Last Thursday 28 May, we went for a bike ride along the Pauatahanui Inlet. The weather was not as fine as the forecast had promised – mainly lumpy clouds, with a few spots of blue sky – but it was absolutely calm, not a breath of wind.
We parked at the Ngati Toa Domain in Mana, and rode along the Camborne Walkway. The inlet was absolutely flat, not the merest ripple. It looked like a gigantic mirror. The whole landscape all around the inlet was reflected in the water – stunning!
The walkway first runs behind a row of colourful boatsheds. The view of these, with their small boats in front and their reflections in the water, was simply beautiful. I love the photo that John took. If you click on the photo to enlarge it, it looks even better.
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| The boatsheds on the Camborne Walkway (photo by John) |
As we emerged from behind the boatsheds (oh dear, that’s sounds a bit naughty!), we were delighted with the perfect reflections all around the inlet. Not only the hills, but also the clouds were beautifully mirrored. We took quite a few photos, it was hard to decide which ones to use here.
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| Magic reflections |
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| A lovely view to look out on while enjoying a rest (photo by John) |
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| A stream running into the inlet isn’t moving either (photo by John) |
As usual, when we come out this way, we stopped at the Ground Up Café for lunch. It is a popular café, and it was quite busy, but the food was worth waiting for. And their coffee is always excellent.
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| Our bikes contrast with the green wall of the café (photo by John) |
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| Hard to believe all this area was under water just a couple of weeks ago (photo by John) |
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| It’s difficult to tell what is land and what is reflection (photo by John) |
When we got back to the car, we had done just 14.5 km, so we did an extra loop towards the Mana boat harbour to make our mileage up to a round 15 km. It was longer than that, we ended up with 17 km for the day.
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| At the boat harbour too, the reflections were perfect (photo by John) |
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Rainbow Theme Night
In the evening that same day, we attended the special Theme Night of our Tawa Scottish country dancing club. The theme was “Rainbows”, and the hall was suitably decorated with colourful kites, balloons, and of course a rainbow and a pot of gold. Members and guests had been asked to wear their most colourful outfits, and everyone made a great effort to look as bright and gaudy as possible.
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| The night started with a warm-up and stretches. The music for the stretches was "I can sing a Rainbow". Our tutor Maureen is in the foreground (photo by John) |
John and I wore our “folding bike” T-shirts (a Christmas gift from our daughter) and I decided a rainbow-coloured wig was a must-have, and John had a rainbow bow tie. In the photo below, John looks as if he has a black eye, but it is just a shadow, as he is just below the ceiling light. That’s what happens when you get someone else to take a photo of you. John would never have let that happen, he would have noticed it before pressing the shutter.
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| Do you like my wig? (photo by another dancer with John’s camera) |
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| Mary and Duncan sported wigs too (photo by John) |
The dances all had names containing a colour, and our tutor, Maureen, had devised a quiz with ten instrumental clips (not SCD music), of which teams had to guess the colour in the title or lyrics of the songs.
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| Colourfully clad dancers listen to the briefing for the next dance (photo by John) |
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| Hilary and Désirée launch into a reel (photo by John) |
The event was a huge success. Everyone went home thoroughly satisfied with a great evening’s dancing. All credit goes to our tutor who came up with the idea of the rainbow theme, and planned the dance programme to match.
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