Winter spirits are high

Today marked our 9 and 8th days and our return to back to back days at Mt Hutt. My has the weather changed. Where as our arrival was cold with fresh snow it's about the groomers the last two days. Off-piste is a moonscape of wind swept ice with sun cups, sastrugi(wierd ice hooks formed by wind) and other snow-sliding atrocities of ice. Meanwhile the groomers are firm, but with good dust on top from scrapings and groomer chewings. We've been kicking a bit free-style lately with some friend jaunts into the terrrain park. Julies been cleaning up her big air on the park feathures while I've been cleaning up those grabs(still can't nail the tail grab, argh!) and a couple Front-side 180s on the bigger features. Yesterday was a sleep in kind of day and for our mid-afternoon relaxation we finally made it inside the lodge at our home mountain after 5 days there. We enjoyed a couple light flavored Export 33 (I think I need a beer blog), and some onion rings.
Today was all about early starts as we finally got out of the house before 8. Made the ski field by a hair past 9 but decided we had skippped breakfast! That would not stand! So we made a bee-line for our new favorite mtn place, which also served a mean breakfast. We enjoyed our cappuccino and mochaccino(eveything is a damn ccino, and good luck getting normal brewed coffee), with a delicious apple & cinnamon porridge and a ham and cheese croissant. We finally made it on snow at 10(no worse than a morning back home I suppose). There was a warm breeze on the slopes but the snow was similar to yesterday. Fast break-away groomers and moonscape elsewhere. We did explore to find a high angle hard-pack/ice slope which my single edge tool(snowboard) didn't adhere to as well as Julie's Skis(excuses, excuses, it was also some balance issues). Don't report me, but we did some freestyle even though I forgot my helmet. No spins on the big stuff today, but I busted a big Method Grab off a park feature. We left early for lunch a pretty resort place called Terrace Downs. Apparently they were having a private party so all us lowly guests were forced to eat outside in 55 degree weather(no prob) with 30-40Mph winds(problem). We scarfed our garlic bread while trying to keep everything from blowing away. We couldn't help but laugh. the garlic was blowing off the pizza, my wine glass started sliding, my dinner plate even lifted up a little. After that we skedaddled home to a pleasant Christchurch early evening.

Arrival

Wow, so much to say!
First, we made it with all luggage, no customs problems, no car issues.
Second this place is amazing, even flying around on a partly cloudy day you could see that.
Third, the books didn't exaggerate how nice the people are. We already got one invite to stay at person's house and our car rental offered to help me buy a car from the local dealerships(not from his fleet).
Fourth, the summer to winter thing is a bit brutal. It felt amazing to walk out of the hot airport, but walking into the cold cottage is another story. I'll have to document the fireplace that functions for looks only.
Fifth, it's just amazing so far. It's starting to sink in how long I'll be here now that all the travel worries are done. I can't wait to go skiing. Well off to unpack some more

NZ problems

Late last night I got an e-mail from Geoff at NZ jobseek; there's no SLP jobs available in Christchurch and he was wondering if we're interested in Dunedin. Bryce and I quickly researched it and figured it wasn't what we wanted; too cold--even colder than here! We had a serious talk and agreed that we would work in Auckland if that's the only place where I could find a job. Auckland is really far away from the ski resorts, so we'd have to devote whole weekends to staying down there. It would put a crimp on Bryce being a snowboarding instructor too.

With the problem of finding a job near a ski resort and with the issue with NZSTA and ASHA, I just feel NZ becoming more and more of a difficult goal to obtain. We do have a backup plan though if this all doesn't work out-- a loooong vacation in NZ and use whatever money we've saved up to buy a house. So it's a win-win situation. I really want to have the experience of living abroad for an extended period though; it's something I really feel I need to experience.