Well first and foremost I need to sincerely apologise for being soooo rubbish at writing for over 3 weeks! When I started this blog 4 months ago (really!) I remember thinking: "this will keep me busy, I won't have time to miss anyone because I'll be so busy writing this" and look what happened - I got too busy to write. So apologies for that little slip, I promise it won't happen again (I might have my fingers crossed behind my back but it's the thought that counts).
So much has happened since I last posted. For those who actually know me in real life will know that I have just turned 30. Thank you all for your birthday wishes and cards and presents - you are too kind. I felt truly touched by how many people remembered. It's supposed to be this HUGE milestone - but to be honest I don't feel any different: I still feel like a little child who's pretending to be an adult. I seriously panic if I leave the house without my ID because I know I'll still get asked to prove that I am over 18....part of me thinks some day I'll get found out for not being old enough. But alas - I am well over the legal age limit. On that note, if someone says to me "you should be thankful, what a compliment!" again when I am ID'd then I will scream. It's not a compliment, it's very frustrating and time consuming and sometimes even downright embarrassing. The most annoying thing is that I can go out and spend $150 on shopping and have ONE bottle of nice red wine and I'll get ID'd...do they seriously think I'd be spending that much money on one bottle of wine if I was under 18?? I'd be buying something cheap with the alcohol content equivalent of turps or meths surely? Rant over.
So, I knew my fiancé had prepared a pretty hefty surprise for my 30th as I needed to book a week off work. There are so many places in New Zealand that I want to visit that I just couldn't pinpoint what he had in store. Stewart Island maybe? Or possibly Milford Sound?? Maybe we were going up to Paihia - where we spent Valentine's Day in 2010?? (If you don't know these places then look them up online, they're truly breathtaking) My mind was awash with places we could be going to. I had NO CLUE if we were going by car / boat / plane / on legs. For all I knew it could have been a ginormous elaborate ruse and we could have spent a week at home having picnics in the lounge. He would throw me off the scent each time I questioned him. You can imagine it can't you? "So what time will we be leaving the house?" "How long will it take to get there?" "Can I take my entire wardrobe?" "Do I have the right clothes for wherever we're going?" "Can I swim there?" the list really is endless and how he didn't end up just calling the whole thing off to save his sanity is beyond me. We went small suitcase shopping the one day (yep, now you can tell I'm in my 30's!) and I thought 'here we go, we must be going on a plane' but then we only bought one and when questioned his response was 'it's for when we go and watch the Wales game, we only need one as we're only there for 1 night.' So that was that - nipped in the bud. So it was our birthday on the Thursday (for those of you who don't know me in real life, my fiancé and I share our birthday - rare as that may be, no it's not cute and it's not as good a thing as you think. Buying presents for someone else on your birthday is never fun, and there are always disagreements about who should make the birthday breakfast). We were finishing work on the Tuesday and leaving on Wednesday morning. Sooo.... Tuesday night came and I was presented with a small suitcase and told to pack it with what I wanted to take. One clue was that I didn't need any big jumpers / coats. The suitcase wasn't the one we'd bought....it had been lent to him by a friend. The sneaky monster had foreseen my questioning and found a way around it!! So I packed.
Wednesday morning we were up at 8 and had to leave at about 9:30am. So I was insanely excited - still none the wiser as to where we were headed. We got in the car and drove...after a while I noticed we were on our way to the beautiful Queenstown as we've been there for a weekend previously. We passed the signs for Milford Sound so that was crossed off my mental list! After 2 hours we arrived at Queenstown airport. How exciting, now I knew I was going somewhere on a plane. I absolutely LOVE flying so this was a great start for me! We checked in and only by looking at the destination on the screen did I know we were flying to Christchurch. The only other time I have been to Christchurch was when I originally emigrated to NZ and had to catch my link plane to Invers from there so I was excited to go back and keen to see the place. After a short flight we landed in Christchurch and strangely the OH (Other Half) was looking for a phone - he found one in the airport and rang a random number.
