We’re off to Auckland! Like the curate’s egg I have some good and some less good news, which in the long term will hopefully pan out well for Rob. As you know he was due for another TOE look at his heart this Thursday and a meeting with the Infectious diseases doctor. Well yesterday while …

Midwinter in Whangarei It’s been a lovely weekend, both days, sunny and warm, even hot at times, yet this is midwinter in NZ. We went for a long walk on Northland NZ’s equivalent of Holkham Beach on Saturday. Breams Bay leads up to Marsden Point, where we cleared in just past NZ’s only oil refinery …

Early Mornings in Riverside Marina In the mornings, around 7.00am Jaap or Renee pull slowly on the chain that grinds up their massive roller shed door allowing natural light to pour in on Jacob’s hull and decks ready for another long laborious day’s work. Jaap and I were chatting on Saturday eve at their 50th …

Lions v Lambs (Barbarians=barbars=lambs!) And Rob’s own Challenge The weather forecast for the first Rugby Game on the 3rd June could not have been more saturated but fortunately the rain stopped around 11.00am in time for the fine Haka display by the local Hatea Maori tribe, so we did not have to wear the dubious …

A Dose of Donna and Playing the Patience Game Our third late season cyclone is dumping her load of rain over us at the moment. After what seemed like a couple of weeks of exquisite weather with cold nights and warm, clear blue days from the Antarctic, Cyclone Donna will have passed by tomorrow and …

Easter Egg Hunt on Zoonie and Zoologist Ruby examines a rare kiwi with egg. Early on Easter Sunday Rob and I laid out the Easter Egg hunt on Zoonie. Rather than have the children competing with eachother Rob set the clues for Henry going forward from the saloon and I set slightly easier ones for …