Farewell Wellington

Can you believe on my first day of no more work I still got out of bed at 6am and went to the gym, now that must be dedication for you. When I got back Colin was still in bed, so I crept out again (in the dark may I add) to make a last post on here from windy welly.

It was very sad saying goodbye to my work colleagues, weight watchers group and Spanish class all in the same day, but on a happy note I lost 700gms yesterday at my final weigh in, now that was a surprise! I actually reached the target of losing 10% of my starting weight, which I received a pin for. It was a really nice way to finish off my time with them.

So, it really is time to leave here and we'll take a lot of good memories with us, but now for the next leg of the trip. I can't believe we'll be in Santiago, Chile in a weeks time, sooooo excited!!!!

Backpacks at the ready!

Once again on our journey of discovery, we find ourselves packing our belongings into our backpacks and heading off into the unknown. It is our last day at work today and first thing in the morning we will be on our merry way.

The place where I have been working for the past 3 months, the 'Plumbers, Gasfitters and Drainlayers Board' (complete coincidence that I'm working in the same field as back home) put on a morning tea for my leaving do, which seeing as though I am only a temp was very nice of them. The chairman of the company told me this morning and I quote 'If i had a wish list, on it would be for you to stay with the company in a permanent position'. He has also offered me a job if I ever returned to Wellington, well, I must be good!!

Pictured above is a view of Oriental Bay from the top of Mount Victoria, we walked up it one day and took this photo, very scenic. We'll be emailing you all very soon with an update of our photos on the kodak gallery, so make sure you all check them and keep up to date with our antics!

I feel like a bit of a blob at the moment, I've been doing really well with going to my weight watcher meetings, eating the right foods and going to the gym. I've also been pretty good at controlling myself around chocolate and not pigging out, but for some reason today I've gone on a rampage. All the food for my farewell morning tea was savoury foods, sausage rolls, mini quiches, etc. There was also a tray of biscuits that I've been picking at every time I walk past. I have a weigh in today and it wont suprise me if I've put on a tonne, it certainly feels like it. I wish someone else would eat the damn things!! Oh no, the shortbreads are calling.......bye!!!

I know I've been a bit slack recently with the blogs, sorry liz (gorg friend and blogging mentor!!) There's no excuse either as the availibilty of using the net at work is pretty flexible, not supposed to though but hey ho! Well, it's our last week at work, YEAH and the weekend just gone was our last in Windy Welly. Very sad to be saying bye so soon, yet happy to be moving on.

The weekend, which was going to be a fairly quite one, ended up being very entertaining. Sat morning we met up with our Spanish tutor and a few others from the Spanish lessons to enjoy a free (anything 'free' is our idea of good entertainment) viewing of "Abros los ojos" which in English is "Open your eyes" and the original of Vanilla sky. Not that we understood the Spanish much though, we're not that good!! It did have English subtitles however and found that I actually preferred the Spanish version so much more than the hyped up hollywood version.
After that, I had a bit of a set back to my great weekend when I got my hair trimmed (trimmed being the operative word!) the hairdresser got a bit scissor happy and decided I needed a proper cut. Needless to say, I was gutted and still am but hey, it'll grow back.

We then met up with one of Colin's work mates who took us and a few other work friends to the Illot theatre in the city to see two of his friends, who are from England, perform in their play called 'Hot Pursuit' (see pic left). It was hilarious and witty and very English, which made me quite homesick. After the play we met the stars of the show, Clare and Adam, and had quite a few drinks with them. The night, or should I say morning, ended up with us in the 'good luck' bar. Nicely fitting for Clare and Adam who are continuing the tour of their show in the North Island of NZ, break a leg guys! Def recommend anyone to go and see the play if it's in your area, as they are touring England as well.

I'm typing this blog with my eyes half open (trying to be positive, cup half full an' all!) as Colin set the alarm for 3am this morning for us to watch the England vs Ecuador match. I managed the first half and of course missed the goal in the second half (fast asleep!) and I am now starting to struggle.
Staring at a comp screen all day doesn't help matters either, this is where reciting the Spanish alphabet backwards will come in handy!!

Hope this has made up for my lack of blogs, you're all probably asleep now to!!

Lovin you all xxx

Heartbroken : (

I am, at the moment going through a greiving process for my dream wedding dress (pictured left).
Since being in NZ I have been able to excitedly start looking through wedding magazines to search for ideas. There are even English ones over here.
In every magazine I've read so far, there has been a picture of this Maggie Sottero dress taunting me. So, one day I sent an email to Mrs Maggie, innocently asking for a rough idea of the price for a dress like this and can you imagine my surprise when they emailed back with a figure of.....14,000 - 16,000 pounds (don't have pound signs on these comps out here!)
Why, why, why??????? Sob, sob..why?..sob. It's not faaaiiiirrrr!!! Ok, so that's my little tantrum over with but seriously, it's ridiculous. Dont get me wrong, I think the wedding mags are great for certain ideas, but other than famous people, gold diggers, scam artists, lottery winners, etc who is really going to be able to afford these fabulous dresses and the castles that the people get married in, in the "real life wedding" stories.
I's thinks they need to find some affordable yet designeresque type dresses that we poor folk can afford. I know they're out there so, Jim please fix it for me!!!!

Road Trip!!!

