Wednesday, September 08, 2004
Busy busy busy
Hi all! We've been busy! Let's see, it's been a couple of weeks since we blogged, terrible terrible. Two weekends ago we hiked close to home. We headed up to Hope (which is where the new job is...but that's for later news) and found our way to a 1-1 1/2 hour hike to a place called Whispering Falls. It was a lovely day, although cold in the shaded parts and we wandered over a swing bridge and past the hideously clearcut hills, in amongst the stumps and woodshavings, to find the river. All along the river was beautiful and made us long for the hot days of Idaho August and the cool waters of the Selway and Lochsa. The water was crystal clear and burbling happily. When we reached the falls we found ourselves hiking through native bush and in fact hiking right up the falls. The water slithered all along the pathway and down the rock faces. We even found a limestone cave under some falls to poke our heads into. It was really cool.
We hiked up above the falls to the pools that they came from and then past those to a grassy meadow where we unpacked our leftover homemade pizza and had a delicious lunch. Then we hiked back out and headed home in time for a movie date with Alan and Shelly Trent.
Over at the Trent's we were meant to watch Jurassic Park III on their big giant screen with surround sound speakers. Unfortunately after we had the popcorn popped and the sprite poured we realized that the builders (thier house isn't finished and is in a slight state of constant chaos) had removed the front speakers to paint them the right shade of grey. Well without the speakers in front we could only hear the music and distant roaring of the dinosaurs because we couldn't turn off the surround sound. It was comical to us, but I think poor Alan was rather annoyed. We ended up watching anyway...with the subtitles on. Thank you Jeff Klein for giving us the idea. =+) It was a fun afternoon and surprisingly the movie wasn't terrible. Jurassic Park II was terrible, but Spielberg was back for the third one.
So then we had another partial week of pruning even though we'd been told otherwise and we'd spent the whole weekend celebrating the end of our pruning days. It wasn't too bad, as most of us were burnt out and so we spent the week being extremely goofy. Fran and I sang and laughed uproariously at ourselves and Mike rolled his eyes and claimed we were on crack, but secretly he enjoyed our shananigans just as much as we did. The last couple of days we did work on frost protection and made some headway for the others who would take over from us because Friday was our last day out at the kiwi orchard. It was a hard farewell to our friends there.
Over this past weekend, we went with a large group of families and friends to a camp in Curious Cove out in the Marlborough Sounds. It was a community thing, where basically a bunch of friends rented out a summer church camp and just spent the weekend togther away from home.
Karen, Pete, Safari, and Indigo were there. So was Jeanette. And Claire and Dean (from kayaking) and Shelly and her two kids Wes and Alicia, and a couple of other people we had met before. And even more that we got to meet out there. Included in the whole group were about 35 kids running amok and having a blast being free and having many others their own age to play with. I swear all 30 of them were either 2 or 6-8. SO it was fun...we also did adult things like hike STRAIGHT up a mountain for an hour and half...to that distant rock at the top...
OK, ok, Mike had to keep up with Karen who is a little psycho and they did it in a hour flat, but us mortals kept to a normal pace...and enjoyed the view just as much as they did.
Pete and Mike were the crazies on the way back down and made it in just 28 minutes. My new downhill buddy, Michelle, and I made it in 58 minutes thank you very much. Ech, I much prefer uphill to downhill, especially when it's slippery! We also played lots of Phase 10 and other games like Commissar and trivia quizzes.
The food was all cooked for us and all the dishes done the whole weekend. We slept in cabins and got to unwrinkle our sleeping bags for a few days. There were kayaks and rope swings and zip lines and ponies and semi-tame deer to pet. Wild pigs to chase and jellyfish to peer at from the dock. Walks out to the beach at the point:
And more. Plenty of things to keep everyone busy and happy. And right from the ferry ride on Friday night, Mike had some competition, heh heh. Within minutes he was flirting madly with me and my heart was his. His name is Max and I'm in love...look at that hair and those big brown eyes in that serious little face. (And when he grins he has dimples, how could I resist???)
