indeed arrived early, after a week of school we scored a long weekend and celebrated with an old favourite of Akaroa, surfing at Hickory Bay and biking on the rail trail pretty fun while Ethan and Em tackled the much harder Double Fenceline in the clouds above us, rounded off with a swim in Akaroa harbour to finish and an amazing Italian dinner at the Bicycle Thief on the way home. Back to the crowds at Sumner beach for holiday Monday but who’s complaining when the sets keep rolling in and the sun keeps shining, skiing already a long distant memory! 😀

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So after the world’s longest summer, we seemed to skip Autumn and move straight into winter with cold temps and frequent heavy rain, though being Christchurch still plenty of sunshine in between! We’ve never been big fans of busy indoor activities so persevered with a quick walk to Taylor’s Mistake between showers and probably the coldest and wettest trip to Bottle Lake for biking ever. In retrospect this would have been a far better swimming pool or climbing wall day! The weather then got even worse with an impending weather bomb forecast, this resulted in closed roads in all directions and lots of flash flooding, so even we finally ventured indoors! First up was the excellent New Brighton hot pools which are well situated right on the beach. Clip and climb continues to impress our keen little climbers and Em and I managed to remember how to put a harness on and did a few auto belay routes which we found very pumpy being more into 5-8m high boulder problems these days! The highlight of a mega rainy weekend was back to New Brighton for some great surfing with seals and if you timed it right, threading the pier was pretty fun too….

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With the days drawing in Em and I were treated to some amazing sunrises and sunsets cycling to and from work but definitely time to dig the bike lights out and get the winter battle gear out to make the commute less of a suffer-fest. We finally lost the mini surf team to the cold water temps but Em and I continued surfing at a very flash flood affected Tumbledown Bay in the mist, and Ethan and I had a lot of fun doing a couple of laps of the adventure park while the girls went to yet another birthday party at Jeremy’s house. Ethan is great to ride with (compared to crazy Iona!) as he knows his limits and rides in control down some pretty technical blue courses. Charlift uphills all very civilised too!

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After the busiest parents evening I’ve ever had with 45 five minute appointments nearly back to back I was ready for a quiet weekend but not to be! Em set off with her girlie gang for a biking and hotpool Hanmer weekend, and I fashioned a plan for me and the kids. We started with a midwinter swim in Cass Bay (no wetsuits allowed!) which was surprisingly pleasant and at 11 degrees or so much warmer than Scotland which would be more like 5 degrees in winter. Still you don’t want to stay in too long and we headed over to bottle lake for some great biking to warm up. Sunday was another wet one so we enjoyed a different swimming experience at Pioneer pool which had plenty to amuse the splashy gang and we rounded the weekend off with huge amounts of popcorn and a movie back at the ranch. Daddy daycare weekends are fun but always nice to get back to work on Monday for a well deserved rest!

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The term ended with a fun soup and cake evening at Kindie, where Iona and her mates performed a couple of cute songs in Maori and I had my most fun lesson of the term at school taking my Yr 13s to the local Velodrome and cycling round while they crunched the numbers and worked out the max speed to stay on the track, friction on the slope etc before heading to a local coffee shop to buy them all a hot drink, cue lots of selfies! Book week also gave me the chance to dress as a character from Jurassic Park and serenade a dinosaur with “Wild Thing” much to the amusement of the students.

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Finally after months of waiting the snow had arrived and along with the masses we set off to the ever reliable Mount Hutt with 4/5 of us armed with exciting new (or hand me down!) skis to test out! The backcountry powder was pretty good especially so early in the year and great to be up in the snowy hills again. Best of all the kids remembered how to ski instantly and carried on where they left off last year, even Iona who couldn’t remember skiing last year, like riding a bike it must be well programmed into your sub-conscious. Always fun to do the ski/surf double – so we went and checked out Waikuku beach the next day and I managed some impressive wipe-outs on the large inflatable SUP.

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Ethan’s birthday week followed so he got to choose the activities for the week and weekend, we started with a Laser strike party mid week, a tasty burger meal out on Friday night, then back to an icier but still fun Mount Hutt for lots of jump park action and a great view on the very long Virgin Mile, Sara and Iona’s first red run, which they skied well despite some minor whimpering at times!

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The winter weather alternates between still and sunny and wild and windy – our poor trampoline took a beating after one night of howling winds and we were lucky not to lose it over the fence! But when the storms blow through you are often left with alpine like frosty mornings and blue skies, which makes great skiing, biking and orienteering weather. Everyone was a bit rusty with the orienteering at Spencer Park but nice to get back into this technical sport and stretch the legs. I’m still loving my weekly commute over the Port hills, complete with ever more adventurous selfies, though definitely getting chilly (and dark!) at this time of year….

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We’d been counting down the days till the winter holidays and finally they arrived, the holiday started with Em and I’s ten year wedding anniversary and our first “date night” in about 6 months, which almost didn’t happen as we booked a table at the Curator’s House (super tasty Spanish cuisine) for 5pm but Em got moved hospitals, held up at work and showed up closer to 7pm! I actually enjoyed 90 minutes of sitting, relaxing and people watching without any work or children to entertain, though I confess I may have tucked into an extra starter or two while waiting! The food didn’t disappoint, tapas starter and Seafood Paella washed down with a spanish white wine a winning combo. Ten years has gone by in a flash, the Scottish wedding and Bali honeymoon really don’t seem that long ago but we’ve certainly had plenty of other amazing adventures since then and I am truly looking forward to see what the next ten years will bring. So lucky to have married someone who shares my love of outdoor adventures and passion for living life to the full.

