The Flying Scotts

Queenstown

During my second week at work I attended a conference in Queenstown. It is an amazing place; the town sits on the edge of a lake surrounded by mountains and is very beautiful. We arrived on the Monday afternoon and I went for a run/walk up a hill with a colleague, which gave us a good view of the lake.

The conference, which ran from Tuesday to Thursday, was good and it was useful to meet lots of peope so early on. On the Wednesday and Thursday mornings a group of us went running before the talks started. I found running there much more comfortable than in Auckland. Although it still got very hot during the day, the overnight and early morning temperatures were much cooler.

After the conference finished on the Thursday we had time to go up in a gondola to get a good view of the area.

One of the things I found strange was the lack of security at the airports for domestic travel. Nobody checked my passport and there was no rush to get through security (some flights didn’t even have security).

After getting back to Auckland I had the weekend to get the house ready for us to live in (Gemma was arriving on the Monday). I had to move my stuff from the hotel I had been staying in across the city to the house using public transport, which took two journeys. The bed got delivered on the Saturday and was easy enough to put together (although there were quite a few screws left when I’d finished). I also bought folding chairs and cutlery, etc. for us to use until our container arrives.

First week in Auckland

The journey over went smoothly although it was very long and tiring. Getting through the airport and finding the hire car was easy enough and I bought a New Zealand sim card so I could use Google Maps to get to the hotel. The hotel I’m staying in for the first three weeks is fine and has everything I need. It’s very close to where I will be working too, which is handy.

On the morning of my second full day I was taken on an orientation of the city, i.e. I was driven around and shown places that might be of interest to us. It was very useful and gave us ideas about where to live and also places to visit.

Pretty much straight away I started looking for a house to rent, which involved searching online and driving around potential areas. I did quite a few house viewings in the first few days and they were very varied. Most looked nothing like the pictures online and weren’t in very good condition and some of the roads didn’t look particularly nice either.

We had seen one online before I left that looked good and it was still available so I viewed that late on Thursday afternoon. We put our application in for it (along with a couple of other families) and found out on Friday that we had been successful. Assuming signing the contracts goes OK this week we will have the keys from Saturday (6th).

House

I’ve managed to go out for a few runs and a couple of swims so far. There is a decent pool about 10-15 minutes drive from where we will be living. It’s a 50m pool that seems to mostly be set up as two 25m pools and it always has lane swimming, as there is a separate recreational pool. One thing I have noticed is that it is very hilly here so it is going to be good for running and cycling. I’ll be doing most of my running early in the mornings before it gets too hot.

I’m looking forward to my first day at work tomorrow now.

Towards the end of 2014 Gemma found out about a type of race we had never done before: swim run. The race she had found was at Loch Lomond and involved alternately swimming between islands on the loch and running across them, including running up a big hill. The race was done in teams of two, and it sounded like a good idea to me, so in early 2015 we entered the race and team “The Flying Scotts” was born.

We have created this website so you can keep track of what we are doing, especially on our next big adventure when we move to New Zealand.

Swim Run Practice

Budapest

We went to Budapest for three days a couple of weeks ago, as a birthday present from Gemma. We had a great time and really enjoyed looking round the city.

Our flight arrived around lunchtime on the Saturday. We got Budapest Cards from the airport which made getting around the city very easy. Our hotel was right next to the river and we had a really good view up to the castle and across the river to the parliament building.

In the afternoon we went for a nice walk around the Castle District, up a large hill behind the hotel. We had been worried about the weather but it was very good on Saturday and Sunday (Monday wasn’t so good).

On our walk on Saturday we overheard someone saying that Margaret Island was very good for running around, so on the Sunday morning that’s where we went. We ran up the side of the river and across to the island and then up the centre of the island. At the far end we discovered that there was a ~5.5 km running track around the edge of the island, so we followed this back to where we started. There were a lot of people out running!

The run also gave me an opportunity to try out my new Xiaomi Yi action camera.

In the afternoon we headed across Budapest to the Széchenyi Thermal Baths. They were very impressive and it was nice to relax in there for the afternoon. In the evening we had dinner on a boat cruise. We had to walk all the way across the river to pick up our tickets, only to then get a bus back to the boat which was right outside our hotel. Dinner was good and we managed to (eventually) get some decent photos of Budapest at night.

On the Monday the weather wasn’t great but we went for a walk down the river to the site Gemma raced in the World Age Group Championships a few years ago. We wandered round some other parts of the city before going to get our flight home.

We had a very good time and I would certainly recommend visiting the city.

Europe trip 2015

As Gemma was working in A&E over summer she had no choice about when to take her holidays, but it worked out well that she got the week leading up to the Frankfurt City triathlon off. The weekend before the race was the final weekend of the Tour de France, so we decided to drive to Paris and watch the last stage of the tour, then drive across to Frankfurt, stopping off somewhere on the way. We planned to camp on the way and had just bought a bigger tent, which would make it more pleasant.

The holiday didn’t get off to a good start. We had booked onto a 3 am channel tunnel crossing but when we arrived there was a 3 hour delay due to migrant activity. When we eventually made it to France we headed straight for Paris where we were staying in the Camping Indigo Paris campsite. We were very happy with the campsite; there were lots of running routes and easy access to Paris. Before the tour arrived we spent a while walking around Paris. The weather wasn’t great and we ended up buying bright yellow ponchos to keep dry. It was a very good experience to see the riders racing around the Champs Elysees.

After Paris we headed to Camping du Muhlenbach on the border between France and Germany. The campsite was very nice and was in quite a remote area. We went for a couple of runs in the forest around the campsite and also got out on the bikes.

We visited the nearby town of Bitche and had a look round the citadel, which was very impressive. There was a very interesting video tour that went through lots of rooms within the castle and talked about the history of the place.

Finally we headed to a campsite in Offenthal, just outside Frankfurt. It was a very good location. When we went for a run on the first day we were there we found an outdoor swimming complex within 3 or 4 kms and so the next day we ran over to the pool and went for a swim, then ran back.

We went into Frankfurt to register for the triathlon on the Saturday and met up with the people from Langen who had looked after us last year. The race itself was on the Sunday, which turned out to be very hot! Gemma and me exited the swim at the same time (well Gemma sat on my feet all the way round and then ran across the mat in front of me) and quite near the front, considering we weren’t wearing wetsuits. The bike was tough, with quite a headwind on the first section, but the run was even harder as it was so hot. I was fairly happy with how it went as I still managed to run a lot faster than last year. It’s a great race and we would certainly like to go back and do it again.

After the race it was a bit of a rush to get back to the tunnel. We made it with plenty of time and although there was a short delay it went more smoothly than on the way out.