So the weekend was a huge success and we really felt like we'd been away longer than a day and a half so it was like we got a bonus weekend. On the way home our little caravan of cars was down to just ours and so Mike, Jeanette, and I stopped over at a winery to sample the lovely bouquets. The rain started just on the way home and followed us back to Tasman where we had a quick nibble for dinner and headed to bed. Sadly since then, starting with Jeanette we've all been fighting a minor coldy type thing but after being with that many kids what did we expect. =+) The spring weather we've enjoyed all week has made up for it though and we are thoroughly enjoying it. Mike and I are still having difficulties with the mental aspect of flipping seasons. As much as we are enjoying the spring weather and eager to have the temperatures rise, the words "October" and "November" just don't conjure up springy, warm, flowery, sunny images. It should be Halloweeny and dark and cool and appley! But what can you do? =+)
We hiked up above the falls to the pools that they came from and then past those to a grassy meadow where we unpacked our leftover homemade pizza and had a delicious lunch. Then we hiked back out and headed home in time for a movie date with Alan and Shelly Trent.
Over at the Trent's we were meant to watch Jurassic Park III on their big giant screen with surround sound speakers. Unfortunately after we had the popcorn popped and the sprite poured we realized that the builders (thier house isn't finished and is in a slight state of constant chaos) had removed the front speakers to paint them the right shade of grey. Well without the speakers in front we could only hear the music and distant roaring of the dinosaurs because we couldn't turn off the surround sound. It was comical to us, but I think poor Alan was rather annoyed. We ended up watching anyway...with the subtitles on. Thank you Jeff Klein for giving us the idea. =+) It was a fun afternoon and surprisingly the movie wasn't terrible. Jurassic Park II was terrible, but Spielberg was back for the third one.
So then we had another partial week of pruning even though we'd been told otherwise and we'd spent the whole weekend celebrating the end of our pruning days. It wasn't too bad, as most of us were burnt out and so we spent the week being extremely goofy. Fran and I sang and laughed uproariously at ourselves and Mike rolled his eyes and claimed we were on crack, but secretly he enjoyed our shananigans just as much as we did. The last couple of days we did work on frost protection and made some headway for the others who would take over from us because Friday was our last day out at the kiwi orchard. It was a hard farewell to our friends there.
Over this past weekend, we went with a large group of families and friends to a camp in Curious Cove out in the Marlborough Sounds. It was a community thing, where basically a bunch of friends rented out a summer church camp and just spent the weekend togther away from home.
Karen, Pete, Safari, and Indigo were there. So was Jeanette. And Claire and Dean (from kayaking) and Shelly and her two kids Wes and Alicia, and a couple of other people we had met before. And even more that we got to meet out there. Included in the whole group were about 35 kids running amok and having a blast being free and having many others their own age to play with. I swear all 30 of them were either 2 or 6-8. SO it was fun...we also did adult things like hike STRAIGHT up a mountain for an hour and half...to that distant rock at the top...
OK, ok, Mike had to keep up with Karen who is a little psycho and they did it in a hour flat, but us mortals kept to a normal pace...and enjoyed the view just as much as they did.
Pete and Mike were the crazies on the way back down and made it in just 28 minutes. My new downhill buddy, Michelle, and I made it in 58 minutes thank you very much. Ech, I much prefer uphill to downhill, especially when it's slippery! We also played lots of Phase 10 and other games like Commissar and trivia quizzes.
The food was all cooked for us and all the dishes done the whole weekend. We slept in cabins and got to unwrinkle our sleeping bags for a few days. There were kayaks and rope swings and zip lines and ponies and semi-tame deer to pet. Wild pigs to chase and jellyfish to peer at from the dock. Walks out to the beach at the point:
And more. Plenty of things to keep everyone busy and happy. And right from the ferry ride on Friday night, Mike had some competition, heh heh. Within minutes he was flirting madly with me and my heart was his. His name is Max and I'm in love...look at that hair and those big brown eyes in that serious little face. (And when he grins he has dimples, how could I resist???)
So the weekend was a huge success and we really felt like we'd been away longer than a day and a half so it was like we got a bonus weekend. On the way home our little caravan of cars was down to just ours and so Mike, Jeanette, and I stopped over at a winery to sample the lovely bouquets. The rain started just on the way home and followed us back to Tasman where we had a quick nibble for dinner and headed to bed. Sadly since then, starting with Jeanette we've all been fighting a minor coldy type thing but after being with that many kids what did we expect. =+) The spring weather we've enjoyed all week has made up for it though and we are thoroughly enjoying it. Mike and I are still having difficulties with the mental aspect of flipping seasons. As much as we are enjoying the spring weather and eager to have the temperatures rise, the words "October" and "November" just don't conjure up springy, warm, flowery, sunny images. It should be Halloweeny and dark and cool and appley! But what can you do? =+)
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