Guy Fawkes Day, the celebration of the British execution of a guy who tried to blow up parliament 600 years ago. How does one celebrate in the colonies? Why with fireworks of course!

Yesterday was Guy Fawkes Day (also known as bonfire night in the UK & Ireland). There was a big fireworks display put on at New Brighton beach (a suburb area) so en masse, about 25 of us from the hostel went to see it. It was a great warm & clear night so we hopped on one of the free shuttles and plunked ourselves down on the beach for the evening. NZ laws are so lax - it's a real take caution and take responsibility for your actions society, but not overyly regulated like ours. Difficult to explain, but well summed up by one of the MCs lst night who said "it's not a 'do not" night, it's a 'do have fun' night". That probably doesn't make a whole lot of sense but the reason I said it is because you can drink in public places here and fireworks are legal for private sale. So all that transpires into a great relaxed atmosphere with small fireworks going off all through the crowd of about 10,000 or more. It was a wicked night. We just sat on the beach until most people had left, then checked out a few New Brighton pubs and headed home at a reasonable hour! Well, reasonable by comparison ...

Anyway, I had today off to get some crap done and then a party with work friends tonight and one with hostel friends to say au revoir to our French contingent. I have only 3 more weeks in Chch (ahhhh!!!) so I'm starting to get myself sorted... first order of business is selling my car! Second is working as much as possible!

Other than work what have I been up to? hmmm - oh I went back to Akaroa last weekend. the Banks Penninsula is just east of Chch and Akaroa only a 1.5 hour drive. The scenery is spectacular (sorry Mark - should have made it a priority to go there!) as the penninsula was formed by a volcano with what was the crater now being a harbour. For millions of year the penninsula was it's own island but eventually the silt from the Southern Alps filled in and joined it to the mainland. But because of this there are a number of different plants and whahaveyou on the penninsula that aren't found anywhere else in NZ!

So I stayed at the Onuku Farm hostel, this fantastic little spot out in the country, sitting on a 2000 acre working sheep farm. There were loads of walks to do along the hills and down to the beach... it was so fantastic. I also went on a harbour cruise while down there to see some dolphins, penguins and seals. The dolphins in Akaroa are Hector's Dolphins, also known as NZ dolphins because this is the only spot in the world they are found. They are the smallest dolphins in the world. Don't remember why they're only in NZ though... maybe because it's a small country?