Moeraki Boulders and Dunedin

These boulders are on the west coast as we drive down to Dunedin. We had to stop and see them cause they are pretty rear. I think they formed higher up in the volcano, they rolled down and settled here on the coast.

As they roll down, some have crashed into each other and broke open. You can see that they are hollow, like they are lava bubbles. They're cool! And littered all along the coast here. We stayed just around the small bay at that point in the first picture for the night before we drive down to Dunedin the next day.

Dunedin is an old city in which gold was found nearby, it was important for the economy of New Zealand in the 19th century. There is a beautiful train station that we are headed in, to board a train up to the canyon where the gold was found. It was very picturesque but the seats were so small, difficult for us chubby Americans to fit into.


At the top of the canyon we were aloud to disembark and stretch our legs before the return ride back to Dunedin. One nice thing, they provided champagne which you could buy, and we did together with a nice piece of chocolate cake.

The Kitchen, 3rd in the Series

This picture is after I gutted the kitchen and am redoing it. This first picture is where the sink goes in the kitchen. The exterior walls are Adobe block so we attached furring to them so as to apply the dry wall to it. Only here did we install dry wall on the interior walls of the Adobe. We re-plumbed and upgraded the electrical for a modern kitchen.

I designed the lay out for the counters including an island after many tries at arranging. I really like the final lay out and decide to go ahead. The counters are in and this picture is shortly after the concrete counters tops are poured, I didn't pour them, I don't really like doing concrete myself. I leave it to the professionals. They're covered with paper for a couple of days to cure and the paper is the same color as the concrete, just a coincidence. That copper pipe next to the post on the left brings the gas and electricity to the island which houses the stove. One of my better ideas if I say so myself. I love copper!

These were two rooms (tiny kitchen and a small breakfast room) that I made into one bigger kitchen. Notice the dishwasher drawers in both pictures to get the perspective. The kitchen is done, I love it! The whole interior was gutted at one point or another. I took recent pictures and will post those as soon as I download them. The quality of these last two are bad, taken with my dinosaur camera phone.

The South Island NZ

View from the Ferry ride. Queen Charlotte Sound. Coming into quaint little Picton.

We docked in Picton, a small village along the Sound on the north side of the South Island. It was very picturesque. The whole ferry ride was so beautiful! We didn't explore this place as we had a schedule to get on. We'd have more time here on return.

Our travels took us to Kaikoura along the west coast of the South Island where we spent the first night on the S Island. I have no pictures of Kaikoura. Not sure why?
We were in Christschurch just before the quake and took no pictures there either, I wish we had! Because it is now not the same after all the shaking, and we where right there where the worst of the damage happened. We went to a bear gathering downtown at a Brewery that night and met all these great guys, one of which had a B and B walking distance from the gathering, he offered us to spend the night at his place. It was very nice of him. We did and sat with his guests drinking wine til the wee hours. While we were there we had heard of the Quake that they had in September of 2010. We saw some damage from that quake around town and said that it would be fun if we had a small tremor while there because we are originally from San Francisco and had lot of experience with the Earth moving. I felt sorry for our words after hearing about the quake.

Just outside of Chch we drove to the Banks Peninsula which is a volcano crater. The lowest part of the crater is at sea level and that water comes in from the ocean. Click on the picture above to see it better.
These are some sheep that were right there where we sipped coffee over the crater. They could care less about our picture taking, they seemed to just enjoy the hillside and views, as were we.

Leaving Banks Peninsula, I saw this sign of a valley named after me, kidding. hehe We took this picture while driving on our way south to the Moeraki Boulders. Next NZ post.

More pictures from the desert, 2nd in the Series

These first three pictures are what the place looked like the day we first saw it. The guy on the couch is my husband and the guy in the chair is our real estate agent. He so cute! Woof! He's gay and was a neighbor too, but has moved. His ranch was pretty close to ours, just a little walk through the desert.
All three pictures are part of the same room, I am just rotating right to take the shots.



This one is after we bought it. It's a cool fireplace, it separates the dining room from the living room. This was once the back of the house. Now it is the front, I built that room I showed you in the first pictures here, making it the front room or foyer. You can see part of the porch that I ripped off through the glass door. The kitchen half is to the right, I'll show you that area in the next house post.

Our house, 1st of the Series

This is how our house first looked when we bought it in 2003 and before I totally changed it.

One night I sat down with a bottle of wine and came up with this design for the new room and garage. It's based on the Eichler design of the house, in which all the rooms have an angle in each room that shows this slight sloping in the ceiling line. I used this gradual angle in almost everything.
I ripped off this porch,
poured a foundation and built the new room seen below.