Speaking of which enough with the soppy romantic stuff, back to the adventures! Em still had a few more days of work so we had a normal weekend with some excellent Bottle Lake biking and a cool fireworks display for Matariki (Maori New Year) on the beach at New Brighton with the impressive fireworks launched off the pier for dramatic effect! In usual fashion I scored a couple of daddy day’s off and landed some great sunshine for a trip up to Porters Pass for my backcountry fix. Skinning up through the very lean and icy ski resort it seemed unlikely to be my day but the snow got better higher and softened (slightly!) in the afternoon sun making for some great scenic skiing and a long bone shattering icy descent back to the pistes and the car. Still not too shabby skiing from and back to your car this early in the season! Day 2 I went back to a rainy Magnet Bay for some more great point break waves and for once I didn’t get bashed around on the rocks. Little River cafe a perfect end to two days of daddy time and it was nice to hang out with the kids the following day and do some mini golf and biking while Em finished her last day of work for the term….

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So excitedly we set off on our road trip south in yet more miserable weather, stopping in Geraldine to visit the interesting and quirky car museum to avoid the rain. First stop was Ohau Lodge on the banks of the very Scottish looking Lake Ohau. The weather was very Scottish too with a fine mizzle (mist/drizzle) and low cloud, but we all enjoyed settling into our luxury accommodation for the night Ohau Lodge, complete with outside hot pools, games room, a roaring fire and lots of families and guests. We normally self-cater so the hotel/ski chalet setup is quite different. Dinner was a long drawn out affair which the mini team turned their nose up at so I ended up stubbornly eating three meals worth of food so we got our money’s worth! Great to chat with other enthusiastic adults over dinner but Ethan was unwell most of the evening and night and the girls have developed awful coughs with all the cold and wet weather so not the best night’s sleep. We awoke to news there was actually too much snow and the nearby ski resort was shut for the day which was probably a good thing with three ill children in tow! Instead we limped on further south stopping regularly for children to be sick, go to the toilet etc etc. A quick lunch break on Lake Wanaka brightened spirits as it always does and Puzzling World was worth a return visit though the maze defeated us all this time!

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So we pitched up in quirky and quaint little Arrowtown which looks like something from a Disney wild west frontier ride with it’s super retro high street. In fact it makes a perfect base for a ski week being much quieter than nearby Queenstown and nicely situated between three of the four ski resorts in the area. Also staying in the holiday park in a two bedroom tourist flat was about half the price of the lakeside apartments on offer nearer to Queenstown for those who like to save money for pricy lift passes! First up for skiing was the Remarkables which had plenty of new snow to play in and great weather for playing in the mountains. The lift queues weren’t too bad for school holidays and we got plenty of laps in and a few fun adventures in the backcountry too including a rather steep couloir down to Lake Alta from high on the ridge which certainly got the adrenaline pumping. Bad weather dictated a rest day the following day and the swimming pool and hot pools were calling. After 20 lengths, many laps on the hydroslides and a long soak in the hot tub, Em suggested I go for a run in the afternoon so she could do one later in the week and I set off for a “couple of hours” of exploring the hills behind the house. First two hills were a slog through sopping wet tussocks very reminiscent of the LAMM/OMM/KIMM mountain marathons with freezing feet and lots of cloud rolling in and out. I tried to take a shortcut down a steep slope to the final hill to save time and got very stuck in the thickest, spikiest vegetation imaginable. After eventually giving up and finding a long way round it had already reached 4pm and I had a decision to make, sensibly turn left and head downhill back to town in time for dinner or turn right as originally planned and try to make it over the well named “Big Hill” before it got dark. (Bear in mind I was ill-prepared with no headtorch, no food and only a waterproof for extra layers!) Of course being me, I turned right which started with a tricky thigh deep fast flowing icy river crossing followed by a meandering indistinct path through the bushes. Luckily it got better as I gained height and I made it to the summit at about 5pm with the sun just setting, all downhill from here luckily. The descent was the best part of the whole run with a great runnable mountain path followed by an amazing steep scrambly ridge back to the valley. I got lost in town trying to find the holiday park and finished finally after 25km and four and a half hours of highs and lows! Some rest day!

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Ski centre number two was Coronet Peak and it was a lot icier then the Remarks being lower in altitude and south facing (ie shady) which scared some of the mini team and I finally got to test the new skis on a short ski de combat off the back. What it lacked in snow it made up for with a stunning cloud inversion. The next day we headed up to the larger scale, alpine feeling Cardrona resort and Ethan had his first ski lessons all day which he seemed to really enjoy, he’s stopped listening to Em and I’s advice so probably for the best! Cardrona has brilliant green and blue runs for cruising complete with jumps, tunnels and wide pistes for lots of turns. Em and I did a mini ski tour to the true summit of Mount Cardrona which had great views and was fun despite the awful snow conditions! Everyone agreed it was probably our favourite of the three but the longest drive, limited backcountry and worst lift queues so once probably enough for this week!

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Another rest day was needed after two full days skiing and the weather also looked better to stay low, with lots of cloud on the higher hills. Arrowtown has a great network of easy cycle tracks so despite the freezing temps we wrapped up well and set out on the classic Arrowtown bridges trail, which has lovely riding, great views of snowy hills and occasional suspension bridges to keep you entertained. After lots of snack and lunch stops to keep the energy levels up, we reached scenic Lake Hayes which was a great finale starting through the swamplands and finishing with an airy path above the lake down to a great rope swing at the north end. After 25km the mini team were done for the day so we sent mummy up the hilly last 6km to get the car to pick us up! I clearly hadn’t learned my lesson properly earlier in the week, and after all this great riding I fancied something a bit harder on the way home and got dropped off at the bottom of Coronet Peak for some late night muddy single track action. You’ve guessed it, again no head torch, light and fast was the order of the day (/night!). A long slog up Dan O’Connell Climb leads to the scenic Coronet Face Water Race which eventually led to the last downhill of Bush Creek, which started okay but got very dark and technical in the trees and I was somewhat relieved to finally see the lights of Arrowtown in the near pitch black and enjoyed the victory cruise down the high street, not getting lost in town this time!!

