Rotorua has many fine views, such as these trees in Government Gardens.
It’s a pleasure to be in Rotorua for a day or two, especially with fewer people around, thanks to our borders being effectively closed.
Am working my way through the NY Times Acrostic archive. Nearly 20 years on and I’m so aware of 11 September 2001. Like early 2020 it was a pivotal moment around the globe.
In both cases air travel was forever transformed — one symptom of massive societal change.
I rarely check texts before I send (I really should) so this autocorrected exchange with my partner while out in town was weird‼️
D: just getting petroleum (a/c from petrol)
Me: Petroleum! Fancy! I hope the house pillow (a/c hoi polloi) like me will be allowed in the car!
🤔
I really enjoyed Netflix ☛ Quartet 🎬:
takes place in Beecham House, a retirement home for former professional musicians, patterned after the real-life Casa di Riposo per Musicisti founded by Giuseppe Verdi.
Featuring Dame Maggie Smith. 👍 It’s a gem.
At the supermarket I spotted this unlabeled tray of weird objects in the fruit department. Turns out they are called Red Dragonfruit. Maybe next time we should buy one and try it.
At Ototoka Beach there was a small waterfall, maybe 3 or 4 metres high. It was enough for a good flow.
This 7 minute video makes a whole lot clear about our Aotearoa New Zealand earthquakes, and is easy to follow: New Zealand’s Twisted Plate Boundary.
Interesting: oceanic crust is basalt of volcanic origin which is heaver than continental crust, maybe something like granite.
The full pollen season in New Zealand is approximately 34 weeks long and varies in its timings each year - It begins in July or August with the Pinus season and continues into August/September with deciduous trees like oaks, elm, birches
We used to live near the top of Mt Victoria in Wellington, beside the Town Belt. Hundreds of pine trees were planted there in a 1930s Work Programme. The 6 weeks on end in 2012 of chainsawing to maintain the trees drove me crazy — no peace at all.
More photos from our visit to Ototoka Beach near Whanganui. The road takes you to the top of the cliffs, then there’s an easy walk down to the beach, past a maybe 3 or 4 metre high waterfall and next to a cliff face full of deep layers of millions of shells.
We watched NZIFF ☛ The County 🎬:
full of feisty female energy … sprinkled with rousing ‘you go girl!’ comic moments.
I suspect the reviewer saw some other film…
one woman’s fight against a co-op stifling the livelihoods of farmers in a remote valley near Reykjavik.
Grim.
And in today’s superb news: ‘our' swans at the lake a couple of hundred metres away have 5 babies. 🥳 🐦
I thought I’d sneaked up, but no… Two of the cygnets hitched a ride on mum as they all glided away.
Last year most babies disappeared. I hope things go better this year.
Remind me why anyone wants to live in Auckland … Volcanic Auckland: Which type of eruption happens where? 🌋:
For the elevated region immediately to the south of the CBD … the most likely scenario is a magmatic eruption – or one that involves fire fountaining of lava
That church in my photo? Hooray for Google Street View: Église Saint-Roch du Muret. Almost 40 years on and it looks just the same…
Waaay back in April 1982 my friend Janet had a VW Bug. We and 2 friends drove from Hamburg, through France and Andorra to Madrid and Valencia and back to Germany. In this photo we’d stopped in Le Muret for lunch of bread and cheese. I’m leaning against the back of the car. #mbaug
We watched NZIFF ☛ Some Kind of Heaven 🎬:
American documentary film — a stylized portrait of four residents living within The Villages (retirement community), Florida struggling to find happiness and meaning in life’s final chapters.
Grimly fascinating. Like a trainwreck.
I enjoyed From Beer to Eternity (A Chloe Jackson, Sea Glass Saloon Mystery) by Sherry Harris to ~80% through 📚:
A whip smart librarian’s fresh start comes with a tart twist in this perfect cocktail of murder and mystery—with a romance chaser.
Ending was rushed, confusing.
We made a 300 Km round trip to Ototaka Beach near Whanganui. The cliffs are 1–2 million years old, show sea level change and include shell fossils.
It was a great day out.
These cliffs are famous for recording changes in sea water depth associated with ice age cycles.
