What a wonderful week stalking Bruce and enjoying my birthday! Mike and I left Wellington super early Thursday morning and Toby was left at home with his Nana. Our flight to Sydney was easy and we picked up the car with no issues at the other end (although the car rental woman took a while to warm up to her customer service job - but she got there in the end).
Drove out to pick up the house key from Scott's work and met Rachelle (who knows us well - or rather, our 20 years ago selves - as she had scanned all our old negatives for us). Went to Rouse Hill for a wander around and sushi for lunch.
Back to the house and settled in. I met Abby and Tyler at Abby's physio appointment and learned how to tape her ankle.
Friday was my birthday and Karen had the day off. We headed to Rouse Hill and saw Patriots Day. Great movie but hardly romantic birthday fare. It was full on - especially during the bomb scenes.
We had lunch afterwards at a tapas place and enjoyed some scrumptious food. Then Friday evening was spent at the athletic park to watch Tyler in javelin. Mike helped Scott as a parent volunteer. I saw them both narrowly avoid an errant javelin once - but Mike says they had to avoid two of them.
Saturday saw us have fun at the local Park Run. Scott and Mike both ran in it. I volunteered as a marshall along with Abby and her friend Bella. Mike did a stunning time of 35 minutes. What a great effort. Scott also did well with a better time from his last run. Mike is keen to find one here and join in when we have free weekends.
After that we headed off for Hunter Valley and the Bruce concert. After navigating Sydney freeways and arterial roads, we got to the general area and realised we'd need sunscreen. We stopped in a town called Cessnock, which was lovely, and found ourselves in 35C heat as we walked the main street.
The Hope Estate venue for the concert was fantastic. As we parked nice and early, Mike went to a wee unmarked tent in the car park to ask about taking food and water in. No on both counts. So we left everything in the car and headed up the driveway/road to the gates we could see in the distance. We saw the GA Front Standing queue and joined that. Slowly people left the queue in some mystifying way, and we ended up under the shade of the tent.
As we stood there, someone said we needed wristbands to enter. And that they were only given out in the unmarked car park tent. Nice. So, we left the queue and headed back down to the car park. Got two wristbands and came back. The queue then self managed as the wristbands had a number on them. We were 287 and 288.
We're standing in the hot sun, with no drink for quite a while now. 36C easily. But the queue manager suddenly shouts out that the lucky number is 231. Mike and I had no idea what that meant. But then the chap says "I am taking everyone from 231 to 309 in first. They won the lottery". We ended up being in the first 50 into the concert - well before anyone else. We got so close!
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| This close! This was Hunter Valley. |
Yep - that close! See? I could touch Bruce if I wanted to. That's my messy hair. And why is it so messy, you ask? Well, let me tell you what happened before Bruce came on. We had the extreme heat and no water issue to contend with. Mike and I did rather better than the people being treated by paramedics around us. Mike saw one woman wobbling like she was drunk - he suspects she was so close to heatstroke. We saw people getting wheeled out.
Then, after we watched Diesel perform, the management came on stage and told us a lightening storm was approaching and we needed to step back from the huge, tall metal structure which was the entire stage. Fortunately the crowd stepped back behind us and we all shuffled back 1.5m to stand on grass.
The rain then started - big, fat drops that got my jacket out pretty fast. Mike shared his picnic blanket with the two women next to us (we knew them for hours now) and they huddled under there. This was going ok, until the hailstones started. Big ones too. I got donked on the head a few times and heard a few "Ows" from people around me. I put Mike's backpack over my head and sheltered under that.
Once the hail stopped the rain really kicked in. It hosed down. Felt like I was standing under a wee waterfall. The man behind me under a huge tarp said "Excuse me - come and step back a few steps". So I did, and amazingly the rain slowed to a near stop. We were under a drain from the very top of the stage and all the water was funneling onto us four and no one else.
We got Mike's attention and him and the women all stepped out of the localised downpour.
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| Hi Bruce |
We were treated to an excellent Bruce concert once the rain cleared, Jet did their thing and the stars came out in the night sky. We even dried out - apart from my feet which stayed soaking wet the entire rest of the evening.
Got out at 10.45pm and it only took an hour to leave the car park. Got back to Sydney at 2am and eventually fell asleep.
Sunday was a lovely day with Scott's family at the Castle hill RSL to celebrate the Feb birthdays.
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| Iced coffee at the Castle Hill RSL. Under all that fake cream was a pretty good iced coffee. |
I re-wrapped Abby's ankles on Sunday night during a break in another full-on movie with bodies getting mutilated during WWII. What was that called? Hacksaw Ridge. It was pretty good, despite the harrowing visuals.
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| Dressed the same! |
Got up super early and said goodbye to Karen and Scott and headed to the airport. Made good time and we were in the departure lounge waiting to board our A380 Emirates flight to Christchurch with two hours to spare. We paid to get upgraded to business class as it was offered for fairly cheap to us via email. It was all on Mike's bucket list (the A380 part) so we decided to try it. The flat beds are fantastic. Very nice. They must fly fast because the flight to Chch seemed very short. I may have slept a lot and missed patches of the movie I watched.
In Chch we caught the local normal bus from the airport into the bus depot and walked the 900m to our hotel. Checked in and recovered from the early start and then walked around central Christchurch for the first time since the 2011 earthquakes (we had driven briefly through it late in 2011 - but it was an eye opener to see it by foot). The buildings are still needing demolition in many places but the rebuilds look great! Roads are still closed in places, but the city functions again now.
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| Looking at the place we first kissed! |
We went to have dinner at a Japanese place next to our hotel and a couple of women were reading the menu outside as we stopped to read it before entering. One turned to us to tell us about the good food they had just eaten there. And when the other one heard us talking, she turned around and gave me a hug! It was Issy from our Nepal trip! How cool is that?
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| Wall of masks |
I saw a wall of pictures of masks in a doorway for Toby to see. He loves masks. We slept well that first night and I went to work from the Chch office on Tuesday. Had an iced coffee at the local cafe.
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| Iced coffee at Passengers |
Got through the day and then Ubered to the Speights Ale house near the AMI stadium and met Sally and Mike for the concert.
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| Happy Bruce customers |
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| We are ready! |
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| Good location |
It was a great concert. Bruce was petitioned to come here after the earthquake and he finally made it. It was a good memorial on the eve of the deadly earthquake. We had a good spot, in the rear standing GA area. Lovely weather. Perfect evening. We walked to Hagley Park afterwards and got an uber back to our accommodation.
I stupidly read until 2am so my alarm at 5.45am was a rude shock. Got myself sorted and left Mike snoring as I Ubered to work. Got through a good day there and then Ubered with a colleague to the airport at 3.40pm. He got me into Koru (thanks Craig!) and I met Sally and Mike there. They had worked from Koru the whole day.
Caught an easy short flight home and loved seeing Toby (and the cat - note the order I place that in!!) and the house and garden were lovely and tidy after Mike's mother lent a big hand to us looking after Toby (and obviously our surroundings too!).
Back to routine today in Wellington, but tomorrow we're all off work/school and heading to Auckland for the last concert. Toby is catching the train up with Sally and Andrew, and Mike and I are driving the new car up. It's going to be huge!
Take care! Love you lots.
Love,
Angela
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