grimey streets

As I walked down to Polytechnic to do some blogging tonight I took a few night shots. I took them as I walked down past the Leith and the Gregs coffee building. I always like checking out the new murals and tagging on the walls. How boring would cities be without this kind of creativity.

A mellow Sunday surf

Saturday night in Dunedin the legendary Little Bushman played a gig at Refuel. Its the second time this year I have seen them and both times have been awesome! Warren Maxwell and the boys never fail to impress with their 60's psychedelic rock jam outs with that Aotearoa flavour, big ups Little Bushman! http://www.myspace.com/littlebushmanband

Sunday started very slowly, the planned 9am surf didn't happen but we made it in the end and had an awesome mellow longboard session on the northcoast.

Pretty mellow surf but a fun way to spend a Sunday afternoon. Summer is coming!!!!!!!

This last image is from a few weeks ago again on the North coast of the Otago Peninsular. It was a fun day with sets like these coming through, I was stoked to see three surfers on three waves in a row. Not sure who the front two are but the third is Ted Whitaker.

Surfing in Dunedin

I decided I would spend this weekend in Dunedin instead of heading over to the Mountains. What a good decision the surf was pumping! We went out for a few epic surfs earlier in the week with a nice northeast swell and offshore winds the points were cranking! All of these shots except one are from friday night at Blackhead. I'll have to admit I didn't go surfing this particular night because we arrived too late and it was quite freezing with 30 knot offshore winds. I took the opportunity to take some nice photos of the awesome waves and surfers, the spray coming off the back of the waves was intense!


Surfer: Leroy Rust

Photo by Dan Bregman taken at sunset at Doctors Point.

Surfer: Unknown

Temple Basin

View looking from a peak on Temple Basin towards the north.

Something that I have been wanting to do for a few years now is hit the Canterbury club fields. After 5 seasons in Wanaka and Queenstown I am getting a bit bored of the same busy mountains and sick of seeing how much more snow Canterbury has been getting. When my mate Ash a few weeks ago suggested we get a crew together and head to Temple Basin I was right into it! We had some general dates planned and a few guys keen. A week before our planned dates the weather report couldn't have looked worse; rain gale force nor-westerlies, and more rain, with snow providing the temps weren't too high. Despite this after much debate the decision was made and it was on!!!! Final count was 8 guys and a few more who would meet us up there.

The Lodge at Temple Basin


Phil Dominick takes a break from shoveling to hit one of his creations.

Sunday 2nd August, Day 1: After a few large nights out in Dunedin, the Kora concert the night before, I managed to pulled myself out of bed and was picked up by the boys at 10am. We did a quick beer/chocolate shop and then hit the road. It was about a 6 hour drive north and then west along the Arthurs Pass. Winds were gusty and we were driving into a big storm brewing in the Alps. It was snowing heavily at Arthurs Pass Village and a guy told us to put chains on our 4x4 so we told him we would. We arrived at the Temple Basin carpark, put our stuff on the goods lift and began our hike through thick snow up to the Club Field. It was dark, luckily the moon came out to guide us. We arrived to 15cms of dry powder and the lights were on for nightriding, we immediatly got in our gears and did some runs. First time using a nutcracker, first time at Temple Basin. Frothing!


View out towards Arthur's Pass at night

Day 2: Didn't sleep very well because I was to excited about snowboarding the next day, I think alot of the other boys were the same. Weather didn't look too good, windy and snowing on and off. We had a few clear patches and did some runs on the main rope tow hitting some good powder and nice wind-lips that kept covering over.

Hotdogs and a Speights for lunch

Day 3 More bad weather but good news was it was snowing. We made the most of it and constructed a rail set up and a hip jump into a nice powder landing, both were close to the lodge which was convenient. The last 2 hours of the day brought sunshine and amazing powder runs on the 2 bottom tows. Mountain to ourselves!!!
Mark Von Roy hitting the box set-up


The team building the Hip Jump in less than epic conditions.


Phil on his jump by the Billy Shack.

Day 4 Weather packed in again and this time it was really snowing! spent alot of the day inside apart from a roof jump we set up and night riding was on again that night.

Mark Von Roy hitting the roof drop

Day 5 First perfect sunny day with half a metre of fresh snow! Headed up the Temple tow and helped dig the track so they could open the Downhill tow. This was the first time it had been open since all the snow so it was garenteed freshies all day!!
Fresh tracks on the Downhill tow after digging the track for half an hour.

Dave Ball slashing the windlip.

Day 6 Perfect sunny day! Did a run through Bill's Basin scoping jump spots and found a few. went to the lodge to gather out gear, shovels, food, beers, and camera gear. A day of building and shooting. Made a nice gap jump, a hip, and got some good shots. Awesome day in the sun shooting from 8.30am until 6pm!

Riley Elliott dropping off a hut at 9am


The crew builing our gap jump out in Bill's Basin

Phil hitting the Gap


Ash Fogelberg doing one of his nose grab blunt stalls at 6pm.

Day 7 Our last day at Temple brough more sun. The snow was crunchy and the crowds were building for the fire and ice festival. We went for a huge hike to one of the peaks that looked out across the alps, amazing views!!! Mark had made a Quarter pipe hit that we had a bit of fun on attempting hand plants and what not and after that we all put our gear on the goods lift and boarded down the mountain as far as we could, a bit of tussock hopping involved! After piling our gear in the car, and having a quick meeting with crazy-legs, we set off on our way home to Dunedin, back to reality. Thank you Temple Basin.

A bit of Tussock hopping on the way down.


Heading back home along the Arthurs Pass.