A unique hole in the ground at a park.

The Lake at Rotorua from the Gondolas.

The Mount Beach from the top of Mount Maunganui.

New Zealand's National Icon.

The view from Mount Maunganui point.

The Mount Beach.

The view of Mount Maunganui from Pam and Graeme's Deck.

The view from the Sky Tower.

Natarsha and I at Waiheke Island.

The view of Auckland from Rob and Heather's house on Waiheke Island.

12d Conference in Brisbane

On the 23rd to the 26th of July I attended a 12d Conference in Brisbane. Not much to say on this event but I had a great time, learnt plenty, enjoyed Brisbane and am looking forward to next year's Conference.

The view of Brisbane City and the River from my Hotel Room.

One of Brisbane's Bridges at night.

The same Brisbane bridge but in some daylight.

The Goldcoast Trip

Now after returning from Western Australia on Sunday the 29th of May, I flew to Wellington to train up some new users in Lower Hutt. I flew down on Tuesday the 31st of May and returned 9pm Wednesday, the pain was, that I had to be back at the airport at 4.30am the next day to fly to the Queensland. After my 4 hours sleep I was back at the airport flying to Brisbane to catch up with two mates from Auckland, who flew the day before me and Toby who lives and works in Brisbane. I arrived to find the boys (Gavin, Mark and Toby) hung over from the big night before, so after some initial greetings I left them to sleep it off whilst sight seeing in the city. Once the boys woke we hired a car and traveled to the Goldcoast where we would be staying for the next 3 nights. From here on in I have blurry patches about what went on, where we went, who we saw and most of the other important details in story telling. So a quick summary of the major events would be we explored Surfer's Paradise, visited the local bars and clubs....numerous times....I recall that part clearly. Over the next couple of days we visited Movie World (where because I was hungover I felt the need to expel my stomach contents after numerous "Lethal Weapon" rides...but managed to tuff it out and maintain composure for the entire day), we visited Byron Bay down in the state of NSW. Now I wasn't away of this fact until I visited Byron Bay and that is; it contains the most eastern point of Australia's mainland, near the lighthouse overlooking the bay. Also that Byron Bay is really a hippies town, very relaxed lifestyle with some strange people wandering the beaches. Further into our trip we visited Mt Tambourine, and finished off with a trip to the Sunshine Coast. Returning from the Sunshine Coast we visited my cousin in Birbie Island, and I accidently left my phone on the side of the road. Fortunately for me it was still there a couple of hours later when Kym picked it up and mailed it back to me. On the final night we finished off at the "Down Under Bar" before having to catch a midday flight back to Auckland. The trip was great, saw plenty of the Goldcoast and surrounding areas and will look forward to a visit back there in the near future.

Brisbane Meter Maid. The old guy looks confused.

The Brisbane river.

The view from our backpackers on the Goldcoast.

Surfer's Paradise Beach.

Movie World ! and me looking extremely hungover....

Kirra Beach, with the Goldcoast skyline in the background.

Tweed Heads. This is the border between QLD and NSW.

Byron Bay Beach.

Byron Bay Lighthouse. The most eastern point of mainland Australia.

One of the nights out at Surfer's Paradise, with some neighbourly backpacking ladies. Check out Toby in the background.

Mt Tambourine behind the Goldcoast.

Caloundra on the Sunshine Coast.

Back to Western Australia

Sadly on the 19th of May 2005 my pop passed away in Carnarvon. After speaking with my mother I was informed not to travel back for the funeral as it was too far to come and too expensive and they would be thinking about me. As soon as I had gotten off the phone I had immediately decided to travel back and started shuffling meetings and training days so I could travel back on the 21st of May, No-one knowing except my brother. After two flights and a 5 hour drive I surprised my mum and nana on Tuesday the 24th, much to their delight. Nothing was going to stop my visit to see my pop for the last time and to say my goodbyes.
Whilst I was in Carnarvon, I decided to travel to the "Blowholes" to inspect the beach shack, have a day in the sun and to remember the good times we all had growing up there with pop. I even had some fresh oysters in memory of my pop and his love for the ocean and seafood.
The following photos are of the shack and surrounding coastal areas.

Rugged coastline !

Blowhole in action again.

A small water blast from the blowhole.

The Oyster Bed.

View of the island and marine reserve.

The Lighthouse overlooks the Blowholes.

The oyster bed from Granny's rock.

Granny's rock !

Plenty of fish with crystal clear water.

Looking towards the Boat Ramp and Island.

Looking towards the surf beach with Black Rock in the background.

Our shack from the beach.

The shack with the brown long drop !

