A mid-winter visit

With relatively little notice Eli and Beth showed up in Dunedin as part of an around the world trip after the World Cup in South Africa. To be fair I did have ample warning that they were coming, but I never quite believed they were actually going to show up. Not because I distrust them, more that I didn't want to get too excited before I knew they actually had purchased tickets (which turns out was about 4 or 5 days before they arrived).

We had a blast while they were here, so much fun that Kate and I both ending up getting sick while they were here, recovered, and kept rocking it.

While I was busy slaving away at work Kate managed to take Eli and Beth out for a Harbour cruise, luckily the provided spray coats kept everyone dry as well as fashionable.

The weather was very cooperative, albeit a bit nippy, but the sunshine allowed us to take a drive into the mountains and meet this cheeky fellow who was very playful until he started pecking at the rubber around our car windows. He then turned slightly hostile and I feared a Hitchcock 'The Birds' scenario was starting so we high tailed it out of there as the Kea hopped along after the car.

Eli also managed to fit this ridiculous lion hat into his suitcase. Those of you privy to justin and jayne'ss wedding last year will remember a similar affair regarding the lion hat.

A group shot of us in a wine cave.

Don't let the blue skies fool you this water was very cold.

We've been trying to lay low and recover in the week or so since they left, it was awesome to have some visitors to break up the winter hibernation.

Cockling

Sorting through the photos from the last few months I came across some oldies but goodies. This happened a while ago, mid May-ish if i recall correctly…

So we were tipped off by some people that you can go "cockling" if you go a bit out of town on the habour. Our friends Kit and Natalie, who represent the fine state of Illinois, invited us along with 3 other Americans and another Aussie along for a Cockling adventure. All told one of the eight of us had been cockling before, a long time ago and not in Dunedin. But her dad was a fisherman, so we figured that was experience enough and rolled with it.

It turns out getting the Cockles (yes, plenty of very predictable jokes were made regarding Cockles) is the easy part, you just go at low tide and start digging and they are everywhere.

Kit, Burt and Caroline

Kate in the sand

Natalie

The time consuming bit about cockling is the preparation. Rinse, Rinse, Rinse, Rinse, scrub and rinse some more, then boil them forever.

Burt scrubbing away

The final product is this…..

Not much left for the end product. But it was cool to do, even though I can't eat them.