OUR FINAL WEEK

It's our final week with Emily and Leon in New Plymouth.  We have had the most incredible weather.  Not one day of rain and even when it looks a bit ominous, the clouds disappear and it turns hot again, not a cloud in the sky.

One of the fun things to do here at Emily's is to wash all our clothes and then hang them out on her clothesline to dry!  It doesn't take long because the wind dries them in a few hours and the clothes smell so nice.

I have walked the secret trail every day, but today, Thursday for the last time. 

On Tuesday we went shopping in town, to a beautiful gift gallery called "Kina" which means "Sea Urchin"  If you have ever had one on Sushi you will know that the actual urchin tastes like a tide pool, so don't bother, but the shells that they live in are beautiful.  The turqoise one below is a ceramic, not real.  We saw it at the N.P. airport, but it wasn't in the shop, so I asked if they had one in the store. They didn't, so the girl said she would go to the airport and get it for me and have it by thursday. (today) but when we went to get it at the store here  and it wasn't there.  They went out and got it for me and brought it to Emily's house.  It just arrived.  Pretty nice of them. For some reason you cannot buy their stuff at the airport, which is where we will be tomorrow.

Brian went fishing on the ocean with some friends of Emily and Leon's and they caught Albacore Tuna.  He got to drive the boat and everything.  He had great fun and almost caught one, but it got away.  The group did catch 2 but he never brought any home as we had cooked some up a few days before that someone had given Leon.  Brian had marinated and then barbequed it and it was absolutely delicious.  He wasn't crazy about bringing in a fish of that size from the ocean.

Last night we went to Jason and Monique's for dinner.  They live along the ocean road in an area called Oakura, not far from here.  We had a beautiful evening with them.  They have come to stay with us in Calgary twice and love to ski in Banff and Whistler.  Adventurous, and lovely couple from South Africa.  Jason had made his own little fireplace out of stainless steel as a project.  It had a super long skinny pipe for a chimney, and as it got dark the pipe got so hot it was blazing red and the flames were spewing out the top.  The picture shows the little firebox and also Monique with her tongue out after tasting Ouzo. 
Emily made a beautiful Pavlova - picture of her in the car.  It was fabulous.

Today we went to Pukeiti (Pook-e-yee-tee) a beautiful garden with tons of rhododendron, which weren't in bloom at this time of year, but many other beautiful and rare plants, trees and flowers that grow on this amazing island. 
I was thinking about how Dad almost ended up here and how it is very much like Ireland in many ways.  I can understand why he wanted to come here.

So right now, Emily is preparing our final meal of Lasagna and Ceasar salad. 
Tonite we will have to pack.  A shuttle will pick us up and we will spend a night in Auckland area with Leon's parents, then home to the land of ice and snow.

It will be hard to say goodbye, but we have had a magnificent holiday!

Kina - "Sea Urchin"

 

Emily with Pavolva

 

Jason's famous firebox, Monique says ewww to Ouzo!

 

Sundown in Oakura, (just couldn't get the pic fast enough!)

 

Leon with "Nixon"-looks like Chuck's brother

 

Crocus at Pukeiti

 

Black Hydrangea

 

Why is it called "Ireland Walk"?

Because......

 

 

...there's shamrock's!

 

"Weta"s are the famous NZ spider, will there be one when we open the box?

 

Not a 'Weta', just a BIG spider that thinks he's a Weta