Hello Canada!

It seems as though many of these blog posts spanned Wednesday Aug 15, probably because we basically experienced it twice! I think Aug 15 on the Canada side was better, because I got to see my parents (yay!) and we rescued Dexter from the airport (yay!) and started the last leg of the journey home! Actually it was just my mom, Dexter and I; Scott flew all the way to Calgary (as explained in the last post...lucky duck!). My dad also flew home because he had to work, but he had accompanied my mom for the drive. So we had some mother-daughter(-dog) bonding time, which was great and made the drive go surprisingly quickly!

Dexter is super happy to be off that airplane! And also to not be in quarentine. 

Moooo

Stopping for ice cream, yum. Dexter is not sure about that goat.

Canada you are beautiful! I missed you!

Selling Binney!

It was sad to see him go, we had a lot of good times over the year, but it needed to be done! Jax did a really nice job getting him all cleaned up and photo'd for the ads, and we had some interested emails for a few weeks before we got to Auckland, but then it got crazzzzy.

This guy had offered $3500 for him (we listed for $4500 originally) without seeing, which I thought was weird. But I met up with him anyways and he quickly discovered all of Binney's secret little problems, but still offered $3500. Ok, guy is probably right... And I really wanted to come home early w/ Jax, so I accepted his $3500 offer eventually after some negotiation attempts (I suck at this!). He offered a deposit right then since the banks were about to close, but I said it was ok, I'd come back tomorrow and we could do it then, it worked out better logistically anyways!

So off I went, I changed my plane ticket to the next day (when Jax was leaving) and went out to visit our Auckland friends! It was wonderous to be coming home! Wee! Then we got a text from the guy: His wife had spent the money. Damnit. I thought then as I do now that he was just scamming us. I wonder what would've happened if I took his deposit?? Anyways, next morning comes around and we don't really know what we're going to do, but we have things to get Dexter onto the plane to do first and then we'd worry more... Guy from the day before texts saying he "found" $2000, would that be ok? Screw off, asshole. :)

Just as we're dropping off Dexter I get a text from another interested buyer who wanted to see the van right then. Gladly! We take off across the city and show it to a really nice couple who own an antique store. They hum and haw for a bit and eventually offer $3200, which we jump on! How fast can we give this van away zomg! So we do all the money transferring and title switching, and they ask when our flight home is.. "Oh, about 4 hours from now!"... muahaha.

We ended up walking to the nearby bank, depositing the money, and waiting there with all our remaining luggage for a cab to take us to our flight home. It had worked out, Binney had a new home! :D

In memoriam: http://binneythevan.info/

Wanaka to Auckland in 2 days

Our drive to Auckland was pretty uneventful, which is probably a good thing! It was great to see our favourite NZ sights along the way, and also to get one last look of the north island before leaving the country.  We even drove through Kaikoura, so Dexter got one last play on his beach there.

By complete chance, the day we took the Interislander Ferry was their 50th anniversary! They had promised cake for all passengers, but alas it never materialized! :( Instead we had to console ourselves by watching a replay of the closing ceremonies on the on-board TVs. [Scott: they were nice enough to lament with us via Twitter that we didn't get our cake though!]

We arrived in Auckland on schedule, late Monday night. On Tuesday we were able to have one last visit with Brian, Theresa, Cooper and Mahalia, our favourite NZ friends! It's been so nice to have some friends in the country (even though we had never met prior to us coming to NZ!). Can't wait for them to visit Canada! Hint hint :)

Wednesday morning Dexter got some final plays and hugs, and then embarked on another big plane journey. I wonder if it was any less terrible the second time around? The good news for him is that he probably won't ever have to go on a plane again! Can't see any trips in the future that will be long enough to warrant bringing him, plus we will be paying off the cost of his airfare for decades to come.

There is a story that fits in here about selling the car, but I will let Scott tell that one... :) Stay tuned!

Scott packs up our skis/snowboard to ship home. 

This beach smells familiar...

