Christmas in the Coromandels

We are all safely back home again - just for 2 days though. Just enough time to unpack, wash everything, pack it all up again, and get ready to go away again on Friday. Last Saturday we set off from Auckland at about 10, and had a very pretty drive south to the Coromandel peninsula. It took us about 3 hours to get there, including a stop for lunch somewhere along the way. Andy had gone with his brother Phillip, and his parents were in there own car, and we were still fully packed up!

The town we stayed in is called Whitianga, and is very pretty. We had a duplex unit with 3 bedrooms, right accross the road from a very sheltered beach. There was fortunately a kiddies park just down the road, as Logan needed to get out there to play fairly regularly. There was no enclosed area at Aquasoleil, so he set off at a run whenever he got the chance. There was a stunning swimming pool there with a huge top step, and he loved to play there. Also, when the tide was out, there was a long stretch of beach for him to be able to play on, but obviously he went directly for the water each time. The weather was clear, but there was a cool wind some of the time.

Cheryl had got food poisoning on the wednesday before Christmas, so she was feeling very miserable the whole time, and could not eat with us at all. She and Brent left on the Monday morning to go home again, then Andy and Philip left on tuesday, as Andy had to get back to work.

On Christmas day, after the pressie session and a good breakfast, we left Logan asleep with Brent and Cheryl, and set off to go tO Hot Water Beach - about 40 minutes drive away. We had a spade with us to dig into the sand to be able to sit in the hot water that wells up in certain areas along the beach. However, the tide was still a bit high, so we were not succesful. We did feel the hot water by digging our feet into the sand, but could not sit down without the waves still coming up and wetting us.

The whole area is so beautiful! There is very little flat ground around - it is all little hills, with a range of pretty high mountains running down the whole Coromandel peninsula. The roads are in excellent condition, but are narrow - definitely only 2 lane roads. So there is no passing at all untill there is a sign saying 'passing lane in 2 kms'. There is some clear grassy ground, with lots of cows and very few sheep, but mostly the hills and valleys are covered with trees and thousands of beautiful tree ferns. When we left this morning, we drove from Whitianga - which is 3/4 of the way up on the right hand side of the peninsula, further towards the top of the peninsula, then across to Coromandal town, and down the left hand side of the peninsula. Once we got over the mountains much of this road runs right beside the sea which is 3 meters to the one side of the road, while the cliff goes upwards 3 meters to the other side of the road. Most beautiful!!

Tomorrow I have to organise things for our New Year's weekend. There will be 4 couples going up to Russell in the Bay of Islands, right to the north of the North Island of NZ. One of the ladies suggested that each couple does a 'Come Dine with Me' each evening while we are there, so this should be quite fun. However, we will be staying in little cabins in a campsite, and will have to use the communal kitchen, so I am not sure quite how things will work! Will have to report back on our return.

Almost Christmas

I see my last blog was on Monday. Linsley wanted to do this blog thing, but do you think he has written a word? Not a chance. Mind you, he probably knows that I would want to correct whatever he says, so maybe it is just best that I do it all from the start.

On Tuesday  we caught the bus in to town. The interesting thing is that on Monday night Margi went on to her laptop, put in her address and then the website told us which was the closest busstop to the house. We walked there by a new route taking a bridge over the railway lines, and waited only 10 minutes or so for a bus. It took about 40 minutes to take us to town. We told the bus driver which stop Margi had suggested, but he said the next one would be better, then a young lady sitting in front of us told us we should get off at the hospital. While chatting a young man sitting oposite us heard our accents, and said he grew up in Cape Town, and although he had lived in Auckland for 7 years he is now living in Australia. Wayne Tucker, the son of another friend of ours, was his English teacher at Bishops. What a small world!

Once we got off the bus, we walked through the Auckland Domain (which is the word they use for 'park') and saw the winter gardens  - which are very beautiful. We then walked up the top of the hill to the imposing museum building, which was built as a memorial to the men who lost their lives in the various wars. There is a large section devoted to the boer war too. The museum is 3 floors, and is very interesting. Margi then fetched us on her way home from work - lots and lots of traffic at that time of day.

Logan got bitten by a mozzie on his forehead and his hand, and when he woke up on Wednesday morning he could hardly see out of his left eye, and his left hand was swollen to an enormous size. He was not a happy chappy, so he stayed home with us for the day. In the afternoon we walked up to Sylvia Park, and took him to a chemist there, but he said what we had been giving him was fine. Fortunately by the next day his eye had opened up somewhat, and today (Friday) he is almost right again.