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Sadly our time in lovely Arrowtown was drawing to a close but we had one day left and all decided that with recent fresh snow and oodles of sunshine another trip to the Remarkables was called for. Facing North it gets all the sun going and was much better second time around with loads of cool backcountry lines to go at, steep powdery gullies and faces off ridges and the mini team cruising down the jump parks and easier gullies too. Nothing like fresh snow rather than icy pistes to get your confidence back. We rounded the day off nicely meeting old friends from Auckland for a slap up pizza dinner at the authentic Italian in town (Terra Mia). The next day was also super sunny and seemed silly to leave too early so Em set out for a mountain run up the impressive looking Brow Peak and the mini team and I went on our own mountain adventure up the ridge I’d descended earlier in the week. This started following the windy Motatapu River gorge and then breaks up the rocky scramble to a great mini summit with views in all directions, the team did really well despite some slippy hoar frost covered grass in places and all agreed that hill walking is a worthy pastime, which is great news for the future – 8km and 400m of climb pretty good for those aged 4! We were all rewarded with tasty treats at the excellent Arrowtown bakery and Em showed up shortly after having had a great run up the impressive hills behind our mini mountain.

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Somewhat reluctantly we did manage to drag ourself away from the delights of Arrowtown and headed to our final destination of the trip – Lake Tekapo. We stayed in the YHA again right on the shores of the lake and with yet more sunshine and powder snow everywhere it would be foolish not to ski, so we headed over to Roundhill for our last ski day of the trip and we certainly saved the best till last. The wide cruisy pistes and nearby off-piste were great for the mini team to learn to ski powder and Em and I got to jump on the impressive Heritage Express Rope Tow which whizzes you up to nearly 2000m for some very long off-piste descents back to base. My harness broke on my first attempt requiring a second go but Em styled it on her very first attempt which was a good effort as it’s really not that easy riding a nutcracker lift especially one this long! The south face off the ridge was in amazing condition with deep, light powder on a nice steep face, intimidating to start but brilliant skiing. It was a tough skin back out in the deep snow but so worth it and much better than the long sun affected descent back to the resort that followed. Em enjoyed following my tracks both down the face and having a skin track in place makes it a lot easier. Almost like skiing together – a virtual version! The views of the ridge take some beating too with Lake Tekapo far below and epic views the other way of the Two Thumbs ranges. Just time for some sledging before we left and then off to town for some burgers and beer after a great week’s skiing. The last morning we enjoyed the Dark Skies Project next to the YHA learning about Maori and western astronomy and Ethan impressed everyone with his scientific and space knowledge.

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As they say all good things come to an end, so back to school and work we went with big smiles on our faces from a great week away, much better than last year’s Wanaka trip with kinder weather and better snow, planning lots of local ski adventures in the Craigieburn Ranges next and maybe a quiet few weekends first! After all that skiing it was nice to do some different activities and we enjoyed some great waves at either end of Sumner beach the following two weeks and did some Rogaining (Score Orienteering) at Orton Bradley Park which Zack and I certainly got our money’s worth out of. We were the fastest team and ran about 30km and 2000m vertical in six hours but our route choice wasn’t the best so came 10th out of 80 teams, felt like we won it when we crossed the finish line which was the main thing! Great homemade soup and cake at the finish too. Sounds like the mini team enjoyed the playpark more than the orienteering on their 1 hour course! A lovely evening was spent post surfing at the Ferrymead Heritage Park’s Night Market where you get to have your face painted, ride on the tram and train and eat plenty of tasty food from the street vendors, feeling spring-like at times in the warm sun but frosty overnight so winter is not done with us yet! The storms keep rolling in and pounding the house, with it’s minimal insulation, lots of single glazing and rattly doors and windows it’s almost like camping in a tent at times in Cannon Hill Crescent! Enjoy the rest of your summer/winter wherever you are in the world and we’ll see you in the Spring for some more NZ road trip action, hopefully Covid will start to be getting under control and the world can open up again, missing Scotland and UK friends and family, NZ is great but the grass is always greener on the other side as they say! Who knows what the next year will bring?! Kia Ora koutou katoa!

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Tēnā koutou katoa. After a long eleven week term it was great to finally reach the school holidays but with a road trip to North Island rolling ever closer, a “quiet” weekend was needed first which we filled in usual fashion with some indoor bouldering (plenty of dyno practice!) and a walk to Taylor’s Mistake once the sun came out. Em had to work the Sunday so I took the kids back to Mclean’s Island for some sunny mountain biking and they did really well, first time they’ve all completed the full 10 mile (16km) loop. Many varied snacks seems to be top tip for success to keep little people moving.

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Taking full advantage of having a nanny with no more holiday days accrued, I scored a couple of daddy days off and with the mountain bike recently fixed after three months (to get the key part shipped in from the UK) it was a no brainer to get some biking in, first stop was Double Fenceline in the Banks peninsula, a route I’d dragged my flatmate (sorry Peet!) and girlfriend round and remembered it being pretty scenic. It didn’t disappoint second time either after a mere 15 years gap – after a long slog up the steep gravel of Port Levy Road, it follows a scenic ridge, all feeling very Lord of the Rings, with a couple of fun summits along the way and a great descent to finish back to the amazing cafe and tasty treats at Little River. Not a berm or a drop off in sight but technical enough in places and great views in all directions. The next day I couldn’t decide what to do so took biking, bouldering and running stuff and headed west to the mountains. I fancied a run the most of all and drove all the way to Arthur’s Pass hoping to do a loop over the classic Avalanche Peak before the snows came. Sadly there were angry clouds spilling over the Divide (which splits the East and West Coast and keeps the bad weather in the west usually), so I aborted that plan and headed back to the ever sunny Craigieburn Ranges nearer to home and opted for some of the excellent mountain biking to be found there, two excellent mountain blues and two steep blacks was a great combo. The famous Hog’s Back rides well in both directions and Dracophyllum flat is super scenic through the alpine meadows. A long slog up the Mount Cheeseman ski-field road accesses Cockayne Alley and the slightly easier Cuckoo Creek which both feature steep, twisty and technical rooty numbers to keep you on your toes, only one minor wipe out with a thankfully soft landing, and I got back to the car in good time for a feast of a picnic lunch and made it home in plenty of time to get the kids to bed, great to have the bike up and running again, especially in Aotearoa where you are spoilt with world class biking tracks!

