See The World

All Blacks V France

2007-06-04T16:03:00.001+12:00

I know I haven't put up a new blog in a while, but not much has been happening lately. But the All Blacks were in town on Friday night with the first game of their international season. Turned out to be an easy win over a somewhat understrength French side.

They really like there pre-match buildup down here with fireworks and a dance performance involving about 100 people. The match itself was pretty good even if it was one sided. The All Blacks almost scored a try in the first minute, but it took them another 35 minutes before they finally got one, and then added another before half time to put their superiority on the score board.

In the second half the French were really struggling to match the fitness of the All Blacks, and at one stage the game was heald up for a few minutes while 4 French players received treatment for injuries.

Almost a full house of 41,500 at Eden Park, which will host the Rugby World Cup final in 2011 (with some renovations and extra capacity).

Haka - France Anthem - New Zealand Anthem

Mossel Bay

2007-04-25T20:26:00.001+12:00

This is the beach at Mossel Bay on the Garden Route. It is technically the indian ocean as it is east of Cape Agulhas (the southern most point of Africa). The waves can be big at times, and body boarding is very popular.

Not too far off shore is a rock with a seal colony on it which attracks the sharks, so it was not advised to go swimming infront of the house where I stayed, but about a km up the beach was perfectly safe. Check out my photos site to see the shark that was caught by a guy fishing infront of the house.

Helicopter Flight & Castle of Good Hope

2007-04-25T20:13:00.001+12:00

You can take a scenic flight around Cape Town & Table Mountain in a Huey helicopter, or if you're feeling more adventurous (like me) you can take the Combat Simulation flight. The helicopter used has been traced back to the Vietnam war when it was in active service. The flight can only be described as a rollercoaster ride without tracks. There was fog covering the beach, so the pilot couldn't take us along a few meters above the waves.

I also visited the castle of Good Hope in Cape Town, which was originally built by the Dutch East India Company between 1666 and 1679 to defend the port from the British. It is a national monument since 1936, and was the regional headquarters for the South African army, but now it houses the castle military museum and is used for official ceremonies.

Check out these links for some videos from Cape Town.

Table Mountain / Flight 1 / Flight 2 / Flight 3 / Flight 4

Cape Town & Table Mountain

2007-04-17T21:21:00.001+12:00

Cape Town is a huge city (population nearly 3 million) with a huge mountain right in the middle. Table mountain is an impressive sight, and can't be missed no matter where you are in the city.

The main city center is all hustle and bustle with various markets (some indoor, some outdoor) on the go every weekday. These markets start up before 8am, and finish up at 6pm. All the usual fast food outlets are here too.

A small bit away from the city center is the Victoria & Albert Waterfront. This is a combination of shopping malls, hotels & restaurants, as well as being the departure point for the Robben Island ferry, and many scenic helicopter flights. Anyone who plans to travel here be warned, that at peak times, the Robben Island ferry can be booked out for upto 3 or 4 days. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get a ticket.

Heading to South Africa

2007-04-17T21:03:00.001+12:00

While queing for check in at Auckland, I was asked to go to the Qantas First Class check in area. Unfortunatley, my luck wasn't that good, I wasn't being upgraded. Then, just as everyone was taking their seats on the plane, there was a security alert and everybody in the airport had to be screened again. Eventually we got going about an hour behind schedule. Next, during the flight to Sydney, the cabin crew asked if there was a doctor on the flight. Someone wasn't feeling too good which resulted in a quarantine officer coming on the plan for an inspection at Sydney.

The flight to Jo'burg was long and uneventful. The passport check at Jo'burg took forever, and I only had about 20 mins to spare before my connecting to flight to Cape Town. By the time I got to the hotel in Cape Town I was ready to sleep for a long time.

St. Patricks Day

2007-03-24T21:35:00.000+12:00

Obviously, its a week since Paddy's day, but here is how it went down on this side of the world.

1:00 pm - Parade
1:30 pm - Drink

The parade actually included 2 midgets dressed like leprechauns. Not exactly pollitically correct.

Because Auckland has so many different cultures, every parade (no matter what the occasion) is just a mish mash of culture. Imagine a load of chinese dancers going down the street dressed in green, followed by the Hindu dancers and followed by the local GAA club.

One of the bars here put on Murphy's for the day, so I had a few of them (no green food colouring in mine thanks). Things got interesting after midnight. In the build up to the Ireland V Italy rugby game, 3 guys from Togher arrived in the bar. Now I was wearing my Cork City jersey for added affect, so they came straight over to me shouting and roaring.

Paraparaumu

2007-03-07T13:49:00.001+13:00

Last weekend I rented a car a drove to Palmerston North for the latest Hurricanes rugby match (they lost this time). Arrived in the hostel to find that they put me in a room with 2 guys from Limerick & 2 from Wicklow. We had a good night out in one of the 4 local Irish bars which is already gearing up for Paddy's day (even if it was full of Scotish & English ex-pats). On the way back, I stopped off at Paraparaumu for a night. The sunset across the Tasman Sea was stunning. For any Munster fans reading, this is the birthplace of one Christian Cullen.

Hurricanes 23-22 Blues

2007-03-01T11:46:00.001+13:00

The Hurricanes beat the blues by a single point at the Westpac Stadium in Wellington. The Blues were really pushing for a position for a drop goal in injury time, but after about 7 or 8 phases, the referee gave a penalty to the Hurricanes for holding on to the ball. Ironically, the Hurricanes were the ones pushing for a try in injury time a week later, but they scored to beat the Brumbies 11-10.

