Taupo Interlude

We have been traveling a lot lately with friends and family and it has been wonderful and can be a little draining all at once. We recently took an afternoon just the four of us to go down to the lake so Tom could do some work on music and the rest of us could play a little bit. All the traveling and sightseeing can make one forget how beautiful the place 5 minutes down the road is. Then we're reminded and feel very lucky.

Here's Tom, really getting some serious work done. 

Jasper - quickly at one with the lake.

Aidan's a bit more circumspect

Hols in Brisbane

We were very lucky to be able to spend Christmas with lots of extended family in Brisbane.  My parents and our family of four stayed with my cousin, her husband and their two girls. We got to spend lots of quality time together and had a really wonderful visit experiencing our first summertime Christmas.

There were lots of fun bits, including special morning walks - quite early as often the daily temperatures rose higher than 100 degrees. During our walks around the neighborhood we saw lots of birds and lots of plant life that we just don't have where we live. One of my favorites was the mimosa plant, that closes its leaves when you touch them. I also got to see sugar cane, banana trees, and pomegranates.

Our boys loved playing with their new cousins. They were in the pool almost every day. They played lots of games on their iPads together. By the end of our visit, they were organizing performances for all the adults. Yes, the quality of these performances was likely exactly what you might imagine it to have been. The grandparents loved them anyway.

Below, a few photos from our adventures down under, captioned by Jasper:

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This is a picture of the Gold Coast. We called it "Gold Coust" because my daddy had a hat with "Gold Coust" written on it. (It was a tourist hat)

This is my dad when he's just finished fishing. He left the house at 2 o'clock in the morning. He was not very happy. You know my dad likes to sleep in.

They caught an octopus. Here it is in what looks like a plastic nest. My uncle Fred took it home and ate it!

This is us feeding kangaroos. After we were done feeding, we had kangaroo saliva all over our hands. We are at the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary, but it's not all koalas.

They had photos on the wall of famous people who had visited.

This is a picture of a mama and joey kangaroo. This is the only one we could find that was holding a joey.

Here's a koala, in case you were wondering why it was called a koala sanctuary.

Here is my Uncle Fred holding his pizza with a bird on his shoulder hungrily staring at it. Eventually he had three birds. Some on his shoulder and some on his arms.

This is the very rickety bridge that my Popo did not want to go on, but she had to. You can see my cousin behind me. For me, it was not scary.

Back to National Park with Viggy and Meera

Hi-ho, Tom here.  We had a great visit with our two friends from the Garden State, Viggy and Meera!  Of course, what could we do but take them to National Park - you can see those mountains from our house and they draw you to them inexorably.  Better to give in and just go stand before them.

Here are Meera, Viggy, me, and a threatening Aidan:

We hiked the Taranaki Falls walk, a two-hour walk that we made three and a half hours due to many stops.  It is a spectacular hike with amazing scenery at the base of Ruapehu.  The views of Ngauruhoe (aka Mount Doom) are great, too.  Here is Jasper, perched on a little rock near the trail:

We stopped for snacks - super-special cocoa and mint Rice Krispie treats supplied by Meera.  I am undoubtedly dispensing essential fatherly wisdom.

Meera and Viggy are pondering my wisdom, certainly.  I am not sure if Viggy's hand leaped to cover his mouth as he realized the depth of my insight or if he is politely stifling a chortle.  I expect the former.

We made it to the top of the falls.  Here is Meera, relaxing beside the stream that plunges over the falls just off the bottom of this picture.

Here is Aidan pretending to slide into the stream.  This isn't as dangerous as it seems in this photo, I swear.

More wisdom, this time about the stream, likely.

Jasper and Meera, happy:

You can't really get enough of Taranaki Falls.  It is a beautiful plunge in a beautiful setting.  Here is one of about a thousand photos we've taken of the falls:

Jasper, displaying the muscles he is building through the steady consumption of cocoa Rice Krispie treats.

Mount Doom, always awesome, always threatening to unleash an unstoppable evil across the globe.  Don't look at it too long - it will look back and then you will clutch at the ring hanging around your neck and wince in pain with your incredibly soulful blue eyes.

Aidan, pondering the ancient evil:

Evelyn, trying in vain to comfort Jasper in the face of implacable evil:

I have to admit, my heart skipped a beat when he leaned over like this at the edge of this chasm, but that didn't stop me from taking a quick picture before spiriting him away from the edge.  It isn't as dangerous as it looks, I swear.

That's Evelyn and the boys down there.

A bunch of Lord of the Rings scenes were filmed in the park.  This falls and pool were used as the Forbidden Pool that hides the entrance to Faramir's secret lair.  Remember Gollum singing his silly fish song and Frodo saving him from being shot by Faramir's archers in the moonlight?  Surely, you do.  Admit it.  Or watch the movies again, for God's sake.  Why don't you have them memorized?

