Our last day in the Catlins dawned sunnier than expected and so after a quick trip to McLean Falls and Lake Wilkie we headed to Tautuku beach.  McLean Falls are stunning although the morning sun made it difficult to photograph.  Once again Gus and I had fun clambering over stream boulders to get different shots of the three parts of the falls.  Definitely worth the climb to get to the top. 

Lake Wilkie is a tiny lake in the bush,  a tranquil spot where you can take a breath and just savour the beauty.  Dragonflies hummed all around us at the lake edge and the birdsong which has been a real feature of our walks in the Catlins was delightful.

At the beach the water was cool but being ‘hard’ northerners (of England) we could hack it! After all I was brought up on North Sea holidays in Filey and Scarborough! 

We headed to the Whistling Frog for tea – great fish and chips but mediocre beer which was a shame since it was a local brew.

The journey to Bluff was uneventful although mention must be made of the weather which was still surprisingly and unexpectedly good.  The continuing sunshine and lack of wind made for a relatively smooth crossing of the Foveaux Strait and brilliant views of Stewart Island. 

Mona meet us at Oban with the Rav4, our vehicle for the week which comes with the cottage.  Ringaringa Cottage is not really a cottage but a tidy two bedroom 1970s house.  What makes it is its location overlooking Ringaringa Beach with a view out to Native Island and a conservatory which is an absolute suntrap. 

It is also home to a host of native birds and we have already been visited by Tui, Kereru, Kaka, as well as thrushes, sparrows and other small birds we can’t name!

A short but steep walk takes us down the crumbling cliff to the beach. For a while we watched the seagulls surfing on the waves as they rolled gently in on the shallow beach, then we wandered along accompanied by the incessant sqwarking of an Oyster Catcher. We thought he was protecting a mate and a nest so walked past quickly aiming for the rocky point as we had been told we could get right round to the next bay. 

However, he flew ahead still shouting at us, then he was joined by his mate and we decided that maybe retreat was the advisable course of action – I certainly didn’tfancy beingon the receiving end of those long, sharp orange beaks!
Conscious that we may not have any sun given the bleak forecast,  Gus and I went for a swim.  I love the clarity of the water in New Zealand, it is impossible to resist plunging in however cold it may be!

After a trip into Oban for some essential supplies (beer and wine) and a recce of the pub and the DOC centre we headed home to light the stove and have tea. Oban, like it’s namesake in Scotland is a port and is the access point to the mainland. It is a busy wee place with a well-stocked general store, a pub, a couple of restaurants, an outdoor clothes shop (merino wear – an essential fabric for the changeable weather and especially useful for those of us who forgot their thermal leggings!) boat supplies, ferry terminal and places offering guided tours of the area.

The forecast,  as I already said was bleak – rain, wind, more rain, gales, rain! You get the idea… So since it was a fine evening,  Nigel and I went out for a short evening walk to Wohler’s Monument.  It afforded us a fantastic view across the bays and up close sightings of Kereru and Tui.

Decided that to document the 366 days in 2016 I will aim to post a photo each day –  here is the link to the blog…. 366photos2016.wordpress.com
Starting off with the very last photo of 2015 as the clock struck 12

A momentous year: our boys turned 21 and 16 respectively and Nigel and I celebrated 25 years together – milestones in their lives and ours.  Putting together a slide show of photos for Lachlan’s 21st Birthday party took us on a journey into the past. How far we have all come? Where did the time go and how did my tiny 5lb premature baby get to be a tall, strong, beautiful young man?  And we look at the Facebook pages of all our friends and their children and they too are young adults making their own ways in the world, taking on challenges that we couldn’t really imagine them ever getting to when they were tiny tots but proud that they have grown strong and independent.

We’ve had a couple of visitors this year from the UK.  So nice to welcome friends and children of friends and show them round our place. Andrew Kyles and his friend Matthew spent a few days with us in winter on their trip around NZ.  As well as meeting them it was lovely to catch up on news from home and chat again to Vanessa and Iain via Facebook.  In October, we had a great week with Imy Farmer re-exploring the Waikato. I love seeing how all those children have grown up and become such wonderful adults.  We don’t have much space but love having visitors so “come on down”!

The year started for me in Costa Rica and Nicaragua with a team of girls from school. What an amazing trip and it has left me with more places to explore and to take the rest of the family. We climbed volcanoes , made chocolate and ziplined through coffee plantations in Nicaragua and trekked through rainforest and worked in a local community in a very isolated part of Costa Rica.

