Sunday was the Wilbanks lab hike and dinner, which turned out a smashing success. At 1 pm Sigurd and his wife Erika along with Pete and Eleni met me at 7B Jura Street for the hike up Mt. Cargill. We decided to drive to the trailhead a few kilometers down the road in order to maximize our time walking on trail rather than road. Strangely enough for someone from New England, the winter vegetation on Mt. Cargill appeared identical to the summer vegetation, with the pine grove, dense rainforest, and subalpine bush all unchanged from my memory several months ago. We encountered a few rain squalls which produced some stunning rainbows. We also came across a silver fern, an important symbol of New Zealand. At the top we enjoyed the familiar superb view of the peninsula, bay, ocean, and distant hills and snow covered mountains many kilometers to the northwest. We also scampered up to nearby rocky Butter's Peak, and Pete, Eleni and I continued on to visit the organ pipes while Sigurd and Erika decided to head down and meet us at the car. All in all, a really fun walk.
We arrived back at the flat a little after 5 to meet Malcolm, Jerry, and Rich for dinner. My contribution was decidedly All-American; the previous night I made garlic basil mashed potatoes and baked cornbread, both of which turned out really tasty. I supplemented these with some fried chicken coated in potato flakes and saltine crumbs. Sigurd and Eleni brought lemon chicken, Pete made sweet dumplings, Eleni brought vegetables and hummus, Jerry brought pizza, Rich cooked honey soy chicken, and Malcolm made lasagna. After dinner we chatted about food, the cold, and New Zealand flora and fauna.
In other events over the weekend, I attened a massive 24 hour book sale at the Regent Theater in the Octagon. It took me half an hour to find an author I had heard of, but finally I purchased Michener's Tales of the South Pacific for one dollar. Then on Saturday afternoon Kyle and I attended a ground breaking ceremony for a Habitat for Humanity project in a suburb called Halfway Bush. The house will be built for a Maori family of 12. There will be working bees every Saturday (with the exception of the Queen's Birthday weekend) starting this coming weekend that Kyle and I plan on helping out at. To accomodate the working bee I've decided to begin my 40-hour famine at 6 pm this Saturday evening, finishing at 10 am Monday morning. I'll give a complete report of how the famine goes next week.
1 comment:
Sounds like you are continuing to have a great and active time there. I also note that many of your posts include sumptuous, vibrant descriptions of food. I suppose this weekend will be very different!
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