Alien in New Zealand

West Coast

2010-01-08T20:02:00.002+13:00

I went to the dark side: bought a car. My office mate Jeff moved back to the USA and I bought his car so that I could see a bit more of New Zealand before I will also be moving. So I made a road trip to the West Coast, which I had not seen before, apart from a train ride to Greymouth.

My route went from Christchurch to Mt Cook, where where I spent a day doing walks, then to Wanaka and over the Haast Pass to Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers. The rest of the trip along the coast to Westport took place in the heaviest rain I have ever experienced. The roads were flooded on many places and North of Punakaiki I narrowly missed a landslide that had blocked one of the lanes. Only when I got back to the East side of Southern Alps could I finally turn off the windshield wipers.

Here are some pictures along the road.

Adelaide

2009-09-20T09:13:00.002+12:00

Last week I spent a few days in Adelaide, South Australia. I got invited in a two-day workshop on weed invasions. More specifically, the workshop was about lag-times in invasions and bringing genetic and ecological invasion studies closer together. That suited me very well, since I had just got a paper accepted on lag-times in New Zealand weed invasions. Still waiting for the proofs, though.

After a couple of intensive days with presentations and discussions, which led to initial drafting of a synthesis paper, I got to spend the weekend touristing around the city. It was hot, so I dropped in every second air conditioned shop as I strolled in the city, or walked from a shadow of a tree to the next in the park around the city. Some crocodile for lunch (taste like pork) and light ale that was a positive surprise after my previous experience of Aussie beers.

Eventually I took the tram to the beach to get a little cooler. That seemed to be a popular move among the city folk and tourists. Plenty of space on the beach, but streets lined with fast food and take away places. I preferred walking in the quiet neighbourhood of the old, impeccably restored brick houses in North Adelaide.

The following day was cooler and I took to the hills outside Adelaide to have a walk in the bush and see a wildlife park. I can't remember seeing kangaroos, koalas, wombats and echidnas live before. Most of them were tame and would eat from the hand, at least if the food was brought right in front of their noses so that did not need to get up to get fed.

Kiwi trip

2009-06-23T19:15:00.003+12:00

Last Saturday I got invited on a field trip to help Malcolm, who works at the Department of Conservation, to replace the radio transmitter on one of the Great Spotted kiwis he is monitoring. Malcolm located the bird named "Perry" by its radio signal, but it was hiding so deep in his burrow under fallen tree trunks that we could not reach it. We spent maybe an hour digging for the bird, which finally decided to flee from us in the thickets nearby. No use of running, so we let it find another burrow before going after it. This time the burrow was more shallow and Malcolm was able to reach for the bird. I held the surprisingly relaxed bird while Malcolm prepared the new transmitter to attached in one of its strong legs. After being released "Perry" can now roam its steep mountain territory in peace, untill next year.

Bike tour Picton - Christchurch

2009-05-03T18:54:00.000+12:00

Right after the Easter in Arapawa Island, I cycled from Picton to Christchurch. This was my first multi-day bike tour carrying all camping equipment. At Picton harbour I put my bike back in riding condition after the transportation in Jenny's car. Tanks for the ride and apologies for all the greasy chainmarks! My backpack, boots and other field work gear that would not be required on the ride got a return ticket in the car, while rest of the stuff fitted in two rear panniers and a handlebar back. The tent was strapped on the rear rack, and I was ready to go. Notice, that the front wheel quick release is open in the picture. Luckily, I did notice that pretty soon.

I rode from Picton to Blenheim during Easter Sunday afternoon. The weather was sunny, not too hot, and the traffic along Highway 1 was tolerable due to a reasonably wide paved road shoulder. Even the gradients were nice and gentle for a first day of loaded touring.

Before Easter I had called Satu, whom I had met at the Finnish independence day party last year, and got invited to visit the Vicarage Lane Wines she and her husband have in Blenh

eim. I did a few rounds in the centre of Blenheim trying to find a supermarket, but they were closed for Easter. When heading towards the Information Centre of the railway station I stopped to wait for the traffic circle to clear. A green SUV came behind, stopped on my right and drove to the traffic circle knocking me over with its mirror. I fell to the lane on my left, which was luckily clear of traffic, while the SUV stopped to the other side of the traffic circle. Unhurt, except for a scratch on the knee and elbow, I rode to tell the SUV driver what I thought of his driving skills. "Sorry mate, I didn't see you

" was not quite as sincere an apology I expected, neither did I accept his excuse for being a kiwi and thus a lousy driver. No real harm had happened, however, and I let the matter to be. Only later did it occur to me that the driver might have been drunk and I could have taken up his license number - or even grabbed the camera and taken a picture of him. Unfortunately I was too shaken and angry to think about that on time.

After the incident with the SUV I rode to see Satu and h

er vineyard a few kilometers away from Blenheim centre. I got a tour among th

e vines and heard a lot about grapes and wine making. It was nice to speak Finnish again. I continued my ride later in the afternoon, with the handlebar bag full of apples as a parting gift from Satu.

