Week 1 - Day 6 - Sun & Surf

What a beautiful day today. The children have started their two week school holiday and get to enjoy a sunny Saturday.

These lilies are found growing everywhere. In gardens, on hillsides and in riverbeds.

Alan and Peter drove in and about town this morning. I walked to town.

I walked across the bridge from the town to the beaches. The tide was out so I enjoyed quite a walk down the beach towards the sea. Raglan is situated in a bay, which is quite far from the open sea. You could see white caps in the distance, but the water around me was quite calm. Across the bay you can see the limestone cliffs. In good weather they kayack over.

This is my favourite cottage in Raglan!

I met a volunteer fisheries officer on my beach walk. He was scouting out the bay for illegal fishing. Apparently these bays are protected as there is a species of miniature dolphins that can be found in the area.

I found the boys in town. We went to the grand hotel for coffee, then we drove out the coast road once again to Manua Bay. The surf was 4 to 6 meters in height, which was unfortunately too high for the surfers. Usually they surf when the waves are a maximum of 2 to 4 meters. Of course we went right down onto the rocks to check out the surf, Peter stayed back to take photos. It was beautiful.

After a quick trip home for lunch, we came back in the afternoon to the surfer's education centre.

Here on Ngarunui Beach, part of the Wainui Reserve, the surfers were starting to arrive. Very few attempted surfing as the surf remained too high. We spent time on the beach walking and enjoying the view.

Week 1 - Day 2 - Raglan Coast

We woke to pouring rain. It was four in the morning, but with the time change our bodies were quite mixed up. I went back to bed.

Alan navigated the seriously narrow gravel coastal road south of Raglan. We spent the day driving down the coast past Whale Bay on Wainui Road, which was a very narrow gravel road.

Alan has certainly become a local with his driving. The speed limit is 100 km on narrow windy roads.

Luckily for the curves it is posted to slow down to 35. The back seat passenger has found it was a bit challenging taking photos out the windows. It was often too narrow to pull over often.

The scenery was beautiful with sharp hills, orange soil outcrops, limestone cliffs and the most amazing flora and limited fauna.

We have seen very interesting black and white birds, like the crow, but not like the Calgary Magpies. Also, we have seen hawks, rabbits, wild turkeys and many pheasants.

I thought there would be sheep everywhere here in New Zealand. For the last two days we have hardly seen any sheep. Oh, I did see one sheep on the front porch of a house and Alan saw sheep on a golf course. We stopped to chat with the golfers and they explained that it makes money for the club and saves money on green's upkeep - cutting grass and fertilzer.

There seems to be more cattle here in New Zealand. Their milking parlours for the dairy herds are outdoors!

At lunch we had Lamb and Mint potato chips...eat

your heart out Andrew!

We finished the day at Bridal Veil Falls. These falls were 150 feet in height. The area is almost pre-historic when you see the plants. The tall Fern Trees are unbelieveable.

Week 1 - Day 1 - New Zealand

The adventure has begun.

Peter arrived at our house at 11:30 we left just after 12 for the airport. Our flight was on time and we arrived in San Francisco at about 6:45. We quickly found our way to the International departure gate. Air New Zealand was wonderful. Even though it was a 14 hour flight it felt much shorter as it was a night flight and most passengers slept.

I was worried about customs as I had brought gluten free foods. The customs or bio-security was not concerned with the food, they were more concerned with the tent Alan brought. It had to be sent off to be tested for infectious hazards. Other than this small obstacle, we quickly had our rental car, a Ford Focus, and were on our way.

Downtown Raglan

Our first week will be in the west coast town of Raglan. This is a surfing and sand restort on the Tasman Sea.

We used the GPS, thanks to Ian, successfully found the holiday home. It is a lovely three bedroom house overlooking the Tasman Sea.

Getting there, Alan had no trouble adapting to the high rates of speed on the tiny, very windy roads.

The back seat passenger (me) found it a bit daunting. The hills or small mountains are quite beautiful and we took the scenic route to this lovely town.

We explored the town and picked up supplies at the local grocery store.

There are many interesting vegetables. We purchased New Zealand Yams to have roasted with onions and parsnips to go along with our steak.