The beautiful Queenstown Airport
I just stood dumbfounded as he didn't say hardly anything but took in (lots and lots of) information from the stranger on the other end of the line. At this point I felt like I was in a movie, some random instructions from a random person - not aware of where I was going or why. Then we were off - out of the airport and into the car park...apparently waiting to be picked up. After ten minutes or so we were collected by a lovely woman who informed us that 30 minutes earlier they'd had another aftershock which reached a magnitude of 4.7. Another big aftershock for ChCh residents - makes you realise how lucky we really are. Fifteen minutes later we were booked into the delightful Papanui Motel - if you go to Christchurch then you should stay here - just the loveliest most helpful owners and a fantastic little room stocked with all the amenities you could wish for. We took a little walk to the shopping mall and stocked up with a bottle of wine, some sushi and some potato wedges (all the essentials) and settled in for a few hours. At this point the OH (Other Half) informed me that we needed to leave before 5am for stage 2 of the magical mystery tour. Perplexed I took to my old questioning technique and used it again as a form of torture for keeping all these lovely secrets from me. Knowing that I would find out as soon as we started out the next day he decided to let me know where we were going. On his laptop was a document titled 'Read Me'. So I did. After a number of clues it was revealed that I would be celebrating my 30th Birthday in true style in the heart of SYDNEY!! I was completely gob smacked. Not only had he managed to arrange everything in secret, with no input whatsoever, we were also leaving the country and he'd been applying for visas and everything on my behalf! To say I was astounded would be an understatement. I certainly didn't think we'd be leaving NZ. The rest of the trip went a little something like this:
At 4am on the morning of my 30th and the OH's 35th the alarm went off. After not a great deal of sleep because I was so excited we had to get up. My excitement hadn't abated one tiny bit! We were picked up by the airport shuttle and taken back to Christchurch airport to board the flight bound for Sydney. After 3 hours (and a little nap) we touched down. The cabin manager was the best member of cabin crew I had ever come across. As the pilot flew into the airport we had a short taxi on the runway to our destined stop. The cabin manager came over the speakers and said "giving you a tour of Sydney airport now, on the left you will see tarmac and the airport....and if you're seated on the right you'll also see tarmac and the airport." He was very witty indeed. So we were now in Sydney AND it was our birthday. We got on the tube at the airport and made our way to the hotel to check in (perfectly placed in Wynyard and right by the tube stop) and decided to take a look around and find our bearings.
First stop: Darling Harbour. It's a gorgeous harbour (no...really?!) lined with cafés and bars (think a very large Cardiff Bay...but in Oz!) We took a wander to the town hall and bought a box of Chinese food which we sat on some steps and ate in the warmth of the Aussie sun (it wasn't bikini hot but it was cardigan warm...yes I'm definitely 30). Then we hopped on the ferry to Circular Quay. The best piece of advice we had as tourists in Oz was at the train station where a very helpful guard advised us to purchase the multi-trip ticket which enabled us to travel on the trains, ferries, light rail and buses as much as we wanted for a week - definitely advisable as the public transport is fantastic in Sydney and we used it loads. Anyway...Circular Quay is a lovely place busy with people mingling, catching ferries, eating and generally being sociable. We saw a man there playing the didgeridoo amazingly whilst a group of school kids watched and played along with knocking sticks and things. Very cute.
After we'd found our bearings we headed back to Darling Harbour for some birthday cocktails and had a lovely meal at the Meat & Wine Company. the OH had read about a place called the Marble Bar online so we went in search of it. What a fantastic find it turned out to be. It has set a new, very high standard for my favourite bar! It's basically underneath the Hilton hotel and you'd think you were a million miles away from there...it was a really bluesy, jazz style bar - with a very 'underground' feel (it literally was underground but I don't mean it in that way). It felt like we'd wandered into a funky 70's type bar. The live music was fantastic, modern (ish) tunes with a jazz / old school feel about them. Brilliant. We were both shattered however so we went back to the hotel for an early night - on our birthday! Still...we had plenty of time yet to celebrate :o)
The Marble Bar, Sydney
On the Friday we decided to go for a mammoth walk around Sydney. We made our way to Oxford Street in Paddington (yes, I had to double check that I wasn't in London too!) and had a look around the shops (same theme as London too), on to the Anzac memorial and then we walked through Hyde Park with the lovely fountains (still, London). Then we made our way to Woolloomooloo Bay (what an AMAZING place name, it deserves to be saluted - if only in my blog) and through the Royal Botanic Gardens which were absolutely beautiful and house one of Sydney's largest bat colony. There were hundreds of them! They weren't caged there, or kept against their will - they were free to fly off but they just chose not to for whatever reason. Then we wound up back at Circular Quay where we found a little deli café which did the most amazing home-made Lentil Burgers and Focaccia sandwiches. Simply scrumptious. Jumped on the ferry and made our way to the gorgeous Manly. A lovely surfer's paradise with all your usual shops - Billabong; Ripcurl, etc. We had a nice stroll through the shops and made our way to Manly beach which is gorgeous. It was a bit nippy on the beach so we found a beach front café called The Sugar Lounge which was again - gorgeous. All rattan furniture and nice cosy, relaxed atmosphere with friendly bar staff and lovely patio heaters on the front tables. The whole front of the café was a huge window which completely opens up so that you can see people walking past / on the beach. The type of place you'd aspire to own :o) We had a few drinks here and relaxed, watching the world go by and then ordered lunch. Their food is yummy too! The OH ordered a Mezze platter which was HUGE and I had pumpkin / goats cheese quesadillas and we shared a bowl of sweet paprika chips. It was all delightful and our eyes were far bigger than our bellies as we couldn't eat it all (try as we might!)
