Winter Solstice

Marking the southern hemisphere's shortest day and longest night of the year, when the sun's daily presence is but a brief moment and the darkness an endless blanket... all across New Zealand, kiwis (and a couple Americans) left the warmth of their homes to pay homage.  The spectacular tradition in Dunedin is a celebration commencing after sunset... full of homemade lanterns, dancers, musicians... and animation to fill any childhood dream.

Mark and I, along with some friends, joined in the celebration marking the first day of winter, and thus the lengthening of days.

This year the theme was creatures of the night, complete with owls and dancing people that I surmise live in the dreams of the children who filled the streets.

The celebration ended with the explosions of fireworks from a building nearby. 

I shivered with the excitement of the coming of spring.

 A Midwinter's Night Dream.

4 Days and Counting

Last week marked the end of all lectures for this semester!  It's hard to believe it's actually here.  It really feels like just yesterday that that I sat in my first Physics lecture with a, "I'm sorry what did you say?" look on my face.  Today starts the countdown until my first final.  The library is busting at the seems with terror stricken faces.  All my usual hiding places are filled with energy drinks and laptops.  And around about the same hour each day, you'll find a good majority of my fellow students face down at their desk.  Not sure why this is funny to me.  But then again, I was looking out the window of the top floor of my favorite library that overlooks another portion of the roof... and Otago Harbour.  I've peered out over this portion of the city countless times, but for some reason this time the sign at the edge of the roof caught my attention...

This is a horrible shot, but the sign says "Beware: Keep Away From the Edge".

I thought I was never going to stop laughing!  How appropriate to have on the edge of the building that houses the activities that causes you to want to throw yourself off a roof.  Ok, maybe I'm a little delirious... but it really was funny at the time.  I'm sure if you looked at the ground below you'd see a pile of Physics and Chem books!

Ok, study break over...

Mark and a Toaster Oven

Most of you know that being the brilliant woman that I am... I chose well in marriage.  Aside from his many wonderful attributes, my husband is an amazing chef.  What's truly remarkable is what he has made in our dinky kitchen.  To fully appreciate this, you would need to see it for yourself... but I refuse to post pictures of our kitchen.  So, just understand that instead of a stove... we have a toaster oven.  I've never seen a toaster oven with stove "eyes" on top until we moved here.  But nothing stops this man!  He has continued to amaze me with his culinary feats.  The following photos aren't even the most amazing things he's made, but I've never seen someone bake bread in a toaster oven!  Mark has taken my desire for healthy AND good food as a challenge... Everything is from scratch, everything is made of things that I can spell, and no butter nor any of the traditional things that are the easy way to make food taste good!  Are you jealous yet!?!  :)

Whole Grain Sunflower Seed Bread

Marbled Butternut Squash and Quinoa Bread

Honey Glazed Oat Bread

Whole Wheat Crust, NZ Sausage Pizza

(Mark wanted me to add that he made the sausage)

Whole Wheat Tomato and Basil Pizza

Before: Some fish I don't remember the name of... but YUM!

After...

We eat fish most nights.  I'm in heaven!!

In case you didn't believe me about the toaster oven...

How lucky am I!!

Bladwin Street versus an American

For some odd reason my university has a thing for exams on Saturday.  I categorize such a thing as cruel and unusual punishment, but they don't seem overly concerned with my opinion on this.  So, this morning I stumbled to an exam along with my fellow victims to yet another academic torture device.  But, unlike my perky 18 year-old counterparts, I have a husband who makes me a HUGE and glorious brunch after every exam.  It literally is the reason I have any enthusiasm to get out of bed!  I know regardless of how horrible an exam might be... I get a ROCKING brunch after!  How lucky am I!?!

After my amazing feast, Mark and I headed to the infamous Baldwin Street.  For those of you who subscribe to "Behind the Times", Baldwin Street is the world's steepest street.  And no doubt... it's stinking steep!  From what I hear, they have a yearly race up this thing.  It's suppose to be quite the spectacle!



So this is the view from the bottom of the street...

This is the view from the top.  I feel like this doesn't accurately portray how insanely steep it really is.  All I can tell you is that first hump in the middle of the photo...you can't see the road after because it goes straight down!

The view of the surrounding area alone was worth it!

This is either a result of my exam... or the daunting thought of finals in two weeks... or merely the hike up some crazy man's idea of putting a street on a hill like this... either way, here I am...

...and so you know, if it weren't for my belt catching on the road... I would have TOATLLY been sliding down the street!

Hope you're having a good weekend!!

Random Things

It has been brought to my attention (more than a few times) that my enthusiastic followers are suffering from my infrequent blogging.  Well far be it for me to deprive the masses!  However, seeing that I'm in my last few weeks of this semester with the threat of finals growing closer, I don't have any new kiwi adventures to share that doesn't involve the words "physics" or "laboratory".  This is said in the old english way of course, "laBORatory"...still cracks me up.
So, I started digging in our vast collection of photos and found a few that make me smile.  Some are old, some are new, some just didn't make the cut to get in the blog for some reason or another.  But, now it's their time to shine.  Hope you enjoy this random moment brought to you by yours truly...

