Highs, Lows and to the End of the Road

  

It's been a long time since my last post!  We've traveled the length of the South Island in the last two weeks and with a full memory card, there's lots of fodder for the blog now.  But even before we left, the boys were delighted to spend a rainy afternoon at Vertical Limits here in Nelson, exercising their muscles and problem solving skills.

We also squeezed in a training hike up the Grampians in preparation for our overnight tramp (future blog post) into Lake Daniell. 

They just love each other so much!  LOL  Much like bear cubs, I'm afraid. 

Off on the adventure, we travelled first to Westport with a stop at Cape Foulwind.
Apparently the name has more to do with the weather than a particular stench.
(Spot the van, we've put nearly 20 000 kms on it in 5 months, we've grown very fond of it!)
 

Seal spotting

Onwards over the Karamea Bluffs - plenty of height here!

Gotta love looking ahead at the road dug into the side of the mountain cliff!

Then we hit the warning signs about the road not being suitable for camper vans etc.

This area receives so much rainfall that the water is rust coloured, like tea, from the tannins that leech out of the decomposing leaves on the forest floor.  It was raining off and on, so we headed underground first to the Crazy Paving and Box Canyon Caves to go hunting for New Zealand's largest spider and the famous weka insect, see if you can spot the difference, or skip the next few photos if you're squeemish. 

 

These are the crazy paving stones!  The floor of the cave "naturally" formed like this. 

Spider - body the size of a loonie plus legs, not too bad.  They make egg sacs that hang like those lovely spherical paper party lanterns

Weka mommy and babies

I'm not cool enough to take photos like this one with the water all swooshy, all the credit goes to Dave!

The Oparara Arch does not lend itself to being captured on film.  To be there is to see its enormous size and marvel open-mouthed at it's height and length and the speed of the water rushing through it.  43 meters high and spanning 219 meters across the river, it rises above the forest.  Oparara Basin

This probably gives you the best idea of what we were facing.  Xavier is scared and I'm comforting him!  He just didn't want to fall into the water and seeing there were no railing etc, I quite happy to have him willingly agree to hold my hand! 

Next we followed up the west coast as far as you can go by car, to the start of the Heaphy Track and walked a half hour in by foot.  There are heaps of Nikau Palms like the ones below, which bring Dave great delight. 

The boys decided to amuse themselves on this hike (the 4th one of the day!) by using sticks as pretend guns and running ahead and hiding to ambush us like snippers.  They don't really understand why mommy doesn't like this game and why I don't shoot back. 

The rest of the hike involved Xavier tearing off a scab and with blood running down his leg, Dave tied a leaf around his shin while I started to head back to the car, only to put the keys in my pocket and discover sticky plasters (aka bandaids!).  Smart mommy!  But by that point, Dave and Jackson had carried on the trail and were out of sight and Xavier lost all of his motivation not being with Jack and playing guns, so I had to carry him a good chunk of the way up to the scenic lookout, which was certainly longer than the posted 20 minutes away.  Through mud.  Alas, there's always a bit of a story behind this lovely photos! 

Rest time on the beach.  Relaxing and enjoying the scenery.

 The boys (again!) had different ideas.  Who can blame them?  See a sand dune = must jump!    I giggled when they kept complaining that their gumboots were filling up with sand . . . so I suggested that they could take them off.  Seriously, who wears gumboots on the beach??  Anyhow, I LOVE these last few shots.  If nothing else, this year has given the boys time to try different things.  As they say here in NZ:  have a go!

I could end the blog post here.  Lovely, happy thoughts.  However, like I said earlier there's always a bit more of the story.  Jackson decided it might be clever to do a somersault.  Yeah, bad idea and we told him so.  Worse, Xavier copied him and got sand in his eyes.  Big bits of sand.  There was a lot of screaming and crying and Dave poking Xavier in the eyes to try and get it out, while convincing him to walk to the van to get some water to wash it out.  Oh, and did I mention that the sandflies were biting???  

What One Does At Easter In New Zealand

For as long as I remember, Easter in NZ is the time of airshows showcasing aircraft from WWII and WWII.  Yep, time for a blog from Dave again!  And this one's especially for Ivan and Tommy.  Each year it alternates between an airfield in Wanaka (down south amongst the mountains and lakes) and Blenheim (1.5 hrs from Nelson).  Luckily it was in Blenheim this year, so I loaded the boys and Poppa into the old people-mover and off we went.  Until we hit the massive traffic jam as thousands of cars were all trying to get to the same place...  The show lasts 3 days and is amazingly choreographed with non-stop flying from countless aircraft.  And also several re-enactments of WW1 and WW2 battles on the ground with guys (& girls) having a grand old time expending hundreds of rounds of blank ammo.

 While Jackson & Xavier like sitting on Grandpa's street bike back in Canada, they loved the idea of a motorbike and sidecar!  There were dozens of WW2 vehicles and displays, and many people resplendent in period uniforms.  It was a little strange seeing guys walking around in SS uniforms carrying guns, enjoying the airshow between their re-enactments.