Nigel and Aonghas went on a good old Kiwi road trip to South Island, visiting rellies and exploring the country.  Lachlan spent the holidays working – life is hard isn’t it?

In March I walked 100km in 18 and a half hours with three teammates to raise funds for Oxfam.  Oxfam Trailwalker is a huge challenge but very rewarding. Lachlan and Aonghas were my amazing support team (Nigel was away in Oz for work) and they provided me with food, massages and encouragement. I couldn’t have done it without them! And thanks to all of you who donated to the cause. Look out! because I have madly signed up for another one and my 54th birthday will be spent walking 100km in Whakatane. Begging emails and FB posts are on their way!  I also managed to run my first (maybe my only) half marathon. I think I might pick and choose – I don’t really like running for running’s sake but do like a challenge and being out in beautiful countryside.  The Kinloch marathon was along the mountain bike tracks by the side of lake Taupo so the views were stunning and it was a great day to be out there.

Nigel continues to work at the University of Waikato in the Waikato Centre for Elearning (WCEL) whilst I made a big change this year and left the classroom! I am now working for a company called Core Education on a Ministry of Education contract. I work with schools providing them with advice and support as they integrate digital technologies into their curricula.  It is a huge change from being in a classroom but I am enjoying the challenge and the flexibility of working from home. The “Craft Beer” resurgence in NZ has meant that there is good bottled beer aplenty for us to sample.   Now the boys are either not at home or old enough to leave on their own we have also rediscovered a night life and some good drinking holes in The Tron that we can almost call our locals!

I managed to fit in a fleeting trip to Spain in July, between jobs. I received a scholarship to study at the University of Salamanca for two weeks along with 9 other NZ teachers. Very complicated in the end due to changing jobs so didn’t manage to have any extra time to make it to the UK or France as I had hoped. Unfortunately, it was also the wrong time of year for anyone to dash across the Channel to meet me in Madrid. However, I hired a tiny little car and drove for 6 hours down the amazing motorway and bridges of Portugal to meet my friend Gail for a weekend in Lisbon. What an incredible city and so good to catch up with Gail.

Lachlan decided this year that working in a shop didn’t offer very exciting lifelong prospects and has enrolled at university. He is studying Philosophy, History and Political Science. Must be thinking of being the next politician who will change the world!  He is living with a group of friends and learning how to cope with the challenge of people who don’t have the same standards of cleanliness that he has! Who would have known that the boy who’s bedroom carpet was only revealed once he left home would be frustrated at other people’s messiness!!??Aonghas started his very extended summer holidays back at the beginning of November when exam leave began and apart from three weeks of relatively concerted study time has pretty much spent his time playing DOTA or Minecraft – oh, apart from the times we can pry him away to load/unload the dishwasher, hang the washing out, do some gardening ….! Still a long way to go until February when the next school year starts. Oh, those summer days when we were young! He still plays hockey and as well as playing for school is also playing for a local Club team. 

No longer a teacher, I have joined the realm of 4 weeks holiday a year + stats, so my Christmas holiday days are just the standard Christmas Day, Boxing Day, News Year’s Day. But the office is closed from 24th Dec to 5th Jan so I have to take leave then.  I have also taken some annual leave to tag on to the end of that so we will have a couple of weeks away.  Our destination this year is the southernmost tip of South Island.  We’ve “done” the north of the North, the south of the North, the north of the South and now it is the turn of the south of the South!  Aunty Chris is coming with us and we are looking forward to a road trip and a chance to explore more of this beautiful country. We still get out and about walking and biking but less than we would hope – weekends are still pretty much tied up with hockey and football matches!

Facebook seems to be our main way of keeping up with people and their news so keep on posting and we’ll keep on stalking. Otherwise, email makes communication quicker than “snailmail.”

Wishing you all our best wishes and lots of love and thoughts for the Christmas season and the New Year.  

Anne, Nigel, Lachlan and Aonghas xxx (please note, I am now the shortest member of my family!!)

