First Quarter 2026
I wrote a little post on LinkedIn at the beginning of the year of my previous 3 months of travel work life in Tauranga. I thought I would continue the series as a blog this year. The first 3 months of the year, they start off with a bang! I finish off my support in Tauranga, and the very next day I’m on a flight to Abu Dhabi to attend my cousin's wedding. It was fantastic, it’s great to catch up with family I haven’t seen in a while and celebrate together. Now looking back at that trip - how lucky were we to visit and celebrate it then with what’s happening in world politics at the moment! It is the only week I have off in between before we kick off the next phase of training for our business. So when I return back home I’m straight into training, I have to move my mindset from go-live support to training mode. It’s certainly a change, but like riding a bike you never forget. I start off in Auckland with a 3 day course. It's intense, but rewarding and also great to see some of my work mates after a few months. We make sure to celebrate the success of our October rollout.
The training proper now starts across the North Island. I will be in all different locations, my travel begins with Wellington and Masterton. “You can’t beat Wellington on a good day”. This is so true, and as luck has it, I’m spending 8hrs inside, but I make sure at the end of the day I get out and just enjoy as much of the daylight, as much of the summer as I can.
Initially, I’m not so excited about being in Masterton, sorry. But you know what’s close to Masterton - the Tararua Ranges! This has me excited a little more than my work, or did it? The Rocky Lookout is a definite highlight. I remember it was just so rewarding because it started off as a cloudy evening, but just as I got to the lookout the clouds cleared and a beautiful view presented itself. The next day, the clouds and rain moved in, but I decided to go out. It is an awesome trail with many streams and cascades and then a big climb to a ridge. I decide to take it on, even though I will finish just after sunset.
On the work front - it is challenging, there are changes along the way and pivoting as required. But this is where the greatest learnings come from, for me my training sessions in Masterton solo were the best sessions I’ve done and the greatest connections I made with the business. Combined with that the couple of trips out the Tararuas - I’m so grateful. I finished my trip to Cape Palliser and headed back to Wellington. I had heard about the cape from friends and online, it lived up to its reputation and more! I thought I might have some time to visit the Putangirua Pinnacles, but I ended up spending all my time at the cape hanging with the seals! And even then I feel I didn’t have enough time there. A couple of days after I visited, a major storm hit the region and wiped out one of the bridges I went over - again I’m incredibly grateful I got to visit there.
Beast Week:
This was going to be a week, a difficult, challenging week - I knew this from the start, but did I really know what was going to hit me?! It started off pretty calm, at home in Auckland but within 24hrs I will be going from Auckland -> Palmerston North -> Whanganui -> Wellington -> Auckland. Flights, driving, and training sessions in between. All within a 24hr period! Bring it! I had prepared as well as I could, but you can never be prepared for what will hit you. I made sure in the evening when I was in Wellington I got out for some fresh air, incredibly the timing was perfect, that I could walk up Mt Victoria with a stunning sunset. I didn’t have my walk/running shoes, nor any of my gear, so in my jeans and work shirt, amongst all the crowd, I felt stupid but it was so worth it. I knew the next morning I would be on a 6am flight out - but in that moment that had all disappeared. The next morning I was off, and back to Auckland. For a double training session - I was a little bit delirious but excited. I made a simple stupid mistake in one of my sessions, but overall I was super happy that I pulled this off!
This was going to be a week, a difficult, challenging week - I knew this from the start, but did I really know what was going to hit me?! It started off pretty calm, at home in Auckland but within 24hrs I will be going from Auckland -> Palmerston North -> Whanganui -> Wellington -> Auckland. Flights, driving, and training sessions in between. All within a 24hr period! Bring it! I had prepared as well as I could, but you can never be prepared for what will hit you. I made sure in the evening when I was in Wellington I got out for some fresh air, incredibly the timing was perfect, that I could walk up Mt Victoria with a stunning sunset. I didn’t have my walk/running shoes, nor any of my gear, so in my jeans and work shirt, amongst all the crowd, I felt stupid but it was so worth it. I knew the next morning I would be on a 6am flight out - but in that moment that had all disappeared. The next morning I was off, and back to Auckland. For a double training session - I was a little bit delirious but excited. I made a simple stupid mistake in one of my sessions, but overall I was super happy that I pulled this off!
I knew the next day I would be on a flight again back to Palmy. At this point I had lost track of what day of the week it was, just relying on the calendar reminders to tell me where to go. The Palmy trip was uneventful thankfully and I was back home. The next day was a day “off”, I could have a breather - but my adrenaline was up and it was hard to come off that high. The week ended with a good catch up with my boss. The weekend I sat on the couch, which was exactly what I needed.
As the training sessions start to come to an end, I get an opportunity to head to the East Coast, to Gisborne. Initially I was allocated to be in the East Coast, but I was then moved to Manawatu. I have been looking forward to the East Coast and Gisborne, because I have friends there and of course it is a beautiful part of the world. I have training on a Friday, and decide to extend the trip over the weekend. My friends organise a stunning sunrise bike ride for me, I love it. And we end the day with sunset climbing up Te Kuri, a short but sharp climb up a local farm hill. The next day, my last day there, we decided to go to Mahia and visit the beautiful peninsula, another bike ride and some bush bashing brings the week to an end, again I’m so grateful for this weekend.
I will now be home for a couple weeks, I have training sessions in Auckland to finish this cycle of training. I’m reunited with my “AP leads” training team, we were first to start off this training cycle, and we are last to finish off the training. We ensure we celebrate this, but also just deliver a killer training session across two days.
There are a couple of things I want to maintain during this period, try to be healthy - don’t put this on the back seat. I’ll get out whenever I can, it doesn't matter if it’s a small walk, a bit of a hike, a run - whatever, one is better than zero. And the other is my photography - I’m grateful I’ve been given this chance to travel a bit and see our country. The camera comes with me, and I’m going to capture the moments, and these are my moments.
For me personally - some of the numbers, 30 training workshops for me, the vast majority where I’m the trainer, totalling to over 120 hours in sessions. 6 cities/towns over the North Island, countless number of flights, and don’t know how much time spent on the road.
