Christmas at Waihi beach

Our second kiwi Christmas....We all had to work Christmas eve, so after finishing work early, James and I packed up the Christmas presents as well as plenty of things for the weekend and headed down to Hamilton. Sal had to work late on Christmas eve so James, Si and I got a takeaway curry and chilled out in front of a movie, when Sal got home we ll turned in for an early-ish night.
As Si had to go to work on Christmas day, we were woken up at 6am to the sound of Christmas songs and Sal putting the kettle on, we all got up early and had a proper Christmas morning together with a poached egg breakfast. We then in true Christmas style proceeded to open Christmas presents round the Christmas tree (Santa even left a stocking for Sal, James and Si). Mum and Dad were able to join us on Skype for the present opening so it really felt like they were there for our Christmas morning. After Si had gone off to work, Sal, James and I packed up the car and headed out to Waihi beach on the bay of plenty.
We arrived at Waihi beach around 11am to be greeted by Fiona, Jen and Sonia (friends of Sals from Hamilton) in their PJ's opening their presents before we cracked open a few bottles of Champagne and headed to the beach. That afternoon we had a 3 course BBQ Christmas dinner complete with crackers and plenty of booze, the night continued with lots of food, alcohol and silly games.
Boxing day we were greeted with a crowd of people who came over from Hamilton for a day of alcohol, food and beach games, it was a gorgeous day and had a wonderful day on the beach before a massive BBQ back at the bach. Andy, Em, Dai and Ash all arrived around 3pm and the fun continues. At around 4pm most people had to head back to Hamilton for work the next day leaving the Bach with just Me, James, Andy, Em, Dai and Ash. (with Oli and his girlfriend Manar due to arrive later that evening) We did our present exchange in the sun with our final presents from Andy and Em being a water pistol each (not surprisingly we were given empty ones and while we were opening them the others ran off to get theirs -twice the size of ours) After a massive water fight with all of us sufficiently soaked we had another BBQ with the alcohol flowing. Boxing day night turned out to be one of the most amusing evenings with Andy demonstrating how easily he can fit his body through a wire coat hanger and a few other surprising talents.
Monday morning Si joined us having worked the Christmas weekend and got straight on the wine (this was his Christmas day!) We all decided to go on a nice walk over to a beautiful secluded beach which was about 40mins walk away, it was worth it with a white sand beach, rolling waves and beautiful pohutakawa trees leaning over the beach, we headed back as the weather started to turn and had some fun playing beach cricket on the beach opposite our bach. Tuesday morning James and I got up early (a very excited James) as we had to drive back to Auckland to pick up Alex and Laura from the airport!

Auckland Christmas time

With 25-30 degree heat in Auckland, we've all been struggling to feel Christmassy so James and I went to buy a Christmas tree to put us in the Christmas spirit... it worked (well for 1 day anyway) we bought the tree in the pouring rain (got to feel a little christmassy in that weather) and after giving it significant time to dry out we spent the afternoon with christmas songs on decorating the tree. That evening we had a bit of a pre-Christmas celebration with Andy, Em and Bea round for a roast dinner (following a rather lengthy angel making competition between Andy and Em).
A couple of days later, still not really feeling in the Christmas spirit Bea and I spent the evening in Ponsonby. Out in Ponsonby there is a street where people go to town decorating their houses with christmas lights and decorations, the street is packed at night with people selling coffee and hot chocolate as well as people dressed up in Christmas costumes giving out mince pies and sweets.... a very bizarre experience! Further along the road one of the big mobile phone companies have set up a large christmas tree made of fairy lights with bean bags underneath to lie on and at all 4 corners, telephone booths for the children to call Santa with their Christmas lists.... again bizarre, so following a nice glass of wine in one of the nice wine bars Bea and I decided to chill out (in Shorts and flip-flops) under the tree staring up at the lights.... a somewhat unusual Christmas experience.

Coromandel........again

Friday night was James' work Christmas do, I intended to met him in Parnell after work for some drinks however after waiting an hour for a taxi I made it in time to join them for the meal. We had a lovely meal in Java a good restaurant with a range of food from all over Asia. After food we headed out for a few drinks. I turned in early, exhausted from my new job whilst James stayed out late to have a few more drinks.
After waking up a groggy, hungover James on Saturday morning we headed over to the Coromandel with Bea and Emma. Unfortunately on the way over we came across a motorcycle accident which meant we were over an hour late meeting Sal, Si, Jen and Sonia (2 of Sal's friends from Hamilton) Once we arrived we headed straight to Cathedral cove to play around on the beach and in the sea. After playing at Cathedral cove we headed over to Cooks beach to our favourite bach. After a beer on the balcony the girls thought it would be an awesome idea to go for a early evening swim (and it was!) We swam for about 20mins across the bay before heading in for an amazing BBQ and wine. That evening was an alcohol fuelled affair with lots of silly games (James surprised us all with his flexibility in the cardboard box game!)

Sunday morning after a bit of a lie in we woke up to a brilliant blue sky and 30 degree heat. We spent the morning chilling at the bach before heading over to Hahei. On route to Hahei we stopped at a beautiful vineyard (we had been left 2 bottles of wine from that vineyard by the owners of the bach we were staying at) and we had a bit of a wine tasting session with some bread and chutneys. On arriving at Hahei we all endulged in a pizza before heading over to snorkel the trail at sting ray bay. After snorkling we all chilled out on Hahei beach before heading back to Auckland

Another amazing weekend at our favourite bach.