The twilight came at 6 pm, while I was still riding among the vineyards towards Saint Arnaud. There was no place to put up a tent, every bit of land being someone's property and fenced off from tiring cyclotourists. It was quite dark when I arrived to Wairau Valley village, found an old tavern that also had a pice of lawn for campers, as well as a shower and beer. The trucks went past on the other side of the fence, but I was too tired to let my sleep to be interfered.

At the following day, the Easter Monday, I continued the riding south-west along the

Wairau River towards St. Arnaud. That was a weary day, riding to a headwind on a straight road in a landscape that was pretty, but changed so slowly that I began to question the sensibility of my ride. Other than the wind, the weather remained fine. There were no villages and few houses before I had done the final climb over the low saddle between the mountains and descended to Saint Arnaud, which seems to be mainly a holiday resort for the campers and trampers at the Nelson Lakes park.

I welcomed the services of a populated place, most importantly the grocery store and the camping ground with a shower. In the evening I went to have a beer at the restaurant of an upscale lodge, but did not feel welcome among the diners in my cyc

ling clothes and unshave

d face.

The next morning was cold and misty, but cleared soon to befit a cyclers paradise: gentle downhill and tailwind in a scenic landscape on a silent road! I pretty much freewheeled all the way to Murchison, where I stopped for a lunch and an unsuccessful attempt to find a charger for my cell phone. The road became more narrow and busy as I came to Highway 6 west of Murchison. I was not comfortable among the

trucks and campervans on a mountain roa

d with blind corners, no shoulder and a steep h

ill up on one side and down on the other.

I was happy to turn south towards Springs Junction on a bit more quiet stretch of road.

The road followed a river that had changed its course after an earthquake in 1929 and formed a wide waterfall. The place must be truly impressive during the spring flood.

Again, the night was coming early and I had

to find a place to camp. There would not be any established locations for a considerable distance and I was becoming tired after a long day in the saddle. The hills around the road were mostly forested and at least accessible for their lack of fences, but where to find a flat piece of ground for the tent? One of the side roads appeared to be for the maintenance of a power line and I trusted nobody would need to come there during the night. I pitched my tent in the middle of the road for the lack of a better place and did, indeed, had a nights sleep without being run over by a 4WD or a tractor.

I woke up in a white-out, as the hills around me were covered by thick clouds. Everything was wet although it had not rained, but it was reasonably warm, however. I had camped higher

up than I had thought and the landscape become more clear as I came

downhill, below the clouds.

After Springs Junction, the road began to climb again towards Lewis Pass. The weather turned hot and a small, previously unknown muscle above my left knee started complaining. That was the perfect moment for the Japanese bath and hot pools of Maruia Springs to come in sight. The place was nearly empty and I had the whole bath house for myself to relax my aching muscles in the sulfurous hot water.

After a generous time healing myself, I continued the climb smelling like rotten eggs.

The tailwind helped me to the saddle point of the climb, but I would certainly have used smaller gears if I had had any. The climb was followed by a steep descent to the Eastern side of the mountains and I got my new record speed on a bike, 71.8 km/h.

I had not quite decided where to stay for the night. My map showed several promising camping places, but they turned out to be resting stops for cars, where tenting was not permitted. The strong tailwind and long downhills made me to continue all the way to a camping place near Hanmer Springs.

The last day of my trip, from Hanmer Springs to Christchurch was long at 130 km, but one of the easiest due to the gentle slopes downhill and the strong tailwind all the way. The landscape turned from mountains to river margins, pastures and hedgerows again. At Waipara, where I stopped for lunch before last leg back home, I was surprised to meet my colleagues Mattias and Mariska, who were cheking some field sites that were conveniently at vineyards. I might consider a change of career to empirical ecology if could do that in similar places!

Not much to say about the last kilometers of the ride. Highway 1 was busy and uninspiring, but at least wide enough to fit a cyclist among the other traffic. From Rangiora I was at familiar roads again and arrived home in Christchurch after a total of 512 km in five days, with daily rides ranging from 70 to 130 km, mostly depending on the wind. A good trip, I will want to go cycle touring again next summer!

Field work at the Arapawa Island

2009-04-27T18:52:00.001+12:00

During the Easter I volunteered to be one of Sean's field assistants doing forest measurements at the Arapawa Island at Cook Straight. We first drove (and Sean flew) from Christchurch to Picton, which is the harbour for the traffic between the North and the South Islands. From Picton we had a boat to give us a one hour trip to the Arapawa Island. At one point, a group of dusky dolphins surfed on the wave of our boat, sometimes jumping high in the air.

On the Island we packed the bulk of our gear to a four-wheel bike to transport it up the steep hills. The weather was clear and we had a good view over high islands of the archipelago. On one side we had the Marlborough Sound and on the other side the Cook Straight. We tried to keeo an eye for whales, but unfortunately did not see any.