On Wednesday evening we went to Margi's friend Grace (a Chinese lady) and her husband Scott ( a Scottish guy) and their 2 year old child Roy for a Steam Boat dinner. This is a typical chinese meal, being a pot on a gas burner, with a clear soup base inside. Then there is tofu, dumplings, beef balls. and very thin slices of pork and lamb meat, as well as bok choi, which we put in to the soup to cook before eating it. By the end of the meal you can put pre-cooked spaghetti in too, and eat it as a soup. Very different and tasty!

Yesterday we had a lazy day again, and were going to walk into Panmure in the afternoon, when it started raining. So we waited an hour or so, and then when the weather cleared we set off. We tried to find - unsuccesfully - a geocache, then bought some sticky fly papers from the $2 Chinese shops which Linsley has taken a great liking to. Margi hates flies and there are quite a few around here. On our way home the heavens opened up again and it poured down. We waited a bit to see if it would stop again, but eventually had to sms Margi - who was home from work by then - to please come to fetch us. We were mighty cold and wet by the time we got home!

Today, being Friday, Logan is home again, but so is Margi, as she went on leave yesterday till the 9th January. Andy's car has been making a noise, and he thought there was a stone caught in the wheel somewhere, but when Margi took it up to the garage today, they said he needed new brakes. We have been packing up to go away tomorrow to the Coromandels for Christmas. Andy's parents and brother will be joining us there too.

I am not sure when I will be blogging again, as I dont know what facilities we will have there, so we wish you all a very merry Christmas. Enjoy your time with your family and friends!

Trip up North

While Logan and Linsley are sleeping, I will use the peace to catch up on our blog. I have already swept the floor and cleared the dishwasher, as it is impossible to do those while Logan is around. In fact, there are 2 brooms in this house, as he also wants to sweep while you are sweeping. Earlier this morning while I was trying to empty the dishwasher, I just managed to catch 2 plates as he 'helped' me take them out. So it was a quick end to that task at that time! As it is Monday Logan is at home today with us. Normally his other granny comes to stay with him every Monday and Friday, as he just goes to Kindercare Tues, Wed, and Thursdays.

On Saturday - the 17th December - we set off after breakfast, going north across the city and the bridge, and saw the headoffice of The Warehouse where Margi works just on the far side of the Bridge. We drove north for just over an hour through very pretty countryside. It is all very green, with lots of trees, and hundreds of tree ferns, all set on very hilly ground. Throughout the day there were rain showers, but each time we needed to get out of the car to walk around the rain stopped, so we were very lucky. We first went to a farmers market in a pretty little village called Matakana. Then on the way home we first stopped at a stall at a bee farm where they sell half a hundred things all made from honey. However, in the restaurant there where we had tea and scones, and the others had a pie and a burger with chips, there was no food prepared with honey at all, which we found strange. However there was honey flavoured icecream, and honey mead and wine.

After that the next stop was at another tiny village called Puhoi, which has a famous pub to which people drive the hour or so out from Auckland. The pub's walls are covered with banknotes from various countries, with many R10 and R20 notes among them. There was also a collection of caps, with a Springbok cap among them, and lovely old photos and farm equipment from the village's past. We had a drink there, then stopped at a cheese farm a little further on, but didn't buy anything at that shop/restaurant.

Later that afternoon, back in Auckland, we went to a couple of shops with A & M who needed to buy Christmas pressies for a few people. Many of their shops are open till midnight at this time of the year! There are lots of really nice shopping centres everywhere, and even late on a Saturday afternoon the roads are full of traffic.

On sunday we vacumed and tidied the house as there is no Mildred here. Logan 'helped' with the vacuming too, but he had a biscuit just afterwards which negated all we had just done. When Andy came back from the gym, and while Logan was still asleep, Margi took us to the Pakuranga library, which is not only open till 4pm every Saturday, but is also open every Sunday! It is also a beautiful library, nicely set up, and also with lots of comfy chairs in which to just sit down and read a while. Every library we have seen has many shelves filled with Chinese books too. At least I am assuming they are Chinese because of the large numbers of Chinese who live here, but there are also very many other Asian people here, so they may be in any one of those languages. If anybody thinks New Zealand is full of shiny white people they will be seriously disappointed when they get here!

Later in the afternoon we set off to Mt Eden to do a geocache in that area. This is one of the 27 or so volcanoes in Auckland, and it has the most beautiful views over the entire city from the top. It was still very cloudy so unfortunately our photos are not too good. The geocache was in a park a suburb or so away, and we had some hot chips and American style corn dogs there, and then we had boerewors and salad for supper. Linsley had seen the boerewors in the supermarket the day before, so made sure he bought some!

Back to Hospital

It is now Friday night, and we have just had the most delicious chilli deep fried prawns, and sweet and sour pork on sticky rice from the local chinese takeaway. While the others are catching up on TV programs, I thought I would catch up on my blogging.

