TV Stand

A while ago I bought a solid rimu dressing table off Trade Me for $30. It was pretty hideous - but I thought it might have some potential. More to come...


Before


After

Coromandel Trip

We were supposed to go on holiday to Australia to visit friends in Canberra and go sea kayaking and snorkelling with some friends in the Whitsundays on the Great Barrier Reef. As a result of Aaron's broken wrist we had to change our plans and have postponed our trip to Australia until next year. So instead we took the opportunity to spend a week exploring an area of New Zealand that we haven't been to and we headed up to the Coromandel Peninsular, (just to the east of Auckland in the north of the North Island). The temperature was a lot warmer than Wellington and reached a balmy 21 degrees C, it wasn't windy and we had only a couple of spots of rain. Perfect weather for camping! Spring has definitely sprung in that part of New Zealand and there were lots of cherry blossom and kowhai flowers out on the trees.

Kowhai flowers

After a long drive north on the first day we spent the second day walking up to the Pinnacles just outside of Thames. This used to be a big forestry area where they logged all the really old and big Kauri trees for building houses and decimated the forest in the area. (Kauri is what Aaron's coffee table is made out of).

Helen inside a chopped down Kauri tree. Kauri trees can grow pretty big!

There are a few large old trees left standing on the Coromandel peninsular, and they are very majestic. We have not got a photo as the pictures don't do the size of the trees any justice. They have planted a lot of Kauri trees on the peninsular in the last few years to try to regenerate some of these original native forests.

A small Kauri.

The Pinnacles tramp is pretty undulating and not too strenuous, until you get to the final pinnacles where there are a series of ladders and scrambling to get to the top. Aaron had a few issues, only having one arm to hold on with - but he survived and the view from the top was quite impressive.

The Pinnacles (note ladder in background)

The next few days we spent heading up the west coast of the Coromandel to the northern tip of the peninsular. From here you can see over to Great Barrier Island and there are lots of rock stacks sticking out of the ocean. We did a nice walk along the coastal walkway from our campsite at Port Jackson.

View of the end of the peninsular with Great Barrier Island on the horizon ~20 km away.

We then worked our way back down the east side of the Coromandel. This is the more touristy side of the peninsular with lots of people visiting Cathedral Cove and Hot Water Beach. Unfortunately the timing of the tides meant that we didn't make it to Hot Water Beach, but we had a nice walk at dusk to Cathedral Cove.

Cathedral Cove (Aaron for scale just under the arch).


Silhouette of us standing under the arch with one of the stacks behind.

We had a very relaxing and nice holiday, it wasn't quite sea kayaking and snorkelling on the Great Barrier Reef, but it was a good break and it was good to get out and explore more of New Zealand.

Happy Birthday?

Monday was my birthday, and look what I got...a purple cast for my wrist. It turns out I broke my wrist snowboarding (see previous post).



On the bright side I also finished my coffee table.



One of the long underside bits is actually the front of a drawer which sits under the table.

Skiing at Whakapapa

We finally managed to get up to the Whakapapa ski field to get some skiing and boarding. It has been a season of lots of snow (4 metres). Unfortunately there has been too much snow the last few weeks and the roads have been closed and the ski fields closed due to high avalanche risk. This weekend was the first with a great forecast and our friend Kathryn organised us accommodation in one of the mountain lodges.

The weather was spectacular and the three volcanoes looked quite different this year with so much more snow. The only problem was that everyone had looked at the forecast - so we spent a little bit of time waiting in lift queues. We usually got a few runs in between 8:30 and 10am before the crowds arrived. It wasn't too bad and sometimes it is nice to get a bit of a rest between runs!

After the first run of the weekend - Aaron pretty much picked up where he had left off last yearand definitely started to get a much better flow to his boarding. There is a movie below of him carving up the slopes!


Kathryn and Aaron


Lots of snow on Ngarahoe and Tongariro in the distance


Aaron carving up the empty slopes in the morning

Cone Hut tramp

We woke to a nice day on Saturday morning and Aaron decided he wanted to go tramping to see the snow in the Tararua's (the mountain range just to the north of Wellington). Well we didn't get up to the snow, but we had a nice walk through the temperate dense forests. It was pretty steep as we tried to avoid the flat stuff along the valley in order to avoid the boggy, muddy bits.
We headed up and over the hill to Cone Hut, unfortunately we didn't have time to go up Cone Peak. We had lunch at Cone Hut, built in 1946 and obviously each bit of wood had been shaped with axes. Then we returned back via Cone Saddle and down to and along the Waiohine Gorge to the newly built suspension bridge and the carpark. We did see some snow on the top of Mt Holdsworth in the distance.

We timed it perfectly as it was just starting to spit with rain when we got back to the car. It took us 6 hours of walking - which was bit more than we had anticipated. The tracks were pretty rough and slippy and we were pretty cautious descending some of the slippy, tree routed sections. We were walking with tramping poles - which helped a lot - especially with testing the depth of the muddy sections! Unfortunately we have spent a couple of days since in a little bit of pain as our tramping muscles are rather un-fit compared to our biking muscles. Need to get out and do some more tramping and get fit again.


The dense jungle


Cone Hut


Snow-capped Mount Holdsworth


Waiohine River

Sunday ride around the bays

We haven't had many sunny days this winter - so we have to make the most of the ones we get. This one was a very cold, but calm day so we headed out for a cruisy ride around the Miramar Pensinsular where we live. There is a relatively flat road that isn't too busy that goes all around the coast and you get some great views of the harbour and then across to the south island at the southern end of the peninsular.


Just getting started


Sailboat in the harbour


Snow-clad mountains of the South Island

Birthday flowers

My surprise birthday pink/purple flowers.... Our house now smells very flowery!
Thank you Laura and Gill.