Up at the ridge of the hill was a small hut on the Department of Conservation land. We could not all fit in and there was hardly any flat ground around the hut, save the track, and that's were we set up our tents.

The field sites, where goats were fenced away from parts of the forest, were down a steep slope towards the sea. We descended maybe 500 m over a horizontal distance of 1500 m, which meant climbing using both feet and hands. It was easier to go uphill than down. We stayed there two days and nights. Some of the group continued to do more field work at similar sites in the North Island. I prepared to to ride back home on my bicycle.

Aces high!

2009-03-15T20:47:00.000+13:00

This weekend I had a unique experience as my colleague Sean invited me for a flight over the Canterbury plains. I knew he was a pilot but I had not known that he also has a Pitts Special, which is a dedicated aerobatic biplane. "All engine, very little plane", as Sean described it.

We had a nice, calm weather, with scattered clouds and good visibility. After the initial check of the plane and rolling it out from the hangar, I was strapped in a five-point safety belt and

an extra safety-safety belt at the front seat, Sean piloting from the back seat, and we took off.

After getting more fuel at another airfield in Rangiora headed somewhere around Oxford (no, not in the UK) and climbed to 4500 feet to have a safe altitude for the maneuvers. No pictures from the rolls, loops and hammerheads, I'm afraid, since I could hardly move my hands at 5G acceleration and was too busy to keep track of the horizon.

Sean asked after every move if I was OK, but no worries. The aerobatic moves were soon over - too soon, like a ride in an amusement park, but I guess it is better to stop while you still have your breakfast. Absolute thrill!

Happy 200th Anniversary Charles Darwin!

2009-02-12T21:20:00.000+13:00

I draw lots of inspiration from this page from Darwin's notebook, which shows the first sketch of an evolutionary tree.

I don't expect to come up with anything comparable, but I also hope that I don't spend 22 years between the first sketch and publication. That might not be tolerated in todays academic world.

(Image stolen from Cambridge University Library)

Pictures from a holiday in South

2009-02-09T21:22:00.000+13:00

Some pictures from the New Year holiday trip to South of South Island. I'll add comments some day...

Tranzscenic train

2009-01-11T20:06:00.001+13:00

I was travelling with my brother Juho after Christmas. The traditional Boxing Day ride took to Greymouth and back on the Tranzscenic train, which crosses the Southern Alps at Arthurs Pass.

The train is really made for scenic tours, having big windows and a guide (a voice in the PA) that tells about the history and nature along the journey. In addition, the train had some open coaches, which were better for taking pictures (no windows to give reflections).

The first part of the trip was through the flat and somewhat uninspiring landscape of Canterbury plains, consisting mostly of pastures and hedgerows. We had some stops along the way, taking a few more passengers, but it seemed that everyone was there for the trip itself rather than for a reason to get to Greymouth.

The mountains were hidden in clouds and some drizzle made me worry if any of the scenery could be seen. Luckily the rain cleared, save

for Arthurs Pass, and we got what we came for - the mountains.

The train follows the road (or the other way round) untill the foot of the mountains at Porters Pass, then finds its own, winding route

round and through the hills and over gorges and streams.

The best views seemed to be on the eastern side of the track, where the river valley was for the most of the time.

Every so often the train goes to one of the 19 tunnels on the route. Some of them are long enough that the smoke of the diesel engine feels hot and irritating in the open coaches. These coaches are closed for the longest tunnel at Arthurs Pass, which takes a full 15 minutes to get through.

On the other side of Arthurs Pass is the West Coast, where some parts get ten times more rain than Canterbury. I wish I could have stopped the train at some of the temperate rainforests. Instead of pulling the emergency stop handle I stayed in nice and dry indoors, as we crossed the river Grey.

At the mouth of the river Grey, the imaginative early settlers had established the town of Greymouth. The train only stopped there for an hour, enough to have a stroll at the main street and the river bank, and stop for a cup of coffee. I suppose there would be more to say of Greymouth after a longer stay. At least the mural at local newspaper office building showed that the place has a lot of interesting history, at least if you found your Christmas stocking was filled with coal.

Christmas Eve

2008-12-24T21:57:00.000+13:00

My brother Juho and myself, enjoying the quiet Christmas Eve, watching the South Park movie. Merry Christmas to all!

The Hobbit

2008-12-15T21:22:00.000+13:00

When the filming of the Hobbit begins, I'm ready!

Tour de Hinewai

2008-10-26T18:56:00.000+13:00

A week ago I took part in a bicycle tour to Hinewai, Banks Peninsula, along with a group of other keen cyclists from Lincoln University. The tour is something of a tradition by now, although it was not arranged last year. Hinewai is a private nature reserve of >1000 ha and covers almost an entire valley East of Akaroa. The place was previously a farm that was seriously infested by gorse, to the extend of making it economically non-viable. It was bought to conservation and research purposes, let to develop with minimal human interference, while maintaining a network of paths for tramping. I had not been there or the whole Banks Peninsula before, and looked forward to see it. I was less eager to the climb up the mountains, however.

