Maxingoutlife (2025)

19/01/2025

Weta Workshop in Auckland blew my mind. What a celebration of creativity!

Weta makes practical effects for movies and presentations. They are most famous for their work with the LoTR franchise, but since movie studios own the rights to much of their work, Weta created three original/fake films to showcase their production techniques.

The fantasy film was my favorite. Dinosaur clans fighting each other? Get out of my dreams, Weta.

It made me so happy to see creativity encouraged. Nowadays, everyone is trying to fake excellence with AI and it fueled my soul to see the creative process valued so highly. With all the media I've worked in over the years, I felt a kinship with these artists who bring dreams to life through passion, persistence, and a sense of humor. These are my people.

The guide told us we could take photos of anything we liked, which was a relief because I loved everything. And I only took pics of maybe 20% of what was on display. What a delight! I came away super inspired.

18/01/2025

We didn't pierce our daughters' ears when they were babies because I wanted them to choose for themselves when they were older. I'm a big "confront and overcome your fears" guy, so I thought it would be a good opportunity for them to grow.

Over the years, I encouraged them to go for it, to no avail.

The day finally came!

Unfortunately, at some point in the past year, I told J that if she got her ears pierced, I'd join her.

J is happy as a clam and proud of herself. It's not that often that my long-term parenting ideas actually work out, so I'm stoked too. Really, the only loser here is Sarah, who is having a difficult time adjusting to my boy band phase.

Just wait, my love. In six weeks I can put in a gold hoop and then I'm buying a pirate hat. Game On, Muchachos. Assuming I last six weeks without Sarah "accidentally" removing it while I sleep.

11/01/2025

An unexpected journey...

Hobbiton blew me away. So much care and thought has gone into this site.

With 2500 visitors a day in high season, the tour could have been total chaos, but everything was so well-organized. We got to take pics and check out dozens of hobbit hole exteriors, learn behind-the-scenes scuttlebutt, and explore a human-sized (albeit, shorter than me) home where we were encouraged to touch everything and try it out.

My sister Wendy is visiting for a couple weeks, so it was rad to share the adventure with her.

My favorite things were:
1. Seeing multiple hobbit holes dug into the same hill in tiers. When they are so close to each other, it creates a sense of community. You can easily see how Gandalf felt so peaceful in the Shire. And also, how everyone knew what everyone else was up to at all times.

2. Drinking ginger beer in front of a fire in the Green Dragon

3. Taking a hobbit hole bath. Much to Sarah's chagrin, the guide very clearly said we could touch anything we wanted.

4. The classic LOTR-style map they gave us with our tickets. The moment I unfolded it, I knew we were in for a special experience.

30/12/2024

These are the good old days. A South Island photo dump, plus some anecdotal joys I don't want to forget:

1. We packed so much stuff into our 2007 Honda CR-V, I took it to a tire alignment shop halfway through the trip, just to make sure I hadn't broken anything on the rear suspension (camber on the rear wheels was angled more than I preferred). They checked the alignment, which was fine. After reassuring me, the guy said, "You've got the wrong car for what you're trying to do.". At this point I laughed for a solid minute while he stared at me, stone-faced. It got super awkward, but I was so relieved I couldn't stop giggling, which only made me laugh harder.

2. Sarah stopped drinking coffee for a while on the boat. Those of you who know her appreciate how radical a change that is.
In New Zealand, she discovered "Flat Whites", a version of espressos that hits her sweet spot. Within hours, she was back on the coffee train.

I got used to her ordering a flat white at gas stations. One day, she drank three. She loved them.

After a week of mailing coffee, she learned that flat whites have TWO shots of espresso in them. This explained a lot. Turns out she wasn't just back ON the coffee train, she had kicked the furnace open and was shoveling coal while screaming, "FASTER! SHE CAN TAKE IT!" at Casey Jones.

3. Pizza oven is now mandatory camping gear.

4. Queenstown traffic was gnarly. Rain only made it worse. In an attempt to short cut a traffic jam, I turned up the Steepest Hill in the World. The slope, rain, and our overloaded rear axle gave our front wheel drive vehicle a proper challenge. Quite simply, if I gave the throttle pedal more than one millimeter of a press, our tires spun freely on the wet cement and we rolled backward down the cliff.