This was a crazy car I saw walking around one day when we first got here.

Being right on the coast, we of course see our fair share of seagulls.  This one is less than thrilled at the big man taking his photo.

Is this the cutest railroad sign ever?

I don't feel like this one needs any commentary.  You all know why this is funny!

Me outside the Chinese Gardens here in Dunedin.  Taken back in Feb shortly after we arrived.

There is a Cadbury factory here in Dunedin as well.  They give tours daily with many opportunities to indulge.  Needless to say, I haven't come within 10 feet the doors yet!  Mark took this picture. I have no self control, and I hear they give you a bag of chocolate at the end.  TORTURE!

Mark assures me that the cow is being milked as part of this display in chocolate making.  But why does he need to face that way!?

Last but not least.... me and my buddy back in Chicago (we have a mutual appreciation for Kermit if you were wondering).  This was at my little birthday bash at The Little Red Hen in Glencoe (my favorite place ever!).  Miss you tons Zafo (don't feed the animals!)!!!

Hope this brightened your weekend.  If not, sorry...blame Chemistry... it's fried my brain!  Lots of love.

  

Queenstown, Part 2

Queenstown, New Zealand

There's something about fall that I love.  In a place like Queenstown there's so much to see with such a diversity of people.  This is a wonderful thing for people watchers...which I TOTALLY am guilty of being.  I could sit forever and watch people come and go.  For at least this weekend, Queenstown provided a never ending supply of things to sit and enjoy.

We rode the Skyline Gondola to the top of a mountain overlooking Queenstown.  I vibrated with the excitement of a kid while views of the city and the vast landscape surrounding came into view.  Did I mention how grateful I am that my husband invested in a good camera? 

Views from the top were more spectacular than we could have hoped for.  Again, it's hard to convey the vastness of this place.  Photos just don't capture how insane it is to be looking out over such a place.

Since both of us are really just big kids (ok maybe more me than Mark), we SO rode the luge down the mountain multiple times.  I didn't tip over (it was close a few times), we didn't crash into anyone, and we didn't get kicked out!!  So much fun!  Here's is the lift for the luge:

Amoung the MANY things to do in Queenstown is Frisbee golf.  I'm a big fan... even if I'm more into seeing how far I can throw a Frisbee between my legs than I am of the whole par concept.  I'm mean seriously... who ACTUALLY gets a hole in one in Frisbee golf?  I vote for style points any day!

The disc golf goes through the gardens of Queenstown.  So, what do you suppose she's pondering?

Mark tells me this is a quintessential "Carrie" shot.  I dont' really know what that means, but I'm watching the ducks having a rather aggressive conversation over something apparently very important... somebody was getting a lecture!

We miss all of you!

Queenstown: Part 1

With the bulk of first semester behind me, I gladly piled my books in a corner and started packing my bags.  We decided to get out of town for my mid semester break and head to Queenstown.  Queenstown is a HUGE tourist spot, and thus one of the main places known by foreigners.  Being a couple of those foreigners, we thought... when in Rome...
So, here we go:

We jumped on a bus and settled in for almost 5 hours of the most spectacular scenery I've ever seen out a bus window.  Silly me brought a NON school book to read that never even got touched.  It's hard to describe the vastness of it all.  The way the emerald rivers snake around the base of the mountains creating the most perfect undisturbed mirror images of the world above.  It really is just humbling.  There's no way to capture this with a camera through the smudged windows of the bus, but here's at least one that came out...

Once we all fell out of the bus in Queenstown, Mark and I gathered our bags and headed to our backpackers accommodations.  What a cool experience this was!  You never know what you're getting yourself into with these places, but this was fantastic.  We met such awesome people from all over.  Stayed up late laughing and sharing life stories every night.  Five star hotels are nice... but isolating.  Here, you share meals and adventures of the day.

The first thing Mark and I did in Queenstown was tramp up a hill.  Not feeling quite up to the 7 hour "hard" trail, we chose the 3 hour "moderate" trail for our first real tramping experience.  And holy cow... the views were insane.  First off, it's fall here so there are these occasional bursts of color on the trails that are just stunning...

This wasn't really on the trail, but the path leading up to the trail.  It was a perfect fall day!!

On this particular trail, they have artwork that has been commissioned and strategically placed periodically.  This gate marked the beginning of the trail.

This would be me getting a closer look at the number of pine cones on the tree above.  No joke...there were too many to count!  I've never seen so many in one tree, let alone ALL the trees up there.  AND pine cone bombs would attack the unsuspecting passerby causing them to holler like a little girl!



Every so often on the way up the hill, there would be this break in the trees and then wow...

Mark taking it all in....

This wire basket was one of the art installations.  My favorite part was the chocolate Cadbury egg someone had left in the middle...

In addition to the installations by local artists, hikers have left their own mark on this trail.  Right at this one bend were tons of stones in piles all over.  It was actually a really cool thing to see.  Gathering his own stones, Mark joined in the quiet display.



The summit at the top of our hill was worth the hike.  It offered a 360 view of Queenstown and all the surrounding area.

It was an amazing morning on top of Queenstown hill.  I'll return and do a part 2 blog about the rest of our trip.  Until then...