We decided to spend the last day of 2009 at Rainbow Springs Kiwi Nature Park.

Water! We saw beautiful a beautiful rainbow pool loaded with trout, when we saw the 4 month old trout we were amazed at the size of the other trout and wondered just how old they must be. The Trout are quite athletic and can leap up waterfalls. They are also quite clever at catching the food pellets, the ones that the ducks and ducklings miss. We saw 2 mother ducks with their ducklings, one family was 2 days old and the others 3 weeks old – they were very cute.

With map in hand, our map girl knew where we should visit next and we set off on our journey around the Nature park.

 

 

We enjoyed some more crunchy NZ rose apples for morning tea and fed the trout.  As we crossed a bridge, James announced, “more wart” and lay down to check the temperature for us!

 

 

Our NZ bird education commenced with the Kea, an alpine parrot that was very entertaining, it is sometimes considered the clown parrot. The entertaining Kea can also play soccer, we thought Jayden and Jack would be delighted to see them play a game.

We saw a kiwi in the Nocturnal house. The kiwis have lived in New Zealand for 70 million years.  We saw lots of native birds, the Tui, a Kereru, a wood pigeon and Kaka, a North Island parrot.

James was delighted to see the Arapawa Island sheep, “more sheep!”

We decided to have a picnic lunch on the Fairy lawn. It was great being surrounded by farm animals.  One of the most interesting was the Kune Kune pig  he was very sociable and seemed quite placid in nature. His nose was huge and James was fascinated by this. The Ponui Donkey are apparently a feral donkey breed in NZ, we thought they were cute.  There were also rabbits, wallabies, chickens and noisy roosters.

At 6.30pm we went down to the Lake front to see the New Year’s Eve celebrations.  We saw the fair, music stage and playground before we went back to the zoo for a very special kiwi encounter.  We explored the zoo, fed trout, ducks, swans, and saw heaps of birds and animals.  Jennifer and James had an absolute ball playing with a kea (parrot) who was hand raised.  Her name was Jenny and she hopped along the fence line.  Our two copied her and this game went on for about 15 minutes, we’re not sure who would have tired first or who was having the most fun, it was gorgeous to watch.

 

 

 

At 9pm we went to the special kiwi encounter, it was great to see them up close and in their natural environment.  We were amazed at how quickly they ran and their feathers were quite pointy.  We all had to be very quiet so we did not frighten the kiwi’s and we were very pleased that every our gorgeous children were so considerate of the birds.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The rainbow trout were quite amazing, they all swam in a circle and it looked brilliant under the pretty lights.  We didn’t know that trout and fish will generally orientate themselves head first into a current, particularly when living in rivers or streams.

 

 

 

We arrived home at about 10pm and you can guess who went straight to sleep without a peep.  At midnight we watched great fireworks on Lake Rotorua from our back veranda and ended up being surrounded by them as displays went off in every direction.  Our little man seemed to want to join in the festivities and slid off his bed – whoops, but he was OK.

Kia Ora.  We were welcomed to TEWHAKAREWAREWATANGAOTEOPETAUAAWAHIO otherwise known as Whakarewarewa or Whaka for short -  much easier to say.  This was one of our must do activities at is is literally behind our accommodation and we have been watching the steam rising every day from our kitchen window. 

Our journey commenced with a tour of the Tuhourangi Ngati Wahiao Maori family’s home.  We were so impressed that they have not succumbed to the modern conveniences of today and actually use the geothermal resources in their back yard for cooking, bathing and playing.  Our tour guide showed us how simply they cook their food.  We really liked the Maori microwave, a steam box where they cook their meat, puddings and root vegetables.  The food was wrapped in foil and placed into trays that are put inside the box.  The green vegetables, seafood and corn were wrapped in a muslin cloth and placed into a thermal pool.  The corn takes 10 minutes to cook, the green veges and seafood only required 5 swishes across the water and presto it’s done.

 

The maori’s have communal bathing in purpose built baths – several baths and a mini swimming pool in the open space – can’t say we’d be so keen on this one.  We actually found the water very smooth to touch but still too hot for us to bath in.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We toured the village including their meeting house and performance venue where we were treated to a superb cultural performance.  James was fascinated by the singing and loved to imitate the hand actions – it was very cute to watch.  Jennifer loved the costumes, poi pois, singing, actions, participating in the songs, everything except the men, she was rather shy of them.

