The weekend with glamping and trapping

Hi,

This long weekend post has all the content to keep my 4 readers happy. Cats, rats and iced coffees. Hahah. 

In some great news, Toby passed his drivers licence test on Thursday! Woot! My clever wee man. And... it turns out he now has covid. He tested positive on Saturday morning. So we have sent him a care package. Poor wee man. Ups and downs.

Mike and I were up early on Friday morning to head up the coast to Paraparaumu. We raced out of the house without brekkie so it was lucky Transmission Gully made up time and we stopped in at a café.

It was super lucky because it turns out we should have had lunch with us for this first day. Fortunately the delicious brekkie at the Marine café kept us going to nibble time at the lodge.

But wait. What is it we are doing, I hear you ask. Well, this was my Christmas present (or was it birthday?) from about 1.5 years back. But we had to keep pushing it out for some reason or other. But finally - this was the weekend! Yes, an overnight glamping stay on Kapiti Island. And before I get lost in the memory of it all and forget to say - everyone should go and do this if they get a chance. What a superb weekend of manu and kai. Obvs not eating the manu. They were separate!

Marine café

From the café we went 1 min up the road and parked and headed over to biosecurity at Kāpiti Island Nature Tours. They went through our gear and told us we could not put our packs down on the ground until we got on the boat. 8.45am departure. We got our ticket for the boat - and realised we had half a day at the usual visitor centre before heading to the northern part at 2.45pm. Oohhhh. See. Lucky we had that big brekkie.

Landing on Kapiti

The boat was full of people eager to explore the island. And it turns out of the 25 or so onboard, about 14 were overnight visitors. 

We walked to the visitor's shelter and heard a talk from Dave, our DOC guide. It was great - good history and conservation info. Then around 9.45am we got to explore. The Trig Track is now uphill only and labelled as strenuous and steep. So off we went. And we were the only punters to tackle it.

View south

Historic whare

Up Trig Track

We stopped about halfway up when I heard a kōkako in the distance. Wow - what a lovely sound. I long for the day when we hear that in the bush. Imagine if we find some in the south motu? They have been extinct there for a while now. But I would love to hear that once more in the southern bush.

View from the trig

View north

Windy - but warm

We got to the top and found only one person - who left almost immediately. We had the place to ourselves for about 15 mins.

Hi Mike

Signs of more recent history

Short Mike

Then back down the hill, stopping at the freshly topped up hihi feeder to watch those wee manu feeding there. We relaxed on the beach for a while before watching the takehē strut around. Then on the 2.45pm boat for 5 mins to the northern landing.

Relaxing on the beach

Takehe

Manaki met us off the boat and took us to the lodge. We were welcomed and had some introductions to the way things would run before taking our gear to our tent.

Our glamping tent

Wow!

We were in the furthest tent. What an amazing idea. Huge canvas tent with a ply wood floor, a deck with chairs and a lovely big bed with lots of duvets. I was going to look forward to snuggling in there later.

Walking to the lodge

Dining room

Mike and I hung around the lodge reading until nibbles came out at 5.30pm and we launched ourselves at them. Okay - I did.

Nibbles

Another view

Dinner was around 6.30pm and was roast lamb, with roast veggies and other delicious food, followed by pudding. Mmmm.

8.30pm saw us split up into two groups. We went with Kiana and she took us around the back of the lodge, by our tents, to spot kiwi. She had a red torch. But the moon was out and we could see well enough. We saw two kiwi really well. And a gecko. 

Turns out the other group saw none! So we really got lucky there.

Then off to bed. And it was as amazing as I envisaged. The sounds of the night all around us. We did get woken up at 3am to hear a kiwi screeching right outside our tent - and then snuffling around us. It must have given Mike dreams - he dreamed Toby did not pass his licence because he failed to do a screech test. Hahahah. I was so confused when Mike told me because I missed the part where it was a dream.

We wake up in the tent

Morning view

We got dressed and headed in for brekkie. Very nice scrambled eggs. We packed up our tent and dropped the bags off in the room to get picked up for the boat at 2.45pm.

Brekkie

Walk to the top of the northern part

Here we go

Then Mike and I spent 3 hours exploring the trails up this end of the motu. Not as many birds - but heaps of water fowl with the freshwater lagoon.

Lagoon

Lookout

Above the lagoon

Colours of the moana

Boy meets buoy

Boy picks up buoy

Back to the lodge for a huge lunch, then a short walk before we visited the gallery and Iona's weaving teacher, Adrienne. She lives on the island. She is such a great artist. Her work is mighty fine. She showed us her PhD work too.

Then onto the boat and over to the mainland. Mike went for a run at Queen Elizabeth park while I read a book. Then home to bed.