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The best things come in threes they say (except maybe children!!) so you’ve guessed it Em was quite keen for some biking the next day too, despite having to work in the afternoon, and everyone fancied testing out the chairlift at Christchurch Adventure Park. Sadly it didn’t open till 11am but I had a back up plan and we drove to the top and sneaked in a side gate to cycle down the excellent and very long Duncan’s Donuts. Em shot off to work and we enjoyed the lift back to the car at the top, luckily Iona was just tall enough to be allowed on the lift and I managed to jump them all on and off on my own! A fun local adventure for sure and nice and quiet in the week (and when closed!!)

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We headed North the next day for our ten day road trip to North Island and had booked two campsites on the surf highway, hoping to surf and run up Mount Taranaki but the 5m (15ft) swell forecast and high winds and rain wasn’t a very attractive option, so we changed the plan to East Coast instead and while driving up to Picton via Kaikoura researched the best places to stay and the surf hotspots, nothing like last minute planning! After a flying visit to the Top 10 in Kaikoura (longer visit planned on the way back!) we reached Picton in good time to enjoy the mini train and boats while waiting for the Inter-islander ferry. After a smooth and scenic crossing we stayed at Lani’s house for the night before a long drive up to Te Awanga campsite near to Napier, which had a great point break right in front of the tent. So good in fact that I had three sessions there in two days! Super quirky and friendly campsite and we enjoyed a few nights relaxing there checking out the nearby beaches and biking. Plenty of wildlife to see too – a really varied farm park with horse rides and tons of animals including a weird 6 legged sheep(!) and the aquarium in Napier was great fun too, with sharks, giant turtles and penguins being the highlights. We also bumped into loads of really happy and friendly cyclists while out on our local rides and then realised they were cycling between wineries and were well lubricated! Waimarama beach down the coast had some great surfing for all ages (sandy bottom way better than rocky point breaks for little people) and finally Pan Pac MTB park at Eskdale had some wonderful flow trails through the woods, the kids did really well on the beginner loop and Em and I enjoyed the famous roller coaster like Grand Traverse and some of the harder lines. For a last minute plan this trip is working out pretty well!

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In terms of saving the best till last North Island still had a few more treats in store for us, we’d seen pictures on the cover of the Inter-islander and N Island travel magazines of a famous lighthouse and turned out it was next to our second campsite of Castlepoint, which is in the middle of nowhere on a very rugged stretch of coast between Napier and Wellington. We broke the long rainy drive there (Em had wisely suggested travelling on the worst forecast day) with more wildlife at the Pukaha National Wildlife park where I got to feed some native birds and Em was braver and fed a mass of hungry eels! Iona loved introducing her pet cuddly kiwis to the real ones and the lighting was great for a change so you could see them up close and personal. Castlepoint blew us away with it’s scenic coastal walks, great surf and even a drive onto the beach at the Gap. There was more fun surfing on very clean waves on the main beach in front of the campsite, and we could have easily stayed here for much longer than two nights. We found an “atmospheric” (ie a bit too exciting) cave under the lighthouse with big waves crashing in and the Deliverance Cove walk is a must do with amazing mini summit and stellar views back to the lighthouse. Just our kind of place all in all and sad to leave and head homewards, though with ice on the tent the final night it was really feeling like the end of the camping season even this far North!

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A final stop in Wellington to visit an old Uni friend Andy and his wife Liang and their lovely family, the kids all got along really well and glad to be inside out of the cold for sure! Makara Peak was the best mountain biking of the trip with a brilliant wooded 6km kid’s loop through the pretty forest and even better adult loop to the summit including a suspension bridge and some well designed flowing and technical single-track back to the car, so good I had to keep going back up for another lap! Andy lives right by Mount Victoria which claims to be the best view in town and made for a great sunset family photo opportunity and views over the harbour.

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A final stop at Kaikoura on the way home after some fun mini-golf at Picton, and this time we had time to swim in the outdoor pool and soak in the hot pool before a final slap up dinner in town, sadly no crayfish this time but the fish and chips isn’t too shabby either! All in all a great holiday to North island, a bit of a long drive but so worth it when you get there and Napier had never been on my radar as somewhere to go but is actually a hidden gem, without children you could take in the excellent looking wineries as well. A final surf at the lovely Gore Bay on the way home turned out to be another hidden gem and with a campsite definitely one to come back to one weekend in the summer, the water back on South Island is certainly feeling colder now, time to retire the 3mm wetsuit for a bit and bust out the 5mm winter suit methinks! Ethan has voted with his (numb) feet and despite us buying him a full length suit he has called it time on the surfing season! Iona is made of sterner stuff and comes out every time, getting at least five rides on her bodyboard each time before a few naked laps of the beach for a grand finale!

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Back to mahi and kura, where Sara continues to impress with her passion for drawing everything from kiwis to the scary gruffalo and the kids have really enjoyed reading “Stories of Kiln Farm” written by their very own Granny Sally. The pain of returning to work was of course softened by my favourite commute over the hills, more tiny yet fun waves to play on at Tumbledown Bay and best of all for a mother’s day treat we all cycled the classic loop from Lyttleton to Diamond Harbour which finishes with a ferry ride whizzing you back to the start. The kids did really well on the hilly 26km loop, with Ethan cycling it all, Sara cycling most and Iona cycling the flatter bits and enjoying the tagalong on the hills. We even had a bracing swim at Charteris Bay, which is very well named as the “home of the optimist”! You’ve guessed it, Ethan said NO WAY, Sara dipped her toes in and the three keen swimmers were the rest of us! Bracing and invigorating in equal measure….

