Masters of something and a whole lot of alone time

Its been a little while since my last storytelling.  So grab a mug of Milo or your favorite beverage and prepare for the onslaught that is our life.

First off, Beth is starting Grad School next month.  I said she couldn't get another undergrad degree and others agreed.  So she is going to for a Masters in Predictive Analytics.  This is directly tied to the role she has been doing for several years.  She is also heading back to the States for 3 weeks.  She will be visiting friends and family.  I may be generous and have her carry back some treats for you guys.  Place your orders now.  She is busy juggling 3 contract jobs at the moment and flying down to Christchurch at a moments notice.  Maybe she'll blog and tell you why.

I didn't get to Woodland Park, instead Jason and I hit up Te Aroha for some riding.  It was pretty bad in my opinion.  It was raining and the track is a bunch of short punchy climbs over wet roots, rocks, and plastic strips.  If you were lucky you might be able to get some traction otherwise it was walking up some gnarly obstacles.  I'm quoted on a video saying I think it would be safer to play with razor blades.  I don't think I'll be back there to ride.  I'm spoiled as I got lots of selection of trails to choose from not to mention the ones we are building.  If I don't like a place, I can just go to another place that I enjoy.  We are just finishing up our 3rd trail and we already have our 4th trail marked out.  We did this about 4 months ago.  It takes a bit of time when its only 4-5 guys with hand tools, but the trails are a lot of fun.

Since my last post, we went to Tauranga and stayed with my friend Phil.  As I hate to come in empty handed I baked some pumpkin whoopie pies.  For those who have eaten my pumpkin cupcakes, I used the same powdered sugar filling between two thick pumpkin cookies.  Needless to say they were a big hit.  In fact, I had so much pumpkin left after roasting a single one that I made several batches of the whoopie pies for work and had pumpkin pancakes for several meals.  If the pancakes weren't good enough already, a little dab of left over frosting melting over the top of the fluffy cakes really soothed my sweet tooth.  Since I do bake and give most of it to my co-workers, I suspect that they think I spend all my free time baking, but I tell them only when it is raining.  Even that isn't exactly true.  I bake when I crave something.  It just so happens to coincide with the rain as I don't like to ride that much in the rain.  The reason for our trip down to Tauranga was to see our friend Faye before she headed back to the UK to work for Marmot UK.  We had a nice dinner on The Strand.  The usual cast of characters from Macpac were there as well as a few new comers.  They work in other stores or started after I left.  Talked to Faye about what she'll be doing and wished her luck.  We ducked out around 10 pm.  Back to Phil's for some stories and to wish him luck as he and a few other friends were doing the Okororie Winter Ride, 70km of country roads.

Beth and I left fairly early as we planned on doing some hiking.  We had several options, most of which I had already done.  Instead, we opted for a hike that neither of us have done and is less than an hour from our place.  We ended up doing the Karangahake Mountain Track, which can be found between Paeroa and Waikino on the Hauraki Rail Trail.  In my opinion it is the best section of the trail for viewing pleasure.  If you want to do a straight ride for fitness then ride from Thames to Te Aroha and back as you only have the Coromandel Forest and Kaimais on the East side of the trail.  We hiked up to the top of the trail and were given a stunning vantage point of the area.

The view from Karangahake hike.

The next week, I believe flew by and we had awesome fun on tap for the weekend.  For the past year and a half we have been trying to get out kite boarding.  For Christmas 2011, Beth and I coincidentally exchanged the same present.  Kite boarding lessons.  The winter was basically a bust because of the freeze/thaw cycle we experienced.  Then we moved over here.  So we never got to utilize our lesson vouchers.  So when Beth found lessons on a group-on like site over here, we pounced.  So last weekend, we went up to Auckland and learned how to fly the kite and do a bunch of different techniques in the water with our teacher Roger.  It was a lot of fun and I even owe Beth and Roger a beer!  You owe someone a beer if you hit them with your kite.  That's right, I dived bombed my kite and smacked the fools.  I then pretended like I didn't know what I was doing.

