Happy Thanksgiving

Actually the 27th was yesterday for us but it’s thanksgiving for all of you back home.  Don’t eat too much turkey and make yourselves uncomfortable.

Barb and I had a great day yesterday, then had a cheese omelet for our thanksgiving dinner.  Not exactly turkey but it “filled the hole” as Barb is fond of saying.  Actually it was a nice dinner and we washed it down with several glasses of wine we had purchased from a winery during the day.

The day consisted of driving north/west of Auckland out to the western shore to a place called Muriwai beach.  It’s a rugged beach with high cliffs and a nice black sand beach.  It is also a big surfing spot.  But what the beach is really known for is that it’s a huge nesting site for gannets.  Gannets are these large birds, about the size of a large raven that plummet from 30 to 40 feet into the ocean.  They user their wings underwater to swim around and catch fish.  They are amazing as was the whole beach.  We saw several chicks and eggs.  It’s spring here, remember.  Pictures below.

Today it’s cold and raining quite heavily.  We plan to head into Auckland and visit the Auckland museum.  Seems like a good day to visit a museum.

That’s all for now.  Happy Thanksgiving to you all.

Spence & Barb

PS.  A note about the pictures.  If you double click on them you will get the full size image.  Also I’m still trying to get the diving videos uploaded.  They are large files and we are still having some internet issues.

Muriwai beach looking south

One of the many gannet nesting sites.  A pretty neat rock pinnacle.

The same pinnacle from a different angle.

There were thousands of them.  It was very cool to watch them come in for a landing.  Somehow they manage to locate their partner, a feat in itself, then drop in without taking out several other birds in the process.  They have some amazing flying skills.

They mate for life and when one of the birds returns and lands next to it’s partner they go through this elaborate neck and head rubbing ritual.  The pair in the middle of the picture is going through this ritual.  It’s kind of nice.  Barb and I tried it, but it didn’t work for us.  🙂

I tried many times to get one in flight.  This one may be my best.

There are also terns that nest at the site.  They are much smaller birds but man can they fly.  You can see a little chick in the center of the picture.

The beach to the North.

A little snooze after our picnic lunch.  It was a beautiful warm day.  Very different from today which is cold and rainy.

Hello from Auckland, New Zealand.

This morning we said good bye to Fiji and hello to New Zealand. Hey! Did you know these crazy people drive on the wrong side of the road? It sure would have been nice to know that BEFORE we came on this little adventure!  🙂  Just kidding.  We knew they drove on the left.  I did managed to get us from the airport car rental place to our little cottage/flat without killing us or anyone else for that matter. However we did have a close shave when we were returning from our food shopping trip. But fortunately the other person had good reflexes and a very good horn. 🙂   I have to remember to look RIGHT when pulling out.

We now have internet, slow internet but it’s internet so I feel like I’m back in touch with the world.

As I mentioned above we did a grocery shopping trip and will make our first meal at our new “home” away from home. Hamburgers, my favorite. Barb is planning our activity for tomorrow. We will head out and see what we can see.

Until the next post.

Spence

Farewell Fiji.

Hello Auckland, New Zealand

See I made it.  I did not kill us or anyone else and the car is not crunched.  Driving on the left is very weird.

This is the little alley/driveway that we are now living on.  You can see a little building at the far end of the red house.  That is our apartment/cottage.

Moving in.

It is quite small but it’s our home away from home.

Hello,

We are saying fare well to Volivoli resort today and Fiji tomorrow. We are leaving the resort this evening around 6:00 pm and heading to Nadi, where we will spend the night in a hotel. Our flight to Auckland leaves pretty early tomorrow morning so rather than get up at 3:00 am to make the flight we thought this a better idea. It has been a great week. We had a great week of diving and ending on a really high note yesterday. Two great dives, “Mellow Yellow” and my favorite dive, “Purple Haze”.  Great dives.  We have also met some great people, which we hope to stay in touch with.  On a side note we were talking with the resort owner the other night and telling him of adventure and mentioned that we would like to work if possible.  He is from New Zealand and owns several businesses there.  He has kindly offered to pass our resumes on to these businesses to help us out.  Very kind of him.  It never hurts to have contacts.

Hope you are all well and staying warm.  Jane, it’s good to know the house is still standing and has not burned down yet. Has Hannah been having wild parties?  🙂   Hannah………   🙂

More when we get to Auckland.

Spence/dad

My beautiful dive buddy getting ready to head out to Bligh Passage for a little diving.

Another picture of my dive buddy giving me the “all’s okay” sign.

This is the is the top of the coral head on the dive known as “Purple Haze”.  Beautiful coral.

Our dive staff on yesterdays dive.  Bola, Seci, and Joe up front.  Great guys and very knowledgeable.

This is to top of the coral head on the dive called “Mellow Yellow”

Just more fish….   Yawn…..   🙂

He must have thought we were too skinny to bother.

Heading out to the dive site.

Beautiful orange flowers on the trees.  Not sure of the name of the tree.

Another view from our deck at low tide.  It is going to be hard to leave this place.

We’ve now been here at Voli Voli for about 5 days.  Our days consist of an early start, off to the dive boat, 2 dives and then back for lunch and a nap.  Then back in the water to splash around, then into the pool for more splashing around, dinner and bed.  So eat, dive, eat, sleep, swim,eat, sleep.  We’ve both observed that if you weren’t diving and if you didn’t want to read a book on the beach, there wouldn’t be much to do here in paradise.  We’re a long way from the nearest small town, with no car.  But the diving is keeping us very entertained and the underwater life we’re seeing is astounding.  We have one more day of diving tomorrow and might  be the only divers on the boat.

Hello all,

My first post of our adventure. It started on Sunday November 16th when we left home for a very long 20 +/- hour travel day. We got to Fiji at about 5:30 am, local time on Tuesday the 18th. If you do the math you will think I skipped a day. Well actually I didn’t skip it, we lost it. 🙂 Fiji as well as New Zealand and Australia are on the other side of the international date line. So while there is only a 4 hour clock difference, we’re 4 hours behind you.  We’re in your tomorrow.

Tuesday was a bit of a waste as we were both sort of jet lagged. So nothing to tell there.  But we dove both yesterday and today. Of course the dives have been fantastic. I have been taking lots of pictures and movies with the new GoPro camera but am not able to post the movies yet. It was kind of expensive to get internet access here at the resort so we only got it for one computer, Barb’s Mac. So I composed this on my PC then transferred it to her Mac so I could post it. There are a few pictures below but the underwater video’s will have to wait until we are in New Zealand.

We hear that the whole country is one big ice box and that the North East has been hammered with snow. I hope you are all staying warm and dry.

That’s all for now. I will update this post with underwater videos as soon as I can.

Spence and Barb

We’ve just arrived and this was our ride.

We’ve arrived at Volivoli resort and are heading down to an early lunch.  After lunch, it’s nap time.  🙂

A view of Volivoli from a spit of sand jutting out from the beach.

This is the view from our room.  Not too shabby.

This dive site is called “Wheat fields” and when I post the video you will see why.  These gold colored sea anemones cover the top of the coral head and waving in the current, they look like a field of wheat blowing in the breeze.  Really quite beautiful.  When we get to New Zealand I will upload the videos.

These are very healthy reefs.  Lots of life.  I wish you could see the videos but I’m afraid that will have to wait.  🙁