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Andy had recommended we try a week of free meals from Hellofresh and despite the ridiculous packaging and some processed ingredients, we were impressed with the tasty kai, and best of all Ethan gained a new enthusiasm for cooking which I hope he continues. More awful news came through from the UK as my great university friend Andy Sims aka the Boy Lard lost his battle with melanoma and brain cancer leaving behind his wife Jane and two lovely children Helena and Robert. I have such wonderful memories of Lard from our twenties where we had some amazing climbing adventures together to places such as Morocco and Lundy Island, and in recent years we’ve enjoyed winter climbing and ski trips to the mountains. Really wish I’d seen more of him in recent years now, but family commitments gets in the way sometimes. Two of my biggest and most memorable days in the hills were the Bob Graham Round and the Chad Challenge finishing with the Cairngorm 4000ers and Lard was there for both of them. He will be very much missed by myself and a lot of his friends but the memories live on for sure…I needed a long surf on some giant waves at Sumner to clear my head and nothing distracts you better than staring over the falls at the long drop! Sunday we whizzed round Bottle Lake with some very tired and whiny children, turns out long road trips to North Island wear the little treasures out!

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Seems a shame to burst the happy bubble and finish with such sad news so I’ll finish with some happier times. After a couple of weekends at home everyone was itching for another adventure and we headed to Hanmer Springs for the weekend, with hard overnight frosts we were finally allowed (by the frugal wife) to splash out on a self catering apartment and not camp, and on the way up we had a great dinner at the Amberley Brewery which had an impressive 25 different beers and amazing pizzas. Another last minute plan had me heading into the hills to explore the remote St James Trail and the others headed in to the woods for Easy Rider, fairies and pump track action. I took a bike shuttle up to the start of Fowler’s pass which was a steep thirty minute uphill slog rewarding you with great views of snowy mountains and a technical switchback descent into remote wooded valleys beyond. A hard frost meant snow patches and plenty of hoar frost and the river crossings were brutal with icy cold water and numb feet! Once I popped out in the sun though things improved at the suntrap that is Lake Guyon, with it’s mirror image reflections of the mountains and I could have stayed there all day to be honest! I dropped down from here and rejoined the main St James Cycle way via a cool swaying swing bridge over the Waiau River (more on that later) and headed down the enormous glaciated valley. Disaster almost struck on a south facing rocky section when my front wheel slipped off the track on the ice and I went flying down the rocky track but luckily the bike survived and I just had a few grazes for my troubles. Bad place to have a serious accident to be honest with no phone reception and I saw only one person in the first 60km! A great lunch spot at Pool Hut and then a long slog back up and over Peter’s Pass got me to the Homestead and the final gravel road, mostly downhill descent to Hanmer and a well-deserved soak in the hot pools with the family. A big 75km 6.5 hour day out, but a great one all the same, almost on a par with things like the Paparoa and the Old Ghost Road and far closer to home!

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Sunday we woke up optimistic that we could paddle the Waiau River below Hanmer – a classic 15km “beginner” grade 2+ river through some rocky gorges but first I had to de-ice the car which was covered in thick hoar frost on all sides! We dropped the bikes at the finish and headed to the start hoping it would warm up soon! The river was fast flowing and had plenty of exciting rapids to avoid/bounce down and the gorge sections had some sharp corners through the rocky walls so it was more exciting than we’d wanted at times and required a few stops to empty water out of the boat! It was pleasantly warm in the sun though and despite a cold Ethan saying he’d had enough and wanting to get out, we made it safely to the end and had a lovely play on the beach while Em cycled back to get the car. Very late in the season but played for and won and to be honest the boat is now sitting super low in the water with five so we definitely need to upgrade to two boats next season. Thoughts turn to the ski season now, ski holiday booked, new skis and jackets fitted and handed down for ever growing children and psyche is high, kids are even sleeping with their skis in their rooms – see you on the slopes next time! Kia Ora!

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After a great summer South Island road trip it was back to Christchurch for the final week of the summer holiday and some fun local adventures at all the usual places. Plenty of time spent in the water as summer doesn’t seem to want to go away, the temperature remains firmly in the upper 20s and low 30s and the hills are starting to look dry and yellow again. Christchurch really maximises it’s rain shadow from the Southern Alps and we are actually missing the wet stuff for a bit of variety! Also we used to only mountain bike when it rained in Scotland but you’d never get any done in New Zealand if you followed that philosophy! I scored a couple of daddy day offs on the hottest two days of the summer and foolishly went for a hilly 110km road bike ride the first day along summit road and over the passes to the remote Purau Bay past Diamond Harbour and back, but I at least broke it up well with lunch at Diamond Harbour and tasty pies at Lyttleton on the way back. The next day was even hotter so I went for the double watersports option, surfing more excellent waves at Magnet Bay (and still getting slammed on the rocks getting out, one day I’ll manage it less painfully!) and swimming at a very busy Corsair Bay on the way home as was too hot even driving!

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The final day of the holiday was exciting – heavy rain forecast so you’ve guessed it we went mountain biking! Despite full waterproofs at Mcleans Island we beat the weather and had a very fun afternoon showing Em all the cool things at the nearby Antarctic Centre.

