A couple of days ago we were hanging out in our room when, like turning on the light, the whole room was bathed in a very bright orange glow. Either we had just been tango'd, or there was a mean sunset to check out from the bathroom window. The red and orange colours are caused by Rayleigh scattering, the same mechanism that causes the sky to be blue. As light travels through the atmosphere, some of it is scattered at large angles by small particles. This type of...

The next weekend Kat, Shani, Aaron, me and Aaron decided to drive back South again and visit the Tongariro National park, to walk the famous Tongariro crossing and climb Mount Ngauruhoe. If you speak English you pronounce it: Nara-ho-ee. If you fancy the Māori way try: Ngah-oo-roo-haw-eh. Ngauruhoe is the youngest vent and highest peak in the Tongariro volcanic complex and first erupted about 2,500 years ago. It lies between the active volcanoes of Mount To...

March was a 'sweet as' month, with a blue sky, a warm breeze and a comfortable temperature. To celebrate Kat's twenty seventh year on this world, Kat and I, Shani, Aaron, Alan and Aaron drove down to Lake Taupo for a weekend break so Kat could jump out of an airplane. Totally un-planned, I ended up playing with the video recorder function on our digital camera and filmed most of the event. So with the help of windows movie maker and a quiet 8 hour spell at work I...

February in New Zealand was the "hottest month" and was dominated by hot sunny days and random heavy showers over Auckland. The sports news became dominated with the arrival of the barmy army (the English cricked supporter's) and the England cricket team, for a six week tour, to play local teams and the kiwi national team, the Black Caps. Eden Park is New Zealand largest sports stadium, and England was playing an evening 20/20 game against the black caps s...

OK, so apologies its now mid March and there has been no blog news. Lets play a little catch up with our January news. Our original plan was to leave New Zealand after Christmas but we are chuffed we decided to stay for the southern hemisphere summer as it has been muchos muchos fun. If you ever visit New Zealand make sure it's during their summer time. Lets start with the classic English conversation starter and mention the weather. To give an idea of ...