Before that room,
I built this garage, because our trucks were being invaded by pack rats in the carport. I had worked for a Landscape Architect doing all his construction jobs, but I had never built a building, until this garage. Then decided to bite off the room on the front. After all this was done, we walled it in. The only thing I didn't do on these projects, was build the fencing walls, to keep the snakes out. I hired a guy and his crew that did a great job! Before, it was all exposed, so snakes could come right up to the house. And they did!


Here is the view out front. I have so many more pictures of all the crap I've done since we moved here, if you want to see more, keep looking. More to come. It's pretty exciting how this old and dumpy ranch house became a really cool home!

Wellington

This building is the nation's Capital Building. They have nicknamed it "The Beehive"
We're now in Wellington, the nation's capital, to catch a ferry headed for the South Island. We took two days to drive (on the left side of the road) down the North island so we can do the South Island first. Wellington is a beautiful city and it reminds us of our home city of San Francisco Ca. It is a coastal city on a bay with little houses climbing up the hilly slopes. Much like SF. We didn't have much time here but will explore it more on our return. From the ferry it looks so much like being on the bay in San Francisco. Talking to a waiter at a restaurant that we had breakfast at (the best breakfast ever!) He told us that Wellington is like Australia's Melbourne and that Auckland is like Australia's Sydney. Having never been to Australia we interpreted this to mean that Wellington is Like our San Francisco as Auckland is like our Los Angeles. So our conclusion was that Wellington has an aire of more sophistication and Auckland has more body conscious people and is bigger, which we did see.

On the ferry, first thing , we find a Red Wine for me and a glass of Champagne for my hubby. I'm on the right in the Tye Dye.


The ferry heads out to sea.

And you can see just how much it reminds us of San Francisco!

We're off to the South island! Here we go!

Big Gay Out

Our last day in Auckland just happened to be their gay pride day. It was totally coincidental. We didn't know about it until we were there. They don't call it Gay Pride, they call it Big Gay Out. It is a celebration in Coyle Park on the water with beautiful views across to downtown. As tourists we didn't even need to find our way there. There was an arranged bus that went around to all the bars and picked people up and take them to Coyle Park and back.
I was impressed with this Drag Queen that performed, she actually performed using her own voice and did not lip sync like so many do. She was fabulous!
It was a fun day and lots of people there were shirtless and showing off their tattoos which were very popular. We also noticed what good shape everybody was in, there did not seem to be any over weight people in New Zealand. The Maori are naturally bigger but still in good shape. Later we found this to be an Auckland thing. The people in the city are just more body conscious. But overall not as fat as Americans.



The event was a success with candidates speaking, entertainment, beer, lots of food and a beautiful day. It was a good time and I'm so glad we got to experience it. Tomorrow we hit the road for our travels around both islands.

Auckland

Steve, me and Brett the owner of the Eagle Bar on Karangahape Rd.
Auckland is a nice city located on an isthmus on the north island of New Zealand. It's the nations largest city and the one we flew in and out of. Our adventure started there for three days at a Bed and Breakfast in the Ponsonby neighborhood. We arrive before the room is ready so the woman that runs the place greets us with a hug, and asks us to come back in a bit. So off we go to explore the neighborhood and get a cup of coffee. The area is beautiful with lots of cool shops and we find the restaurant that Steve wants to eat dinner at. Also, we find the Gay Center on Karangahape Rd. (otherwise know as K Rd) and all the Bars and meet the owner of one that is so friendly he keeps buying us drinks. The weather is warm and humid, which we are not used to and we are sweating like crazy walking up and down the hills of Auckland.
These sculptures were in the park on Ponsonby Rd



The next day we head downtown to explore the waterfront. The tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere is The Sky Tower. A similar building to Seattle's Space Needle. Up we go to the observation deck at the top for a look around. Reading the little signs that point out the various surrounding stuff I glance up and see outside of the window a man dangling right in front of me. He hangs there for a second and then drops. Straight down but he is tethered by a steel cable. I was blown away! This is one of the thrills you can do on this tower, but we decide that it is just over the top for us.

And now another problem

Just recently the girls have started laying soft shelled eggs. I found one the other day on the highest nesting box where they have never laid an egg before. Today I found two more in the same nesting box. They are more white and flexible then the other egg shells and very fragile. I cracked the first one open and inside it looked like an typical egg.
Not sure what is going on, I looked on line and found this is not uncommon. The remedy is to feed the girls calcium in the form of ground oyster shell or even ground up egg shells. There could be a problem feeding them egg shells in that they love egg shells naturally and may start eating their own eggs. Some recommend not starting them on this path. I'm not sure what I will do. I'm off to the feed store to ask them for advice.

Tiny Little Eggs

For some reason we have a hen that is not keeping up with the others. I don't know which one it is and she doesn't do it all the time but about once a month she lays a tiny egg. This week she laid two in three days. They are cute and we really don't mind. I wonder if they hatched, would we get a tiny bird?
And even though it is April 1st, this is no April Fool's Joke!