We started on Friday morning from Steve's place, rode leisurely at the foot of Port Hills towards Tai tapu, where we would be joined by the rest of the group. Myles took the task of driving a support car, which would carry most of our stuff and food for the weekend. He also carried his bike and took every opportunity to drive the car ahead of us, cycle back to meet us and cycle back to the car. The weather was about as good as it gets for cycling, which means that we had a bright day without excess heat and no wind to speak of. The first 60 km to Little River was a breeze, although the test of my cyclocross bike's offroad abilities ended in an exposive puncture of the front tyre. That was soon replaced with a new one, but I took it better to stay on a sealed road after the incident.

After a break and a lunch in Little River we started the long and arduous climb to the Hilltop. Our tight 'peloton' spread beyond visual contact when Steve took off with his new lighter-than-air road bike (he's also the most active cyclist among us). I could not cycle all the way up non-stop, but had to rest and walk when I could no longer keep a steering speed by pedalling. We all made it to the top, however, and were rewarded with the views from the Summit Road to Akaroa Harbour below us.

The rest of the journey was basically uphill and downhill with enough repetition to make the uphill parts a walking exercise for me once more. After what seemed like eternity there was, however, the last uphill (this time for real!) and a steep descent to Hinewai. We were met with a well-maintained, clean hut that even offered a hot shower, which was in the top three of my priorities (along with food and beer) after a 98 km bike ride. I was amazed how well-thought everything was, how the life of a visitor was made easy by clear instructions of the house rules etc. The rest of the evening was relaxing, watching Myles make pizza á la James Oliver, sipping the beer, and restoring the salt balance with salmiakki.

Saturday was a rest day. It rained for the whole morning, which people spent with board games, reading or sleeping (my choice). After the lunch it cleared and we headed down the valley to gather fire wood from places that Hugh Wilson, the resident manager of the reserve, had marked on a map. Hugh is a jolly chap, a real character! We found wood in neat piles where he had indicated and took what we could carry along the steep paths up to the visitor centre. It was a sweaty job on a worm day, but not too bad, since we had so many hands at work. Even Max (aged about 6 months) carried a stick while fully asleep!

On Sunday we cycled back. There is not as much to tell about that, since we were fully rested at the hilly part of the trip and there was a lot more downhill, anyway. My cycle computer recorded the maximum speed of 61.1 km/h in one downhill.

The long descent between Hilltop and Little River had to be taken more slowly, since there was more winding and busy traffic than at the hills. After a lunch in Little River we worked the long flat part of the return trip in variable head winds, trying to find a speed that would suite everyone. The long, sweaty hours began to take their toll and I welcomed every opportunity to lift my butt from the saddle. Eventually we were back in Christchurch, concluding our trip at Jon's place, enjoying the remaining beers. I still had a few more km to my place, where the bike computer announced 102 km for the return trip. That's more than I have ever before done in a single day. It was a great trip!

Visiting Europe

2008-10-22T19:04:00.000+13:00

Quite some time has passed since I last wrote here. At the first writing I was not able to upload any pictures, but after a few days and several attempts later I managed to get two pics through to illustrate my recent trip to Europe.

In late September I attended the Neobiota conference in

Prague, Czech Republic, presenting a poster on New Zealand weed invasions based on the analysis of herbarium records. This is the third time I attend Neobiota, which is organized every two years, always in nice European cities. I have not been in Prague before, even if it is a popular place to visit for Finns also.

Late September was supposed to be off-season, but I was still surprised of the large crowds of tourists, mainly from Germany, it seemed, that filled the narrow streets and alleys of the Old Town. One can hardly blame them, Prague is an exceptionally beautiful and enjoyable city.

After the conference I went to Finland for a bit more than a week. It was a short visit and since I wanted to meet family and as many of my friends as possible, I was very busy. First I stayed in Helsinki at my mother's place, meeting also previous colleagues a the university. Next I went to Mikkeli to spend a couple of days at my father's place. After that I had some time left to visit Oulu and the people that have been important to me since my PhD studies there.

After this brief visit to Finland and all the activity, I became home sick at the Helsinki airport, where a souvenir shop sold all kinds of Finnish delicacies, which I would miss back in New Zealand. At least I made sure I was well stocked with salmiakki (a kind of salty liquorice that gets its distinctive taste from ammoniun chloride) in various strengths and flavors, solid and liquid. The landscape of autumn coloured forests and dark lakes was also so beautiful when seen from above that for a moment I felt sorry to be leaving it behind. The feeling did not last long, however, and as soon as I was above the clouds I drifted into to the numbness that was my survival strategy for the tedious flight to the other side of the Earth.