Thursday was the end of another chapter.  I start a new job in two weeks time.  Not as a teacher of children but as a facilitator for a company called Core Education. I will be part of a Ministry of Education team advising and supporting schools as they integrate technology into their learning programmes. This sort of work has been a large part of what I have been doing over the last 7 years anyway but it is a big step to take and I feel just a bit weird!
Anyway, more of that in a later post. For now I am in Spain; long complicated back story but basically I was lucky enough to win a scholarship provided by the University of Auckland and the Spanish Embassy to come to Salamanca University to study Spanish for two weeks.  I am going to make the most of it because for the first time in my life I will not have 11 weeks holiday a year to play with! So the next few posts will be ramblings from Spain.

Viernes el 3 de julio
I promised myself a trip to the mountains out of Madrid and a visit to Manzanares. So up reasonably early to catch train at Atocha at 9.00am. Just as well I gave myself plenty of time because the station was heaving and I had to queue for half an hour for ticket. Then found that train was at 9.30 ! Next: breakfast. l had an Oferta de Manana- coffee, orange juice and croissant for 3€ standing up at bar “a la Espanol” Confusion abounded then as I searched for my way into the platforms- 3 different sets of platforms at Atocha: Local, regional, national! More confusion once I found the right one as hordes of people are milling around at the top of the stairs going down to the platforms.  It seems we are in some sort of holding area waiting for the lady who spends more time on her phone or greeting long lost friends than doing her job.  “Espera,  espera!” she repeats to everyone who tries to ask for help.
Finally, I am on the train; the uninspiring industrial and commercial buildings typical of the outskirts of any big city have given way to dry, undulating, yellow fields of olive trees to my left, green fields to my right with low hills in the middle distance. Every now and then clusters of red roofed, pale terracotta houses seem to be evidence of the creeping urban sprawl of Madrid linked by the main road that runs alongside us. The embankment wall is scrawled with grafitti mainly of the bored youth variety but occasionally a political slogan or two.

First stop Aranjuez, I have no idea how many stops before Manzanares but it will take 2 hours so I have plenty of time to enjoy the scenery. This is a “go with the flow ‘ day.  Apart from reading a few sentences that said Manzanares was an interesting place to visit and the fact that you can walk in the forest and hills around, l know nothing! I have 8 hours to explore! Hoping it’s not going to be too hot! But I have my hat and my “abanico “, a bottIe or two of water and my adventuring head on! Here goes!

Stop 2: Villasequilla
Sun parched fields, olive groves, dry baked earth – yellow but tinged red, unclouded blue sky and the heat shimmering on the horizon. Looking out from an air-conditioned train, it looks pleasant but I know what heat is going to hit me once I step out!
White windmills with red roofs and big sails, the old-fashioned type, sit on the hills just above a village. T o my left, along the whole length of the ridge, the tall, elegant modern day sort stand resplendent, their three sails turning, turning, turning.

Stop 3: Villacanas.
A small, industrial town- I say industrial became it looks like there is a factory, a chimney, warehouses and water towers, but it is surrounded by fields – a splash of a different colour in the centre of the flat lands of yellow.  It seems amazing that the newly planted olive trees (l presume that’s what they are but will confirm later ) could survive the harsh sun.

Stop 4: Quero.
Storks perched precariously on abandoned buildings. More grafitti daubed walls.  A nothing place!

Stop 5: Alcazar de san Juan
Alcazar means castle or fort but this looks industrial.  I wonder what the town and its people are really like?  Here I am making judgements from the glimpses I have as the train enters and leaves the station. A corridor view, blinkered by the constraints of what I can see from my seat.  Grafitti decorates the walls, bright, artistic, expressions of youths’ boredom, frustration or just a need to make a mark.  After all people have been doing it for centuries! It is more than a blip on the landscape. An old steam train is parked to the right, not haphazardly and I wonder what it’s used for.  Large white tanks and the tell-tale factory zig-zag roof profile help to strengthen my thoughts about this being an industrial hub.

I think my stop is next!! But still 20 mins to go. Little white buildings with red tiled roofs at the corner of each planted field . Not sure what the little trees / bushes) seedlings are – olives? It’s still very flat – where are the hills? Starting  to see vague outlines in the distances, smokey brown shapes through the heat haze.

Phones ringing,”Dime, dime!” conversations going on with invisible people ! Even stranger when folks don’t have a phone but just ear pieces as they seem to be talking to themselves!

Final stop: Manzanares
So….. wrong Manzanares! l sort of knew that the place I wanted was called Manzanares el Real, But when I asked at the railway station for a ticket to Manzanares I didn’t know there was another town called “Manzanares “and they didn’t ask which Manzanares I wanted.