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The return to work turned out to be not so painful, much easier than this time last year as we actually have a nice house to live in this year rather than a campsite and knowing all the staff, lots of the students and the intricacies of the NZ curriculum also eases the burden. I’ve also scored some very nice classes this year with small, motivated classes in Year 12 and 13 and the top set Year 11 (compared to two bottom sets last year) – I think they want to keep me here longer! After a very quick first week involving a whole school sports day we reached Waitangi Weekend, seemed rude to have a three day weekend already but not complaining! We headed out west again with dinner at the excellent Bealey Hotel near Arthur’s Pass and set up camp in the fading light at Punakaiki campsite, which is right on the beach in a temperate rainforest so all in all pretty scenic. Heather, Duncan and family had gone for the more civilised apartment option but Em is too Scottish for that so cheap camping was our option and luckily the weather forecast was pretty good. The plan for the weekend was taking turns cycling the new Paparoa Great Walk trail, NZ’s tenth and most recent great walk and at 57km a full value hilly day ride. Heather and Em set out the next morning on the bus shuttle after much deliberation on who was going first and Duncan and I set out with our tribe of small children to explore the local sights. First stop was the excellent Punakaiki Caverns complete with “dinosuar eggs” and plenty of mud. This was followed by the classic Punakaiki Rocks clifftop walk which the kids raced round and had to be pulled back from the massive drops occasionally. After a quick lunch break we worked off some more energy biking round camp and splashing in the nearby lagoon (more of a tidal river estuary but much safer swimming spot than the sea). Team mummy got back just in time for dinner with smiles on their faces and more importantly just in time for tired children meltdowns! A great first day and next day Duncan and I set off for our turn on the Paparoa. First five kilometres was a lot of fun, plenty of good chat, nice trails in the woods and suspension bridges to cross but then disaster struck as a rock bounced up and snapped my rear mech hanger clean in half. Duncan did a great job at turning it into a single speed but without the rear derailleur it was in a very high gear, not ideal for steep uphills, not to be denied I cranked it out working up quite a sweat powering up the hill, and then the high torque was too much for the poor bike and the chain sheared the front sprocket off as well meaning I now had a bike with no transmission aka a run ride suitable for a toddler. I don’t normally swear very much but the sky turned blue for a couple of minutes as I marched angrily up the hill to the first hut on the route – Ces Clarke Hut which is above the bush line and has a cracking view of Mount Rolleston and the Southern Alps. Time to eat some lunch and weigh up my options – option 1) freewheel 7km back to the start and hitch all the way home with a broken bike or 2) Continue for the next 50km walking the uphills, coasting the flats and enjoying the downhills? The weather was so perfect and the views so stunning that it didn’t take me long to go for option 2) and it was honestly better than you might think, the uphills were a little frustrating but I seemed to be keeping pace with all the mountain bikers (actually faster than some!) and the downhills were as fun as they would be with a working bike. The trail is very well designed and follows a narrow ridge line, very reminiscent of the Old Ghost Road but a bit more friendly difficulty wise being more like Blue/Red standard than the Black sections on OGR. I followed the slightly shorter walkers path on the final section which had a fun through route through a cave and lots of steps but none of the walkers I met seemed to mind too much and I pointed out my bike was missing a few key parts anyway! Not quite the day out I’d planned but a fun one anyway and a nice swim in the river to finish. Duncan (who’d had an impressive hour long hot lunch break at the second hut) arrived back to base shortly after me and this time it was our turn to time it well for a slap up dinner. We broke the drive home the next day at Arthur’s Pass and enjoyed the super scenic Devil’s Punchbowl Falls walk, including some fun scrambling up the river bed to get closer to the falls. A great long weekend all in all showcasing some of New Zealand’s best scenery.

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The heatwave continued for the next few weekends so more beach trips and slip and slides in the garden were called for and it was also Chinese New Years so we enjoyed the procession through the centre of town with some cool dancing dragons. Sara and Em went on a mummy and daughter adventure and spent the night in a hut on Quail Island which was very exciting and Ethan and Iona and I went back to Corsair Bay, which continues to be the perfect venue for the kids to practice their SUP skills. Even Iona is getting pretty good at paddling in a straight line. After picking the girls up from Lyttleton harbour we headed to the Banks Peninsula music festival at Orton Bradley which was a fun way to spend a hot Saturday afternoon with lots of tasty food, freshly squeezed lemonade and plenty of fun live music to dance to. It was pretty quiet though, a few more people on the dance floor might have made it more fun! Think it was lost on the little people though who in typical fashion seemed to prefer the playpark to anything else. Sumner beach also continues to impress with great waves for surfing and warm late summer water for swimming, amazing to have this only ten minutes from home, especially as you can bike home over the hills too if keen…

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Ethan had been very, very keen to stay in a mountain hut too especially as Sara had beaten him to it the weekend before so we set out from Gebbie’s Pass the next Friday night for a two day, two night adventure in the hills, following Te Ara Pataka or the Crater Rim walkway over the biggest hills in the Banks Peninsula Mount Herbert (919m) and Mount Bradley. Em came up with a great plan for dinner and we all enjoyed the view from Gebbie’s Pass and had a picnic together in the evening sunshine. Then we set off climbing up to the well situated Packhorse Hut (450m) stopping briefly for a quick boulder en-route. Ethan is great company for hiking as he chats away merrily and is interested by all the hills, sights, wildlife, rocks and people we encountered. As luck would have it the only other people in Packhorse (sleeps 9 people) were a couple of friendly girls and another family of five and one girl is in Ethan’s class so the kids had a great time exploring round the hut, playing Uno and enjoying mountain life. The roaring log burning stove was a nice touch even though it was arguably far too hot to have it running! The one negative is the long drop toilet which is smelly and swarming with big black flies but other than that a great first hut experience for an eight year old. Thanks to good old kiwi bedtime we were all asleep by about 9.30pm and recharged ready for a big day ahead.

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The others all headed back to Gebbie’s Pass but Ethan and I wandered up into the dense cloud and set off up Mount Bradley and I had a good feeling about the weather improving. Sure enough we popped out above the clouds near the summit and got some great views above the cloud inversion, what we thought was the Port Hills was actually the Southern Alps, the air clarity was that good! The route skirts Mount Bradley and winds it’s way up Mount Herbert which was the high point for the day and the perfect place for a lunchbreak. Having seen no-one all day we bumped into about ten people up here who’d all done a day trip from Diamond Harbour. It’s a bit of a flat, broad summit but does have some great 360 degree views in all directions being the highest point and this was my third time up here and definitely the best of the bunch.