Esa Ranta In Memoriam

2008-09-02T06:45:00.000+12:00

Professor Esa Ranta (1953-2008) was my post-doc supervisor at the University of Helsinki. The picture was taken at his 50th birthday cruise in Loviisa.

Skiing at Mt. Hutt

2008-08-28T19:39:00.000+12:00

Last Saturday I was skiing at Mt Hutt together with others from the Lincoln University skiing club. The weather was perfect and snow conditions was said to be best in years. I built up high anticipation as we drew closer to the mountains, which seemed to be very close all the time due to the good visibility.

As we rode up the mountain, we had to stop midway to put on the snow chains, which were required on all two-wheel drives ascending the icy road. That gave me an opportunity to take a look at the Canterbury plains and the braided Rakaia River below.

This being my second time downhill skiing, I started carefully, going a couple of times at the beginners slope to get a feeling of my rented skis. The next step was the easy slopes marked in green, then the intermediate and then... I decided to stay at the intermediate level, still remembering the pain in my left shoulder after the last time I overestimated my skills. Mt Hutt is certainly easier than Mt Cheeseman, since the tracks are wider and more even, giving me space and time for controlled turns.

Mt Hutt is easier than Mt Cheeseman, since the tracks are wider and more even, giving me the necessary space and time for controlled turns. Even the top of the mountain was good to ski and of course it offered great views, too. It strongly reminded me of the "lightning of the beacons" scene from Lord of the Rings, which is in fact filmed quite a bit further south. Edoras is supposed to be closer in some valley in the same general direction.

I am hardly the first tourist who has his picture taken with this background.

Kea, the mountain parrot, at the parking place. I did not see any damage, but I've heard they like making havoc at the windscreen wipers and other rubber parts it could get their beaks into. Even bicycle saddles are not safe. They were quite curious, but kept a distance.

Skiing at Mt. Cheeseman

2008-07-27T18:43:00.000+12:00

Last Friday was my first time ever to go downhill skiing. I was asked by Sean from work to join him for a day at the mountains, as the weather promised to be good and the mountains had received plenty of fresh snow. I did hesitate for a moment, because my experience of skiing is mostly from deep-snow hikes, where I would be equipped with long forest skis and pulling a toboggan, and do my best to avoid steep slopes, whether up or downhill. I decided to take the opportunity, however, and filled the necessary form to apply for a day off from work.

It was raining in Christchurch and the whole Canterbury plains when we drove in Sean's 4WD towards Arthur's Pass and the whole idea of skiing felt very remote in that weather. I rented alpine skis, poles and boots along the way. The weather turned colder and more bright as we got closer to the mountains. At one point there was a check point along the road, where ordinary cars had to put on their snow chains. The roads ahead were snowy and icy, nothing worse than is common in Finland, but local vehicles are not equipped with winter tires (except chains) and there is a long way down the face of the m

ountain, so everyone drove extra carefully.

The road to Mt. Cheeseman, named after a notable kiwi botanist, was unsealed and narrow, lacking a fence between the road and the void. A good number of people had made their way to the skiing area, but it was not crowded by any means. We arrived just in time for me to get to a lesson for beginners, starting on how to get on and off your skis, maintaining balance, sliding, turning, etc. It was all too easy on a gentle slo

pe, with the cross-country and deep-snow skiing experience behind me.

After having a lunch and building some over-confidence, I got the lift to the main tracks and watched Sean to effortlessly find his way down the hill with a beautiful telemark-style. I

followed with much more effort, with less than beautiful style and more speed than I could safely manage. The first fall left me gasping for breath in my empty lungs. The second fall gave a nasty blow on the left elbow, which had dislocated in the past. I felt it moving from its socket again, but returning back in place and staying functional. This was enough to bring me realize the limits of my current skills and I took rest of the skiing much more carefully, enjoying, not just surviving.

In the end, I went all the way to the top box, which was again well beyond my skills, but one can always get down, in one way or another. This was at the ridge of the mountain, offering good view to to the valley on both sides.

I was really tired afterwards and every part of my body ached the next morning, but I enjoyed the trip anyway. After the flatness of Christchurch and Canterbury it is great to get to the mountains. I had also missed the snow, it had not felt real winter before that.

Read your pay slip!

2008-07-19T09:53:00.000+12:00

When I was making the decision about taking the job here in New Zealand I was a little worried about the lower salary I would be getting. In the end, that was outweighted by other factors, but I knew I should watch my expenditure while I am here. Luckily that is made very easy by my local bank, since I can download the events from my bank account and graph the changes in a spreadsheet program, with the results shown below (I prefer not to disclose the vertical axis scale).

The declining trend over the last month or two did not indicate sustainable economy, but I could not think of anything too costly in my life style. Maybe there is something wrong with the income part of the balance? Shouldn't the forth-nightly peaks upwards be a little higher?

After having a look at my pay slip and making some calculations based on my annual salary, I realized that only about half of my gross salary is paid on my account. The tax rate is not 50%, but the university is still deducing the rent of the guest house where I used to live, about six weeks after I moved out!

