I spend today drinking beer! Well first we caught up with Ralph for breakfast at Felix Cafe and then drove up to his place to see it and his FPGA radio. Then wandered down the hill to the Westpac Stadium to join the hundreds of other beer tasters. It was all extremely well organised with a festival catalogue, tokens, food, seminars, cleaners and of course beer. Between us we tried 12-20 different beers. Favourite beers were McCashin’s Brewery Stoke Bomber – Stout, Feral Brewing Boris, Invercargill Brewery Smokin Bishop, Mussell Inn Captain Cooker Manuka Beer, and Sprig and Fern Doppelbock. Tim said hello to Ian from Galbraiths. Dinner was Cambodian at Siem Reap.

So, live blogging from the train didn’t work out too well. Lost the cellphone signal somewhere after Otorohanga, but we had a very scenic pleasant trip down.

More photos added.

The train stopped at National Park where we had lunch at The Station. My clever plan of emailing an order ahead didn’t work out. I’m still waiting to a reply to my email about the soup-of-the-day. But Tim managed to get in the front of the queue and get our orders in while I secured a table. The cafe is all set up to handle the rush anyway and got through the train-full of orders quickly and efficiently. It is better though to arrive there by car and take a bit of time for lunch.

We dumped our bags at the YHA, and walked on over for dinner at Sweet Mother’s (where even though it was packed we succeeded in getting a table without any wait). (Had a juicy pork burrito washed down by an 1812 IPA.) Then we wandered over to Hashigo Zake which was also the choice of some other Beervana attendees. And that was Friday.

As I said we’re staying at the YHA. But with private rooms, we’re not exactly slumming it. I was woken by blaring music at 6am through my double glazed windows, but that’s what you get staying in the inner city. Am planning on a lazy start this morning anyway, then find Ralph, then Beervana.

My friend Simon (who is feeding my cat) suggested I live blog from the train, so we’ll see how this goes. Tim and I are travelling down to Wellington for the annual Beervana festival. Just enjoying sliding through Auckland at low speed looking at all the poor sods on their way to work. We’re travelling at low speed because the signalling is faulty. Probably a software bug. We left Britomart at 7.30 which meant I was up at 5.30 to catch a 6.30 bus in. Tim is now trying to persuade everyone in the cabin to close their curtains so he can get a good photo out his window without the reflections.

Some photos over here.

Wynyard Quarter has it’s opening day this Saturday. I’m going to be in Wellington, but I had a walk over there at lunchtime. Walls are being painted, cafes furnished, roads being swept, and tram drivers being trained. It looks like it will be a very nice spot. I imagine it is going to be very popular/crowded, (the new Viaduct?), at least until the novelty wears off. Nice to have a little bit more of Auckland’s waterfront open to the public.

He does pack up very compactly.

Compact cat is under a night time curfew and must wear a bell when he goes outside during the day after the recent killing of an innocent duckling.