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Onward to new territory and after a nice mini summit of Little Mount Herbert we followed the ridge past some atmospheric trees and on towards Port Levy Saddle and a meeting with the girls. Ethan likes to run all the downhills which was hard work keeping up with a large rucksack, but did mean we kept a good pace all day! In fact once he saw the girls on top of a hill in the distance he started running uphills too to get to them! A short walk over Waipuna Saddle and we dropped down to our second hut for the weekend, Rod Donald Hut which is another great place to stay, not as scenic a position as Packhorse but the toilet is far superior and the hut is smaller and cosier too. Yet again we had friends to play with as the only other occupants this time were a family of four. Not quite as much sleep but lots of fun and great conversations with the adults.

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Time to go home sadly as Ethan and I by this point were long overdue a shower, after 25km of hot, hilly walking. Em set off running to retrace our steps and get a nice 22km run back to Gebbie’s Pass and the rest of us walked out slowly back to the car at Port Levy Saddle. A quick game of hide and seek in the atmospheric trees at Waipuna Saddle and then a long windy drive back via Port-Levy and Purau to meet up with mummy again. We stopped at the well-positioned Lion Rock near Purau Bay and the Monument and did a spot of highball bouldering but were too slow to beat the speed demon that is mummy who beat us to Gebbie’s pass with minutes to play with. Amazing that she can run in a couple of hours what took Ethan and I the best part of two days walking! A very satisfying family expedition to the hills and definitely whetted our appetite for more nights in mountain huts in New Zealand, the huts here are to such a high standard compared to the ramshackle (and loveable) Scottish bothies we are used to!

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After all the time in the hills we’d missed the watersports so were back to local beaches the following weekend – more fun waves at Sumner and New Brighton and I had a go at the new big thing – wing surfing. Basically similar to windsurfing but you hold a giant inflatable wing and use it to pull you across the water. I was a fairly quick learner and it was quite fun but also frustrating at times as I could only go downwind. Apparently it’s easier when the wind is stronger and once you attach a foil underneath and rise up out of the water you go a lot faster. Will give it one or two more goes before I decide if I’ve got yet another hobby to add to the collection!

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Warning – mega activity weekend – warning! Em was super keen to get a decent run in the hills before the winter weather arrived and fancied the Torlesse Traverse that Zack and I did in the summer holidays. She got a great forecast the next weekend and so we spent Friday night at Smylie’s excellent accommodation in Springfield at the foot of the hills. The next morning Em set off armed with plenty of food, water and beta from me about the scary bits. The kids and I had a great morning’s bouldering at Castle Hill which is always fun for all ages and their particular favourite was the swiss cheese rock where they could practice their dynamic approach to climbing….

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Once our fingers had had enough climbing, caving and hide and seek we headed over to Castle Hill village for lunch and many laps on the fun slip and slide there, then we jumped on the bikes for a quick loop of some of the Hogs Back Trail and the excellent pump track. Em had texted to say she had one more peak to go on the traverse so we drove down the valley to look for her. Em tried to go off-piste at the end to meet us nearer to the village rather than the simple path to Porter’s Pass and this took her about an hour longer than planned but we were all relieved to see her safely down and we whizzed down the valley to the tasty treats of dinner at the Sheffield Hotel.

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Most people would then go on to have a lazy Sunday after that one but we had other plans, Sunday was the Sea to Sky Triathlon which I’d been training for for a while, zero running, some cycling and lots of swimming to hopefully work my weaknesses. With no international travel allowed the race was featuring NZ’s world class Olympic triathletes so quite a strong field to say the least! The kids were also entered in the Aquathlon event and were excited about taking part. Unfortunately the sea didn’t get the message about race day and was wild with 4-6foot messy swell pounding in. The organisers figured they’d give it a go and shortened the swim from 750m to 400m and off we went. It was pretty sketchy to be honest combining the usual scrum of flailing arms and legs with large waves meaning people were actually picked up and dropped on your head. I tried to take a wide line to stay out of trouble but ended up swimming much further and found it hard to get any kind of rhythm to my strokes or breathing. Leaving the water in a disappointing 100th place and having a slow transition (socks and bike gloves a bit OTT in a race!!) but great to be out of the scary surf and back on my bike. The plus of being rubbish at swimming is psychologically you can then overtake plenty of people for the rest of the race. The course suited me too being hilly and on hills I know and love, so I whizzed up Evan’s Pass leaving many riders in my wake! Helped by a strong tailwind I overtook about fifty riders before the turn around point at the top of Mount Pleasant (directly above the house!) and then cautiously whizzed back to Evan’s Pass and onto Godley Head and the run. This was the best bit of the race by far and probably the best run of any triathlon I’ve ever done being glorious coastal running above the cliffs of Godley Head, overtaking another 25 tired triathletes with their funny running action moaning about the hilly course, along the beach at Taylor’s, over Scarborough Hill to a great finish along Sumner beach with a few high fives from the mini team just before the finish. Overall placing of 28th and 5th veteran (and only 90s off the podium) not a bad days work all in all after a terrible start! The kids did even better in their race and Sara came 3rd in the under 6 girls race and Ethan second in the age 8 and 9 race – they had to race through waist deep water past many lifeguards and run along the esplanade and back. We don’t do many races these days due to old age kicking in but this one is definitely a classic and worth seeking out if you live in this part of the world – very similar to the Croyde Ocean Triathlon round Baggy Point but even more scenic!