Having made our way back to the hotel we decided to go to The Rocks - an area of Sydney we'd heard about but not seen. Armed with inside information from a resident Aussie we were on the hunt for a rooftop bar called the Glenmore Hotel. We were told to look for a 'spooky looking staircase that looks like it leads to nowhere' and strangely enough we found it...exactly as described! We went in and the hotel looked like any dated hotel of it's time...nothing too special. No signs to be seen for any rooftop area....so after a quick scan the OH asked someone and by jove we found it! Views across Sydney, lovely patio heaters and just another great atmosphere greeted us. What a great little find this turned out to be. Not exactly a 'find' but we'll claim that one ;-) After a couple of drinks here we headed to Argyles which looked like a typical bar / club....until you went inside. The décor was quirky and very very different. It was really nice and clearly attracted lots of different groups of people - from young groups of friends - to families - to couples. It seemed to suit all tastes and it did it well.
Saturday we went to Sydney Tower. If you go to Sydney - I highly recommend that you go up and have a look across the whole of Sydney. We managed to work out where we had walked the day before and were proud of the vast amount of walking we'd done! The tower is 309 metres high and there is so much going on within it that you couldn't imagine from outside. There are gorgeous shops galore and one floor is dedicated to food of every variety you can think of. We had a nice coffee and a beautiful pineapple / coconut muffin at Becasse café. Yum yum yum. Then we went up to the observation deck - I think it costs about AUS$25 per person and it's worth every cent! We spent an hour or so up there and enjoyed marvelling at the lovely Sydney sights. You can choose to get harnessed up and walk around the top - actually outside! The OH was tempted but there was no way I could have done it. I remember walking up to the 2nd level of the Eiffel Tower years ago and my legs turned to jelly...I am no good with heights whatsoever. I do however, want to jump out of a plane...but that's another story.
After the tower we decided to head off to the fantastic Bondi Beach. Having seen it on the TV we expected a really big beach teaming with people....but it wasn't half as big as I expected! Don't get me wrong it was lovely and there were people playing beach volleyball (as you'd expect) and heaps of people were surfing (again, as you'd expect) - it just wasn't as BIG as I was expecting it to be. One cool thing was as you go onto Bondi Beach there's a big bowl that looks like a human sized plug hole but it's for the boarders. There were quite a few skateboarders using that and it was good fun to watch. Whilst it was sunny and blue-skied, it was a bit too nippy to sunbathe on the beach - the sea was really cold when we had a paddle too - so we strolled along and then went up to the chip shop and bought blue cod burgers and ate them on the beach. Yet again GORGEOUS food (this post is seriously food oriented). Then we made our way home and freshened up ready for the evening.
That night we decided to find Ivy Bar (another bar the OH had read about) which turned out to be even better hidden than the Glenmore Hotel! We had to go down a side street (it looked like nothing was down there) and then round a few corners until we finally found a hive of activity in the shape of a number of bars clustered together. We got to the 1st security guard and he stood very close to the OH and asked "Where are you going?" to which we replied that we were looking to have some dinner. His tone changed immediately and he became the most helpful person ever: "well you've got plenty of options: Ivy Bar is there, Mad Cow is there, there's Thai food upstairs..." so we thanked him and walked on....to the 2nd security guard who also asked "Can I help you?" - again we explained that we were looking for some food. He walked us up to a desk where you could book into the various restaurants - on the way to this desk the 3rd security asked "can I help you?" and we explained we were being looked after by the 2nd security guard. We got to the desk and the guy asked us which one we wanted to book in to - we still hadn't seen a menu for any of the eateries at this point and as they only had a limited selection of menus at the reservations desk (and because I'm a pescetarian which can make it difficult) we asked if we could just walk around and and look at the restaurants / menus. He was fine with that and pointed us in the direction of Ivy Bar. We walked up the steps to be greeted by the 4th security guard who asked what we wanted. We explained yet again that we were looking for food and he allowed us to pass. Well what a palaver - but we were finally in! Ivy Bar is a stunning looking bar come restaurant with disco balls and strings of lights hanging between the trees inside and it has no roof - all open air (not sure how they cope if it rains??) It's quite upmarket to look at but weirdly when you order food they give you a buzzer and when it starts flashing & vibrating you have to go and pick your food up from the kitchen. I ordered a prawn dish and the OH had steak. The buzzer buzzed and flashed manically and we went to pick up our food. When we got back to our table I noticed something had been sprinkled on top of my delightful chilli prawn spaghetti....crispy onions? No... Some sort of herb?? No... A straggly spice??? Errrm, no. Crispy bacon in fact. So I spent some time trawling through and picking out bits of bacon (I'm not so fussy as to take it back or not eat it: I don't want to cut my nose off to spite my face) and the food (when bacon free) was absolutely delish. Whilst I was on bacon patrol there seemed to be a far few police who had made their way into the bar - they were removing someone it turned out. Then some more police arrived...with a dog. It turned out to be a drug sniffer dog who was shown around the bar and he sniffed all of us (I was careful not to drop any bacon on the floor in case I attracted his attention without due cause). He was a really cute dog too - I wanted to pet him but I didn't. It was like when I see a blind dog and I always want to pet them but it says not to so I have to refrain (not an actual blind dog of course, I mean a blind person's helping dog - if it was a real blind dog then I would pet and cwtch him loads).
