Visitors, good times & good food.

Well the evening is my own - Isaac has gone to the Treble Cone staff do and I feel rather at a loss to be honest, so I'm choosing to share it with you, gentle reader, in preference to the High School Musical 1 AND 2 extravaganza over on channel 2. I hope you appreciate it. It does feel very odd actually, since this is the first time one of us has gone out without the other in...well the whole time we've been in NZ in fact. To be fair, Isaac didn't actually want to go, but since he was awarded the 'Exceptional Employee of the Fortnight'* award at work recently, he has been entered in a draw to win some supposedly fabulous prizes (last year a brand new pair of skis and a heli-skiing trip were up for grabs) so he had to go along to be eligible. They had a Mexican theme, so Isaac, with a somewhat loose interpretation, went wearing a plaid shirt and a bandana tied at the front, but accidentally left his giant handmade cardboard moustache at home sadly. I'm wearing it as I type, just to add some rich imagery for you. I'm waiting for the call to say he's won something fantastic and can I come and pick him up please?

So the big news of course, is that Isaac's dad, Imo, and his brother Reilly came out to visit us. It's a long journey** for a short trip, but we managed to pack a lot in to the 9 days they were here and I think they were glad they came. We picked them up from the little-more-than-a-shed that is Wanaka airport (one small room, which rather amusingly has a tannoy system for flight announcements, even though the man who runs it could probably whisper and you'd still hear him), got their bags from baggage reclaim (a patch of dirt outside the shed which has a sign saying 'Baggage Claim Area' written importantly on it) and drove home in the Nissan Terrano we'd hired for the week to out tiny flat built for 2, which was somewhat overwhelmed with the amount of bags/snowboards/sour cherry blasters*** that it now contained. After torturing Imo & Reilly with a continued lack of sleep to get them to conquer the jetlag quickly, Isaac took them all up to Treble Cone the very next day to go snowboarding while I went to work (SOMEONE'S got to earn the rent goddamnit). Tired and sore, we went out for New Culinary Experience for the Weinerts #1 that evening: Thai. One red curry, one pad thai, one garlic chicken and one mixed noodle stirfry later, we were all full and happy.

The following day we were both off work, but the weather wasn't great, so we gave Imo & Reilly's aching legs a break and drove off to Queenstown to show the the shops and grab ourselves a taste of the legend that is Fergburger. I also picked up a little something along the way - a brand new snowboard. Not just any snowboard - oh no. The Gnu B-Nice, the board I'd been swooning after ever since I first saw it. I'd made attempts to buy it at trade price through our rentals department but the board was sold out throughout NZ. In fact the one I'd seen in Queenstown was pretty much the last one left in the country...and I wanted it badly. Of COURSE I couldn't afford it and of COURSE I wasn't good enough yet to justify a new board really, but it has banana technology (it's a bit bent like a banana so you don't catch edges so much) and magnetraction (has wavy edges which help your edges grip in the snow better) and, far more importantly, it has graphics that looked it was designed by Habitat. I wanted it. I ummed. I ahhhed. I sodded it. I bought it. I love it. Now I just have to learn to ride it properly.

And on that note, the following day we all headed up to Cardrona where I took advantage of having a snowboard instructor (Imo) all to myself. He did his best to help me keep my back straight, my knees bent, my shoulders back, my head up, my confidence brimming and my right hand down at my side, rather than swung out in front of me like I'm carrying an imaginary cup of coffee, setting me off balance, as it invariably does if I don't concentrate on keeping it down. I never got all of these things right at the same time, sadly, but I definitely got better, so that's a step in the right direction. The new board made it easier for sure, and the fact that I was so proud to be riding it helped too, of that I have no doubt.

New Culinary Experience for the Weinerts #2 - Indian. Mmmmmmmm. "These are good - what are they?" "Onion bhajies". Bless.****

The Wanaka cinema was a must-do, naturally, so we booked tickets for Transformers 2, which Isaac had been looking forward to seeing. I'd fallen asleep during the first one so wasn't really that bothered about it, but I do like a comfy sofa and a delicious pizza so I was happy to go along. We got our pizza ordered for the interval, but as soon as I'd eaten it I thought it would be nice to have a bit of a lie down on the sofa - one of the benefits of the Wanaka cinema - and promptly fell asleep, despite the ridiculously loud explosions. Really says something about my less-than-enthusiastic response to the Transformers franchise I suppose.

Friday was the only day that both Isaac & I were due to work, so Imo & Reilly would have to entertain themselves. However, a stroke of good luck meant that the snow came in and the wind came up, closing both our resorts, so instead we had a lazy day of recovering our muscles, catching up on our facebook picture uploading, and watching my newly purchased Top Gear dvds; a new experience for the Weinerts and one I'm happy - and hardly surprised - to report has gone down exceedingly well. Jezza, the Hamster and Captain Slow are now firm favourites. More snowboarding did follow however, with Imo, Reilly & I on the Saturday while Isaac went to work and Isaac, Imo & Reilly on Sunday while I did the honours. I have no doubt with whom they had more fun, but hope that I didn't hold them up too much. Reilly cooked a fabulous stirfry for our last night together - I love having a chef in the house.

Monday came around too soon and we were back in the shed saying goodbye. Still at least it won't be too long till we see them again this time.

Imo's parting gift for us was to offer us one more day's rental on the Nissan, so we took off for Queentown to visit the Onsen Hot Pools, which has six private pools, the front of which opens up to reveal a spectacular view over the Shotover river and surrounding valley. 1 hour of absolute bliss.

Got the call to go and pick Isaac up, so let's go see if he won anything...

*for 'services to the manager in the form of copious amounts of photocopying', if Isaac is indeed to be believed...
**Toronto-Vancouver-Auckland-Christchurch-Wanaka
***Isaac's favourite sweets from back home
****For the Canadians amongst you: for us English, not knowing what an onion bhaji is, is like not knowing what poutine is for you - which most English people don't by the way.