Climbing and Surfing

Sal and I have both taken to climbing since arriving in New Zealand, however up until now all we have been doing is building up our strength and technique indoors on climbing walls, so this weekend we recruited some friends and headed south of Hamilton to an awesome climbing spot. One of my friends from Middlemore, Chip, and one of Sals colleagues, Andrew, have both been into climbing for a while and brought along all their climbing ropes and gear (along with some spare harnesses and shoes) and we (me, James, Sal, Bea, Chip and Andrew) set up for the day at the foot of some good climbs, we spent the whole day challenging ourselves to harder climbs before finishing with a beer and heading back to Hamilton.
That evening we all (minus Andrew) went for a Thai before having a few beers in Hamilton to complete the day.
After a bit of a lie in on Sunday morning we headed over to Raglan for a cooked breakfast before spending a day chilling on the beach, Bea got to open her Christmas present from Sal and Si early as it was a body board for her to enjoy on the waves at Raglan. We spent the afternoon in the sea, surfing, body boarding and skim boarding before getting an Ice cream and heading back up to Auckland, my first outdoor climbing experience.....and I'm hooked!

Ponsonby & Waiheke with the girls

So the weekend began with Sallie and Simon driving up to Auckland with one of their friends from hamilton, Fiona. It was a beautiful spring evening so we decided to have a BBQ in our flat before heading out for a night out on Ponsonby, (given that Sal and Si hadn't yet experienced a night out in Auckland!) Ponsonby always makes for a great night wih plenty of wine and cocktail bars and great company (also joined by some of my ED colleagues and Bea) we had an entertaining and drunken night ending in burger fuel at 3am.
Saturday morning (not feeling too flash hot) Sal, Bea, Fiona and I decided to abandon the boys (James went shooting and Si was about to start his APLS course in Auckland) dragged ourselves out of bed in a hungover stupor to catch the 12pm ferry to Waiheke Island for a girls weekend. Luckily it was a beautifully hot day, so as soon as we had arrived in our hostel we dumped our stuff and headed straight to the beach where we lay for the rest of the afternoon!
Feeling a little brighter after a couple of hours of beach sleep we headed back to get showered and changed before heading up to Oneroa for a glass of wine (really sorted us out) and dinner at an amazing Turkish restaurant.
Sunday morning (feeling considerably brighter than the previous morning) we checked out of the hostel and headed into Oneroa for breakfast before hiring some kayaks for sea kayaking around the Island. The weather was perfect and we pulled our Kayaks into Cable bay winery and walked up to the top of the hill for some stunning views of the island. That afternoon we caught the ferry back to Auckland before taking Sal and Fiona climbing in the climbing gym near us to complete our weekend.... another fun packed weekend.

Waiheke Weekend

So this week was an eventful week! I started the week on nights having spent Monday helping get Bea sorted, the nights went ok until 05.20am when I developed some right flank pain, needless to say I ended my night shift with 1g Paracetamol, 60mg Codeine, 20mg IV Morphine and 75mg Diclofenac before I was eventually pain free having passed my kidney stone- all in all not my finest moment!
Having recovered from that and home around lunchtime on Friday, I went to bed for a couple of hours before getting up and packing for a weekend on Waiheke Island. So that evening James, Bea and I collected the Lemon (their yellow people carrier) from Andy and Em (they wanted to get the passenger ferry) and we drove onto the car ferry to Waiheke.

We arrived in Waiheke around 9pm to a beautiful rainforest retreat, we were greeted by the others with a glass of wine before stoking up the BBQ. That evening was spent with plenty of wine, a good BBQ and friends, chilling out in swimwear and dressing gowns in the spa pool and in front of a lovely outdoor fire.

After a lie in on Saturday morning we woke up to bacon butties before heading out to the Olive festival on Waiheke. We spent the day drinking wine accompanied by cheese and olives before heading back to the retreat. That evening we spent another very relaxing evening in much the same way as the previous night with a full on team pizza making effort with the stone baked pizza oven and plenty of wine flowing.

Sunday was spent chilling on the beach before catching the ferry home.

Goat Island Camping - Bea arrives in NZ

So after having worked the past 3 weekends on the trot (actually wasn't too bad as I have gotten to know a few of the ED guys pretty well and have had many BBQ's, surf days and drinking sessions with them on our days off!) I eventually had a weekend off with James, Sal and Si. I was working till 1am and Si till 11pm so they drove up to Auckland after Si finished work and arrived just before I did! We all headed straight to bed so we could get up and do something with our day. Just as we got up on Saturday we got a message from Bea saying that she had arrived and was staying in a hotel near the airport so Sal went to collect her as we got ready to go away for the weekend.
After picking Bea up we headed straight up north to Matakana a quiet little town an hour north of Auckland, we wandered around the shops and market before heading up to the Goat Island campsite to pitch our tents. We then headed to Pakiri beach in gorgeous sunshine with the skim board and a rugby ball to enjoy a bit of chilling. That evening we headed into Matakana for a pizza and some wine before heading back to the campsite for games.
Sunday morning we got up early due to the sweltering heat in the tents, packed the tents up and headed down to Goat Island, we got Bea a wet suit (well, 2- just to keep her cosy!))and we all headed down for some snorkling. We spent an hour in the water with the fishes before we got a bit too cold and went into Matakana for some lunch. The afternoon was spent chilling playing volley ball and beach games on Omaha beach before heading back to Auckland for a beautiful fish based BBQ. I think Bea enjoyed her introduction to NZ!