Our big news!

Last Saturday Robyn and I had been together for 4 years, and when she'd finished work we went for a walk around a small local lake. About halfway round is the spot in the picture, and like an old romantic fool I dropped down on one knee and popped the question. Robyn of course said yes (we knew she would ay Bob ;)!) and we toodled off round the rest of the walk.
We had a lovely spot of lunch in town when we got back, and a couple of quiet drinks in on Saturday night. We're off out for a proper sit down meal tonight to celebrate at a restaurant called The Bearing Point (thanks Mum and Dad) which should be nice!
Robyn likes to have a joke and say that I only proposed on Saturday because we'd been together for 4 years and it's one less date to remember, but that never occured to me.......

End of July.....

Not been much to blog about lately really, we've sort of been getting into a routine up here in Ohakune. Robyn's working pretty much 5 days a week at Kings, and I'm haning out here at Canoe Safaris checking people in and then cleaning up the rooms after they've gone. School holidays were pretty busy, I think over the course of a week we cleaned the 6 rooms we have 21 times!
When we get a nice bit of weather or when our work allows, we're away up the mountain for some snowboarding. We've not been doing too bad really, progressing from sliding down the nicely groomed beginners meadow to getting on the lift and coming down a proper run. Both of us have managed to make it all the way down without falling off once, which we were pretty chuffed about. Robyn wasn't very keen first time we got on the lift, I think she thought she was going to fall out somehow, but so far nothing like that has happened.
The pictures show our snowboards from both sides. Robyn's is the shiny new looking black one, and mine is the battered scratched sky blue one. I think if we come back to Ohakune next year I might be investing in a better board, or at least one in better condition.
Week after next we're off to Taupo for Robyn's birthday which should be good, its about a 2hr drive from here. We called in when we had our lovely flowery campervan and it was a pretty cool place, hope the weather isn't too bad!

Our new Subaru

Yesterday after work we caught the 1pm Overlander train to Auckland, the train is incredibly scenic with a glass wall at the back of the train giving you incredible views. We arrived at the Britomart station 6 hours later at 7pm and met with a guy called Clement le Clem (yes really).
We travelled all this way to buy the best car ever! Its a Subaru Legacy, 2.2l engine, 4 wheel drive - we would never be able to afford this in England! However, its a very standard car here and here you insure the car not the driver so its pretty cheap! The car cost $2000 and came with a free snowboard, bindings, tent, airbed, gas stove and a bunch of CDs. All in all it was a bit of a bargain!
Unfortunately it was a 4 1/2hour drive back to Ohakune on the unlit windy New Zealand roads, so overall it was a 10 1/2 hour round trip, but for a brilliant car!