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After such an active weekend we all longed for a quiet one the next week, but Ethan was booked on cub camp on Quail Island so this time he and I set out on the ferry from Lyttleton, Ethan was visually excited with some full body bouncing and after setting up camp we took the 9 cubs on an adventure to explore the island and find shipwrecks. It was certainly well staffed with 9 kids and 6 adults but actually at this age they really do need this many adults! We spotted each other for breaks from the noise and bickering and I enjoyed a run round the island so much I did a second lap, quite pleased to get a hilly 11km run completed in such a small place and it’s super scenic being clifftop vistas in pretty much every direction! The cubs made some impressive rope bridges and abseil lines down mud banks and we feasted on burgers and hot dogs (every meal! Not a vegetable in sight this weekend!) plus some of the lumpiest, sweetest custard I’ve ever had the misfortune to digest! Late night sparklers on the beach was a hit and after some amusing late night banter from the leaders we had a fun Sunday morning riding the biscuit (doughnut) and I even had a long overdue second go at waterskiing (at least 15 years ago!) which was thankfully easier than it looked. We finished with some awesome pier jumping and diving and got the boat back to civilisation ready for a night in a proper bed. Ethan interacts so well 1 on 1 but I honestly can’t see what he likes about cubs so much, the activities are amazing but the interactions between 8 year old boys who fall out endlessly is hard work at times! And the food would kill you if you ate it for more than two days straight!

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Em was really keen to get away camping the next weekend but after pretty much the worst week we’ve had in New Zealand (if not ever) where we all felt ill, the kids decided they wouldn’t sleep at night and worst of all we heard sad news about friends diagnosed with terminal cancer and Grandad Stan passing away we needed to be kind to ourselves. A day trip to Tumbledown Bay was just the therapy we needed with small but perfect waves to bodyboard and surf on, we almost got all five of us on one wave, definitely a project to aim for! The wildlife was also amazing with dolphins swimming in the bay and endless seals all around the sides which you could get up close to on the SUP. Bottle Lake Biking on Sunday was also ideal, the pure simplicity of picking blackberries takes your mind of all your worries and the biking isn’t bad either!

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Finally after a few weeks of not getting away Em got her wish and we reached Easter weekend which was a 4/5 day weekend and just the break we all needed. The west coast weather didn’t play ball this time so we headed to the ever reliable suntrap of the Banks Peninsula and a new campsite to stay at – Okains Bay. With bad weather everywhere we waited one more day and then drove over, picking a brave Em up en-route who’d run 15 miles of crater rim from the house – it was pouring with rain and we lasted 5 minutes out of the car before beating a hasty retreat! Next stop Akaroa and the rain continued to fall so we headed to the Giant’s House for our third visit to this quirky mosaic garden, which although fun again was damp to say the least. Akaroa museum was a better place to hide from the weather and best of all was the tasty pizza at Three Boys Brewery right on the water’s edge. Eventually the rain stopped and we headed over to Okain’s Bay to get the tent up before it got dark.

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The next day was a complete contrast -perfect weather and light winds so after a leisurely breakfast we set out on one of our family boat adventures. We can still just about fit five in the inflatable canoe and this paddle didn’t disappoint – plenty of sea birds and seals to interact with, towering cliffs and pinnacles, remote beaches to land on and best of all some really interesting caves that you could paddle right into. Something special about boating less than 100m from your tent too without driving anywhere and we rounded the day off nicely with some flying fox and bike track action in the campsite.

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Easter Sunday we had a visit from the Easter bunny, lots of chocolate eggs to find, and we then headed over to Hickory Bay via the scenic drive along summit road and despite quite a strong offshore wind there were some great waves to be had. Last time we came here the beach was empty, this time there were tons of cars, obviously a popular Easter weekend destination! Back to the campsite for a final swim and SUP in the sheltered rivermouth, all in all a great campsite and one we’ll definitely return to.

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Em had enjoyed a run on the way here so it was my turn on the way home and despite the 29/30 degrees weather forecast and howling NW winds I opted for a ludicrously ambitious plan to bike all the way home crossing the hills at least five times. The first hill almost ended the plan before it started as the climb out of Okains Bay up to 500m is super tough especially in a strong headwind. I headed East along summit road and started to enjoy the ride a bit more with great views off both sides of the ridge. After a fast and slightly scary crosswind descent to Akaroa I headed back up to summit road and down to the remote Pigeon Bay where things got tougher as the road changed to rough gravel for the third pass over the hills to Port Levy. The heat was beating down now so I opted for a swim to revive me and then flagged down a car to beg for some water, I’d already drunk 4 litres and was parched. The next pass over to Purau was draining and half way up I had to lie down in the shade to recover, maybe it was time to call it quits? I’d arranged to meet Em and the kids at Diamond harbour at 12pm, then 2pm but was more like 3pm when I rolled into town after 40 very tough miles for a late lunch and well deserved cold drink. The others had wisely given up waiting and headed for home! The original plan from here was another 40 miles up “The Bastard” and along summit road to finish at the house but I honestly don’t think I’d have made it! I had a large salt and sugar filled meal and a long swim in the harbour instead and caught the ferry back to Lyttleton which left me with just Evan’s Pass and Mount Pleasant instead which was fine after my long lunch break and I think 60 miles and 10,000ft of hill climbing is plenty for one day! Definitely got my money’s worth and made it home in time for dinner too! What an eventful weekend!

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Awoke feeling not too battered by the long day on the bike so headed to Magnet Bay again for some more point break action. Not quite as clean as last time and another freak wave getting in was a horror show, and I was thrown around on the rocks like a rag doll getting plenty of bruises and cuts for my troubles, made the whole session painful and I dreaded getting out (usually harder than getting in) but styled it this time fortunately. Such a shame such a perfect peeling wave has such a tricky entry/exit. The final weekend of term was wet so we all enjoyed the manic fun that is clip and climb and headed up the coast to Amberly beach, which had nice looking waves but very strong cross-shore currents resulting in a long walk of shame back up the shingle beach after each attempt at catching a wave. Definitely getting plenty of surfing action this summer/autumn, going to miss having so many reliable beaches on our doorstep when we return to the UK. Next stop North Island for a ten day Easter holiday break, see you there, time for a sleep now after all that exercise….

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