So I moved to the other side of the planet, and one of the first shops I see is called “Kiwi”!!! So I walk in, expecting to see nothing but Kiwi paraphernalia, sheep, rugby crap, buzzy bees etc. and what do I find? … groceries. Groceries, groceries and a few more groceries. Why do they call the grocery shop “Kiwi”? No idea. Norwegians are weird.
In semi-related news, the word “Kiwi” in Brazil refers to a homosexual man with excessive body hair, and in many other countries it is used to refer to “Kiwi fruit”.
Kiwis outside a kiwi shop. The delightful Harriet Geohegan on left and me on the right.
We had the biggest snow dump I’ve seen in Dunedin city during 2011. Here are snaps from my camera from that day. Justine and I went to Poppas Pizza’s before going to see some snowboarders and skiers having a lot of fun on the hills.
Skating trip to Frogner stadion in Oslo. The ice surface was super smooth, the temperatures were high and there was more ice than you could possibly imagine (for a rink). A complete lack of fitness and having not skated properly in around nine months left me pretty much dead at the end of my skating stint.
I headed to Sognsvann just north of Oslo to go ice skating. It turned out there was way too much snow on the lake for skating, but I had a nice walk around the lake anyway.
We made a group trip to the Idaburn dam to find skatable ice. That failed in epic fashion, so we did some team shots including the following super sexy duckface shot! Thanks to Devon Wallace for the photos.
Ed Waite on the left, yours truly at the top, Jaydee Cabral in the middle and Devon Wallace on right doing our best attempt at the super sexy duckface shot.From left: Thomas Hedderwick, Jacyln Ho, Dave Patchett, Bret Dougherty, Pip, Ed Waite, Jaydee Cabral, Hernesha Fakir, Ryan Hellyer (me), Liz Roberts, Chris Laing and Keith Dickson.
Dave Patchett and I headed to the Lower Manorburn dam for some ice skating on July 10th. The ice was a bit thin in some areas, but we found enough to skate on 🙂
Yours truly (Ryan Hellyer) standing on the hill above Rushcutters bay. The channel is in the background.Yours truly on the ice. My arm was in a sling as my shoulder was quite munted due to dislocations.Dave Patchett in the gorgeDave Patchett checking out the ice in the channel
I went camping on the weekend with Ed Waite and Dave Patchett to Poolburn reservoir. We headed off on Friday evening packing tents, as much cold weather gear as we could find and a set of chains in the back Ed’s trusty Toyota Landcruiser. The road up to lake Poolburn was nicely frozen and easy to drive on, apart from a large puddle which Ed decided to travel through instead of around. The puddle was frozen, but apparently not enough to support the weight of a fully laden Toyota Landcruiser but Ed’s ninja awesome four wheel drive skills saved the day and we managed to get out of the ice hole in one piece (sort of …). We found a neat little flat spot perched above the dam where we set up camp with a beautiful view out across the frozen reservoir.
Dave Patchett at the camp site above Poolburn damEd Waite chilling out at the camp site
We quicky discovered that camping in sub-zero temperatures is quite cold, duh! We never took an accurate temperature reading, but from what we could tell it was approximately -8° C. Thankfully we were kitted out well enough to survive the night without any dramas, just a little chilly at times.
We awoke to a beautifully calm, albeit chill day and an excellent view from the campsite, out across the Poolburn dam.
View north from the campsiteEd Waite and Dave Patchett on the ice
We were greeted at the lake shore with an excellent expanse of solid hard ice to skate on. We did a full circumnavigation around the lake, including many sections we had never skated on before due to the water level having risen considerably this year.
Ed Waite on the iceEd Waite and Dave Patchett on the iceEd Waite showing off whilst Dave takes a breakView back to truck from the ice. Dave Patchett on the left and me (Ryan Hellyer) on the right. Thanks to Ed Waite for the photo.There were some massive icicles alongside the cliff area by the dam. Ryan Hellyer (me) on the left and Dave Patchett on the right. Thanks to Ed Waite for the photo.
There were some excellent sections of ice on the streams leading into the dam. It was really fun being able to skate downhill for hundreds of meters.
Downhill skating … with a little water hopping 🙂 The segments of open water were mostly jumpable or could be avoided by skating down the edges of them.Downhill skating. This particular section was a little 'cheesy' but was totally frozen over so less worries about falling into water.Ryan Hellyer (me) and Dave Patchett standing on a frozen stream. We managed to skate downhill in that stream for a few hundred meters. Thanks to Ed Waite for the photo.
Ed and I headed to Alexandra later in the day to have a skate on the Lower Manorburn dam before heading back to Poolburn. We had an excellent skate under the stars at Poolburn before heading to bed for the night. Unfortunately the weather packed in really badly and blew our tend down in the middle of the night! Thankfully we were well prepared and didn’t get too cold despite the battering from the wind and some snow blustering in through the tents ventilation holes.
We had a very windy skate across the reservoir first thing in the morning. It was certainly an interesting experience being able to just stand their and be pushed along by the wind at break neck speed.
On our way back to Dunedin we got caught in a fairly bad snow storm. Lots of cars fallen off the side of the road, a bus full of tourists careering backwards down the Kilmog hill and many silly drivers still attempting to make their way back to Dunedin grossly unprepared. Thankfully Ed’s Landcruiser was well up to the task and after Ed and Dave kindly put the chains on the truck in horrid conditions (whilst I took stood around taking pictures) we had no problems making our way back home.
Ed and Dave attaching the chains to the mighty LandcruiserEnd of the carnage on the Kilmog hill. Apparently some people think it's perfectly sensible to drive on crazily icy roads with no chains or four wheel drive!? Thanks to Ed Waite for the photo.