So, no walking in the mountains! But l am exploring this little town, not entirely sure how to fill the time until 7 pm when my train leaves as there are only so many churches & museums to shelter from the sun in. The grand looking “Gran Teatro” dominates the street as I walk into town to the tourist office to find out what there is to do here. There is something intellectual about european grafitti! But then when a country is in economic crisis and there is something to protest about, and 25% of under 30s are unemployed, there is time to be creative.

The gems in this place this morning though have been the Museo Manuel Pina and the Museo de Queso Manchego. 5€ well spent.  Manuel Pina was Spain’s leading fashion designer in the 80’s and 90’s. He designed clothes for Almodovar’s characters and was highly influential in the fashion world. He took his inspiration from the women of the region, the colours of the land and the climate. The museum is small, Pina died at the age of 53 fm AIDS, but it is delightful. Housed in the cellar of a old house, the mannequins stand in the vaulted brick arches, artistically lit and not so many that you are overwhelmed.  The clothes are bold, they make statements about the land and its women and Manuel’s relationship with them. I love the quote from him that translates as “A man’s shadow is sometimes more human and more real than the man himself”.

Next up el Museo de Queso Manchego. This gave me a greater understanding of the land I travelled through on the train. It is a great little museum housed in a former dignitary’s grand dwelling with tiled floors and walls and a courtyard with a well in the middle. Cool in the heat of the sun.  A mixture of local art and pottery alongside artefacts from the cheese making industry and a well-planned explanation of the importance of the cheese industry to the  area. I thought the child friendly synopses of the extended written explanations were brilliant idea. They certainly helped me! The cheese tasting at the end ( with wine) topped the visit off.

Less impressive is the Castillo; it has been recently renovated and looks a bit like a mock castle now -walls too straight, the bricks/ stones too regular. l didn’t go in , not even sure you can. I am currently sitting in la Plaza de la Constitucion opposite a beautiful XVI century church which goes by the rather long name of la Iglesia Parroquial de la Asuncion de Nuestra Senora, drinking beer and eating enough for two! A huge plate of jamon iberico and an ensalada mixta – wondering if l can get a doggy bag. On the other hand I have all day so might as well order another beer!

Interestingly though, talking about regular bricks. it does seem that the natural building material here is clay bricks. They are a beautiful, warm pinkish red colour. Many of the older buildings have them whereas more modern constructs are concrete with a painted plaster covering.

It is getting hotter and I am struggling. I think the travel days have caught up with me. I decide to head to the station to see if I can get an earlier train.  Manzanares is a ghost town.  I have arrived on day 2 of the annual fiesta. Shops that normally close at 2 pm and reopen at 4pm will not open un til 6 pm. The population is holed up preparing to party tonight.
One more place to visit though,  since I am here.  The Parque de Poligono de Manzanares.  A bit tacky but I am too hot really to appreciate anything right now. Normally I would delight in the peacocks strutting around – well to be honest they’re not strutting, I think they’re too hot as well!  The feature of this park are the planets all laid out in order from the Sun to Pluto.  On a scale of 1/166.500 the sun has a diameter of 8.4m and the Earth 7.7cm.  It is quite fascinating but not in 38 degrees after travelling halfway round the world.
Off to the station, surely I’ll be able to change my ticket? Long story short, I couldn’t.  The guard must be having a really bad day – I’m trying to be charitable here… the train is practically empty, it is due to stop in only three places on the way,  he won’t let me on. I have to wait another two hours.  As he closes the doors on me, I plead with him.  Frustration wins and I hurl English abuse at an unhearing man and a disappearing train.  As the concerned couple in the station say when I explain what has happened, I should have just got on rather than being honest and asking.
Self pity is bearing down,  and I almost let it engulf me. I indulge in a few tears and then remember the bus station.  Maybe there is a bus!? Loathe to spend more money.  Maybe I can find a bar to sit in the cool until the train?  A walk back down the street answers that question – Manzanares is still shut!
Bus station,  bus in 10 minutes, yayy! I buy a ticket and head to the bar – yes, the bus station has a bar – and I get a beer. Standing at the counter I almost knock it back in a oner! So thirsty despite drinking loads of water.
Fell asleep in the bus about 10 minutes out of town,  wake up as bus pulls into Madrid!  Day done!  It was an adventure.