Blues V Crusaders

2007-02-07T20:25:00.001+13:00

Went to Eden Park last Friday for the opening game of the Super 14. The competition has started about a month early this year because of the World Cup. The Blues won 34-25. The Crusaders have won the competition 6 out of 11 years, so defeats are rare. None of the big names were playing as the All Blacks are having a pre season training camp in Christchurch this month.

The Blues deserved the win, even thought their captain Troy Flavell spent the last 10 minutes in the bin after a yellow card.

Everybody should do a bungy jump

2007-01-15T15:35:00.000+13:00

I did a bungy jump last Friday from the Auckland harbour bridge. It's a 40m jump from under the bridge.

You don't really have time to comprehend what's going on when you jump/fall (one guy said "there is no up or down"), but once you start to bounce back up everything starts to slow down and you start to take everything in.

After 3 bounces, you can release your ankles and remain suspended by the harness at your waist while they drop another cable to winch you back up.

I think that I will have to do this again sometime soon.

Christmas & New Year

2007-01-03T18:04:00.001+13:00

Fireworks
Originally uploaded by paulhurley76.

Had a christmas party in the hostel on christmas eve, and went to mission bay beach for a christmas day picnic.

We decided that we couldn't spend new years in Auckland, so packed the bags and headed to Paihia in the Bay of Islands about 200 Km north. The weather was excellent, and the fireworks were even better.

Santa Parade

2006-11-26T23:53:00.001+13:00

DSC_0085
Originally uploaded by paulhurley76.

The Santa Parade took place on Sunday afternoon. It felt a bit like St. Patricks day, except for all the bands playing Christmas music, and the guy in the red suit.

It felt a bit strange in the sunshine, and everyone lashing on the sun cream.

The parade is sponsored by one of the super market chains, and the city council start the cleanup operation withing 30 minutes of Santa finishing the parade route which was basically a lap of the CBD (central business district).

U2 Concert

2006-11-26T23:37:00.001+13:00

DSCN0099
Originally uploaded by paulhurley76.

U2 were playing 2 concerts at the Mt Smart stadium in Auckland this weekend, so along I went on Friday afternoon to see if I could get a ticket. No luck, and along comes a security guard to move people away from the stadium just before U2 went on stage. To make things worse, I missed the hourly train back to the centre by seconds, and spent an hour on the platform listening to the concert and chatting to a Maori security guard about the ins and outs of U2 concerts and building stadiums for the 2011 world cup.

Determined not to fail, I made the same trip on Saturday afternoon, but this time I waited outside a different gate. After only 30 minutes, a guy was going by asking if anyone needed a ticket. I jumped at the oportunity, but was a bit worried that it might be a fake. His mate couldn't make it, so he just wanted to get some of his money back. 80 dollars was his asking price for a reserved seat ticket worth 199 dollars. I bought the ticket and in I went. The view was partly blocked by a speaker/camera pylon, but at least I was in the stadium. What a show U2 put on. Bono really interacted with the crowd, and even made a monty python joke. When dedicating a song to the Irish peace process & any other peace process he said "blessed indeed are the cheese makers". Half the stadium laughed, the other half didn't get it.

Week 3 - Skyjump

2006-11-16T12:19:00.000+13:00

As it is my birthday this Friday, I treated myself to a skyjump off the Auckland skytower. 192m of pure adrenaline rush in about 20 seconds. There's just something not right about stepping off the side of a building and all you can make out on the ground is the big bulls-eye where you are going to land. I can't recommend this highly enough. Even when the guy was giving me the count down, I thought I would back out but when he got to 1 I just let go. Ironically, there were 2 other guys jumping aswell, an Englishman and a Scotsman. I went first because the punchline always comes last.

Week 2 - Getting to know Auckland

2006-11-13T10:58:00.000+13:00

Took a ferry trip to Devonport accross the harbour, including a trip to the Naval museum, 2 volvanos and Devonport beach looking accross to Rangitoto Island (another volvano). Impressive view of Auckland from the top of Mt Victoria.

Went to the North Harbour Stadium in Albany, for NZ Knights V Queensland ROAR. 2650 people saw the bottom of the table Knights beat 2nd place ROAR 1-0. The standard is quite poor, even the once great Andy Packer couldn't salvage anything for ROAR.

Took the free Stray bus tour of Auckland, and saw the Sky tower, harbour bridge, viaduct harbour, bastion point, K’ road, Ponsonby. A great free way to get to know the city and some of its suburbs.

Headed out to Mission Bay, Okahu Bay, Hobson Bay on the bus.

The weather hasn't been great. We even had a minor tropical storm with 150kph winds and heavy rain. Pretty windy most days anyway.

Week 1 - Travelling

2006-11-03T10:35:00.000+13:00

Due to fog at Cork Aiport the night before, the Aerlingus plane couldn't take off. Ended up with a charter flight to replace the Aerlingus plane which meant a 2 hour delay.
Made the connection at Amsterdam just about, but couldn't really get any sleep on the 13 hour flight to Singapore. Arrived just before dawn, and spent the whole day there. Went on the 2 hour tour of the city from the airport.

Got the over night flight to Auckland, and arrived 11.30 am & cleared customs no bother, got the shuttle bus to the hostel in the city centre, got a bed and slept for the afternoon.
Spent the next day getting to know the place a bit.