Last weekend with Kelly....

This weekend was Kelly's last in New Zealand. It's a sad sad day down here...

Luckily though, it was the Queens Birthday Weekend, which means Monday is a holiday so Kel and I got to spend another fun weekend in Wellington and have it be a 3 day!!

On Saturday, we had the ambitious plans of taking the train up north to 'a couple small towns' all day to go to cafe's and tour around... we left our house in the morning and hopped on the train. We got ready to buy our tickets and told the lady where we would like to go and she told us that we missed that train. Oops! From our lack of research, we didn't realize that the weekends only had one train leaving to go north in the early morning and one train coming back in the evening. While sitting on the train heading as far as it would go, the whole 15 minute ride to Upper Hutt where I teach everyday, Kel and I were figuring out what to do now. Luckily, I got a coworkers cell phone number and texted him to say we'd be stuck near his place for a little bit. This new friend of mine is Paul Higham... I like to call him Sir Higham, because, it just fits his character (he is an English and Drama teacher at Upper Hutt). He was right near the train station and decided to come greet us and show us around this particular small town... not exactly what Kel and I had envisioned for our Saturday adventure, but it worked out!! Sir Higham took us to a cute cafe that used to be a movie theater, we got some coffees and chatted away for an hour until the next train came through.

Since we couldn't continue our northernly route, we heading back down south toward Wellington. We thought, we could go to some small cafe's in Welly and do tourist-y things there... which we did! We got down to the waterfront and, Sir Higham gave us the idea to rent Rollerblades. I'm not much for this kind of activity, but I said if we can rent them for under $10 I'm in. Kel and I strolled into the little rental shop on the waterfront and saw that it was only $7 to rent the skates! We figured we should do it, no matter how lame we looked - which, we did - and again, the evidence is on Kels camera so I'll have to upload the pictures at a later date.

We headed out...very slowly, and not so gracefully (well I should say I did all this, Kel seemed to be a pro). There were two highlights from this - one was when Kel and I got to a small bridge to cross over... there were wooden slates that made up this bridge and for some reason kelly and I couldn't exactly push off to get the blades moving, so we held on to the side of it and just walked across... in the blades still. Yes, this would have probably been pretty funny just to watch, and we were laughing at ourselves while slowing stumbling over the bridge, but the best part was when an older women came whizzing by us and said 'Alright, now I don't feel so bad!'. How rude!! She was rubbing it in that she was such a better skater than us... not cool, but very true.

The second highlight was when we had just started out. The waterfront is a flat area and well paved so it was a good way to head out on skates that I hadn't been on for about 10 years. Kel skated ahead of me and I was trying to keep pace, but doing so unsuccessfully thus, she was about 15 feet ahead of me. I started to hear a rumbling noise behind me, and it was coming up quick! I slowed down and turned my head to see 7 little kids on their skateboard and one by one they were whizzing by me!! Apparently I let out some kind of whimper because Kel turned around to check on me and find I'm frozen in place amidst skater boys flying past!

Unfortunately, this may not be quite as entertaining to you as it was for Kel and I...

After skating, we treated ourselves to a drink at a bar nearby, hung out in the city for a while longer then went back to Lower Hutt to meet up with Fi and Sam for a family function.

Sunday Kel and I went to see the musical Cats in Wellington and we went all out by getting a hotel near by. The show was really good and one of the teachers at Upper Hutt was in it! We went to a veggie place for dinner then just relaxed at the hotel to celebrate the fun trip we've had so far!!

Unfortunately though, Kelly's time in New Zealand has come to an end and she is heading back to Seattle tomorrow (Well, we think she is heading back... we'll see if she gets on the flight!)

That's all for now. I'm preparing for my last month and a half down here and doing so without my side kick Kel by my side! Should be a good experience for me though and I'm looking forward to branching out a bit more!