So ensued the Slowest Hill Climb of the 21st Century. We literally inched up the endless slope of slippery death, which gave us plenty of time to pray for traction.

5. Tent campers are a minority out here. At one campground, I counted 68 self-contained campers. We were the only tent.

We encountered other tents here and there, but South Island really is campervan heaven. The NZ Dept of Conservation does an amazing job of accommodating everyone, regardless of setup.

Amazing trip all round. I'll remember this one.

18/12/2024

We stopped by AJ Hackett's Bungy near Queenstown a couple days ago to watch people jump. I told my kids if they wanted to try, we'd pay for it. I even offered to jump, too. Joss (age 10) gave a hard "No.". Zoe (13) quirked her eyebrow but kept quiet as we left.

Zoe knew we'd be driving back through Queenstown, so she vacillated back and forth for two days.

I jumped from the Auckland Harbour Bridge 18 years ago (see my fb profile pic), so I wasn't planning on jumping again. Then Zoe decided to go for it.

I gave her every chance to bow out, so there wasn't any pressure. Bungy jumping is a pretty intense mental challenge. I wanted her to discover how strong she is without feeling like she needed to impress anyone else.

All the staff and especially the guy on the bridge did an amazing job encouraging Zoe. She nearly froze on the board, but they gave her the moment of courage she needed to smash through fear.

She told me afterwards, "My body betrayed my mind. I jumped before my mind realized what was happening!"

I shed Dad Tears watching her kick fear's butt. Diving headfirst into a gorge is scary, no matter who you are.

Shortly thereafter, I made good on my pledge and waddled onto the dive platform.

It was a completely different experience this time. Adrenaline jitters were replaced by pure enjoyment of the experience (I'll admit to watching with intense focus as the staff guy clipped carabiners to my feet). Also, I was very aware I needed to bust out a sweet swan dive for my kids.

What a day:)

13/12/2024

Snapshots of New Zealand's South Island

1. Our pizza oven (Mt. Doom) made his triumphant camping debut. There were naysayers who doubted the wisdom of bringing Mt. Doom with us on a camping trip. I, however, can be incredibly obstinate when a hill is worth dying on.

Mt. Doom forged multiple pizzas, with one pepperoni to rule them all.

2. Sarah and Zoe shot the album cover shot for their dope mixtape, "Driftwood Teepees".

3. Zoe and I spent ten minutes slamming makeshift wizard staffs into the beach and shouting, "YOU..SHALL NOT...SPLAAAAASH!" at the ocean.

Speaking of LOTR, we are into hour four of the audiobook and they still haven't met Aragorn. What the heck, J.R.? Fifteen minutes discussing Frodo's conflicted feelings about leaving the Shire? I had no idea Peter Jackson cut so much from the book.

4. One of our campsites was by a river so the girls and I pumped up the paddle board and went for a float. Shortly thereafter, class II rapids taught us the value of paddles on a river (Zoe very much enjoyed reminding me that when she asked if we had a paddle, I said we didn't need one and left it in the car).

10/12/2024

New Zealand rules. On a two week road trip to the South Island. Tent (Twenty McTentface) was in storage for 28 years and it is thrilled to be used. Still waterproof after all this time.

Other stuff:
1. There is NO limit to the amount of stuff you can shove into the boot of a 2007 CR-V. We bend the laws of physics on the daily.

2. This morning Sarah and I both used Google maps to see how long our drive to the ferry would be. My phone said 3 hrs. Hers said 1.5.

At this point Zoe discovered my phone (which we'd used for navigating the past two days) was set to "avoid all major roads" for routing. Which explained some of the absolutely random roads we've been taking. I swear, yesterday we drove the bendiest, swerviest, rainforesty road outside the Darien Gap (it was easily my favorite road so far, but I was confused why we were the only car out there).

Anyways, we probably added a good three hours or so to our jaunt down the North Island.