Logan has not let us take the splinter out of his foot, and it got quite red around it, so we decided to go back to the Accident and Emergency hospital where we had taken Linsley last week. The doctor had said to Linsley to come back again, but he just chatted to him to make sure he was OK. Then it was Logan's turn, and he was not a happy chappy. The doctor - a young chinese kiwi guy, was very good, and wrapped a sheet round Logan to immobilise him. Then two nurses held him down while the doctor struggled to get the splinter out of his foot to much weeping and wailing from the poor little guy. There was lots of blood but the doctors were really good. We have to take Logan back again tomorrow for them to change the dressing and let them see that all is clean and healing.

Yesterday Margi had her once-a-year work in a store day, so she only left home just to get to the Warehouse up the road at Sylvia Park just before 10. Today she was named the 'buying team leader' of the month so she was quite chuffed .

Today - Friday - was Logan's day at home, so then Andy came to fetch us just before 3pm as it was the Christmas Party at Logan's Kindercare. Margi had a cute little elf outfit for Logan, but he had a blue fit when I put it on, so we managed a couple of photos before we had to take it off and put another top on him! There are 18 children in Logan's 'class', and five teachers to look after them. There are other classes for the bigger kids. Today there seemed to be hundreds of people there. The children sang and danced and generally played around, we had snacks, and then Santa Claus gave each child a gift. It is now just after 9pm and he is not asleep yet, so obviously got over excited today.

Harbour Tour

We are at home today catching our tails, as we were busy yesterday. But I will start from Monday evening, when Linsley and I went to a Rotary meeting at the Waipuna Hotel, which is just an 8 minute walk along the lagoon pathway from Margi and Andy's home. As it was pouring with rain at 5:30pm Margi dropped us off at the hotel, where we were warmly greeted by the Rotarians from the Pakuranga Club. We had a drink while standing around, then went in to a public dining room for a delicious buffet. After 1/2 an hour or so we all went off to another room, where the actual Rotary meeting took place. The guest speaker was very interesting as he is one of the directors of the largest dairy co-op in New Zealand, and they export all over the world. He is also the president of World Vision in New Zealand. The club is about 80 strong, but there seem to be very few women amongst the members. As the rain had stopped during the evening we walked back home afterwards.

On Tuesday Andrew Raine came to fetch us just before 10 as he had to go through to Auckland to see a customer, and he dropped us off at the harbour. Our Andy had organised for us to go on a 'Ports of Auckland' tour which is free for ratepayers. A huge catamarang took us into and out of all the little bays and sections of the harbour, and a lady gave a running commentary and history of the whole harbour. It was most interesting, and took about an hour. The weather was very iffy although it did not rain, but there was quite a big swell and it was windy so it felt good and clean and fresh. Just one of the small sailing craft harbours in the main harbour holds about 1900 craft! There must be millions of yachts and little boats in and around Auckland. It is truly called City of the Sails.

Afterwards we walked along to the station at Britomart where we caught a free link bus which goes round the city continously throughout the day. We got off up the hill and walked to the main library, which we wanted to go back to, having been so impressed by it on our previous visit. On the ground floor there is a coffee shop, the chinese books, many other books, and a huge selection of DVD's and music discs. On the fist floor it is just crowded with books, and up on the second floor is an archive section and their offices etc. It is all really nice, and there are hundreds of chairs around - some comfy ones in which to just sit and read, and many in front of desks which ran the entire length of the building, and which were all filled with people working on their laptops. We wandered around for a while, then each chose a book and just sat and read there for a couple of hours.

After some fish and chips we took the bus back down to the station, and caught the train out to Sylvia Park, where Margi fetched us at about 4:30. We then went to fetch Logan at his school and had a good dinner at home - as always cooked beautifully by Andy. Logan has a splinter in one of his feet, and he wont let us take it out. We have put zambuc on it to try to get it to soften, and Margi has tried to extract it when he is sleeping, but he is far too quick for us!

Busy Weekend

I see it is a number of days since I last had the chance to sit down and write anything. On Friday, when we look after Logan, there is no time to do so anyway, as he is a busy little body. Last Friday evening we went for a drive as we wanted to buy fish and chips and have it at one of the yacht clubs nearby, but we could not find a F & C shop on the shore, so the plans changed midway and we went to a chinese place where Andy and Margi have always enjoyed the dumplings, only to find that that place had changed hands and they no longer specialised in them. Anyway we went in there, and had two types of dumplings, a plate of beef pancakes, and some mutton  kebabs. It was very unlike chinese restaurants in SA, being a local eating house for the local chinese, who evidently don't cook at home, but go out each evening to have a 'home cooked meal' at any of the hundreds of restaurants around.