The problem was quickly solved and apologized for when I went to see the appropriate person in the administration. I will be refunded, of course, so no harm was done. In practice, I had saved the money on another (zero interest rate) bank account, instead of spending it. Lesson learned, it is possible to survive with less, but better still is to read the pay slip and be aware of how much I should be getting.

Between the sea and the mountain

2008-07-06T16:25:00.000+12:00

After a long silence I finally update my blog with some pictures. Nothing exotic has happend really and there is little to write about my ordinary life. "One town's very like the other when your head's down over your keyboard, brother." Besides, my four years old camera died. The camera I quickly got a replaced by a devise is so small that I can easily carry it in a pocket. No use having a camera that you do not bother to carry with you.

The last few weeks have been rainy, especially during weekends when I have the opportunity to

be out of doors during daylight. Therefore I have not really been much anywhere that would yield pictures or stories. The once that I post now are from a cycling trip to Sumner, a part of the city that is between the sea and the Port Hills.

I first went to New Brighton, which has a nice beach and a landmark Pier that extends from a building that has a library a restaurant. It seems to be popular site four tourists and locals alike, even during mid-winter, and the surfers do not let cold weather to make breaks in their hobby either.

The estuary of Heathcote and Avon rivers has

a wildlife refuge, presumably mainly for waterfowl. The lagoons and islands are oxidation ponds that apparently perform some function in sewage processing. The shallow lagoons and

mudplains attract birds also, which is very nice

so near the city. Too bad I don't have binoculars (which should also be so small that it is not inconvenient to have them on your person, even when cycling).

The technical limitations and the busy roa

d behind my back did not facilitate great nature discoveries. It is also rather unprofessional for a biologist not to know all the species he saw. Oh well, maybe I find them in my field guide (which I also should be carrying with me). The black ones in the front are pukeko's, one of the few local species I have seen so far.

Most others seem to be aliens, like the geese in the picture below. The same seems to be the case in my work. The current demography of at my corridor at Lincoln University, which roughly corresponds to Plant Ecology Lab, has nine Americans, four Europeans and four Kiwis.

The road to Sumner is popular cycling route especially for road cyclists. My bike has mudguards, a rack and pannier bag, and I wear hiking boots and cargo pants when cycling. This setup allows me to ride slowly, looking around, and not engage in competition with the road cyclists that swoosh past me with their carbon fibre bikes and spandex outfits. Ok, I admit that I would also like a carbon fibre bike, but then I would need to ride fast and wear colours that were fashionable in the 80's.

The vulcanic origin of the Port Hills shore is very noticeable at the shore, where steep hills leave only a narrow strip of land and beach between the rock and sea. Some of the rocky islets look pretty exotic to my eye that is more accustomed to ancient bedrock that has been honed by the ice ages.

Another exotic landscape feature is caves, which are exceedingly rare in Finland. The old bedrock and ice ages are again to blame for that. Caves are more common here, but still rare enough to be indicated as nature reserves and be photographed by every tourist that hits the spot. I am no exception and dutifully took the pictures that I could as well have downloaded from flickr.

I'll be back at the same kiwi-time at the same kiwi-channel (if it does not rain).

Moving in and staying out

2008-06-03T13:27:00.000+12:00

My move to the new apartment in Christchurch City was both the easiest and the most difficult I have ever had. It was easy, because I had very little to move: one suitcase, a backpack and a guitar. The contents of the fridge fit in one bike pannier, while the bike and the other pannier was left in the old apartment. I had to come back later to clean up and decided I would cycle back to city after that.

My office mate Jeff gave me and my meagre possessions a lift to the city. On our way we stopped at Jon, who is another colleague, to get a bed I had bought from him. The matress went to the roof and the rest of it fited inside. The receiving end of the move offered no complications either. Later that night I had my old place in good shape and cycled in the dark to the city. I have lights in the front and rear, a red jacket and red pannier with reflectors, which was barely enough for drivers to notice or care about my presence, and not make one more road kill of me.

OK. The move itself was quite easy, but that's not the end of story. On Friday I went to work, paying special attention to lock the door properly and make sure that I have the key with me. I would be returning home late, since the Saff Club would continue with a pub crawl at the city to celebrate the end of teaching. I am not burdened by teaching, but of course I had my move to celebrate. After a good time with recent and new friends, and a good deal of sampling among local beers, I left for home at midnight.

And the door would not open. I had the key, two in fact, since the previous tenant had returned one extra key in my mailbox. Neither of the keys would open the lock. Apparently I made some noise in my attempts to get inside, because the updoors neighbour came to see what was going on. We had not met before and he did not know that the previous tenant had moved. It took some convincing before he accepted that I was not breaking in. He also gave the lock a try, but with no more success than I had.