3. Sarah and I have tried and failed to get our girls into Middle Earth fiction. They weren't intrigued by reading the Hobbit or LOTR. We showed them parts of the movies. Meh.

Yesterday Joss asked me to play music while we were driving through the Shire, so I loaded the soundtrack to LOTR. Then I saw that Andy Serkis' narrated version of LOTR is included in my Spotify subscription. On a lark, I tried it.

BOOM. My kids were mesmerized. Andy's brilliant narration drew them in. Yes, chapter one was over an hour long thanks to Tolkein's style, but we were all into it. We'll see how it goes.

4. NZ is lovely. Cannot believe the beauty around us. And it keeps shifting to different microclimates. Eager to see the South.

01/11/2024

Day 11 Tonga to NZ

That, friends, is Cape Brett! Welcome to New Zealand:)

Another 50 miles to Marsden Point, where we will check into the country. It’s Saturday, so we might need to wait a couple days for officialdom. No worries.

This was a tricky passage. Negotiating constantly shifting weather over 1300 miles is a chess match. Except when the wearher thumbs its nose at the forecast, at which point it becomes less of a chess match and more of a Texas Chainsaw Massacre-situation where you’re just screaming and running for an exit.

The most critical choice we made was to stay north and bide our time instead of pointing straight at NZ. That strategy ultimately prevented us plowing into 30 knot headwinds for a couple days.

Our Starlink refused to connect for 48 hours, which forced us to go to Plan B. I captured twenty-six sea gulls and trained them to fly in a straight line and return. Then I stuck a Post-It note to their beaks, knowing that if it was wet, rain squalls lay in that direction. Soon, I was able to construct a real-time weather map of our vicinity. Simplicity itself.

Thirty-six hours into Operation Noah, having constructed a map of startlingly violent squalls surrounding us, I discovered the birds were landing in the ocean to rest. Their Post-It notes invariably got wet, giving me inaccurate data.

So we moved to Plan C, whereupon we used common sense and conferred with cruisers over the radio.

Stoked to be in New Zealand! This is gonna be fun:)

29/10/2024

Day Seven (Eight?) Tonga to NZ

Our conservative weather strategy is paying off. Glassy water as far as the eye can see.

We are currently three hundred miles east of the notorious Abbott family “Slot”.

I’ve alluded to this event before, but here is the full story:

Sarah and I were dating in college. Over summer break, I flew to NZ to sail to New Caledonia with my folks. The plan was for Sarah to fly over for a week of sailing (her first time on a sailboat!).

A classic cruising dilemma. As the old saying goes: “Passengers flying in can choose the date or the location, but not both.”

Dad and I scoured weather forecasts for a glimmer of a window to New Cal. This was in the days before Starlink and smart phones. We downloaded weather faxes every 12 hours over our PACTOR modem. Sarah’s arrival in New Cal drew closer and I grew frantic.

Finally, we saw a tiny sliver of a possibility (one I would, with the benefit of experience, now laugh at) that I infamously labeled “the Slot”.

“Dad, I see a slot!”

We agreed the forecast was not great, but it wasn’t a cataclysm either. And it wasn’t likely to get better any time soon. We readied our heavy weather gear and went for it.

300 miles north, we got clobbered. It turned out, our “Slot” was forecast by Judas. Big waves. Big winds. I got to experience crawling across the deck in a gale at night to drape myself over the bow seats and wrestle shackles with a Leatherman, grunting the Mariner’s Mantra aloud: “Don’t drop it, don’t drop it, don’t drop it.” Then I dunked the sea parachute off the bow, careful to avoid getting my foot caught in the spooling bridle, which would be permanently bad for my health. We executed our plan to a T, but it was pretty intense.

When that chute popped underwater, everything calmed. It was amazing. We went from existential bashing to sitting in an elevator, rising and falling over every freight train that rolled by. The wind still roared through the rigging, but in lieu of a shivering mast, it lacked fangs.

Eighteen hours later, the weather calmed enough to retrieve our gear and continue on. In all that time, we only drifted three quarters of a mile. The parachute worked perfectly.

So that’s what I thought about when I looked at the endlessly glassy ocean today.

