Christmas Tree

It was the time of year to put up the Christmas tree. Instead of getting involved I took the opportunity to capture some photo's of the girls getting into the event together. Lucy was rather taken with the shiny coloured decorations, as an one year old would. She just couldn't help herself.

While Amelia enjoyed the result.

Wairarapa Away

Last weekend we'd had enough of hanging around the house. Luckily the Cakebread's had invited us over to Greytown to share a weekend with them at their batch. The last one in fact, before they sold the place. The weather kindly obliged, dosing us with generous quantities of clear skies and hot sunny days. Which is what the Wairarapa is all about.

Both families have kids the same age so it works out great. Saturday saw us hanging around Greytown and visting Masterton for a swim with the kids and a play in the local park. On the Saturday evening we took the kids to the park for a play and dinner. The camera came out and I did my level best to capture some nice shots of all the girls at play. Here is one of Lilly I quite like.

Lucy has started to sprout nice photogenic angles. Recently it has been Amelia that was easy to photo. Now Lucy is filling into her person she is starting to steal some light from the sun too.

On Sunday we took the girls to an animal farm where they could interact with local farm animals. Sheep, bulls, donkeys, goats, ponies and rabbits. The girls just loved it, plus the ice block afterwards in the Martinborough square. I managed to get an interesting shot of Amelia surveying the animals in their hutches.

More shots of the weekend are here.

Into the sun

I've been experimenting a bit with shooting into the sun to see if I can get some likable light effects. While I'm not sure if I'm achieving anything, it did manage to get this shot into the sun of the girls at play on a slide at the end of the day.  The slide is Lucy's on borrow, but it has turned into a hot competition between Amelia and Lucy to throw themselves down it in the most ludicrous of ways.

Pyromaniac Genes

 Lucy discovers her pyromaniac genes with a look of glee in her eye.

Choooice

Oh, the potential.

While her father photographs his.

More photos here.

Anticpation

I had managed to catch this photo of Amelia before she headed off to see a much awaited show of ballet with her mother. I like this shot. Amelia has dressed up in her best dress and is waiting patiently, but with anticipation.

A happy smile soon followed.

More photos are here.

Weekend of Labour

This weekend was a busy one. That's the reason its called Labour Weekend.

Most of the weekend was taken up with catching up on garden jobs now that the weather has warmed up. On Saturday I dug out a bank of mud down the side of the house and built a retaining wall. Amelia helped by getting stuck in with the spade as well and shifted a surprising amount of dirt and clay for a 5 year old girl.

On Sunday we packed up the girls and drove out to Staglands Wildlife Park. I'd never been there before, and the drive is memorable. 17 km of sealed goat track through the Akatarawa's to get there. It was worth the visit though. Those that know me, know I hate zoo's with a fairly unbridled passion. African wildlife has no business being caged in Wellington to make money off the ignorant. However as Staglands focused on local wildife in an appropraite setting I was prepared to cut it some slack. Besides the local birds, sheep, horses and pigs probably had it better than they would of on most farms.

Highlight of the day was getting two great shots of the girls on the back of a ricktery but rustic wooden wagon.

Quite like these shots. More shots of the day are here.

Rivers to Snow

Last weekend the rest of the family was up in Auckland for the end of school holidays so I headed back up to Ohakune to try and get more skiing out of a tough weather season.

Saturday, predictably, was yet another closed day on the mountain so I packed up the fishing gear and drove over to Turangi in an attempt to catch an elusive trout. I think river fishing is more and art than a sport.  Its definitely tough to be proficient enough to get all the factors right to hook a fish. I only get to go fresh water fishing very rarely so I have little success in discovering what all those success factors are. While I had a peaceful and interesting time on the side of the Tongariro I didn't catch anything. The best thing about fishing on the river is that it almost doesn't matter if you strike out; the surrounds, sights and sounds that you find yourself casting away in are very therapeutic. There is something about the whip and rhythm of casting nymphs into the stream that enriches this. I found a perfect pool nearby Red Hut pool however and saw a fish jump. Just to taunt me, no doubt.

A day on the River

 Every cloud has a silver lining - despite the lack of fish I did managed to hook into a magnificent pie outside the Turangi bakery. Pie of the year award material.

The drive back over the volcanic plateau yielded a nice shot of the sun on the wide open spaces on the expanses of alpine desert tussock.

Afternoon light on the Volcanic Plateau

Sunday dawned patchy with a clearing in between spring frontal systems. It turned out to be a magically memorable day.  After clearing the ski lifts up after the previous weather cycle it was a late opening. After a late start I found myself up the mountain with few people and a fresh 5-10cm of new snow over the mountain. The car made first tracks in the snow in the car park so I knew that was a good sign.

And it was.  The phantom High Noon Express had resurrected itself after being closed for extensive repair just as I arrived. This opened up an easy expanse of fresh snow right off the lifts. While it was quickly tracked out, there remained excellent quality deep fresh dry snow skiing for the rest of the day.  The Slider bowl went into epic mode. The skiing just west of the cornice was quite perfect - boot high dry untracked snow. Dropping over the Slider bowl cornice in steep soft reverse spin drift on the vertical faces was a dream like sensation. The edges on the steep fall lines in the deep snow had to used with attention. A mistake would of been very dramatic on the highly steep bowl sides. After sessioning a traverse out to Sliders, a drop over the bowl into the deep stuff, a traverse out of the east Slider into Branchline and determinedly back into the Main Trunk bowl, a couple of fresh tracks off the bowl cornice and then directly back over to the High Noon lift - the lift run of the day was discovered. Maximised best snow and terrain of the day without having to take the skis off.

The last run of the day I reserved the best for last. I traversed out past the Solitude bowl and out to my 'best bowl' that I'd spent last Saturday in. The snow was just as perfect this time, with the snow perhaps fresher and drier. With a nice routine now, I mounted my skins and skinned up further so 30 minutes to gain some better elevation. The rewards was a perfect blast in new snow though a wide gully with a wind lip and a repeat back through the 'best bowl' snow. Not a person nor other track in sight the entire time. Freshness, freedom over a virgin snow pack. Within 8 days I had to leave the same bowl behind, with the same regret, this time with only one set of extended round tracks to mark my visit.