Here is a funny group shot.  Jasper nailed it.

I'll close with a portrait of Ruapehu.  That's an awesome mountain.  I could look at it all day.  Standing in its shadow makes you understand why early people considered mountains gods.  The Maori don't stand on top of mountains because it is disrespectful and disturbs the sacredness of the place.  I get that when I am looking at Ruapehu.

The Destruction of a Trout

Hello, Tom here.  One of Evelyn's colleagues very kindly gave us a venison steak and a trout.  We haven't cooked the venison yet (it is waiting for us in our freezer), but we decided to make the trout right away.  Unfortunately, this one wasn't fully prepared for us like the last one we'd been gifted.  The fisherman had chopped off the head and tail and then ripped the guts out, but that was about the state of it when we got it.

I am no fish expert, so I did what you do when faced with a task you don't know how to accomplish: I watched YouTube videos.  Funny, all the professional chefs demonstrating how to prepare a trout were cutting up tiny little trouts, nothing like the monster I had on my counter top.  So, I did my best to supersize their instructions.  Here is the beast:

Here it is after I spent some time with a knife trying to destroy it and make it completely inedible.  I nearly succeeded:

Here are the rib bones I removed and the spine I tore out:

At some point, I gave up trying to remove anymore bones and I put it in a pan with oil and garlic.  Here it is, looking unpleasant:

In the end, it was actually delicious and the remaining bones weren't a problem.  Shows what I know.  Here are two big pieces, ready for distribution to the family for dinner:

As consolation for all those gross fish pictures, here is a cool sunset photo.  Ruapehu is in there with snow on top - look closely for it.

National Park with the Chus

Hello, Tom here.  Evelyn's parents came to visit us and we took a trip down to National Park where the volcanoes are.  We stopped, as we often do, at the best cafe on SH1, Licorice Cafe, for some delicious coffee and a meat pie for Aidan.  We also made a stop in Turangi so that Evelyn could show her folks the clinic where she works.  Aidan would have eaten a second meat pie there if we'd let him, but we draw the line at third breakfasts.

Here is a cool view of Tongariro, the old man volcano, seen across Rotoaira.  You can see a puff of cloud where the volcano is pretty much always venting.

Jasper is conserving energy because he worried we are taking him on a long hike later.

When we arrived at Ruapehu, we headed up to Whakapapa, the ski resort.  This is a shot of Happy Valley where we skied back in winter with the boys.  Now there is no snow, so you can see the bare mountainside.  See the poles for the ski lift?

The main lift had just reopened that day for the summer, so we rode to the cafe up on the side of the mountain.  This is a view from the chairlift.  That waterfall wasn't there in the winter.

Here are the Pinnacles.  You might remember them from the photos from a previous blog entry.  I skied at the base of them in winter.

The boys enjoyed it, though it was very cold at the top.

Here is the view back down the mountain.

There are no good photos of all of us, but here is the best we have of our little crew, eating lunch at the cafe.  You can see the bottle of L&P on the table ("World Famous in New Zealand!"), Aidan spooning his hot chocolate, and Jasper hiding.

We wanted to go for a hike at the top, but the conditions weren't yet really hike-ready.  There was still a lot of snow on the trail, so we didn't get very far.  Here is Jasper, checking it out.

Here is Evelyn, making her way across the snow.

Another awesome view of the Pinnacles:

Evelyn and Jasper dancing at the base of the Pinnacles:

Aidan, scaling them:

The dude at the bottom of the lift offered to take our picture.  The picture is a bit blurry, but here we all are with Mount Doom in the background:

Cool photo of Mount Doom:

So, you might have been thinking, "Man, Tom, that landscape looks harsh and desolate.  It could almost stand in for the area around Mordor.  Are you sure that area wasn't featured in the Lord of the Rings films?"  Well, I've got this to tell you - you are right!  The opening scenes of The Two Towers were filmed here.  Remember the capture of Gollum?  Check out the photo below!  That crazy rocky outcropping is called Mead's Wall.

Gollum was caught right there.  There's naught left in him but lies and deceit, but I have to believe he can come back.  That area is covered in very strange rock formations.  Here is another cool one:

Evelyn in front of another one:

This one looks like it could get up and start talking like the Rockbiter in Neverending Story any second now:

This place is about a ten minute walk from the ski area, but is perched over a deep crevasse and is fairly dangerous.  You can see it behind me here.

This is the dramatic front of Mead's Wall.  It is huge.  Frodo and Sam stood here.

Maybe we can just smash this ring with a hammer.  Not sure it needs to be carried all the way to Mordor.

The National Park is great in summer and looks completely different than it did in winter.  We'll have more in a future blog post.  I can't wait to do the Tongariro Crossing in February!