Cold Enough To...

So on the weekend I went up to Rotorua with ReptonInfinity and a nice American chap called Sam who hitched along for the ride so that Repton and Sam could go to the Brass Monkey frisbee tournament. It turns out that Brass Monkey is for Repton what SF conventions and NAAMAs are for me - he goes every year, hangs out with the same group of people from all over the country (with some new additions), and they all have a bunch of traditions about what they do, like always going to the same Backpackers, and counting the seconds for a new person to figure out how the lock to the hot pool works.

On Saturday, the two of us were straight out tourists and went to visit a thermal area called Waimangu, which over a hundred years ago held the eighth natural wonder of the world, the Pink and White Terraces, and now has lots of cool landmarks and features left over from the explosion of Tarawera in 1886. What I thought coolest, (well not coolest literally) was the lake that looked like someone had dug out a footpath around it. In fact, they hadn't, but the lake fluctuated in water level a lot, and the silica rich water had built up the ledge just as high as its overflow level. Also, we found out the joys of off-season tourism - a 4km walk, and no-one in sight until we got to the boat jetty. Also we did gondolas and luges at the Skyline Skyrides place, which had nice views and whizzing around fast and that.

On Sunday, I started off as a proper groupie and watched Repton being a black ninja spider out on the field for a while on a Very Cold Day before losing groupie status and buggering off to a cafe to get warm and do some study. Yes, there are people that enjoy running around all day in the cold and wet, but I'm not one of them. I think it's highly relevant that all the players got a scarf with their registrations. Last year it was wooly socks and the year before beanies. Not a co-incidence. :-)

I think we all enjoyed ourselves...