Other stuff:
- We stopped the boat for a swim! My favorite. After seven days at sea, we needed a break and a lot of soap.

- We refueled! Yeah, we brought a lot of diesel (see story above to extol the merits of not dilly dallying in these waters waiting for wind).

- The sky was crazy this morning. Clouds looked like feathers. I’ve never seen that before. Awesome!

27/10/2024

Day Six(ish…Seven?) Tonga to New Zealand

In my last post we were charging straight for NZ like Furiosa driving her war rig into a sandstorm.

Weather necessitated a strategy shift. If we were a faster boat, we could sneak into land before Wednesday’s low pressure system blows through. But our relatively chill hull speed and aversion to breaking the boat has us aiming for a spot five hundred miles north of the NZ coast.

We are heading west to wait out two lows, then dip south on Wed/Thurs when the next high pressure system moves in. We will arrive a day or two later, but won’t have to punch into 15-20 knot headwinds for the final two days. Been there, done that.

Whew. Weather moves FAST out here. Last night, Dad and I were talking about a cold front on the forecast, but our skies were clear. Fifteen minutes later, he called me outside. Squall clouds dominated the horizon. And just like that, we dropped sails and battened the hatches. Cold front rolls through, rinsing our decks. Three hours later, we are back in business with a new wind direction (which unfortunately, is slightly on the nose at the moment, but forecast to shift south and lighten).

As you can see from my unbroken string of weather thoughts, we have one thing on our mind out here:

Ice cream.

I’m gonna be honest with you. Checking out of officialdom in Tonga was a bit of a mess. They weren’t organized, dozens of boats were all leaving in the same weather window, and officials had a baffling insistence on cruisers docking at a dangerous wharf to check out. Beyond that, I had to clean and scrape the hull to NZ quarantine’s exacting standards, we needed diesel, and had to make water. There was a lot going on.

In the midst of the chaos, the girls bought a pint of ice cream. We had no time to eat it, so we discovered IT FIT IN OUR FREEZER. WHAT THE HECK, GUYS? What are we doing? How many thousands of miles did we sail to only figure this out now?!?

So ANYWAYS, we ate ice cream two days ago, in the middle of the Pacific blue. I’m equal parts mad and ecstatic.

25/10/2024

Day Four (Five?) Tonga to New Zealand

We’ve reached the point of the voyage where I’ve lost count of days.

It’s action-packed out here. First off, let me start by saying our Starlink wouldn’t connect for half the day, so if you don’t hear from me for a while, it’s more than likely satellite related. We have backup communication systems and strategies in place, but none that post to social media.

Yesterday we passed by Minerva Reef. It’s a cool reef in the middle of the ocean where boats can anchor. I wanted to stop, but we are looking at a tight weather window and it unfortunately didn’t make sense for us. Alas. We pushed on.

Last night, friends on a boat ahead of us got dismasted (the big stick that holds the sail fell over). Still not sure how it happened, since they were 50 miles south of us and our weather was relatively mild. They sent o it their location on a WhatsApp group and help sprung into action. Boats volunteered to rendezvous and share fuel so they can motor to land. Unfortunately, we’ve been too far away to help so far.

Then Starlink went out and we knew nothing.

Thankfully, this morning we heard they met a couple boats, took on fuel, and even an additional crew member. They plan to motor to NZ, so it’s gonna take some time. They rigged up a short range vhf antenna and AIS rig too. Sounds like they are good to go. As best I can figure, we are within twenty miles of them now.

Wind has lightened so we are motoring south with extreme prejudice. Weather window is changing daily. Looks like we want to get more west, so a low pressure system will help us scoot down the NZ coast on Wednesday. But it could all change.

Currently 685 nautical miles from Whangarei Heads. It’s gonna be an interesting five days.

Other stuff:
Sarah is making tuna melts right now. I am very happy about this.

Maxingoutlife

19/01/2025

18/01/2025

11/01/2025

30/12/2024

18/12/2024

13/12/2024

10/12/2024

01/11/2024

29/10/2024

27/10/2024

25/10/2024

Address

Website

Alerts

Shortcuts

Share