The Gold Coast’s a tourist destination on the eastern edge of Australia, where masses of burned and tanned bodies dressed in vests, flat caps and bikinis, writhe round the ankles of a forest of sky-scrapers.

My Dad, brother and I have a tradition of finding adventures on holiday.  Nick’s planning, stepping off the beaten track and mucking around, make for a good time.

Christchurch’s botanical gardens are beautifully kept, but after a day and a night, and another day of rain we nonetheless decided to go with the flow and head on down to the coast:

Unrelated to pretty much anything else here, but a good parenting fable and top of this trip’s playlist.

At Blockhill, Melisa and Olmec are 8 years into their sustainable, low environmental impact project, and we were bowled over by their efforts to turn a grass hillside into a verdant and bountiful garden.

This trip took a lot of preparation: arranging time off school, travel arrangements, route planning etc. etc. but all that only took us as far as Wellington on the North Island.