I walked some distance to the police station, waited among other "customers" before getting to explain the situation to an officer. He tried to call the property manager, but got no answer. He could only suggest that I break in (I would have to pay for the damage myself) or go to a hostel for the night and get a locksmith in the morning. I agreed that the second option was probably to best. After giving the lock one more try, I took a taxi and asked to be driven to a hostel or hotel, or whatever. I was too tired to really care. The motel near my impenetraply locked home offerd a single room for NZ$50.

In the morning I called the property manager once more, this time leaving a message, and spend the morning waiting for a reply. When she finally called me back, it turned out that she was in Auckland, but she could at least give me the phone number of the previous tenant, hoping that he would know what kind of trick the lock was playing on me. This turned out to be helpful and I learned that I had turned a swith on the lock to a position that prevents opening from the outside. The key would thus be useless, but he adviced that one of the windows could be opened from the outside with some effort and patience. I surprised myself by still having both and the window finally opened, although I had to remove one panel of glass before I could reach the handle and open the window completely. Once inside, the door opened without problems. The relief of getting inside was mixed with worries about living in a place, where one can break in about five minutes without tools and without leaving any visible signs of entry.

Hetken tie on kevyt...

2008-05-20T14:56:00.001+12:00

New Home and Cycling at Port Hills

2008-05-13T07:21:00.000+12:00

Last Saturday I cycled to City Centre to see an apartment that I could potentially rent. The one-bedroom flat is at Worcester Street, less than one kilometer east from the Cathedral Square. The place was the first to meet my requirements of location, size and rent during the time I had been looking for a new home, a month or so. I decided to look no further and agreed to rent the plance, signing the contract was signed on Monday. I get to move in by the end of May.

After seeing my new home, I decided to find my way back to Lincoln by cycling along the foot of the Port Hills, which are south from Christchurch towards Lyttelton. Somehow I took the turn towards Dyers Pass and started to climb the steep hill that would take me to the Summit Road at the top of the hills.

It was a beautiful day and the narrow road was full of traffic: other cyclists, cars a

nd motorcycles. Each of them made the ascent faster than I did, but I had no intention to make this a competitive event. I had quite enough just by keeping my breath and trying not to faint. Luckily the beginning of the ascent was the hardest part and the road became much easier as I approached the saddle point and the Sign of the Kiwi, which is a nice café and resting place with great view to the City on one side of the hills and Lyttelton Harbour on the other.

After having enjoyed a boysenberry ice cream and filling my water bottle I took the Summit Road to the South West direction, which would eventually descent to Motukarara. Cycling at the

Summit Road among the clouded hill tops must be one of my best cycling experiences and the descent was certainly the fastest I've ever done on a bike. I just enjoyed the speed so much that did not even stop to take that many pictures.

After the descent to Motukarara I had to face one of the reasons I wanted to move away from Lincoln: 17 km of flat road along pastures and hedgerows is rather uninspiring after the winding hill roads and spectacular views over the landscape. It was a great trip, anyway, and the nice thing is that these great cycling roads will be even closer when I move to the City.

New friends

2008-05-04T11:00:00.000+12:00

Yesterday I was shopping at Riccarton Mall when I heard two ladies speaking Finnish and of course I went to talk them. One of them, Suvi, is a long term resident in NZ and maintains a list of Finns living in the South Island. The other one, Taru, is an au pair in the family. They live at the same village of Lincoln where I do and Suvi even works as a researcher close to the university. Actually, I had over heard Taru and her friend Rosa to talk loudly to each other in the bus 81 from Lincoln to the City. Too bad I did not hear what they actually said to each other, since they blushed so strongly after noticing that there is another Finnish speaker in the bus.

Suvi invited me to the "vappu" (First of May) party that would be held at the Cashmere Club at the same evening. Maybe two dozen Finns (including families) gathered there to enjoy the company, Finnish music and foods. I could never have imagined that salmiakki would taste so good after only a month without having any!

It's nice to know some Finns at this place, which is about as far as one can go from home one can get.

Second week

2008-04-21T17:38:00.000+12:00

I have established some routine by now. I wake up at 6 am and some time after seven I walk accross the rugby-field to the other side of the campus to the Burns Wing -building. The early mornings are used for making Skype-calls to Finland, where the time is nine hours later than here. If I am sufficiently early to make a call, my girlfriend Anna has not gone to bed and I can wish her goodnight.

After this nice start of the day, I work. That is, I sit by my Mac-laptop (many thanks Esa!) and the ancient Windows-tabletop computer I found at the desk that was given to me. I will get a new computer at some time, and hopefully also an extra live internet-socket, but the wheels seem to be turning a bit slowly. No matter, I am quite happy that the friendly, familiar Mac-environment is making it easier to adopt to a new environment.

Speaking about working environments: a major component of my working life has been the Matlab-software, which I use for everything that involves numbers. Matlab is not, however, as ubiquitous as I had thought and most of the local modellers seem to use R instead. I have been aware of R and its benefits (Yes, yes. I have heard it all by now!) compared to Matlab, but I have chosen to use the tools that serve me best and I can luckily continue to use Matlab here, too.