Tauranga Power Boat Racing

New Zealand Power Boat Racing competition held its last round in the Tauranga Harbour on the 14th of May 2005, this competition involves boats of all sizes racing together in separate classes. Graeme and Pam both know the brothers that drive "Jessie James" a 31ft twin V8 boat that puts out 1300HP, and because of this we were invited to be a marshall for the day which involved sitting in Graeme's boat on the racing line. After the brief of the events to come, we were sent out on the water to marshall between two points, which included stopping boats from crossing the racing line, helping boats in distress and general lookout. As the race started, we were more concerned about stopping boats crossing the racing line as we had the Harbour entrance, little did we know that in the second lap a boat called "Broomstick" a sleek black 6m outboard powered boat proved us wrong by getting some air right in front of us, clipping the next chop and nose diving into the third piece of chop. So here we were keeping an eye on it as it started to fill up with water in great volumes, a quick distress wave from the crew and we were next to the sinking boat and the two occupants in no time. I was stationed at the back of the boat, after making the initial call to race control, trying to help the driver out of the water, who happened to be female. After giving the rope she had to Kevin, who was looking after the sinking boat, I realized the rope was still tangled around her arm and neck, after quickly releasing the rope from around her neck, I helped the driver into the boat. The driver had a bleeding nose from head butting the dashboard and the passenger was okay. Meanwhile, Pam and Robin were hiding in the front of the boat out of the way. Within seconds of getting the crew into the boat we had a two helicopters, the coast guard and a 10m launch surrounding us. We then gave the semi sunken boat to the launch who towed it in and we took the crew back to shore, before returning to our marshalling area. After the rescue, the race finished about an hour later with no other real incidents, except for a boat nearly hitting us. About three other boats sank in the race from similar events but not within our area. The winner of the top class was "Jessie James" but missed out by a few points to take the championship from the "Placemakers" boat. A bbq and plenty of drinks finished the eventful day off. I was a little busy to take photos of the sinking "Broomstick" but got a few snaps of the other racing boats.

Jessie James, the winner of the Tauranga Power Boat Race 2005 cruises past the harbour entrance.

The smaller category boats go just as hard as the bigger ones. Check out the air under the boat on the right.

One of the many Helicopters on the day.

Placemakers trying to catch Jessie James out in front.

Jessie James racing in front of the Mount.

TNT, an inboard V8 boat.

Jessie James' mini-me boat used for cruising around the Harbour.

Black Water Rafting

On the weekend of the 7th and 8th of May I traveled from Tauranga to Waitomo to do Black Water Rafting (BWR) with six YP's from Auckland (www.blackwaterrafting.co.nz). Now BWR contains a variety of adventures, we completed the Black Abyss adventure, this starts with getting suited up with wetsuit, booties, harness, and a helmet(light attached). We then jumped into a van for a 5 min car journey to the entrance, once there we practiced abseiling down a bank to get the feel of it before jumping into the hole. The Abseil is about a 40m drop with the first part of the abseil seated until you get inside the cave entrance (which is fairly small and squishy), once inside the cave it is completely dark except for the light on your helmet, after spinning around so that I could face the wall I proceeded to jump down the face. Not knowing where the bottom was a really adrenaline pumping experience. So once down we walked for a bit along a grate like walkway which was located over a deep hole in the cave. At the end of the walkway was a Flying Fox, which we were sent down with no lights on at all, not knowing where you were going or what you were going to hit was really cool feeling which got the adrenaline pumping again. After a small break with hot coffee we jumped off a ledge with our tyre tubes into icy cold water and paddled up stream. After a while we turned around, turned the lights off and followed the millions of glow worms on the cave roof. Really beautiful, completely dark except for the electric blue glow worms and perfect silence. Once we got back to the ledge we lost the tubes and proceeded by foot which entailed a water slide, a rock climbing challenge and numerous small caves which were small and cozy to say the least. Towards the end we got a choice to walk out or climb out, so the climb out involved us climbing up two small water falls, unharnessed. Really good feeling of adventure and as we finished early we got to go for another small caving adventure which was really tight... After the BWR caving adventure we headed for our accommodation and proceeded to get pissed until the early hours of the morning. Really great weekend with plenty of action in and out of the caves...Highly recommended.

Black Water Rafting Team from left to right: Mark, Me, Gavin, David, Bryan, Suzanne and Dean all suited up ready for action.

Bryan and me getting suited ready for the adventure!

Fishing in Tauranga

Over the past couple of weekends I have been getting up early....for a Saturday and heading off fishing with Graeme and his boat Angelique. Both weekends we have come back with 15 to 18 snapper, at least a couple of trevally and a couple of New Zealand's own brand of fish a kahawai and a John Dory. Now I was told that when you catch a John Dory, there is always a dory-story that goes with it...
My particular dory-story goes like this : I pulled up a small cod about 100mm and Graeme told me to throw it over with the hooks through it back and fish for a John Dory. Now never having seen or heard of a dory before i thought why not and fished for a dory for about half an hour or so, whilst continuing to fish for snapper on my other rod....no dory so graeme told me to pack that rod and continue fishing. Whilst pulling up my um-teenth small snapper i thought geez this one small...or so i thought as the rod just got heavy from that point on. Thinking I had a occy or maybe an old boot and as i pulled it to the surface i discovered i had a snapper about 100mm long inside this mouth, which was actually attached to a fish...A John Dory...
And thats my John Dory Story . . . So whilst the weather has been great, Graeme and I have been enjoying it in the boat.

The John Dory I caught on Angelique.

HOLIDAYS IN GERO . . .

Well I have just returned from a hectic week and a half in Geraldton. It all started on Sat the 26th of March, with the Buccs party and lasted through til April the 2nd - The Wedding of Marc and Amanda O'Brien. The week was filled with plenty of drinking, golfing, crayfishing, jet skiing, swimming and more drinking and basically it was great just to get back and spend time with my family and friends.
The buccs party was great, best of all the groom came out unharmed.
The wedding even better, the Bride looked absolutely Gorgeous.
Best wishes go out to Marc and Amanda on their honeymoon and for their future life together.
Anyway I am back in Tauranga, working again. Will keep you all updated to where I am located next, probably back in Auckland next week for a week, before returning here again.
Later.

Marc and Amanda's Wedding on the 2nd of April 2005, Geraldton.
The boys waiting......Marc, Will, Me, Matt and Carl.

View of the northern end of Tauranga Harbour near Waihi Beach