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

We ate at one of my favorite places to eat in Auckland, El Sizzling Chorizo.  We pulled up a spot at the small counter and smelled the smoked meat.  I ordered a platter of meat while Beth got the roasted veggies with cheese.  It brings back memories of visiting our friends Pete and Leeann in Argentina.  After we ate, we jumped in our car and made for Hamilton.  Beth had to pick up some puzzles that she had won on TradeMe.  After we picked up the puzzles, we hit up The Wolverine.   It really made me want to go back to Japan.  It also made me miss my chops.  Welcome back chops.  According to my old boss I should now be driving a windowless van and sport a t-shirt saying "Strangers have the best candy".  I don't rock either one.

These beef ribs are awesome.

On my Tuesday night run, I ended up doing 12km in under an hour.  They guys asked if I had registered for Ironman yet.  I responded that I'm still debating it.  Several of the guys that I run and swim with are competing this year.  I was told that the word on the street is that the race is 90% full.  If I want to race, I got to register soon.  I feel rather reserved when it comes to registering as its a lot of training and I have plans for our summer already that includes a visit back to the States.  On Wed night I did a mountain bike ride with Graeme and we discussed our upcoming weekend trip to Taupo.  We are planning on doing W2K with the Headland loop along with the K2K on Saturday and then doing several of the local trails on Sunday.  On Friday I registered for Ironman.  I've got some big training on the horizon as I have K2  (Oct) , Port of Tauranga Half (Jan), and now Ironman New Zealand (Mar).  So Steve, I hope you step up and do something more than just a marathon!  I'm sure I wont be able to say no to some other events not to mention my personal list of things I want to do.

My meat platter.

The price is your pride

First and foremost Happy Birthday Asa! Happy belated birthday Josiah and Juniper.

Our view.

So its been a few weeks since the last post and I feel a bit beaten up.  For the last several weeks, I haven't been running or swimming as my back had been seizing up and reducing me to walking or nearly drowning. 

My Motobecane above Rotorua.

Instead I've been hitting the bike.  My mountain bike friends from Thames and I went to Rotorua for a weekend of riding.  We logged 9hrs of riding and lots of meters of climbing.  Saturday was 5 hours and over 1000 m of climbing.  The guys wanted to do a little drinking so we went to a liquor store.  I purchased Ginger Beer and M&M's and I got carded.  I couldn't believe it.  I haven't been carded for pop in years.  We ended up at a buffet not too far from our hotel and I put down a couple plates and my friends were shocked.  Little did they know that I wasn't even showing them remotely what I am capable of.  The next morning was a race that we just sort of crashed as the trails were still open.  I heard the funniest thing that morning.  A young woman comes flying down the open trail to the beginning of the woods and slams on her brakes and exclaimed "I don't do trees!"  "Nobody told me we would be riding in trees."After a quick conversation over the next 10 minutes, we find out that she is a track cyclist.  I told her to think of it like her track bike and not to use her brakes.

The cost is only $10. The price is your pride.

We waited another 10 minutes for John, one of the guys we ride with in Thames, to pass the point we were waiting at.  We rode with his bunch for a good little stretch and then harassed a few other racers we know.  It was at one of these stops that we heard about a woman that crashed and she believed she broke her arm.  A call was made to the race coordinators to get help up at the beginning of the track.  We made her a sling and passed her some pain pills.  I did do most of my WFR checklist from memory before doing any treatment.  My diagnosis was a fracture.  If I had my first aid kit I could have done more, but the swath of cloth made a nice sling. 

Gnarly wooden throne at the beginning of Be Rude Not To

We continued on and road up Hill Rd for a 2nd time in the weekend.  This is a difficult climb on tired legs and I was forced to ride in my granny gear.  We then had to wait for 2 of the guys who decided to take the shuttle up the road and then ride down to meet us.  It is now an on-going joke about offering a ride to the top of any hill.  I said I would offer a ride to the top for $10, but my prices go up exponentially.  I'll be getting another bike in a couple weeks!

Our Wed night rides have been taking us up to the beginning of the Pinnacles track (40km round trip), but this past week we did Tararu Creek Road (15 miles round trip).  It is a long steady climb that was made all the more painful as my legs were tired because I did a 13km run the night before.  My first run in weeks and I felt good.  My legs are sore days later.  This past weekend, I took my TT bike out for an easy session.  I wanted to see what it felt like as I haven't ridden it in about 2 years.  Having been here over a year and it being winter before I got here my TT bike hasn't been getting the love.  I was able to do 25 miles averaging 19.9 mph without pushing hard.  Not a bad place to start from.  I expect that I'll be back up to 24-26 mph average once my training peaks. 

