Long time no blog!

Well goodness me time flies when you're at work! Here we are and it's September. We have been here in Redland Bay 7 months.

Hamish is enjoying high school, and life in general, especially since starting up playing hockey again. His team came third in the local competition. It took him time to get used to playing on real turf after years of astro turf on the North Shore. Anyway now it is swimming season and both Hamish and Kate have signed up to a local swim club and will also be joining a surf life saving club called Coochiemudlo Island Life Saving Club, starting next term (Depending on the qualifying swim.).

Kate has been really loving her CAPA dance classes owned and run by her gorgeous and very talented cousin Kristy. They had their studio performance last holidays and now it is practice for the exams. She has settled into her new school well and is looking forward to going on her first school camp on the Gold Coast in November. Better still is the Loop Camp also on the Gold Coast which is run by a network of school chaplains on week two of the September holidays.

We have had visits from both sides of the family with Nana Phyl in June and Grandma Gwen and Grandpa Ken in August. It was really lovely to have them over here. We finally bought a decent car and took them both to the Tambourine Mountains. These are in land from the Gold Coast. Very pretty and full of neat nicy-nacy type shops plus a great lolly shop run by a very nice man which was, of course, the kids favourite shop. We want to go back and check out the tree top board walk that has been advertisied on tv.

Today we decided to go and check out the film set of the Narnia movie. There is a replica of the Dawn Treader and it is on hydraulics . It is built on the end of Cleveland Point. We saw it before filming began with my parents. At that time it was fairly quiet there and the film makers had built a small grandstand for the public. Well the nice grandstand has been removed. We had to park quite a distance away as the road was closed and walk to the Point. There were plenty of others there. I wore a very bright pink top that I had given to me. But it was no good. I didn't get talent spotted but neither did any one else in our family! We think we saw Prince Caspian - a very yummy looking bloke who was standing round chatting. The kids thought they caught a glimpse of Lucy but couldn't be sure. You can see why movies cost so much. We were there about 45 minutes and they seemed to film a 2 minute shot at least twice. We saw some strange Narnian creatures. And the pirate like crew. I think the best bit was the yummy coffe and chocolate ice-cream I ate on the way back to the car.

We have started the process of importing Blue Heron - Lindsay the Brave has been doing battle with a couple of government departments and managed to get the paper work sorted. A big achievement. Blue Heron passed the termite dog inspection. She also got a very good compliment from the inspector who also did a moisture reading of the interior. He said it was the driest boat he had measured.

I am enjoying teaching here in Australia. This is despite a very unsupportive state government who refuses to pay teachers here a decent wage. They are the lowest paid in Australia and significantly lower paid than NZ! Here the hourly rate looks ok until you get told that you will only be paid for 25 hours per week. Plus if lucky enough to be offered permanent work you can easily be sent to where ever the department wants to send you. Hmmmm. The great things are the lovely people I work with and I have had some very cool professional development. The kiddies are super with a good splattering of kiwis thrown in!

What have we been up to?

Hamish's 13th birthday. We took a friend from 

school to The Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary. 

Finally we got to see and cuddle a Koala!

 Also saw Dingos, Wombats, Snakes and 

probably the best bit was the Birds of Prey.

 Hamish got to hold a Sea Eagle - quite

 heavy for a bird 3 kgs plus a 6ft wing span.

A Barking Owl.

A family picnic at the Gold Coast in March. Fairly lumpy surf but still good fun.

Daisy Hill Koala Sanctuary - We went here in January but there were no Koalas. We did meet this very friendly Wallaby and a Kookaburra.

Shooting the tube at wet-n-wild! We all had a great day here.

At South Bank. A fake beach in the centre of Brisbane beside the river.

Hi ho hi ho its off to work we go...

Well we are still in Brisbane and have decided to stay put for a while. Hamish is now in year 8 and over here that means he is going to High School. Kate has started at the same school as her mother and her cousin. We are really enjoying being close to family for the first time ever! We have two lots of cousins nearby. Over the Xmas holidays we had a bit of a look around. Brisbane is a lot like Auckland as a city. The people are extremely friendly and amazingly helpful. Photos to follow.

Merry Christmas!

Electrical storm

I don't know why this is not straight! But it's a great shot Lindsay took - real Cristmas Lights!

Bundaburg to Mooloolaba

Celestial navigators on passage to Bundaberg

Not long after arriving in Australia we met Bayswater friends Shaun and Erin off Whimsey and had a super evening under the setting sun!