Ivy Bar, Sydney
Anyway, I digress. So we're at Ivy Bar, everyone's being sniffed by dogs, I'm trying not to poison myself by eating pig and then a line of 10 police purposefully stride upstairs. They were clearly on the lookout for something. So we had a lovely meal and drinks and some entertainment in the form of law enforcement. It was really strange as the bar looks so upmarket and seems to attract a smart crowd and yet all this palaver was going on inside. It was a very enjoyable evening nonetheless and I'd thoroughly recommend going there. After that we went to Marble Bar again and it didn't disappoint - still just a beautifully addictive place - not pretentious or uninviting, just a deeply soulful enjoyable place to be. We had a few Canadian Clubs here and then had to head home as we had an early flight to Christchurch the next morning.
When we got back to Christchurch we were let down by the place we were supposed to be staying at so we contacted the owners of the Papanui Motel again - and they were very obliging. Within 15 minutes we were back at their motel, all checked in and cosy. That night I experienced my first ever earthquake aftershock. Initially I thought the OH was wobbling the bed - until he said "that's an aftershock" and when I said "I thought you were trying to wind me up by shaking the bed" he laughed. You could hear the building creaking and the whole floor shook for a few seconds but it felt like a lot longer. It was frightening and you didn't know if that was it or if it was going to get more intense. I can't believe that residents of ChCh have experienced over 3700 aftershocks since the initial quake hit over a year ago. Admittedly you don't feel all of them but one was enough for me. It must be devastating not knowing if or when they're going to end.
So that was it. Amazing. We're now home and I am 30. The OH is 35 and I have only 5 years to plan something for his 40th that will match the amazing magical mystery tour that he arranged for me. For that I thank you with all my heart OH...it was absolutely amazing, I loved every moment and I can never thank you enough.
We came home to the beginning of the Rugby World Cup 2011 and how exciting has it been already?! On the Friday night before the game we booked last minute tickets to the Scotland vs. Romania game in Invercargill. Rugby Park is within walking distance of where we live and it was a great game - fab to chat to some Scots at the game and to get caught up in the whole atmosphere of it. I hope you all saw the opening ceremony - I personally thought it was absolutely brilliant (apart from the shipping crane ballet dancing bit - that was just plain weird). We have watched almost all of the games either on TV or at the pub. The Wales vs. South Africa game was heart wrenching. I think we deserved to win it but then I'm probably just biased. To be fair though our customers in the shop agree and if I had a dollar for every time I heard "you were robbed" the following week then I'd be minted ;-) The Ireland vs. Australia game was simply amazing! I'd have loved to have been in Ireland on THAT night, I expect there were a few sore heads the following day as they sure know how to party. As if everyone here needed an excuse to lay claim to an Irish grandparent. The NZ'ers were delighted. There's a healthy competition between NZ & Australia - not dissimilar to that of Wales & England.
Rugby Park, Invercargill
This weekend just gone Wales took on Samoa and it looked like a completely different team to that which played last weekend. We won - and I'll take the win - but we didn't play well and we need to shape up. After all, if we make it through to the quarters (and we should) then we'll be playing Ireland.
Other BIG news for you all in this post is that we're moving! After we've been to watch the Wales game we're relocating to Wellington, so that will be the next big thing.
Oooh I almost forgot: it's officially official :o) The Batch Café has won 'Best Café in Southland 2011'. Good news eh?! It's a pretty impressive accolade when you see the number of cafés dotted around Invercargill alone. It went down very well in work as you can imagine. We now have our liquor license and will be trading evenings and weekends before you know it. It really is a completely gorgeous café, if you're ever in Invercargill you should visit it, it's so relaxing, the food is completely amazing and the service is obviously second to none ;-) Also, we now have a live FaceBook page so you should find it and like it :o)
