Up at 05.45 for a 07.45 flight to the Dunedin. The flight was uneventful apart from the presence of half of NZ’s media. In Dunedin we checked into the Living Space hotel which perhaps could be better named ‘only just enough living space’ hotel as the room
is literally one and a half times the size of the bed and we have to orchestrate movements before executing them (but a bargain at £32 per night). 

We wandered up to the Octagon which is the central hub of Dunedin for a coffee and at lunch time we met up with Russell Isaac and Dai Williams (from Sports Media Services) and are collected by Elm Wildlife Tours for a tour of the Otago peninsular.

We spend the afternoon visiting various beaches and cliffs where we film sealions basking on the beach, penguins coming home from a hard day’s fishing, fur seals resting on the rocks and albatross skimming the ocean. All very interesting – the penguins and the albatross were the best.

While we are out and about I receive a call from Tourism Dunedin who have invited us  to the media reception that evening at the Speight’s Brewery. I have no history whatsoever of turning down invitations of this nature, so, after sprucing ourselves up a little, we head to the Speight’s Brewery and socialise with the great and the good of NZ and Welsh Rugby broadcasting. Part-way through the evening I unveiled my ‘Haden Dived’ banner (sticking it to a wall with the gaffer tape I have brought with me) to much laughter and subsequent heated debate.

We also find ourselves chatting with Colin Meads who is insistent that I should captain Wales in a nude rugby match against the ‘Nude Blacks’ the following afternoon. Colin Meads is not an easy man to say ‘no’ to and before I know it I am being introduced to everyone at the reception as the captain of the Wales Nude Rugby side.

As the evening progresses the Welsh media contingent formed an impromptu choir and sing  a couple of songs before heading to the Octagon for a few beers. Here we meet-up with Brendan Culhanne (from Brecon) and have a good chat before calling it a day and squeezing our way into our tiny hotel room.

On match day we wake up to unseasonably fine weather. I arranged to meet Ruth in town and head over to TV3’s studio (three scruffy rooms above a shop) to provide them with  footage of interviews with the Welsh supporters we had taken in the Welsh Bar in Wellington earlier in the week. In return TV3 is providing footage of the build up to the game that we won’t be able to film due to WRU commitments.

In the afternoon the ‘Nude Blacks’ played the ‘Welsh Leeks’ at Logan Park (the subject of a separate post I’ll be writing shortly) watched by a three-deep crowd. The ‘Nude Blacks’ won in the final minute 30 point to 25. Gutted.

Back to the micro-hotel room for a shower and change and then back to the Octagon where we meet-up with Carl Lougher, who was in the same school and year as Ruth. Carl and his wife Lisa are over from Australia where they now live.

The Wales game is the last planned game at Carisbrook as a new stadium with a roof, the Forsythe Barr stadium, is being built for the 2011 Rugby World Cup. Carisbrook is the original ‘House of Pain’ with many a brutal ABs encounter played at this atmospheric ground.

We all head off to the stadium as dusk approaches (a 45min walk from the centre of town) with the ‘Our World Cup Where’s Yours ?’ banner unfurled. The game is exciting and I am optimistic for long periods but ultimately Dan Carter’s class turned NZ’s limited territory into points far more efficiently than the Welsh team was able to and that was that. The final score was 42-9 (15-9 at half time).

I am told that Wales missed 38 tackles and Sean Edwards went ballistic after the game. Stephen Jones and Andrew Bishop both broke bones in their hands. What a game though and what an atmosphere, Dunedin people are nuts (there are 20,000 students in a city of 180,000) and the terrace we watched the match from lived up to its mad reputation! Afterwards we headed back to town to series of rammed pubs to party (there was more personal space in our micro hotel room than any of the pubs we found ourselves in).

Up at 07.00 to pack our bags, not much chance of leaving anything behind as you would’t be able to open the door to exit the room if you did. We were on the same flight as the Welsh team and I had a chat with Ian Gough (who is travelling down with me to Queenstown at the end of the tour).

While the mood is subdued there are positives to be taken from the Welsh performance. The Sunday Star Times comment sums-up the competitive nature of the game quite well “the Welsh last night stood and respected it [the haka] – as they do – and then answered in the appropriate fashion. With a ton of pressure. Yes, this was test rugby as we know and love it, 15 against 15, tight, tense and at times terrific. The All Blacks may have eventually broken the shackles, but make no mistake, they spent much of the first half of this game under the blow torch” – significant praise from the NZ press I can assure you.

Back in Auckland in the afternoon and I pop along to Viaduct Harbour where I meet up wth  Gareth Davies. Gareth is originally from Merthyr Tydfil and now lives in Auckland. His company, Vinstar, specialises in the provision of economic consultancy services in Asia and the Pacific. Gareth is also a novice playwright and his debut play ‘the good socialist’ played in Auckland and at the Hay-on-Wye festival a couple of weeks ago and is set to tour South Wales in the near future. Gareth is one of the expats we’re interviewing for the documentary.  Russell and Dai from Sports Media Services arrived from Dunedin a little later with John William (WRU Communications Director). Gareth’s interview proves to be quite a cathartic moment as  afterwards he confides in me that it was only during the interview that it dawned on him that New Zealand was indeed now his home and not South Wales. And then we crew an America’s Cup yacht on the Waitamata harbour and filmed further footage. And that was that.

Apart from the result, a damn good weekend !!