Cozy Dexter in Binney with boxes and luggage :)

Where's our cake?

Springtime on the north island already?

One last dinner out in NZ!

Assembling Dexter's kennel for the plane trip. I think this picture also shows well how massive it is. 

Bye Dexter, see you on the other side!

Starting the homeward journey!

It's our last few days in New Zealand! 10 months has passed really quickly...but then when I think of all we've done I can't believe that we've been here less than a year. It's been such a great adventure and I'm sad it's over. But I am also looking forwards to seeing everyone back home and enjoying the rest of Canadian summer :)

We've got the van all packed and are ready to start our big drive tomorrow morning. It's 9ish hours to Picton, where we'll stay overnight. Then 3 hours on the ferry and 8 hours drive to Auckland. Ugh, not looking forward to it. If all goes to plan we should be there with a whole day of buffer until Dexter and I have to get on the plane! Then 14 hours in the air to Vancouver where my parents will pick us up (yay!), and another big 10 hour drive to Calgary. Lot's of travel in the next few days :) Scott gets to fly all the way to Calgary, lucky. But he also has to stay behind to sell our van and get our other affairs in order... so I guess I don't envy that part. 

On the way to Auckland we will hopefully be losing our surfboards in Christchurch. Somebody there replied to our internet ad and we are meeting up to make the sale, woo! The van is a lot less full in general because we donated most of the random stuff we've acquired here that isn't worth bringing home.

Here's some parting shots from Wanaka. See you soon!!!!

Our last day of skiing was probably the best one! Beautiful snow and sunshine!

Clouds down in the valley, but not up here!

Scott stops for pics on the way home from skiing.

We keep seeing this bird and finally got a picture. It is apparently an European Goldfinch

Dexter has a drink from the lake

Didn't know that shags liked to live so far from the ocean, hmmm.

Dexter swims with the ducks

Hahaha funny picture of Dexter shaking off!

And another :)

Last Lake Wanaka swim!

Puzzling World

We went to Puzzling World today! It was puzzlerific! First we tacked the Great Maze: 1.5km of outdoor labyrinth which was much harder than we expected :) There were bridges that added  3rd dimension, which was what really made it tricky. It was really fun! We were proud that we finished in about 40min, much faster than the average time of 1-1.5h.

Next we went inside to the Illusion Rooms. There were some cool holographs and optical illusions, but my favourite was the Ames Room where I finally got to be taller than Scott! The Tilted House was pretty cool too. 

In the cafe there were lots of fun puzzles and games to play too, so we spent some time there too. Definitely a great place to visit!

The Leaning Tower of Wanaka

Hmmmm this maze is hard....

We did the difficult challange! It involved a lot of backtracking.

FINALLY found the yellow corner (it ended up being the furthest from the start).

Green corner! This one was easy.

Blue!

Red! Last one!

Hooray we finished the maze!

Multiple levels mean extra complicated...

Extra complicated means extra fun!

The restrooms...hmm...

This Hanoi Tower would take 700 billion years to compete, assuming 1 move per second. Crazy!!!

I'm taller than Scott!!

Now I'm smaller :( Optical illusions are fun!

I'm great at balancing!

This dangling swing shows how tilted this room is! Crazy!

Even MORE Ski Pics!!!

Thanks to the new snow we had 4 great days of skiing in a row this week! Wednesday was supposed to be sunny, but instead it looked like this:

Ummm, where's the sun?

Also Scott's banana went skiing with me,oops! :(

The snow was still great, so the day wasn't a waste. But we had to go back on Thursday to get the good snow AND the sunshine!

Look at all the snow!

Fantastic skiing in Saddle Basin this week!

I'm having a great day!

Swoosh

Riding up for more

Keep tips up!

I liked this one

Heading down while we still have enough legs left. 

Check out the snow line on the distant mountains, pretty neat!

Cars winding all the way down the highway...lucky for us we skied through lunch when everybody was eating!

Eep Scott skied off a cliff somehow!

But he's ok!