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sport

netball

we went to watch a netball game on sunday.  it was quite excellent.  new zealand vs australia.  australia won in the last quarter (boo!) but we had a great time.  got to hear Opshop (world famous in new zealand) and the prime minister was there as well.  few photos above.

soccer

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friday was a noisey day at work

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i fear we’re not yet over the worse

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retro bowling

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we went to a fantastically retro bowling alley today.  apparently this is the more modern one of our two nearest.  i’m sure i remember this machine from trips bowling in nottingham from when i was a lad

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the shoes certainly looked like they’ve seen a few years of action

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and there were plaques all over the place celebrating big achievements on the different lanes.  this one showed the first time someone had scored over 300 on lanes 15 and 16.

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the machines looked modern in a retro calculator sort of way

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you could image people playing the original space invaders game in the background loving all the new technology

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and the cafe was great too

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and finally there was a lovely universal greeting sign as we came in.  all absolutely lovely and we shall be back for more of the same next month !

all blacks

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sport is a way of life over here in kiwi land.  here’s a good example.  two all blacks, a couple of olympians, an international triathlon lady and a national netball player came along to encourage the kids at a triathlon yesterday morning.

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colour coordinated pens

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esther and kezia did their first triathlons yesterday.  i don’t think they would have done anything like that in england.  although the sea was a bit chilly a good time was had by all !

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round the bays

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we did the auckland ’round the bays’ walk on sunday.  it was jolly good

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we even got to be ‘wooped up’ by the new zealand prime minister john key

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kezia said he was much bigger than she expected.  but that’s because she’s been singing “little john key” (to the tune of little donkey).  esther thought he should dress as a key and do the race in fancy dress.  but he didn’t

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the blues

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we went to the local stadium to see ‘the blues’ football team who were doing some signing

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when we got there it turned out they were a rugby team

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that serves me right for not doing my homework

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rather than queue for an hour to get things signed we took a few photos

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this chap was prowling the area trying to queue jump

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but he was quickly sent to the back of the queue

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a friend here told me that it’s quite amazing how close you can get to sporting stars over here and she was right.  if you know who they are (i don’t) then you’re likely to bump in to them all over the place, and not just (free) signing events like these

london ignores champions

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i love london.  and i love how you can walk down the street and see something fantastic that everyone else is ignoring.  like these athletes we saw being photographed after we’d dropped our passports off at New Zealand House (that’s the base of eros just behind them)

A bit of googling revealed the chap is Laurent Vidal  There was also a swedish athlete and another lady with her back to us (who perhaps could have done with longer shorts).

playing or practising golf

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i like how they’ve made it clear it’s playing or practising golf which is outlawed.  just so you can’t claim you were playing when you were practising and vice versa to avoid the rule

orienteering

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compii

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used cups only

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tree time

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finish

skating

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i had the day off yesterday so i took the girls ice skating.  exhausting stuff, although esther and kezia are now much better than me which helps.

climbing

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there goes esther up the climbing wall

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this man was concerned.  so would i be with a fantastic beard like this

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day 13 crazy golf

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every holiday needs a trip to the crazy golf course and we went to this excellent one at Heatherton.    it had a pirate theme and was your more sensible sort of crazy gold with pretend bunkers and sloping greens rather than comedy obstacles

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we were the first on the course in the morning so we could lead the pace.  we scored using the funkypancake family amendment to the rules (no one can score more than 8 on any hole, so people don’t forfeit the game by having one bad hole)

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it ended up being down to the final shot by my father-in-law.  if he pocketed the ball on a shot from a tricky bunker up against a wall, he would win against jane.

he hit it, and it went straight in to the hole but it bounced back out !  his next shot went in so it was a draw with jane.  well done to them both