All Whites trip

Last month me, Andrew, and dad decided that we wanted to go to Wellington to watch the New Zealand soccer team take on Mexico in a world cup qualifying match. We went with a couple of friends, Gavin and Jackson, for the day. I had to fly over in the afternoon because I had a school exam in the morning while dad and Andrew took the ferry in the morning. Luckily I knew a couple of people on the plane so I was able to get a ride with them in to town. At around 4 that day we all met up for some late lunch and then proceeded on to the game.

The All Whites were at a huge disadvantage having lost 5-1 in the opening fixture, but that didn't stop the NZ fans support. Thousands of people lined the streets in the procession to the stadium.

We got to the stadium pretty early to see the players warm up and the stadium was only a bit full when we got there, but by the kick off time it was packed.

New Zealand came out on attack but in the opening 30 minutes conceded 3 goals. The support was getting pretty silent, but the All Whites staged a little comeback at the end and scored two goals to the delight of the supporters. The final score was NZ 2 Mexico 4, but even though we lost it was a great trip and fun was had by all.

Raroa comes into Port Nelson, Labor Day 2013

It's Labor Day in NZ, and folks at the port were working hard. The rest of us got to wander down to the water's edge and spectate.

According to news reports this was the biggest ship ever to come in for a refit. I knew things were unusual when I woke up, checked out the window and saw one of the tugs shooting spectacular sprays from its firehoses - no pic sorry. This was all a bit of show, but it was enough to make us hop on our bikes and head down for a better look. This first one is the lead tug entering what is known locally as "the cut":

 

I am told that tug is here from Singapore, and you can see that our own tug, the little black and white fellow, looks like a toy beside it.

There is an equally large tug at the back, facing the other way, which perhaps gave the Boatshed and other restaurants at water's edge a bit more piece of mind should the wind kick up. You can see some tight navigation as the Raroa passes just above one of the principal channel markers.

She's in.

That red tug tucked in at the back came across from Wellington to help out. We like the sign on the back by helipad that says, No Smoking.

Yes the event brought out lots of folks. 

So this is what we got up to this morning. We've had high wind for a few days - glad it came right on the holiday.

Heat Sensors
Force Field
Underground Tunnels
Micro chipping
Red Line
Robot Guards
Software
Pop up fences

OK. What do all these have in common? Well... they are all possible solutions that Andrew's Future Problem Solving group has come up with in order to increase the safety of the current future scene they are working on, in which cars are driven by ADS (Automated Driving System) and all cars are made and governed by an international consortium managed by the U.N. Here this team worked on the problem of the system's difficulty in detecting small objects.

Underground tunnels, while perhaps excellent at keeping pedestrians out of the roadway, rated poorly in terms of cost/efficiency, environment and health effects. Lots of pent up exhaust fumes.

Red lines, Software, and heat sensors were the top rated solutions according to criteria chosen by the students. Red lines being the most cost effective but least aesthetically pleasing.  Software is a game-based solution designed to educate young children in road safety.

We have been having fun with this, and as Dean has been participating in FPS for several years now, he has been mentoring this younger team. More on the class blog here: http://gatebroadgreen.blogspot.co.nz/2013/06/future-problem-solving.html

Recently we went to Australia, we did plenty of cool things but one of the definite highlights was going to the Tangaroa Zoo in Sydney. When we got there and it was amazing we were first in line so we got in really quickly and immediately got lost. We wanted to make to the bird show at 11 and we were in the zoo at about 10:45 so that didn't give us very much time. We rushed and ended up by the elephants but eventually we found our way to the bird show. The bird show was pretty cool we had parakeets chirping and doing tricks, hawks swooping right over our heads and a naughty owl that refused to do it's trick but eventually it was done and we had to move on. Dean soon realised that he was hungry so we had to stop to stop him from extensively complaining. After a 30 minute break we found our selves watching the gorillas, which was by far the most interesting they were fighting each other, running around and pounding there chests we spent around an hour there. we then explored all around the zoo seeing things like wombats, kangaroos, red pandas, crocodiles and even a platypus after spending the bulk of our day there (It was now about 5:30) we had to leave we really enjoyed our time there. here are some pictures of the animals. By Andrew