Hello Again!

We have now arrived in Oz so a quick back track to let you know what we have been up to in the interim. Having left David and Claire with the family in Wellington we hopped on a ferry over to the south island where we jumped straight into the swing of things with some wine tasting at a number of the vineyards in the area - though I felt terrible having tiny sips and pouring away more wine than ever before, sometimes being the driver isn't so great. However we did find a number of wines that were very much to our taste and stocked up a little (check out the Villa Maria ones).

Heading down the coast we stopped in an area renowned for both whale and dolphin watching, it was however mighty cold so while the idea of swimming with dolphins really apealed, getting in the water didn't! So we went out in a small plane and did a bit of spotting from above and saw hundreds of dolphins playing about below us as well as two sperm whales.

We then headed west over the Lewis pass and up to Hamner Springs where we changed van as the lack of gas heater meant we woke up with ice on the inside of the windows and we didn't consider this to be part of our holiday plans. So we went for a walk around Conical Hill and then spent the afternoon soaking in the dozen pools of different temperatures. Lovely!

As many of you know I have had a bit of a dread of my 33rd Birthday as this signified the end of my tweenage years (hobbitlore, thanks Dougs) so VIrginie helped me see it out with a bang. We flew up in a small plane to look out over the Franz Joeseph and Fox Glacier and up to look at Mount Cook before jumping out for a skydive. An exhilerating ride and a great way to celebrate.

Milford Sound was stunning with beautiful views of Mitre Peak as well as the underwater observatory where we spent a happy hour peering out into the "deep water environment".

We made ourselves very happy when walking along a beach looking at petrified wood(Curio Bay) we stumbled accross a couple of rare yellow eyed penguins, pretty but their smell certainly left more than a little to be desired, my darling much prefered the tiny Blue Penguins that we met in Oamaru (the smallest penguins in the world up to 50 cm).

Our time in Indonesia was wonderful but the one other comfort that we missed was cheese, we managed to stop off in an award winning cheese factory `Whitestone Cheese Factory` and taste our way through almost their entire selection.

We then went to Christchurch to give the van back and spent the weekend at Louise and Robert Steel in Halswell with their two little girls, Sophie and Katie.

We went into town and had a look at the cathedral and other buildings before getting ready for flying to Australia.

Looking forward to hearing from you all kisses , Rob and Virginie