For easter weekend, we decided to go for a roadtrip to North Wales. We had been told to expect castles, mountains and rain. We didn’t climb any mountains but weren’t disappointed on the other points. The castles were amazing and it rained most of the time we were there. But first we had to get to Wales. We convinced a couple of Rob’s friends from NZ (M&M) to join us on our wee adventure. First adventure stop was the town [...]

A few weekends ago we decided to go for a road trip out to Suffolk to have a look around. Primarily to see Bury St Edmunds, the Greene King Brewery and a small town called Lavenham. When wandering through Bury, the walkway went through a derelict cemetery.. I still don’t understand how they treat cemetery’s like they do. Bury St Edmunds is a lovely old town with quite a bit of history. Below I am standing outside one of the old Abbey gates. It is host [...]

We were in NZ for a month, all up. It was brilliant seeing all our friends and family. What was not brilliant was some of the worst Christmas/New Years weather we’ve ever had. But at least, socially, everything was great. We got to catchup with all our friends at parties, weddings and baches. The Bilkeys were in top form, as usual. We saw various parts of the Mountain whanau at Mum’s, or the zoo, or up north. All the little [...]

One Tree Hill is an icon in Auckland’s landscape – the largest volcano on the skyline with a tall monument at the top. It’s surrounded by a great park, Cornwall Park, and is a nice place to walk dogs. So that’s what we did. The hill used to have one tree at the peak, but due to a chainsaw attack, the old pine tree that was there died. So now it’s nicknamed ‘None Tree Hill’. The local iwi don’t want [...]

When we got back to Auckland, we had a few days to spend time with our families. One of our days was spent at Auckland Zoo, which has developed quite a bit since we last went a few years ago. We went with Mum, Matta and my younger cousins Emere, Hana T and Takimoana. The kids must’ve played on every playground in the whole zoo as we wandered around. We loved the new tiger enclosure. There’s a pool right next [...]