Thursday 30 November

We were in the pool this morning at 9am for a further recovery session. There has been a bit of a theme so far throughout the World Cup, that being "cold" and the good old pool did not let us down – freezing! Thankfully though the weather has turned out fine today – nice and sunny but not without some strong winds.

Prior to lunch some of the players ventured in to Hagley Park to catch some of the action between South Africa and India, whilst others remained at Lincoln and watched the Netherlands take on England.

In the afternoon we trained out at Burnham in preparation for our game tomorrow against Ireland at the BIL Oval.

It is very pleasant being out here in Lincoln. Although it is only 30 minutes from the city we are practically in the country and every so often you do get a reminder of this. For instance I have sheep outside my window – lots of them! For those of you living outside of New Zealand you may not be too surprised by this! We have also befriended an interesting looking bird with a long orange beak that it taps constantly on Deb Hockley's and Emily Travers' window at ridiculous hours of the night.

You can see the mountains from where we are and this morning they had what looked to be a fresh cover of snow on them. Christchurch is such a great city because it is so central to everything. If you get the chance you should come. We are within 30 minutes from the beach, 90minutes to the ski fields, and there is some of the most unbelievable scenery throughout the forests and country side that is only a few hours away by car or train.

This brief explanation doesn't really do it justice but I am sure that the visiting teams will find out exactly what I mean when they get some time to see some of the region.

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