We spent about 4 days exploring Bundaberg and generally sorting ourselves out after the ocean voyage. We have been amazed at how friendly people are here. Some of it is because it is a rural community but people seem very open and relaxed.

We are really conscious of opportunity the boat provides us to enable us to visit and see wildlife in their natural environments. This is something that is becoming harder and harder to do with diminishing habitats. So it has been great to see some amazing Australian animals here.

We find the Pelicans incredible – they are so big! One of the children’s first experiences was getting up at 5 o’clock in the morning and going to the back of Bundaberg’s Port Marina area where they watched a group of Kangaroos playing in the grass

We enjoyed the trip up the Burnett River and visited a small zoo. The zoo had wallabies, Emu’s and several other birds.

In the bush beside the river we saw a large Water Dragon (Lizard). We stayed there a short time mainly to re-provision ready for the passage south.

Even the ants are huge here!!!!

From Bundaberg we sailed down through the Sandy Strait which flows between Frazer Island and the mainland. Frazer Island is the largest sand island in the world and we were disappointed not to get to see any dingoes there. We stopped at a spot called Gary’s Place for morning tea with friends Dennis and Joy off Molokai and there we heard our first Kookaburgh laugh.

From there we sailed to Tin Can Bay and anchored for the night. Early the next morning we all went ashore to join the locals who feed 2-3 dolphins at 8am every day. Kate and Hamish got to feed a couple of fish to these Indo-Pacific estuarine dolphins. They were very friendly and quite confident around people. It was well controlled and a great experience. Sadly there are only about 50 of them left in the area.

We had to leave promptly so that we could cross the large sand bar at the entrance to the Sandy Straits on the high tide. That was quite tricky and for a while the roughest sea we had seen for a long time. After that it was plain sailing down to Mooloolaba. This is a canal type holiday town about 100 kilometres north of Brisbane. Hamish thinks he is in heaven as across the road from the marina is a beautiful white sandy ocean beach. He wants a surf board for Christmas!

We have been thrust into the Christmas Season all of a sudden and it was a bit of a shock. The first Saturday here was a Christmas parade of boats lit up with flashing, colourful lights and a Santa playing an organ on the deck of an old runabout. We have also hit the wet season so it is hot and muggy with spectacular lightning storms most nights. Great after dinner viewing! (No T.V and not missed)

So what are our plans for the near future? Well we really like it here so will be here over Xmas -New Year apart from a visit to Brisbane to stay with Lindsay’s brother and do some theme park stuff. After that it is a whole new year with some decisions to make over where we will go and what we will do next.

Our trip to Isle of Pines, New Calendonia.

This is a little out of order as I had problems getting a connection before we left New Caledonia. But we had such a great time we still want to share what happened with you.

The Isle of Pines is south of the main island Grande Terre in New Caledonia. On the way down we stopped in Baie de Prony. This is an eerie kind of place but quite beautiful. The Kanack people refuse to live near because, in past many battles were fought in the bay and they believe there are too many warrior ghosts around. It cetainly has that feel about it. It was also stripped of its trees to built the first houses in Noumea. Now the bush is starting to regenerate.

We sailed up to the very end so that we could have a dip in a natural fresh water pool built in the bush by a river. It was lovely and refreshing.

Both Lindsay and I were woken up during the night with strange noises which we took to be large fish jumping. Early next morning while weighing anchor Hamish and Lindsay saw a 10ft hammerhead shark swimming beside the boat. It was about ¼ the length of the boat. As we motored down the bay we saw a large turtle swim past too.

In fact it turned out to be the best day for sea creature spotting we have had. Later that day we had common pacific dolphins swimming at our bow. This was the first lot we have seen since NZ. But wait there’s more! As we approached Isle de Pins we saw in the distance whales leaping out of the water – what a display as they leapt clear and also slapped their tails. Although it would have been spectacular to see close up I was secretly glad that they were so far off.

We stayed in a lovely white sandy bay called Bay de Kuto. Hamish and Kate enjoyed snorkelling and turtle spotting as there were about 5 turtles swimming around. The best part was when they got towed behind our dinghy on their boogie boards by their father. The weather was pleasantly warm although we had to motor sail most of the way back to Noumea due of lack of wind.

We then had to prepare for our last big ocean passage for a while. There was a lot to do. I made and froze 5 dinners, bought provisions to last the 6-7 day trip, caught up with all the washing, Hamish and Kate completed as much school work as they could and we posted it off. Lindsay built a cover for our new generator and there were lots of forms to fill out for both New Caledonian and Australian Officials.