Leo Blake

I stayed with a family of four; James and Victoria with their two boys (aged two and five). James is English and Victoria a Kiwi but she lived in England for 15 years, where they met and decided to move out of London to a more peaceful lifestyle in New Zealand. They have a lovely open plan house, in a nice rural setting so there were some great views. I had a decent room with an en suite! There’s also a lodge which they rent out to guests who can then access the pool and gardens. Most of the time I was doing various gardening jobs, which was pretty good with the sun shining for the majority of the week. They had a small vegetable patch, so we ate a few home-grown things, including strawberries (one ... read more

Unfortunately my weekly futsal session has finished until next Feb! Bit gutted about that as I had slowly been getting fitter over the past two months since I had been playing so it will be a shame to go back scratch when it restarts again next year. Since October, the weather has been consistently good, with pretty much nil rain as it got warmer and warmer. Then about a week in December, it tipped in down one day and for the rest of the month it has been very random with only a few sunny days. Despite the rain, it has been incredibly warm still, especially at night (close to 20C, and 25C+ in the day), making it very humid. Work has been quite busy as my we’re now putting a lot of time into our ... read more

The first weekend of December we spent in Raglan. It’s small surfer town on the west coast and a two hour drive from Auckland. I had already been there in July, when it was pretty quiet and no surf, so it was a lot different in summer. Unfortunately there was no swell this weekend as well, and it was about 1ft and messy. Surfable on a longer board so a few of the others who hadn’t surfed before had a lesson, but I didn’t feel it was worth renting the gear. (The main reason for the trip was just to get away from the city for a while and chill out, so I wasn’t really disappointed about not surfing). One of the guys on the trip was quite a keen surfer and had brought his board ... read more

I’m getting really slack at keeping up with the blog so will try to do my best at remembering the last month! I spent most of the month in Auckland, enjoying some pretty good weather as we come into summer! A typical weekend at the moment is spent at the park or beach. The closest beach – Mission Bay – is about a 15 min bus ride away (plus 20 min walk to the bus stop), so I have been chilling at the beach, topping my ‘xmas tan’. Although by Sunday evenings, there is usually a bit of red to accompany this. I can’t get over how strong the sun is. Regardless of the temperature, if the sun is out all day, you can get burnt anytime of the year. The sea is just about warm ... read more

For Labour Weekend we made the most of the extra day off by going somewhere a bit further away – Hawkes Bay, on the south east coast (North Island). There were five of us – my roommate Tim (French), his colleague Jamie (Kiwi) who grew up there, Guillermo (Spanish) and Simon (Swiss), so a big mix of people. We managed to leave work a bit earlier, but the majority of Auckland seemed to be going away as it was the first public holiday for six months so we got caught in a lot of heavy traffic leaving the city. Think the total journey time was over 7 hours in the end, but we got there with enough time to have a few drinks and go to a couple of bars. As Jamie/his family knew the area ... read more

So I have a new roommate! Tim le Frenchman. Get on pretty well and have good Frog Vs Roast Beef banter. (Not sure if I have mentioned it before but) I’ve found a place to get some regular footie in! Initially I joined a Futsal team but they play on Sundays and I’m not available for most games so have backed out as there’s also something going on on Mondays. Just a casual Futsal game organised by a local with people from all around the world playing which is quite interesting as there’s a big mix of styles. On the weekend, 6 of us - Kyle (Canadian), Niek + JW (Dutch), Dominik + Stephanie (German) - all took the Monday off work for a 3 day ski trip! Same mountain (Mt Ruapehu) as last time, but ... read more

The agency - Intern - organised a meal out in the week and about 40 people turned up! So had a chance to meet a few of the new group which had just arrived. Had my first curry in New Zealand :p then we went out after for a few drinks (cheap Wednesday prices!) At work, a new intern (German guy) started in the Marketing department so Kim (my boss) took us all out for drinks after work, which was really nice as I got to see some more swanky places in the city and got an education in NZ white wine......... The week after I was out for another meal with people from work. Tarsha took me and Tim out for steak! The first steakhouse in Auckland apparently and the food went down very well! ... read more