Tom, Penguins and Boulders

 I had some troubles with the pictures in this one, but here we go.  It is early fall here, but Tom looks like it is late into winter.  The breeze and sitting waiting for penguins made it a bit chilly.  This is Tom's first encounter with one of his new favorite beers --- Emerson's Pilsner.


 Below we have the yellow-eyed penguin series.  There weren't tons (more earlier in summer) but plenty and this one walked right in front of us.  There is also the one on the "wrong" side of the wildlife sign. 

 The next morning (after penguins and a great dinner at Fleurs) we ran to the Moeraki Boulders.  They are really surprisingly round. 

The rest of this day included a trip to Dunedin, Emerson's brewery, lunch with Jessica Leigh (see post Cass Lagoon Saddle) and pushing on to Te Anau, dinner and crashing. 

Tom Arrives in New Zealand

 Tom arrived in NZ on March 12 super late.  We got up and went to Downtown Christchurch to see some of the earthquake damage.  These two pictures don't do it justice, but here are a few. 

C1 --- one of the few cafes open in downtown with great breakfasts and coffee. 

Weekend Fun

Yesterday (Saturday) I went mountain biking in the Port Hills (the hills full of great trails on the South side of Christchurch) with 3 lovely women --- Alex, Barret and Maaike.  Yeah!  I've been missing riding with cool women.  It has become so easy to do at home!   I met Alex in the math department here and she coordinated it.  I had such a great time, I hope they invite me again. 

Today, I ran what Mike calls the "Sumner Heads" with Mike.  Its a great loop starting and finishing in Sumner.  I got to pass through Taylor's Mistake again, but this time was alert and happy and running pretty fast as opposed to when I did it at the end of the crater rim run. 

Tom arrives on Tuesday.  Yippeeee!  I probably won't take my computer on our excursions so the posts will die down for a while, but then I'll have lots to share when I return. 

Work

I am working a lot while I'm in New Zealand, in case anyone was wondering (my other posts might bring this into question, but running and biking make for better posts).  Every day I work in an office in the Erskine building at the University of Canterbury.

My office is on the back side of the second "tower" on the sixth floor.  Mike and I are working on an interesting probability problem involving questions of causality and I just started discussing graphical models with Marco as a result of me giving the department colloquium last week.  I'm also having great discussions with Raaz about teaching statistics.  I'm excited about all the mathematics I'm learning! I'm such a nerd.

Shoes

Tom is bringing me some new running shoes.  This is why. This picture does not do the destruction of New Zealand running justice, but you can see at least one of the holes.

Crater Rim

I've picked out a marathon (Arrowsmith marathon, April 6) to do and so I guess I ought to train.  I wanted to do 20+ this past weekend and so Mike suggested the Crater Rim Trail --- the whole thing.  This was actually a great idea, but for the spots where I got lost and had to do a bit of trudging through way overgrown trails --- although still nothing as bad as the bad section on my first big trail run in NZ (see the Adventure Runs in New Zealand post).   This was great.  Awesome views and mostly runnable and all along an obvious crater rim.   Just in case anyone is wondering --- Tom will be here soon!  Yippeee!

I finally got a new Nike watch and so I have a nice map of this run.  The crater has since been filled in by water, but hopefully here you can see the crater rim that I was following.  Around Mile 19 I'm in "Taylor's Mistake"--- take that however you want.

 Looking forward. This is not long after I started.  I'm headed to the point on the left that is tough to see due to the sun and the clouds.  

 Looking toward the end of my run, but I'm a lot closer now.  Yippeee!  I ran out to the "head" you can see on the left.  I went pretty much to the very end (had to cut off a small bit to get back to make dinner for friends), then over onto the beach on the left side (can't see that) and into the town of Sumner.  Near the end (no pictures, I was tired and in a hurry and around mile 19) I crossed "Taylor's Mistake." 

A bit farther along I took a picture looking back toward the start.  The bump sticking out in the middle of the picture (the farthest one back of the prominent ones) is about a mile or so from the start of the run and Mike and I climbed up there.  That is near where I took the first picture.

Tripping Hazard

I ran past a lot of these signs.  Mike said I should.  It turned out o.k.  The tracks are now safe as long as a big earthquake does not hit...and they are clearly doing work on those trails to officially reopen them.  These signs preceded each of the pictures below, taken looking back at the trail I had just run.  You can see the trail, or it is directly at the bottom of the rock faces you see.

 After the slowest part of my trip getting past the rocks in the picture above, I found these WWII batteries.  These two pictures are really for Tom and anyone else who is into that sort of thing. :)

And one final gratuitous panoramic photo. 

The Great Kiwi Beer Fest!

On Saturday (Feb 23) I went to the "Great Kiwi Beer Fest" in Christchurch.  Good time.  A bit different than the one in Manitou, but maybe not so much different from the one in Denver.  Costumes (not so much Manitou, but I've heard there are plenty in Denver).  

Small people.  There were quite a few.  Maybe I can bring Jack and Charlie to the next one!  Might have to bring them to NZ to get them in. Also, plenty of room to just sit down anywhere that seemed good at the time.  Gave me a good chance to write some postcards. 

 And I learned that there IS good beer in New Zealand, but you definitely need to know what to look for.  Twisted Hop, Renaissance and Parrot Dog had some particularly good ones, along with Emersons and Three Boys.  Twisted Hop and Three Boys are in Christchurch!