Sunday saw us up early for trapline day. Callan got dropped at our house at 8am by Stacey. Then we picked up Andrew and the grubber and headed to Sunny Grove.

We all did Sunny Grove traps while Andrew grubbed our the drainage channels on the track. Got a few rats there. Then we split up and Andrew and I did KAT ("Kiwi Access Track") line. And out of the 6 traps, we had 4 kills. One including a stoat! That is the 3rd stoat in this area Andrew has seen in recent months. 

A stoat on KAT!

Mike and Callan also got a lot. 6 out of the 11 traps had rats on the Upper Turere Stream! Andrew and I headed up to the old track from the end of KAT and he went back to the scene of our trap replacement the week before to pick up the fadge we left behind.

Then we grubbed out the channels Andrew did not do on our way down. One was a huge effort - right below the clay bomber section. It was so buried. Hahah.

Channel clearing

Andrew and his fadge get stuck

We got to the car about 20 mins before Callan and Mike. 3pm we headed away to drop Andrew back home then Callan.

Home to have a light tea (leftover wraps), hose down our soggy muddy tramping gear, and watch YouTube with the cats seeking warmth.

Smudge draped over me

Moxley draped over the laptop

Off to bed early. Up for gym for Mike and a bike ride to work for me. Big day at work. Then I will ride home and pack for my long weekend and tidy the house for Jase and Chelsea.

Have an awesome day and enjoy the week ahead.

Love,

Angela

The weekend with my mother getting her hip done and a lot of bike riding for me

 Hi,

I am a bit in tenterhooks with my mother getting her second hip done on Friday. Dad is updating us all - but I am super antsy about it all and would love to be over there. She developed a cough or something because Dad said she got x rays and they thought it was pneumonia at some point over the weekend. But - no! Thank goodness. Last we heard, she might be sent home today (Monday). And I think Shona is due up there soon.

Anyway, I had a perfect distraction on Friday as I headed out to the airport to meet Col at 7am. We had brekkie there - Ugly Bagel and a very nice iced latte. Col was catching the 2pm bus to PN for a long weekend to catch up with mates visiting from overseas. But I wish I had known her plans - I would have loved to drive her up to PN. But I already had plans and she had a bus ticket!

Hey there!

Giant eagle eyes off my iced latte from Ugly Bagels

I left Col at the airport with her route to the bus stop plotted out so she knew where to go. She was going to get more coffee and hunker down to watch planes arriving and read her book.

I got home - after a traffic snarl through town - and changed to head out on my bike for a wee bike ride. I did eat some of the grapes from the wine in Blenheim that Col had brought up with her. Delicious.

I got home grown grapes from Col!

I parked at the beach at the US Marines Memorial and rode up to Paraparaumu to visit with Jill from work. She was working from home. We shared a V and I met the two dogs she was dogsitting. Two black pups about 6 months old. Labradoodle types. Big boys. Like Ramble. But black.

Then back on my bike to ride back to the car. On the downhill stretch at the southern end of Paraparaumu - just before Poplar Ave - I felt something tickling my chest. I flicked a hand up to my necklace, thinking (okay - hoping) it was that. But no. Felt SOMETHING crawl down my t-shirt.

I slammed to a halt, and hauled my t shirt away from my body and peered down the neck of it. And to my horror of horrors I saw a giant (in my mind now it was the size of 3 wasps) wasp nestled in my cleavage.

A lot of panic ensued. Mainly manifested with silent screams of terror, a lot of jiggling and some punching towards my chest area. This continued for some time. The wasp did not enjoy this. But eventually I gathered enough courage to take another look down there. No sign of the wasp. 

I started riding again. My chest hurt a bit. I would continue until the toilets located where I had parked the car. My imagination told me there was a veritable nest of wasps in my t shirt but my rational brain did override that.

My face after a wasp stung me inside my t-shirt!

Got to the car and ran to the toilet and threw off my clothes. No sign of a wasp. But my chest was red and as it turned out over the next few days, very bruised.

Seems like the wasp went to town stinging me and I went to town punching my chest to kill it. No idea what happened to the wasp - never saw its dead body. But I punch like Tayla Harris (great AFL player in Aus - who also happens to box like a champ too!) if my bruises are any indication.

Bike and car

Anyway - back home and cooked tea. Sausage casserole. We ate outside in lovely evening conditions.

Dinner on the deck.

Snuggles under the duvet with me

Up Saturday to get ready for another bike ride. Met Sally and Andrew close to 11.30am at the same place as yesterday.

We all rode up the cycleway next to the expressway and had a stop at the same bakery at Waikanae as always.

