First week down

The first week back went by very quickly. This whole term is going to go pretty quick. I lose 2 senior classes in 3 weeks time, and it's only another 8 weeks until the summer holidays.

This weekend Zealandia (formerly the Karori Wildlife sanctuary) was free to locals. They have recently opened a brand spanking new, all bells & whistles visitors centre, and hiked the entry fee up to $28 accordingly! This was a great opportunity to go along for free. It had been quite widely advertised, & because the weather wasn't too bad, it seemed like half of Wellington had the same idea. We arrived at quite a good time before the crowds were too huge. When we left they were queueing halfway down the street to get in!

We had a very nice day out. Once you headed off into the valley you weren't quite so aware of the crowds. We probably didn't see as much wildlife as you usually would when it was a bit quieter, but we were still happy. The tuatara had come out to play, & that was one of the highlights for us.

We also saw Hihi and Kaka hanging out around the feeding stations.

It was a really nice day, and good to get out into the fresh air and get some exercise. It was pretty poor that since mid January we had been living 5 minutes drive from the sanctuary, and had never visited. I guess we are a bit spoilt having Otari-Wiltons bush right on our doorstep. The terrain is very similar, just not quite the same abundance of wildlife.

On Saturday night we went to the Lions/Taranaki rugby game at the Cake-Tin. It was the last home game of the regular season, and the last chance to use the 'buy one ticket get one free' offer from our entertainment book. It was a very good match with Wellington totally dominating. The final score was 49-15. The match was marred by an injury to Piri Weepu early in the second half. Straight away we knew it was serious, as the angle his ankle was hanging off his leg was all wrong! Sure enough, it turned out he had a broken leg. Such a shame for him as he has been playing so well, and would have been a certainty for the end of season tour... Speaking of the tour, I'm excited about SBW! I'm looking forward to seeing what he can offer in the black jersey...

Today the weather was pretty awful, our cherry blossom is almost at its peak & I have no idea how the blossom is managing to cling on in the blustery wet conditions! Our wisteria is also very close to coming out. It climbs all over the pergola so should look spectacular when it is fully out. The seeds we have planted are doing very well on our sunny windowsill. In fact as you can see in the pic below, some of them are starting to get a bit big for the initial medium I planted them in. Late afternoon there was a break in he weather so I took the opportunity to shift some into bigger pots. In a week or two some of them will be ready for planting out into the garden.