I've been baking a bit lately.  I had the craving for French Silk Pie so I made 2 pies this past weekend.  I made a flaky pie crust, whipped up the chocolate filling, and whipped topping.  I took them to work and they disappeared very quickly.  Then after running on Tuesday night, I felt like Peanut Butter cookies.  I found a quick 5 ingredient gluten free recipe that takes under 20 minutes from cracking the egg to smearing nutella on the cookie and gnoshing on it. 

This weekend we are planning on heading up North of Auckland to ride at Woodhill.  Its about 40 minutes from Central Auckland.  After that we plan on working on our trails as we are almost done with another track.  Then we have 2 more marked that need to be started.  Its extremely gratifying to build a trail and a short while later be bombing down the flow that you marked out. 

On a sad note, our friend Faye is moving back to the UK.  I've known her most of the time that I have been here.  She was the assistant manager/manager at Macpac while I was there.  She was a riding and running companion.  I introduced her and Elaine to the joys of Santo Churros in the Mount.  She was offered a job with Marmont Europe last week and will be moving back in a couple weeks.  I think I'll surprise her with some baking for her going away party that will be held in Tauranga. 

Winter time

So its Winter here and we have already had frost on our windshield twice, but no scrapper.  We have yet to see any being sold.  How crazy is that?  They are a staple in MN for so many months out of the year and I don't have one here.  Then again, our days have been heating up into the 50s even though they may start off a bit nippy. 

Last weekend, we went to Tauranga and got a little work done on Beth's bike.  Replaced her quill stem with a more traditional stem and replaced her 12-23 cassette with a 11-28.  We went out for a ride on Saturday along the coast and a little bit of the Hauraki Rail Trail.  I think the changes to the bike are an improvement, but Beth would prefer to be on her Trek.  I ended up riding 3 out of 4 bikes last weekend!  I even had my first flat in a long time on the side of the road.  I hit a rock that shot out from under my tire across the road and hit a fence with a lot of force.  A few seconds later, psssst.
 
This weekend I put our roof rack on the car.  It didn't take all that long, but would have been quicker if it actually mounted to rails or something.  Then on Sunday, we went to Hamilton to see our friend, Faye, and try to catch Despicable Me 2, but it sold out.  So we ended up doing a little monkeying around before heading back to Thames.  Where I roasted a lime and chilli chicken with veggies.  Should be good eats for a couple days.  Tomorrow I start my base training as I have 2 months before I start to hammer my body for the Port of Tauranga Half-Ironman (POTH) in January.

Immigration Woes are over

We received our passports back today with yet another page-stealing sticker, aka our residency visas. 
Beth will be able to work in New Zealand now if she chooses to.  She is contemplating going after her Masters. 

I'll post more later.  I'm recovering from an imaginary gunshot wound.  A young boy had me in his sights this afternoon on my ride up the hill.  Once I got about 15 feet away, he said 'bang, bang' and I flailed my arms and shouted in pain.  I could continue to hear him shooting at me as I got to our driveway. 

Celebrating Independence Day in Samoa

How far from home are we?

Beth and I took our first vacation this past weekend.  We jetted off to Samoa over the holiday weekend.  New Zealand celebrated the Queen's Birthday and Samoa their 51st Independence Day.  We arrived in Apia very late on Wednesday night or I should say Thursday morning.  We were treated to a very hot and humid evening and a long church filled drive to our lodging for a few hours.  We definitely weren't used to the Samoan weather.  In Thames, we had just had our first window scrapper morning.  Samoan's are very religious and you might be shocked to see the quantity and size of the churches that are only surpassed by the number of dogs that roam the country. 

A waterfall near a "cult" town.

We rented a car for the 5 day vacation which allowed us to explore the island of Upolu.  With the amount of time we had we didn't venture over to Savai'i which is the largest of the Samoan Islands.  That is on our list of things to do.  Our traveling list however never seems to get smaller as I'm always looking for an excuse to go see friends in places that we have been like Japan and Germany not to mention seeing family in in the US.  There is a long list of places we haven't been to, but want to.  So who wants to sponsor our travels and I will write and take photos for your personalized "experience"?

