The Yellow Bee

Tim & Dad's Christmas Present - The Yellow Bee

Well, Tim and Dad finally got around to taking their Christmas present for a spin. .... The Yellow Bee - their remote control airplane.
Tim took it for its first ride....it looked as though the pilot flying the yellow bee was drunk. Shortly after its wild ride begins, it came crashing down. With some significant damage to the front wings. We thought....okay, this is going to be a short lived activity. Tim patched it together enough to get it in the air again. Dad went to retrieve the back up wings from the car (note: always have backup wings and bring them with you - tape would have been nice too!) Sure enough it came tumbling down once again.

After the wing replacements surgery, Dad took it for a spin. We thought it was never going to come back - Dad had it circling high in the air and over the water! Slowly but surely, he brought it back in for a crash landing - we were all cheering because the front wings survived, only the rear wings needed to be replaced. You will also see in the photos we continued to get damage the cockpit area. We had a great time. Believe it or not, we were not stopped by the damage to the plane, but by the dead batteries!

Waimea Canyon

Going out for a nice dinner

Snorkeling

Up close and personal...

Na Pali... from the ground

more Na Pali

Na Pali coast line

Juarassic Park!

coastal views

Helicopter ride around Kauai

Why did the chicken cross the road?

Amazing

Bombs away!

Kipu Falls

It was really awesome. We found some waterfalls where you could jump off the edge and also had a rope swing.

Maybe she'll win Ms. Hawaii...

WIPEOUT

Ahhhh the beach

Pineapple fun!

Who loves guava?

Trying to be a local

MMMMMMmmmm. Starfruit.

The rose gets around!

What's with the rose?

The boys

Some people thought it'd be funny to paint our car and make us wear costumes. Yes sir Commander!

Another good picture

It was a good party. Thanks for all who came!

The BIG DAY!

For those of you who didn't make it... or want to relive the moment... Here's a picture from the wedding day.

Helping out. John, Heather, and Papa 

Sunset in Oregon 

Oh how cute 

Crater lake in Oregon 

Watch out for that black wild animal behind you! 

Sliding like a champ! 

Heather, Tim & Amour at the Portland Rose Gardens 

It's not all that bad.

We have the doggie!!!! She's sooo cute!
Since being back, I have been going going going. From NZ to Santa Barbara, to LA for 4 days, to Denver to play rugby, to San Francisco/Orinda for 4 days, to Sacramento, to Chico, to Portland Oregon, to Kennewick Washington to see dad for 3 days, back to Orinda! Boyo that's some time in the car! Here's some pics though of what we did...

Back in Black!

After 8 months in kiwiland, we're back! Painted black and ready to start life, we're back. I think being back has been a very strange realization on how different it can be from one place to another on this small planet. New Zealand... green, young, outdoorsy, open-minded, and absolutely rugby mad! the US... brown, harsh, old, cars, traffic, cemente, people, busy, going going going, cars, traffic! I think the oddest thing for me (Tim here) was flying out of NZ and arriving into Los Angeles. Flying over this human grid of cars, houses, and streets stretching as far as the eye can see. Non-stop movement and colors moving around and around. Landing and being shutled like cattle into the customs. Being pushed out of the womb into harsh reality where 200 people are shoving one another to get out of the terminal! Once out... you get into your car. In NZ, we got delayed by 2 hours... putting us into LA at 3:30PM. RUSH HOUR! I sat in the car for 3 hours to go 100 miles. Then got back into the car to drive to Santa Barbara for another 3.5 hours. Wheew.... welcome back!

Franz Josef Glacier

Franz Josef the town is really small! The 3/4 day Glacier Hike was great!!
I loved it...photos will be coming.

Christchurch....

We'll we all arrived in Christchurch with the idea of going on the train over the Greymouth, but the train rails were getting repaired. So we rented a car a bit yearly and headed into Christchurch. Tim and I took a run through the Botantical Gardens. Then we head out for a meal and went to pub to give it a go at Quiz night. We were worthless, we didn't know anything and we were at the bottom of the point scale the whole night. Well we met someone that knew some of the answers and so we had him join our team. He helped us out quite a bit....but then he proceeded to convince the boys that they needed to do the Queenstown Bungy (134 metres) The third largest in the world! So we take off to Queenstown....quite a few hours out of our way. But we carry on. We got there early afternoon and they signed up. We checked out the town. It's a little ski town. The next morning we get in the bus and head over bungy jumping spot. It was crazy....two cables hanging across the canyon with a little bit of water under. We ride in a little basket across the canyon into a glass room with one side open that everyone jumps out of. Except me. I didn't jump, heck no! Anyway, I was the photographer. It was crazy, I was scared just standing up there.
After that we drove up to Franz Josef Glacier....

This trip is coming to an end...

Well, this trip is coming to an end. We just finished our last bit of travelling in New Zealand. Two of Tim's high school friends came out for 10 days to join us for our last tour of New Zealand. 10 days was far too short, but with work commitments they couldn't make their stay any longer. Tim and I planned to pick them up last sunday at the Auckland Airport, so we decieded to make our way back up the Kauri Museum in the Northland. We started on Friday night and drove past Auckland. Saturday morning we went up the Kauri Museum which was amazing. Did you know that the Kauri tree is actually a pine tree? Papa will be interested to hear about that. Anyway, we saw the museum and then picked out a new Kauri wood bowl to recover the one we had lost when our car got broken into. We also picked kauri plate for our friends Mike and Becky, who lost theirs in the car theft as well. We then went down to Auckland to pick up our friends. Dave had flight delays, so we showed Ben around Auckland a bit. Then when Dave finally came in...his luggage wasn't there!
We drove straight to Rotorua and chucked them in a wet ZORB. Then we had a big kiwi meal at Mike's house and then we went to the Polynesian Spa and enjoyed the therma spa pools. By that time they were totally tuckered out. The next morning we drove out to the Lakes and showed them around the local Marae. Then we flew out of Rotorua to Christchurch.

NZSA year end awards

The advenures are coming to an end... after thinking the trip would never end, we are winding down here in NZ. The New Zealand Sports Academy end of the year International awards had their awards night last night. All the International boys got a bone carving necklace for their hardwork and for safe travels back home. There was 4 individual awards... Most improved, best forward, Best back, and MVP (pictures below). After the awards, the bar tab was opened up! The boys had lots of fun and the year has been good. The end is near. We are trying to wrap up our last travels and getting mentally ready to come home.

Tim, Andreas, and Heather (Ace hiding in the back) 

Pool que haka