Together we look forward to planning our Wedding which is likely to take place in November 2009

It was awesome and had perfect weather for it. We took off at about 7am from in the center of Hamilton and flew out over the eastern suburbs finally ending up in Gordonton around 8:30am.

See the photos in my gallery.

I have really enjoyed my time away but looking forward to getting home and seeing Sarah and catching up with friends and Family. Not so much looking forward to going back to work however, but guess i have to pay for my next trip somehow!

Highlights of my trip:

• Catching up with Matt and Kat in Dublin
• Road Tripping around Ireland
• Catching up with Chris in Whistler
• Snowboarding and Snowmobiling in Whistler!

Our tour started off fairly leisurely taking some fairly ordinary tracks up into the hills. This gave us an opportunity to get used to our new toys. We arrived in a large bowl at which time our guide told us to let lose and have a bit of a play around. We did this for a while just mucking around going up banks, plowing through powder drifts etc… During this time Chris managed to roll his snowmobile while trying to turn on a hill, fortunately he didn’t hurt him self.

We then continued on into the steeper terrain and deeper powder. At one point i got my snowmobile stuck in deep powder, so deep when I stepped off I sunk in up to my waist!

The rest of the trip included steep banks (near vertical), more powder, runs through trees and a lot of fun!  Included in our package was  a BBQ lunch however we decided that we would rather spend more time snowmobiling than having a BBQ as we can do that any old time. We did however stop for a quick bite to eat and a drink. Then proceeded to play on a frozen lake where i managed to get up to 85MPH (137KM/hr) however could have gone faster if they weren’t limited to 85MPH. Upon leaving the lake area we each went over a jump and each got a bit of air under our sleds.

Overall it was an awesome experience which I would recommend to anyone! I will put some photos up in my gallery as soon as i get time.

Well i have one more day here in Whistler before heading to Vancouver for a few days then back home to NZ.

Wednesday I had a fairly quite day, I just sat round most of the morning. Then in the afternoon went down into the village to do a spot of shopping. As i had not brought my snowboard over to Canada due to the weight restrictions on baggage through the UK, purchasing a snowboard was my main priority.

So now I have an awesome new board it is a 2008 Burton Custom with Burton Cartel bindings. I’m pretty happy with it. After dinner I went to the Coca Cola Tube Park with a few of Chris’s friends (Chris was working) which is just a short walk from Staff housing where Chris lives. Basically the tube park is a steep hill of snow which has channeled lanes which you slide down in a round tube. Going down it last night I got clocked traveling at 59km/hr!

Today I took my new board out for a spin, and am happy to say it lives up to my expectations! In fact it is better than I thought it would be. Will probably head up the mountain with Chris tomorrow as he is not working which is good as he will be able to share some of the locals secret spots!

Few more photos in the gallery…

The drive down the east coast took us through many small villages and along the rocky coast line, through Belfast and back to Dublin. We arrived back to the rental car depot around 2:30pm then caught a bus back to Matt and Kats apartment.

From my observations from the road trip i have decided that Ireland is a much older country than NZ with a lot of history and character. There are various landscapes which resemble parts of the NZ countryside.

• My Photo Gallery
• Matt’s Photo Gallery
• Matt’s blog summarising the road trip.

We decided we would stop in Ballymena for a bite to eat and a coffee. However we we sadly disappointed at the lack of quality cafes. We settled on one which seemed to be the best there was however it was not that stunning. We wandered back through the town then continued driving north.

We reached the northern coast at a town called Ballycastle. From here we followed the coast line to the west. At Carrick-A-Rede there are some impressive cliffs and islands just off the coast. One of these cliffs is connected to the mainland by rope bridge. Unfortunately however they take the bridge down in the winter. We still got a good look at the islands, beach and cliffs. Despite the ‘Authentic Irish Weather’ as Kat put it.

From Carrick-A-Rede we continued along the coast a little bit further to the Gaints Causeway which is an area of about 40,000 interlocking Basalt columns, the result of an ancient volcanic eruption. The tops of the columns form stepping stones that lead from the cliff foot and disappear under the sea. Most of the columns are hexagonal.

We then decided to visit the Old Bushmills Distillery where they make Old Bushmills Whiskey. We had a late lunch here before starting a tour of the distillery. The tour its self was interesting as we got to see how them make the whiskey in a real working distillery.

From here we continued on to Portrush where we are staying for the night. We checked into the guest house where we are staying then went out to find somewhere for dinner. We picked a restaurant called Coast which served pizzas and pastas mainly. This restaurant got extremely busy while we were them with people coming in and being told there was over an hour wait for a table. The food wasn’t bad and was quite well priced so we couldn’t complain.

After driving a bit longer it soon became clear we were coming into Northern Ireland, as all the road signs once again changed this time to British road signs. We passed through some very nice although small villages and stopped to take some photos of some old style church’s and castles.

We passed through Enniskillen, Omagh, Cookstown before coming to Ardboe, where we visited an old Abby and the Ardboe High Cross. From here we continued on to the M1 motorway which brought us into Belfast. We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around Belfast and viewing some of the murals painted on the walls here.

I’m currently writing this blog post while sitting in the restaurant where we had dinner borrowing someones free wifi. The restaurant is the Gourmet Burger Bank. The waiter here proudly told us that gourmet burgers originated in NZ!

After leaving the cliffs we drove up the coast through the Burren, which is basically a huge area just covered in rocks. It’s just amazing the size and volume of rocks in the area which just goes on for miles and miles.
We arrived in Galway and found the guesthouse where we were staying. After settling in we walked down into town to for a look around and to find somewhere for dinner. Galway is quite a nice mid sized Irish town with many narrow streets and old buildings which I’m beginning to realise is normal for towns in Ireland. We had dinner at a small pub, the meal was good and fairly well priced.

I then hopped onto an open top bus tour. This took me around various sites in the city with a commentary the whole way which gave me quite a bit of history about Dublin. The Georgian section of Dublin and the old buildings, church’s etc… give Dublin real character.

I got off the bus at the Guinness Storehouse and did a tour here. This explained the process that goes into making Ireland’s No. 1 beer. As part of this process I got to start a batch of Guinness, my batch is batch number 7302 (I think).

After admiring the 360 degree views of Dublin from the bar at the top of the Guinness factory I continued on the bus tour of Dublin and learned more about the history of Dublin and got to see some of the more popular sites around Dublin.

I hoped of the bus and caught the DART (Rail system) to the Google offices where I met up with Matt for lunch. Then Matt showed me around the offices and where he works. This is quite interesting. Although from all the toys and the laid back atmosphere in the office I’m not sure how much work gets done. Matt however assures me work is done.

The rest of the afternoon I spent wandering around the city admiring parks and taking in the scenery.