cooder
Well-known member
You seem to know NZ quite well, been here to visit @Feral Feline ?
We are building at Lake Poerua.
https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-42.702042,171.4860124,7398m/data=!3m1!1e3
Random pix
- Thread starter Chuck D. Bones
- Start date
We are building at Lake Poerua.
https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-42.702042,171.4860124,7398m/data=!3m1!1e3
cooder
Well-known member
Feral Feline
Well-known member
A friend of mine is from just north of Auckland; we took the family station-wagon and hit every MTB spot down and across to the South Island and the West Coast all the way to Queenstown.
Shortly after we originally set off from ... Coatsville? ( too long ago, can't remember for sure, but near there), I said:
"I smell burning rubber".
Nobody believed me. I mentioned it a few more times in the next 20 minutes, they were getting tired of my "joke" but somewhere near Rosedale finally one of the other 3 noticed the smell, too, and then they all noticed it. We stopped. I had mentioned before setting off that the front tire of one of the bikes was too close to the exhaust (trailer-hitch bike rack) — "Ah, it'll be fine, mate," said our resident guide. Yet lo, behold, before us was a shrivelled up knobby tire peeling itself off the rim. A quick pit-stop at a shop for a new front wheel (even the old rim had warped from the exhaust heat) and a new tire and on we went. In no particular linearity...
Stayed in Rotarua at a B&B with a Newf named Jake; I'd hang out with him after riding near the mud pools (as close as we could, sneaky deaky) and watch Jake drool. Don't ever get a Newfoundland if you don't want to deal with a LOT of drool (and big stool). Glow worms, Pancake Rocks, Kiwi birds in parking lots, Terra-chips and finally crafted beer at the local brew-pub in Wellington...
We came upon some cut-rate spring-skiing tickets (available only with a Moro Bar wrapper) for Cardrona; so we took a break from biking and I taught my friends how to snowboard on the bunnyhill and then hit the chairlift by myself and later the more adroit of them joined me and then another got lonely and joined us on the big slopes even though he'd only mastered left turns... hilarious on the intermediate to advanced runs.
Got my biggest air ever off a jump there, and my friend caught it on film.
Everything about that trip was BIG & EPIC. That downhill you can see from downtown Nelson, we decided to hit that and I thought "well if I wreck at least we're super close to a hospital" — fastest I've ever ridden on a hard-tail, hell fastest I've ever rode fult-stop-period. So many memories: MTBing in the snow in Queenstown with local parrots, Taupo top-notch riding...
Pulled in late one night to a small-town hotel and the only food-place open was a Pizza parlour, got there just before closing. Decided to try a deep-fried Morro Bar. Well, I guess they'd already shut off the deep fryer earlier 'cause the batter was just saturated with oil. I'm usually able to eat about 3-5 times what the average person eats, but even with the others' help I couldn't finish it — it was like guzzling cooking oil.
We stopped to build a snow man and instead wound up building a phalic 3' hood ornament onto the hood of the car (Kiwi-friend's idea) and then driving across the Rangipo Desert with Sir Richard distracting other traffic — we almost made it all the way across the desert with it, but the wind, road vibration and heat of the motor softened the stiff snowrnament and lost the load.
Alas, one of our party got sick, so we had to cut our trip short and never hit Christchurch to visit friend's Gran. In fact, maybe the sickie got that way trying to eat that Oil-Derek'd Moro bar and it took a while to manifest itself...
So many more stories from that trip, but... this is a picture thread. Perhaps my pal has pics I can pilfer — I shall try to find some pics to append this post with, post haste.
PS:
Only pic I have of the trip, but just shot an email to my friend manning the camera — he was not expecting the Two Moons of Queenstown for this picturewrecksque shot...
Last edited:
cooder
Well-known member
Sounds indeed like a fun epic trip @Feral Feline glad you have such good memories!
Mentaltossflycoon
Well-known member
I considered calling my prunes n custard the rotorua cause I thought it sounded "stanky."
Chuck D. Bones
Circuit Wizard
A friend of mine was out at Burning Man in 2018, before the plague. He took some cool pix & videos.
fig
Village Idiot
That's the biggest broccoli floret I've ever seen.
fig
Village Idiot
This was the start of our 2020 garden which was extremely ambitious but produced more much more than we expected. That's our daughter putting the roto-tiller to use. we turned in an extra couple tons of garden topsoil, to help breakup the red clay. The second picture is after a pass with the disc bedder.
fig
Village Idiot
Two rows of of the San Marzano plum-type (obviously not in the same soil), Better and Best Boys…we had planned to make sauce but the bugs consumed quite a few. A barrier plant would probably have kept them at bay, but we seriously over-planted anyway. Most everything that was planted yielded more than expected ,with a few exceptions like gourds…by the time the pumpkins and birdhouse gourds were growing, the end of the summer squash was being drained by 3 generations of squash-bugs…(this kept them away from other things they don’t like as much)..the zucchini plants already pulled. The most disappointing was the rutabagas. I don’t think the row’s soil was dressed correctly for them. My wife likes them cubed, coated with olive oil, and roasted.
Again, it was a lot of fun and I learned a lot. Here’s what we grew;
Tomatoes
Sweet potatoes
Cabbage
Zucchini squash
Summer squash
Peanuts
Black-eyed peas
Pole beans (2 kinds)
Cucumber
Banana pepper
Hot pepper
Zipper-creme peas
rutabaga
Watermelon
Honeydew
Cantaloupe
Birdhouse gourd
Pumpkin
….I think that’s all…whew!
Again, it was a lot of fun and I learned a lot. Here’s what we grew;
Tomatoes
Sweet potatoes
Cabbage
Zucchini squash
Summer squash
Peanuts
Black-eyed peas
Pole beans (2 kinds)
Cucumber
Banana pepper
Hot pepper
Zipper-creme peas
rutabaga
Watermelon
Honeydew
Cantaloupe
Birdhouse gourd
Pumpkin
….I think that’s all…whew!
Feral Feline
Well-known member
jimilee
Well-known member
No you gonna can them through the winter?Two rows of of the San Marzano plum-type (obviously not in the same soil), Better and Best Boys…we had planned to make sauce but the bugs consumed quite a few. A barrier plant would probably have kept them at bay, but we seriously over-planted anyway. Most everything that was planted yielded more than expected ,with a few exceptions like gourds…by the time the pumpkins and birdhouse gourds were growing, the end of the summer squash was being drained by 3 generations of squash-bugs…(this kept them away from other things they don’t like as much)..the zucchini plants already pulled. The most disappointing was the rutabagas. I don’t think the row’s soil was dressed correctly for them. My wife likes them cubed, coated with olive oil, and roasted.
Again, it was a lot of fun and I learned a lot. Here’s what we grew;
Tomatoes
Sweet potatoes
Cabbage
Zucchini squash
Summer squash
Peanuts
Black-eyed peas
Pole beans (2 kinds)
Cucumber
Banana pepper
Hot pepper
Zipper-creme peas
rutabaga
Watermelon
Honeydew
Cantaloupe
Birdhouse gourd
Pumpkin
….I think that’s all…whew!
fig
Village Idiot
We did can some tomatoes, and also some killer zucchini relish. This was the 2020 garden.
