Holidaying At Home

Saturday

Mark worked late last night, so Sherry got up early with Ro and took him to Drury Park, letting Mark get some much needed quiet shut-eye. The smell of bacon and pancakes with real maple syrup (which is tough to get here) finally roused Mark from his slumber. Looking down at the bustling streets below our apartment, you could tell this was no ordinary Saturday morning. In addition to it being Labour Day weekend, the regional Busking Championships were being held along Maunganui Road. Today's competition was for the juniors, so in addition to the throngs of onlookers you had the doting stage parents.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Busking

Ro sporting his new Ben 10 Heatblast costume

Junior busker at work

We took in a couple of the acts as we walked to the beach a few blocks away. Warm and sunny, although a bit windy, the beach was a popular place to be today. According to Kathryn, the beautiful wildflowers that cover the dunes aren't native to NZ, but came from people dumping out their ornamental potted plants. Ro soon found a couple of boys to play with, who had dug a fairly impressive hole in the sand, and Ro was all too happy to help them dig it deeper. In the States, we say that you can dig all the way to China if you go straight down, so we were trying to guess where you'd end up if you started digging in NZ. Ireland?

Sherry relaxing on her makeshift boogie-board chair

They were content to let Ro do the work

Ahh...the point emerges. Something challenging to jump over

Mark took a brief dip in the clear water, and Ro enjoyed jumping the waves for a little while, but the ocean is nowhere near warm enough yet for cold-natured Sherry to venture into it. Ro played beach rugby with his new friends while we sunned ourselves, watching the half-dozen or so kite surfers in the distance down at Tay St Beach. As the afternoon wore on, there was a slight nip in the air, and the spa tub at our apartment was calling our name.

Ro bites the dust going for a tackle

The blue Jawa and mum heading home from the beach

Being a three-day weekend, the pool at The Anchorage was unusually crowded, mostly with a few families up on holiday from Wellington. Sherry fixed some eats upstairs while Mark entertained Ro. We were soon joined at the pool by Barnaby, Craig, and his lady-friend Paulette, then Sherry brought down the barbecue she'd prepared. We congregated around the picnic table, sipping white wine and snacking on hors d'oeuvres, chatting while the boys played in the pool. Grilled sausages and veggie kebabs soon followed.

After about a half-dozen picture attempts, this was the best

As the sun was setting and the air cooled considerably, we retreated upstairs. Mark and the boys rinsed off (they were the only ones who got in the pool), and we all met down at Craig's place for some more wine and conversation. Craig and Mark took turns wrestling with the boys, much to the amusement of the ladies. When a wine spill doused the table, Craig's leg, and a bit of the carpet, we decided we'd had enough and it was time to put the boys to bed. They wanted a sleepover, so we took them upstairs to our place where they promptly fell asleep in Ro's bed, despite their pleas to play some more.

"On shoulders, daddy!"

The boys getting in over their head

Subduing and cuffing Craig