 The museum that is attached to the airfield featured in an earlier blog, and quite a number of the WW1 biplanes were wheeled out and flown in mock dogfights during the airshow.  Amazing is the number of aircraft that exist in private collections which are brought out especially for the airshows.  Apparently just the cost of insurance of flying a vintage aircraft can run up around $80,000 per year... 

 These brightly coloured beasties would be Yaks...early Russian fighters/trainers from WW2.  They put on quite the aerobatics display.

 A competition class glider gave an amazing demonstration of the agility and speed of these things at the hands of a skilled pilot.  I gave up counting how many times he looped and having it zoom past just above your head at over 200 km/hr yet almost completely silent.  They can fly up to 2,000 km before landing if conditions are right.  I tried my hand flying one when I was a young teen; it was harder that I thought...I could do the circling round and round part fine, but I would keep losing altitude instead of gaining.  More like falling slowly than gliding!

 Seven little Fokkers in the sky.  The commentator said it was the first time since WW1 that a flight of seven of the triplanes had flown together.  Apparently the breeding program is coming along nicely, not surprising given their name...

 Look to your left and what do you see but one of the first tanks ever used in WW1 and a recreated French chateau.  A group of guys maintains and drives this tank around for fun, including shooting blank ammo from the guns.  Some people collect stamps as a hobby...others play with tanks.  Which reminds me, I need to check out a place in Christchurch when we visit in a couple of weeks that lets you take modern battle tanks out for a spin.  Oh yeah!

 The coolest thing about the old biplanes and triplanes is how their engines sound just like lawnmower engines.  Or Grandpa Al's SRT4.

 Ah, the roaring sound of my youth...a flight of WW2 Harvard aircraft retired long ago from the NZ Air Force.  I lived near an Air Force base so we always knew when the pilots were taking these out for a joyride.  And boy-racers think their car exhausts are loud.

 One of the stars of the airshow was this beautifully restored Avro Anson from WW2.  The owners have restored it right down to the spare valves for the radio and original maps for the navigator.  I wouldn't even want to think how much money has gone into the 10 year long restoration, but it is the only one in flying condition in the world.

Another version of Yak fighter from Russia in WW2.  Neat to be able to see aircraft from half a world away down here.

 And now to the new toys that the government bought the Air Force.  The flashy A109 is the successor for the old Sioux helicopter used as a trainer.  For those of you who watched MASH episodes on TV in years past, the Sioux was the helicopter used to bring in the patients on stretchers.  Modern enough in the 1950's but more than a little out of date now.  Apparently they had to slow down when flying in rain because the rain drops would accumulate on the windshield to the point the pilot couldn't see where they were going.  Nice.  Guess the Air Force hadn't heard of Rain-X...

And if you master flying the A109 without pranging it, they may let you play with the bigger NH90.  These replace the old Iroquis helicopters our Air Force flew forever (since the Vietnam war to be precise).  So the rotorheads in the Air Force are very contented kittens these days with their flash new toys!  Our main attack method is still tossing sheep out the side door onto the enemy below...we can just get there faster now.

British Spitfire Mk.XIVe and German Focke-Wulf FW190 in formation.  A rare sight anywhere.

Definitely would be fun to fly a Spitfire...

 Maybe if I got a second job...or a first job, come to think of it!

 The Focke-Wulf was a treat as I hadn't seen one flying before.

 Fokker, Focke-Wulf...the Germans sure did come up with naughty-sounding names, didn't they?

 And no airshow would be complete without a bunch of dudes driving around in a WW2 German Tiger tank.  Seeing one of these close up made me glad I wasn't one of the guys laying in the mud facing it with just a rifle all those years ago.  Note the German soldier amongst the spectators in the foreground...like I said earlier, it was kinda weird seeing them wandering around everywhere!

 For the recreation of the Battle of the Pacific (US vs Japan) they had a Corsair zooming around.  Only on the ground can you get an appreciation for how big the thing is.  The wings are canted so the landing gear can be closer to the ground so the massive propeller doesn't hit the ground.  If you are 6 feet tall, you can walk underneath the engine cowling without ducking!

A German Bf108...I never could figure out the point of painting a mottled gray camouflage pattern then painting the nose and tail bright yellow.  Perhaps the enemy would just see two yellow bits flying and think "Is that a bird?  Is that a plane?  Nah, it's just two yellow blobs"

Now this is what one flew in during the early romantic days of air travel in the 1930's.  A de Havilland Fox Moth.  A sibling of the well-known Tiger Moth biplane you can still see flying around lots of places.  Apparently the designer was into lepidopterology (go on, you know you want to Google it!).

Re-enactments are so much cooler when they include explosions.  Unless you're my 2-yr old nephew who did not like the "loud bang-bangs" one little bit!

This P-51 Mustang is definitely cooler than a Ford Mustang.

 

And lastly, Xavier and Jackson trying out a vintage truck.  It had wooden spoked wheels, the tyres were solid rubber, and I don't believe it had air conditioning or windscreen wipers...

What was Renee doing while us boys were at the airshow?  Working of course!  Gotta pay for the tickets some how...  ;-)