On Saturday Margi took us to a bank so that we could sort out our money, as our card had refused to pay out when we had swiped it at various stores, even though we had organised all before leaving home. But we just drew a whole lot of cash, and will work with cash. I haven't tried to swipe my card yet, so will try soon to see how that goes. We also went to Margi's friend Grace's house to drop off a huge gift and two chairs for them to take into town for us. We then caught the local train in to Auckland, walked about 2kms to meet Andrew and Antonio at the Fish Market at the harbour, where they wanted to buy fish for us all. As we would not all have fitted into their car, Margi, Father and I caught the local circular bus which dropped us off just a block away from A & A's apartment. They have a stunning view over the harbour from their balcony!

Scott and Grace arrived a little later with M & Andy's birthday gift for Antonio and he was very chuffed with the de longi coffee machine they had got him. Antonio cooked a superb paella on the balcony for us all which served as a late lunch / early supper, together with a lots of drinks and snacks. Afterwards Scott and Grace dropped Linsley and I off at the top of the hill where we waited for the others to walk up to go to Christmas in the Park, where about 5000+ people were milling around. Notably they were mostly 18 to 25 year olds and we saw very few families as we normally see at Somerset West. So this is hugely bigger, but not as characterful. Just after half time A & A walked back home down the hill, and we walked in the opposite direction to get a taxi to take us home again.

On Sunday we went to Andy's parents home to take Logan to them for the night, as we were going to Antonio's surprise 40th birthday party later. It was amazing to see the smile on Logan's face when he saw Brent and Cheryl! We had tea and half a hundred cakes there on their patio, which has stunning views down towards Auckland. They live on a smallholding about 30 minutes drive away from M & A's home.

After much planning Andrew came to fetch us at about 5pm and dropped us at the venue for the party where we put up balloons and decorations all in red and yellow to match the Spanish flag we had up on the flagpole. Other guests started arriving before 6 so when Andrew brought Antonio up 'just for a drink' he really did get a huge surprise. Later in the evening a Spanish dancer (who was actually a Dutch woman!) came to dance for us, and it was really good to see Antonio dance with her for a while. We caught a taxi back home again afterwards as everyone had had plenty to drink.

Tuesday morning now, and we are off for a harbour ferry ride which Andy organised for us. Cheers.

Midweek Medical

Hi everyone,

Yes, yes, I know it is a number of days since we last blogged, but the reason for that is that nothing has happened on this side. Because of Linsley's sore back we have napped and read books and watched TV and napped again, and had little walks along the lagoon path in between times. Either we are getting very lazy, or we are just catching up on sleep. We are totally over any jetlag by now!

Anyway, Linsley was still complaining about his back being sore, so last evening Margi took us to an Accident and Emergency clinic here, where the doctor checked him out. No spinal problems, no broken ribs, no kidney bleeding, so everything all fine as far as the back is concerned. The doc said it would be a number of weeks before the pain disappears altogether, though. But the doctor was a bit worried about his pulse rate, and sent him to have an ECG. We must go back go back next week for another check up.

This morning after breakfast at about 11am we walked up to the local library, sat there reading for an hour or so, then we bought sarmies from a chinese shop, and walked back home. I am going with Margie and her girlfriends to see a movie tonight, and the guys will be looking after Logan.

Rainy Sunday

Hi Everyone,

As it is raining today we have been housebound, which is maybe a good thing as Linsley hurt his back this morning taking a tumble down the last couple of steps while carrying Logan down. Fortunately Logan was not hurt even though he got a huge fright.

We managed fine on Friday even though there were a few tears when Logan saw his daddy leave for work. But he very quickly got over it, and we had fun. He mostly feeds himself, although the adult feeder puts every second spoonful into his mouth. He tends to turn the spoon upside down, and often it is inside his mouth and he gets the food in the right place, but sometimes it gets turned before reaching his mouth. Let's just put it htis way - he needs to be cleaned up when he has finished eating! But he eats well and can mostly be left alone to feed himself.

When he had his nap - guest what we did? Yes, we felt we had earned a little rest too, even though it was about 10am. Then in the afternoon we walked for about 15 minutes to a huge shopping centre. It is all nicely set up with Christmas elves and trees etc. It was dangerous to let Logan out of his pram, as he took the opportunity to dash into the closest shop every time. Margi had to go to her office Christmas party on friday night, so Andrew and Antonio came round, and we had a 'braai' on the gas cooker outside. There is a nice deck and a very pretty garden out there.

Yesterday Margi and I went to a baby shower that Margi had organised and the boys went geocaching with Linsley. They could not find the cache, but A & A & A were all quite impressed.

Must stop now as some friends are coming round - some for tea and some to stay on for lamb shank supper.