Auld Aquaintance

Friday

Sherry spent all morning planning our trip to Northland, making various calls and reservations. Although frustrating and time consuming, she had finalized things by the time Mark rolled out of bed around 11. Because he has to work the evening shift today, he'd stayed up late last night trying to get the blog caught up!

After a quick brunch, we all walked down to the Main Beach to meet Kim and Mark, our friends from Rarotonga. They were up here on holiday from Taranaki (about 5 hours southwest of us). Ronan was excited to see Kelsea and her brother Josh again, however, once we spotted them, Ro got quite shy and hid behind Sherry's legs! Evidently, Kelsea had suffered the same quickening of the nerves, and Sherry saw her leap up from her sandcastle, run to her mum's blanket and sit down while flinging her hat off. Ro promptly took off his sun hat, too. And all this from still a good 50 feet away!

Catching up

American Mark stayed to chat for another 15 minutes before having to run off for work, and during that time, Kelsea and Ro still hadn't spoken to each other. They just sat awkwardly on the fringes of the adult conversation, while Josh took Ro's boogie board out for a spin. With Mark gone, Kim and Sherry fell into the easy path of ex-pat conversation, and with both families going back to their home countries at the same time, they discussed the endless list of odds and ends to wrap up before February! Aussie Mark took off to play with Josh, leaving Ro and Kelsea to finally start what passes for five year-old conversation. Sherry whipped out her camera for a picture when Josh returned with the boogie board, and Kelsea and Ro decided to share it as a bench. She told them to scoot a little closer, and the next thing you know, they were running around hand-in-hand just like in the Cook Islands. They were so adorable!

Taking a break from the waves

Picking up where they left off

The tide was out, so everyone went to the wonderful tide pools forming on the boulder-strewn beaches at the base of Mauao. Josh found a huge brittle star, while Sherry found a large sea cucumber and some small fish. Kelsea and Ro climbed up on one of the largest rocks and sat engrossed with one another, climbing down long enough to take a peek whenever someone found something interesting.

Someone had a REALLY good time last night

What IS it with this guy?

Getting away from the adults

The breeze off the ocean was giving the wet kids a chill, so Sherry invited everyone back to The Anchorage for a dip in our heated pool. On the way, Sherry took them by the locally famous Copenhagen Cones for a homemade waffle cone filled with ice creamy goodness (and plenty of whipped cream). Walking along Pilot Bay eating ice creams, the kids enjoyed watching the boats come in.

One last afternoon with the Beightons

After a play in the pool, it was nearly dinner time, and sadly we said goodbye to our Aussie friends, hoping to catch up at least once more before February. Ro gave Kelsea a hemp shell bracelet Sherry had made him while driving to Auckland on our trip there before Christmas, and Kim whispered to Sherry that she'd probably never take it off her little ankle!

Five minutes after she'd left, Ro looked up at Sherry sadly and exclaimed, "I miss Kelsea."