It seems, however, that I can not completely avoid R in the near future. The Plant Ecology research group has kind of a workshop in statistics. I was invited to a session to learn about hierarchical models and was very happy about the opportunity. It turned out, that hierarchical models were not the only thing I was not familiar with, since the exercises were all intended to be carried out using R, which I had never used before. Additional problems were the local keyboard, where parenthesis, brackets and other special symbols are in completely different places than in my Scandinavian keyboard, and of course, the computers had Windows.

I ended up taking very slow steps in introductory-R, rather than learning sophisticated models, but at least I realized that R is not that different from Matlab and learning it is probably not a mission impossible. A completely different question is whether it makes sense to use time and effort to learn a new programming language when I already know one that is very similar?

OK, so much about programming languages.

The evenings go pretty much the same way as the mornings: communications with the friends and relatives back in Finland. This is less regular than my morning routine, however. If you feel like making a Skype-call to me, your early morning is probably the best time of the day to do that.

My life is more active during weekends, when I go to the City, beach, or the hills, but I will write about that at some later time.

First week in New Zealand

2008-04-16T18:05:00.000+12:00

Initial ramblings...

This blog was locked after the first message and remained that way for several weeks. Can you read something dubious in my first entry? At least some program that has a duty of sniffing through all the blogs at this site decided that the content is spam and the moderators (or whatever) of this site were not in a great hurry to act on my request to have it unlocked. You get what you pay for, I guess.

Anyway, I had already given up hope that I could continue my blog and I am rather annoyed of not being able blog from the very beginning of my move to NZ. Starting late feels like defeating the whole purpose of blogging. I had, however, a chat with a colleague (who has a very nice blog about her time abroad) and she encouraged me to continue despite the initial difficulties. Many thanks for that, Katja!

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So, what has happened since my first blog entry? First and foremost, I have moved to New Zealand, where I currently work at Lincoln Univeristy, in Canterbury region. I have bli

ssfully forgotten exactly how many hours the flight from Helsinki via London, Hong Kong and

Auckland to Christchurch took. It was not the kind of nightmare I was expecting, but I was happy when I finally reached my destination on Monday 31th March.

My boss, prof. Philip Hulme met me at the airport, took me to the university guest house, showed where my office is and made sure I had everything OK and could rest after the long travel. Many thanks, that was very thoughtful!

The housing (the unit at the left in the picture) provided by the Lincoln University is bigger than the apartment I have back in Helsinki, Finland. It's nice to have space and extra bedroom if everyone who has promised will actually come for a visit, but I need to seriously think whether I want to pay the rent for space that would be empty for most of the time. More importantly, the University guest house is available only to the end of May, so I will need to move anyway. Maybe to the City centre next?

The first week of April mostly went as I arranged practical things, such as got keys and staff ID-card for the university, opened a bank account, met new colleagues and so on.

On Thursday 3rd April I was invited with the rest of the Plant Ecology Lab members to one of the field sites at the forest line at the nearest mountains in Graigburn (I have check the sp

elling lager). It took more than an hour to drive there and the straight paved roads between pastures and hedges changed to winding gravel roads as we got nearer. My facial expressions moved from a satisfied grin at the magnificent views to worried glimpses down the slopes to the valleys far below or the potentially collapsing ridges above us.

Finally we got as far as the road could take us and had to climb slopes that were steeper than anything I had climbed before (remember, I come from Finland, which is, for most parts, flat as a pancake and dominated by lakes rather than mountains). The rest of the group just took off when I was crawling on my all fours, trying to keep balance, get breath and not slide down with the gravel-surface (the "scree", I believe they called it).

When the vegetation was able to keep the soil relatively stable, It was made of nearly impenetrable bushes or slippery tussocks of grass along with a rosette plant with hard, dagger-like leaves. Some of the cuts are still visible in my hands and legs.

Anyway, I survived the field trip, but have to confess that I am not physically as fit as I thought I was. The day cycling back home was not enough to make me a field biologist for the present conditions, but maybe that will change as I spend more time here.

After the field trip it was time to discuss what I would do during my two-year post-doc at Phil's group. I am a modeller and hired to do that kind of work (instead of climbing mountains), it was easy to agree on that. I got some data on invasive plant species to so I have something to work on. Maybe I'll tell of the work-related things later. (What I do is top-secret. I know hardly anything about it myself.)

OK, let's start a blog

2008-03-21T23:08:00.000+13:00

Starting my first blog. Difficult questions to solve first, such as whether I should write in English or in Finnish, which is my native language. The reason for starting the whole thing is to have a method of communicating with the friends and colleagues at home, sharing my thoughts and impressions of New Zealand, which is going to be my home for the coming two years. I am starting a new job as an invasion ecologist, studying the dynamics of alien plant species, which are a major ecological problem in NZ. Of course, I will be an alien myself, too, which is perhaps fitting for the job.