Our first full-day was spent driving across the island and then checking into beach hut at Faofao Fales for the next 2 evenings.  Besides providing an awesome view, it included dinner and breakfast.  We were also subjected to driving rain, a leaky thatched roof, and gusts of wind that blew open the thatched panels.  Beth tried in vain to weave the panels closed as I slept most of the evening only waking up when drops of rain hit my face or when Beth stepped on my leg.  The next night wasn't as bad as it was just raining without the gusting wind. 
 

Ship marked the end of the boat race.

At the fales, we met an older couple from Auckland who have been coming to Samoa for the last 17 years.  They had a wealth of knowledge of the area and culture and a German girl, who is on a working holiday in Auckland, was grilling them for information.  She was busing and hitching around Upolu and getting caught in the sudden downpours that appeared out of nowhere.  

Morning view

Beth found on the tourism site that was going to be an Independence Day swim (either 1.5k or 3k) across the harbor.  So we registered our interest in the swim.  It would be our first open water swim in awhile and our first in the country.  We didn't know what to expect so we went with the shorter distance.  The swim was beautiful as you could see the bottom, including blue star fishes, and looking around we were treated to mountains peeking out of the mist.  This wasn't a race, but rather a group swim with designated stopping spots for roll call.  There were 34 individuals swimming and another half dozen in water crafts offering support for those who needed it.  After the swim we ate with the group and talked with the organizers who started this event last year as well as a swim series.  We have some friends going over in August to do one of the races in the swim series. 

At least it wasn't a horse.  Just everything else.

Driving around the island you have to pay close attention.  The speed limit isn't much, but we had to dodge or slow down for many a creature darting or meandering across.  This included dogs, chickens, kids, adults, pigs, and cows.  However, I really wanted the horses tied up to the side of the road to break free and cause us to recognize their superior size on the roadway, but no such luck.  Beth learned the passing rules from our cabbie on the first night.  This basically means you can pass when and where ever just give a little honk prior to over-taking.  We also saw how quick nature could reclaim an area.  Don't leave your car parked for too long.

We did a little walk to see the Robert Louis Stevenson grave at Mount Vaea.  We walked through a botanical garden past a little waterfall and a pool filled with locals.  Instead of bothering them, we scooted past and trudged up a very muddy and at times covered trail.  In case you are wondering?  We took the long path on the way up and the short one on the way down.  On  the descent there was even a rope to give you assistance where it was very necessary.  The scenery was amazing on the walk and made me want to talk other walks on the island.  The only issue is that you need a guide as it is crazy thick and any trails are probably reclaimed by nature after a short amount of time.

The other Independence Day activities we took in were 30ish man boat races across the harbor and locals signing in front of some street food.  I partook in the street food with a good helping of hot bbq.  It was taro, chicken, and a hot dog.  There were a lot of little signs dotting the main highway with these temptations.  I'm glad we found one open on our trip as the country is one of the various churches on Sundays and this particular Monday just happened to be a Monday-nized holiday.  

Brownie with ice cream and chocolate pie with fresh cream.

I'm sure I'm missing tales, but my mind is tired as we were delayed out of Apia last night for close to 3 hours and didn't get into bed until 4am and I was at work by 8 this morning.  It was a quick trip, but it was a lot of fun.  We found a quaint little Italian restaurant that did wood fire pizza and an amazing desert plate.  We enjoyed it so much that when nothing else was open on Sunday, we sought out another round of Indulgence.  The good news doesn't stop, our residency application has been accepted contingent that we send in our passports and pay a one-time, one-more, fee.  That is being done tomorrow.  Now time to enter resident only contests.  Let's hope my luck has followed me.  I'm sure 93x listeners are happy someone else is winning.

Kind of like Christmas

A very expensive Christmas that is.  Our stuff is supposed to be delivered tomorrow.  Much of this stuff I haven't seen in over a year so it will be like opening a box of goodies, except they are all from ourselves and I've used the majority of them.  There are some new hiking boots as my other ones didn't not meet my expectations and they waterproofing died a tragic death after only a couple months. 

I must apologize as I haven't had the opportunity to post any pictures lately as my phone stopped uploading to Picasa.  I have a feeling I have to update to whatever Google Plus product it changed to in order to get it to work.  Much like Talk went to Hangouts and well the UI on the phone kinda sucks.  Any way, I have lots of photos that I have to manually transfer to the computer to post.  Yeah its an extra step and I don't really charge my phone by my computer.  However, once I get my desktop set-up and all the software upgraded, I might actually do a back-up of all the images and music I have on my laptop.  I would hate to see a corruption.

