I am not built for this sort of heat...

Saturday 6th August

I was SO ridiculously excited to finally have a day off (and three in a row at that!) there were streets to be explored, hills to be climbed, shrines to be discovered, and boiling heat to send me trudging back to my room with my tail between my legs after an hour and a half of being out in the summer humidity.

Shirase Nobu feat. Penguin

I manged to make it to Shirase Nobu’s grave site which is behind the BOE office. Shirase was a Japanese army officer who led an expedition to Antarctica and was the first to make landfall on the Edward VII Peninsula. He was born in Konoura so there is a museum dedicated to him (which I might hit up tomorrow) statues and it is also the reason why Konoura has quite an obsession with Penguins…

After wandering around the shrine and graveyard there I headed down the hill and made my way to the beach only to discover that there seems to be a sea wall running along most of the water front, so while it’s nice to see the ocean, it might be a bit more of a walk if I want to get my feet wet. Meandering back to the main street I found another graveyard on top of a hill and took refuge in some shade, until I realised that butch ass ants were also taking refuge in the shade and apparently on me.

Decided it was getting a bit too hot so picked up some lunch on the way through and went back home for an hour or so to cool down and start prepping my self-introduction which I’ll have to do god knows how many times for the schools.

Back out into the furnace – but this time donning running shoes with my non-running outfit (Nelly I’m sorry) as my feet (and fingers) were a bit swollen for the heat and I was planning to make it to Seishi park which was a bit of a hike (in 30 degrees).

I got to a lake and decided to take a stroll around that (good thing I did because I then realised that THAT was seishi park…) Cherry Blossom trees ran all the way around the lake so while it will look miserable in winter when all the leaves go, it will be absolutely stunning in spring. Chilled out on a little bench by the water in the shade for a wee bit. It’s so lovely and peaceful here. Very little traffic noise and there are birds and butterflies all over (though the little shits move too quick for me to get a decent photo).

Zigzagged my way to another Shrine, I didn’t explore all the little paths around it as there was a sign that warned that some sort of bee had been hanging around. There seems to be a trail of sorts with 33 points, I have a feeling that it takes you around all the shrines and grave sights but I’m not sure as of yet – I also think I read something that said it was based on the 88 temple pilgrimage in Shikoku (google it).

Still not convinced that I had seen all of Seishi park I followed signs that had “Seishi” followed by kanji that I couldn’t read on them. As it turns out the kanji meant nursery so I scrapped that mission and headed back up another hill to yet another grave yard. You’re supposed to wash your hands and face after being in a cemetery to wash the taint of death off you (very similar to Maori culture) but given I didn’t want to sacrifice my drinking water I’ll just have to hope that the cold shower when I got home did the trick.

After inadvertently walking back up to the same temple twice more I managed to find my way to another foresty park thing. Walking through the trees reminded me how different this was to Tokyo, and that there had been several bear issues in Akita recently….

Found another lake to walk around- this one seemed to be set up for rowing – suspicions confirmed when two young lads paddled out in a boat, chuckles escaped when one of them fell in. I found the “whale park” that Yuu-san had pointed out to me on Thursday night and took no time in testing out the flying fox. There was also a large boat that was part of the playground so I have a feeling the whole thing is another nudge towards Shirase (the fact that his museum was right across the road was also a solid hint).

Playground opposite the Shirase Nobu Museum

Toddled back home with swollen fingers and tonight actually manged to get my stove working. The thing is ancient and only has a few buttons but  still won’t do anything unless you have something sitting on it apparently. For the record – Udon stir-fry-ish-sorta-thing tastes waaaaay better coming from a wok that it does when you are culinarily challenged and have to cook it in the microwave.

For the time being and until I start getting busy I think I’ll opt for cooking every night rather than doing big batches and fridging it – mainly for time killing purposes so that I don’t spend too much time by myself getting lonely.

Sunday 7th August

Today I was lazy.

The alarm was snoozed for nearly 2 hours and I managed to peal myself out of bed (yes bed, by the way  - I don’t have to sleep on the floor) and mooched around in my pyjamas, making breakfast and coffee with no intention to leave the somewhat cool –ish house until I had binged a few episodes of game of thrones. I think all the running around finally caught up with me. Even just sitting on the couch with the fan pointed directly at me it was still uncomfortably muggy. I do feel a bit bad moaning about the heat when Wellington seems to be freezing over currently but I’m quite over being covered in a layer of my own sweat.

Sometime after 12 I ventured out into the heat, picked up a bento from the supermarket (my GOD that air conditioning is heaven) and went and sat by one of the lakes that I had found yesterday and watched dragon flies flitting around (apparently it’s mating season for them….).

Continued on and took a wee detour up to one of the shrines on the 33 route (reference to previous entry) only to discover that there were a few spider webs in between myself and the statue. I’m not normally phased by spiders, but I have also seen how big they are here and more importantly it was too bloody hot to deal with trying to pluck webs off my face.  Took a couple of photos – got sick of mozzies buzzing in my ear and soldiered on.

After inadvertently taking the long way around the second lake I made it to the Shirase Nobu museum.

The Doors at the entrance were curved metal and you walk through the first set to find yourself in a circular chamber type thing, then have to walk through the next set – this is one of those times that you start to doubt that you’re in the right place so I think I looked quite perplexed when the second set of doors opened into the entrance/giftshop and the employee was sitting there ready to greet me.

I gave reading  the oodles of information a shot but really my kanji is crap and just went around looking at the pictures, model boats and taxidermied penguins. Did learn that there is a plaque of sorts for Shirase in Wellington (it looks like it’s on the water front by frankitts so someone will have to have a look and let me know). There was a section of the sail boat (Nankaimaru – which I think roughly translates as south sea circle….up for interpretation) that Shirase took to show what the sleeping quarters were like, as well as one of the big ass snow trucks that they pottered around in – with all the tech they would have used as well.

Sat through a video on the aurora (was getting to the stage where I had to concentrate a bit not too fall asleep with the lights so dim…). Pottered back through the parks and stopped in at the supermarket again (I always swore on doing one supermarket visit a week and now I'm popping in at least once a day) to pick up some treats for myself. Was pretty unimpressed at the fact that the only dishwashing gloves that didn’t come in pink were the large sized 

ones.

Back home to continue prepping my self-introduction powerpoint, udon noodle stir-fry-thing for dinner for the third night in a row and then I think it will be about time for macha ice cream and more Game of Thrones. And hopefully soon I’ll stop freaking out every time I hear a noise and thinking it’s someone in my room ==” .
 

In other news, everything that requires to be stored below 30 degrees has now been moved to my fridge, given that it got to 34 the other day…(this includes contact lense solution, sunblock and after sun gel).