Waikanae bakery iced latte goodness

Riding on the beach was a hoot

We got up as far as 4.8km south of Te Horo before the closed bike track stopped us. We backtracked a tiny bit then headed to the beach at Peka Peka. 

Andrew and I decided to ride south along the beach. Sally and Mike headed back to the cafe at Harrisons and then along the cycle path back to meet us later.

Sally captured Mike looking amazing

Sally snaps me riding across a road crossing

Riding along the beach was great on my eBike. Andrew found it much harder on his pedal powered bike. But he has legs of steel. We saw some nudists out enjoying the sunshine - I hope they used a lot of sunscreen.

Andrew and I ended up at Waikanae beach where we had an affogato flavoured iced cream cone. Then back to the trail and met Sally and Mike on the south side of the river at the expressway.

Mike with stripey sunburn

Getting the new security cameras sorted

Mike ended up with stripes on his head from sun getting through his slotted helmet. He looks like that villain in the rebooted Star Wars films. Darth Maul. Without horns.

Back to Sally and Andrew's place for tea and cleaning the bikes. Watched Everything everywhere all at once. We all enjoyed it. It was funny and serious.

Back home and to bed. Up Sunday to a lazy day. Mike wanted to get the hot water timer sorted. In the end we went to Briscoes and to see if we can replace our broken tongs. And we got better spatulas. Mike tried to get a casing for the new HWC timer but the mega centre did not have the depth we needed.

As we drove around, Mike heard cicadas in the back of the car. And as I type here at home, I can hear them in the bathroom. Moxley loves catching them and bringing them to us. I don't think they are really everywhere. But we hear a similar frequency and we get convinced.

We ended up at Sally and Andrew's place again - and stayed for tea. Back home and a wee bit of running around before bed.

Up to windy weather and rain looks likely.

Hope your week is ok. Enjoy whatever comes your way. I hope my mother is well enough to go home and she gets better.

Love,

Angela

The weekend jam packed with things

Hi,

What a manic weekend!  Hahahah.

Friday iced latte!  With awesome rainbow background.

 I did get an iced latte on Friday with Andrew.  Heard about his day trip planned for Sunday to tackle that last spot height in the area over in the Wairarapa somewhere.  (Hint:  he did do it on Sunday - easily).

Saturday saw me and Mike at Quentin's abs workout at 10.30am.  Ahhh - yes.  My abs have been tender all weekend since then.  Hayden came along - and it is always so good to see him.

Smudge enjoying the sunny weekend

 We went to visit Phillipa's studio after that - saw her working space and her sister's exhibition.  Met Dean too. 

Wandered off to Joe's Garage for some lunch and an iced coffee.  Oh - I was disappointed in it.  :-(  Joe's has definitely lost its iced coffee crown.

Joe's Garage iced coffee

Mike caught the train  to Upper Hutt and a Brew festival.  I chilled with Toby, reading and tickling before I headed out to pick up Andrew and Celia for quiz night.

It was at the Petone Working Man's Club - and we got a dinner beforehand.  Vege stack for me and Andrew.  Roast pork dinner for Celia.  Her friend Navi (hope I spelled that right) joined us - she had a deluxe chicken burger.  So cheap!

Up to get a table for the quiz.  Joined by two more Angelas (Ange and another woman that I may have met once - identified as "Angela H with the PhD in something related to animals").  And we owned the night.  Well, ok.  Not quite.  But we came second!  By one point!

Oosshh!

Won some wine. 

It went late.  As quizzes are known to do.  Dropped Celia and Andrew off at 10.45pm and it was past 11pm by the time I got to Upper Hutt.  Went through a breath test stop and found the venue where Mike had enjoyed a Bruce Springsteen tribute band.

Picked him, Lee and Gabe up and dropped them both home before heading back to Wellington.

Iona's, Col's and my feet - in the Kapiti Coast warm sear

Iona wading

Stunning day!

Up Sunday to chill before driving with Toby up to Paekakariki for a coffee with Iona and Col.  Walked along the beach with a quencher (yum - something local and very yummy), chatting away.

Headed back, dropped off Toby, picked up Mike and went to Sally and Andrew's house for family tea.  So good to see everyone.  Anthony was telling me all about his Japan trip and uni.

Back home to fall into bed!  While we walked from the car to the house, we were admiring the still, clear night and wondering where Sally got her weather forecast for rain and gale winds from for tomorrow.  Woke at 10pm to hear heavy rain and the wind picking up!  OMG.  We live somewhere crazy.

Up early for the PT session.  Noodle arms again now.

Wet outside.  Gale winds.  Who knew?  Oh - Sally knew!

Have a great week!  Shona is here on Thursday (with Frank and Michael) and staying through to Monday.  Hope the weather picks up!

Love,
Angela