Beth and I bought a Honda Fit not this past weekend, but the one before.  We spent this last weekend sick.  The flu is going around the office and a lot of us got sick.  Beth has been indoctrinated with work speak already as a few of my coworkers come over to the house for lunch.  I've been whipping up little meals for us to munch on.  Its a lot better than the options in town and a fraction of the cost.  I've introduced them to spicy beans from scratch, bbq pulled pork, pancakes, french toast, homemade pizzas, and chimichurri.  It is nice to be able to make a meal for others.  Beth and I often get the left overs as well.

I've signed up for a Half Ironman in January, just happens to be around the time that Beth's parents leave.  They'll be over around Christmas time for a visit.  The people I've been swimming and running with keep asking if I have signed up for Ironman New Zealand, which is hosted in Taupo in March.  I keep saying I'm thinking about it.  I really am.  Its just that I was thinking of heading back to the States for a quick vacation in February and that would kill any training I would be doing and I would probably put on weight from catching up with all my favorite food spots.  So who knows on that one.  I'm tempted to do a 2 day adventure race in August that involves mountain biking, trail running, road riding, and kayaking.  It starts and stops in town with an over-night in Tairua (the start of K2 last year). 

So in other words, I've been keeping busy.

Fall Already

So the never ending MN Winter seems to have come to an end and the rainy New Zealand Autumn/Winter has just started.   My friends and family back in MN would complain when we conversed that sprinter (as the guy from comcast called it) was never ending.

Beth has been busy getting things situated back in the States.  She sold our car, rented our house, sold a bunch of stuff, and donated some as well.  She also was a little unsuccessful in quitting her job as they'll be keeping her on part-time until they hire a replacement.  They are in the process of interviewing at the moment, so it shouldn't be too long.  She also arrives here on Thursday.  I'll no longer be living the single life.  No more being able to drop whatever I'm doing and head out for a long bike ride or a hike with Shiv.  I'll be cooking for 2 instead of one.  Its been difficult as we don't see each other, but we talk daily.  We probably talk more apart than when in the same house.  Ok that isn't exactly true, but you get to the important bits a lot faster and she doesn't have to listen to my stupid stories.  She can read them if she wants.

So I've moved into our 3 bedroom house  recently and its pretty nice.  The only complaint I have right now, is that I'm hungry looking out the window everyday as there are lambs and sheep roaming in the paddocks behind the house.  I don't think my neighbor would miss one of the three back there.  I could even put it on the rotisserie grill that is on the deck.  I can feel that I'm getting stronger on the ride back from work as the hill is worse than Ramsey Hill over in St Paul as its just a little longer, more elevation gain, and a wicked curve.  I can do it in my 2nd ring on my disc trucker, but not the big ring as of yet.  I biked past a woman who was mowing her lawn the other day and she said I was awfully fit for biking up the hill.  I felt pretty good as I passed her, but if she would have seen me gasping for breathe a couple weeks back she probably would have called 111 (the emergency number here).

Shiv and I have been hanging out a fair amount.  We take turns making dinner, play various PS3 games, and just bs.  We did go out on a short hike this past weekend.  We parked at our co-worker Janet's house and forded several streams while enjoying a pleasant morning.  I came home and spent several hours in the kitchen.  I made ribs and kumara nuggets with brown sugar butter.

Today I spent the day baking and cooking.  My co-workers and I have been eating out daily and its gotten old.  So we'll be coming back to my place for lunch and I'll be whipping something up.  So today I made some spicy beans to compliment the planned fajitas.  I also made 2 pumpkin cheesecakes and a pumpkin cookie with caramel sauce.  Annette from work was nice enough to get Graham Crackers for me from Auckland for the base.  Yes, I even had to roast the pumpkin again.

I've gotten all the necessary paperwork and filed for residency this past week.  We'll here pretty soon from Immigration about the process as Beth is going to be entering the country on a visitor's visa.  This means she has to have a ticket with a destination out of New Zealand upon entering.  So we are going to Samoa over the Queen's Birthday Holiday.  Evidently there is some good diving over there so I might head over to Tairu to get certified one of these weekends.