We were quite honoured last weekend to witness something that people love to watch, but may never actually get to see in person. Yes.....we saw the All Blacks (the creme de la creme of NZ rugby players) perform the Haka in front of a 25,000+ crowd, WOW!
The game against Ireland, although wasn't the best, was a fantastic experience. The opening ceremony (this was the first game of a test) went off with a bang, literally. They had fireworks on the ground and the final explosions were huge vertical puffs of fire, I really can't think of another way to describe it, but I'm sure the people at the front of the stands had their eyebrows singed as we could feel the heat come off it from about 10 lines back!!
Unlike football, where they segregate the fans because of the very likely event of a brawl, we were surrounded by giant green leprachauns!! Well not literally, but you get the gist. The behaviour and at times the respect of all the fans here leaves much to be desired for, especially when you're standing next to an Irish group who are applauding the All Blacks for scoring a fantastic try.

Anyway, listen to me getting all hooked on Rugby (it really is hard not to get swept up in the moment here).
The next thing I know Colin will have bought me a season ticket for Everton!! This may not be such a bad thing as long as they start to win a few matches!

For the weekend we drove to a place called Cambridge, just outside of Hamilton (where the game was played).
Chris, bless him, drove most of the way there and back and the day after the game, they took us to one of the thermal springs in Lake Taupo where we had a quick dip. It's amazing how the geo-thermal activity causes the water to run hot and cold. Here we are in our togs (NZ word for swimming costume) it was about 15 deg that day, if that and we're sitting in water, which felt like a bath. Awesome experience and a great way to end a fantastic weekend!!!

I would like to give myself a huge pat on the back for accomplishing a couple of things this week. The first is that I've finally accepted the fact that I DON'T have straight hair....what? I hear you cry...but yes, it has taken all of my 25 years to admit it. So, to heck with the straightners, it's time us wavy/curly haired girls made a stand!!!
There have been many occasions on this trip when my hair has done a Monica and became a mop of fuzzy hair, but now it has grown a little longer it has thankfully become more manageable. Even so, I can now manage to say that "I love my hair" Oooh that was easy, I'll say it again, "I love my hair"

Now the second achievement of the week is quite a big one. As some of you are aware I joined weight watchers here in Wellington about 7 weeks ago. Colin and I became a couple of porkers before we arrived in NZ, what with our deep fried food diet in Vietnam, our creamy curry diet in Thailand, chicken satay diet in Bali and our meat/bbq diet in OZ, it was time to admit that my jeans were actually too tight and not that they had shrunk in the wash!!
So, on my 7th week of weigh ins I finally managed to lose 5kg (well, 5.2kgs to be exact.) which is a bit of a milestone and one where people tend to start noticing differences, i.e dropping a dress size. 5.2 kgs is the equivalent to 11.5 pounds and to be honest I've never felt better. Joining weight watchers has made me realise that you can eat well, feel full and still lose weight. Everything's on the menu (yes, chocolate included!)and it's never been easier to eat it!!!
I'm feeling quite proud of myself this week, so YEAH to me!!!!!

Boy talk

If there's one thing that we've missed from being away for so long, then it's not being able to see our gorgeous godson (not officially yet, but soon to be) Mason grow during the first year of his life. Needless to say we haven't been able to see him during his learning to walk or talk phase of his life.
Although Mason won't have any idea of who we are when we get back, it hopefully won't take to long to change that and we're looking forward to taking on full godparent duties.

Whilst I'm on the topic of babies, I'd like to congratulate Clair and Gareth Ellis on the birth of their beautiful baby boy, Kian. We hope you're not having to many sleepless nights and smelly nappies, but even if you are, I'm sure you're loving every minute of it!

Come on the Canes!

Here we are at the semi final of the Rugby Super 14's, supporting Wellingtons local team 'The Hurricanes'.
Now, with Wellington ('windy welly' as it's known to locals) literally being the windiest city in the world, then the name kinda fits. We've been to a few of the games now and the atmosphere at the Westpac stadium has been awesome. The Canes won the Semi final, but sadly lost to 'The Crusaders' (Christchurch, NZ) in the final.

The main reason though for publishing this photo is to say a huge THANK YOU to our Kiwi friends, Chris and Aimee. Colin met Chris at work and they have both shown us heaps of kindness and generosity. We'll always remember our night out after this rugby game and def won't forget those P P!!!
Our only hope is that we are able to show them just as good a time when they get over to England, which we're really looking forward to.

P.S CONGRATULATIONS to you both on your engagement!!

Finally!!

I've finally managed to create my own blog page, phew!
I started to create one for both Colin and I back in January to showcase the rest of our trip, but at the time, we were in Australia and cost an absolute fortune to keep using the internet. When I thought I had actually got somewhere with it my money ran out and the damn computer turned itself off.
Anyhow, I've decided to make this page my own but will still be posting details of the rest of our trip. So to all of Colin's friends, this won't be just about me! I'm just ecstatic to be able to write my thoughts somewhere rather than go crazy by talking to myself or drive Colin crazy as he's the only one around to talk to.

The inspiration for my blog title came from a wonderful saying by Marcel Proust. We stumbled upon it in Byron Bay, Australia whilst we were staying at what was once an old hippy commune. All you fellow travellers will know it as the Arts Factory.

"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes"

This made us both think about what we wanted to get out of our trip. It would be so easy to continue life as 'normal' and visit all the great places but visually let many of the small and wonderful things pass us by, which is what most of us do wherever we are, but here we both have this chance to see and experience things that a lot of people don't and this has definately opened up our eyes with a new outlook on our lives.

So, here's to my first of many blogs to come!!