Backyard Hiking

Something I've been meaning to do for a while is explore the hillside boarding Thorndon (my neighborhood) on the northwest. This is the same network of hills circling central Wellington that I wandered through while staying with Carsten and Sarah. Between weather and other distractions, I just haven't gotten around to checking out that part of my neighborhood (when Sam was here he was rather incredulous I hadn't explored my what is essentially my own backyard).

So, this past Sunday, after sleeping in (necessary after a late-night celebration of the All Blacks thumping Australia to retain the Bledisoe and Tri-Nations cups), I went for a little hike. What's great about these particular hills, is they don't waste any time - within 20 min I had some fantastic views of the city and the harbor.


I've mentioned this before, but it is striking how quickly city turns into wilderness here in Wellington - after hiking to the top with rock music blaring from my Ipod, I turned the music off on the descent and could hear nothing but the trees (giant trees mind you) creaking in the wind. I still see the city through the trees, but was completely isolated otherwise. In addition to the view, the wildlife is intriguing - I've found that on the whole, plants don't look that much different down here from back home. But, if you actually look closely, many are totally unfamiliar (example - giant ferns!). I imagine there will be many more impromptu walks through these hills before I leave.



This week will be some more adventures in New Zealand sport... Tuesday night I am going with Aaron to see the National Basketball team take on Venezuela. They call the national team the "Tall Blacks". Seriously... too funny (many NZ national team names derive from All Blacks, but this is by far the best). The team stars include Kirk Penny (of Wisconsin Badger fame when I was in college) and Craig Bradshaw (played for Winthrop in the last couple NCAA tourneys). Aaron used to play with a couple of the Tall Blacks in HS, so he'll be a wealth of information at the game. Also, on Friday the national rugby competition (Air New Zealand Cup) starts, which includes teams from most of the major NZ cities, as well as some of the less populous regions. There is a big international film festival in Wellington this week too - I may try to catch a couple of films before the week is out.

For my tailgating breathren, we did some grilling this weekend before the Rugby. My flatmate picked up his propane tank recently, so the grill on the front porch is now operable. We didn't go all out, but I cooked Lamb Bratwurst, which I give two thumbs up (next I'll try Ostrich). During the Air NZ Cup, I think it's likely that the tailgating will come out full force. By the way, the words "tailgating" and "grilling" don't work in NZ - it's barbequing (every time I say the word "grill" at work, Ian - one of the Kiwis on our team - makes fun of me).

I'll sign off with an ACC fun fact that I recently learned: in the last three months, the most common concern received by 0800-Poison (NZ's version of poison control) was for ingesting dish-soap.