The Maoris' taught us the hungi which was a handshake and 2 nose to nose presses with a partner (they definitely stipulated not rubs like the Eskimos do).  This greeting symbolises a bond of friendship and our little man has quite taken to greeting each of us in the family in this traditional Maori method.

 

 

We tried Hangi pies – corned beef, chicken, potato, kumara, carrot wrapped in pastry.  Needless to say they were absolutely delicious, we would have been tempted to go back for more for our dinner if only they were open.

 

We came home for James’ rest then Jennifer and Kathy went back to see another cultural performance.  We were so glad that we did because they performed the Maori Hokey Pokey.  Jennifer was a Maori expert at this one, they used the Maori name for all the body parts although the chorus was in English.  Jennifer decided she would like a photo with one of the maori ladies, when we had our turn for a photo one of the men snuck across and hopped into the photo.  Afterwards Jennifer said, “Did one of the Maori men jump into my photo” and of course the answer was yes.  Jennifer said, “Well that’s OK he’s a handsome one he hasn’t got a beard!”

 

 

 

The girls walked home and collected the boys and we went back to have a closer look at the Pohuta Geyser.  It is just so amazing watching the steam suddenly shoot up into the air.  We then set off for the freedom walks and walked along the paths and boardwalks to the green and hot lakes.  The colours from the minerals are very pretty.

 

We watched the Maori children play a game called penny diving where they dive into the water to collect gold coins that we threw into the water.  Both Jennifer and James reaped as much enjoyment as the Maori children watching them dive for the coins and our super thrower James set them a challenge to retrieve his coins. 

We woke up to rain this morning so decided to stay indoors and play.  We built the train station and tower for the James duplo set, coloured in, read books and watched Ice Age 2.

While James had a rest, Jennifer and Mummy decided to brave the shops in the rain in search of another wet weather activity.  We found ourselves in the toy Lego section at Farmers.  Jennifer bought a 4wd with horse float with her holiday spending money and we bought James his holiday gift a Busy Garage duplo. 

When we got home James had just woken up and was most impressed with his present, “Truck”, “Tar”, “Tools” he announced as we opened it.  We spent 2½ hours building lego and working in the garage, changing tyres, checking batteries, filling up with petrol, putting air in the tyres and more changing tyres.  We had the best rainy day!

This morning we visited the Government Gardens. First we drove around the edge of Lake Rotorua and saw lots of birds – swans, ducks, geese and seagulls. We also saw the steaming water and found a path to walk along tonight. We walked through the park and saw the Whangapipiro – also known as the Rachel Pool, it was very hot and steaming.

The Museum was located in the gardens in a beautiful building, allegedly the most photographed building in Rotorua. The viewing platform was only opened in 2006 after a major refurbishment.  Mr James was delighted with the rotary mower for the lawns, it was beaut with a seat trailer to ride on at the back.

A gorgeous rose garden was next to the playground. It was a great playground and we all went down the slides and played hide and seek.  Jennifer mastered the flying fox type piece of apparatus and can now get across to the other side without any assistance.  It started to rain so we took cover in the playground which was rather like a cubbyhouse while Daddy went to fetch the car.

 

Alas, the walk around the Sulphur Bay will have to be rescheduled to another day due to the rain.

Today we visited the Agrodome. The first activity was the Sheep show.  As we sat down we were impressed to see lots of cute sheep lined up in a corral beside our seats, we just had to go over and say hello. They were very friendly and soft to touch.  A definite favourite was the Merino even with those big horns.

 

 

Our host, Karl told us that we would meet all the breeds of sheep, see how to shear a sheep, milk a cow and see the working dogs. Jennifer really liked the working dogs.  Karl set them off to run over the top of all the sheep while the sheep stood ever so still.  For the finale the dogs just sat on top of the sheep.  Of course, James was infatuated by the sheep  and after his fix of patting all the sheep on stage at the end of the show he found some stuffed lambs and sheep and became friends with them as well.

 

 

We set off to find the Tractors for our tour around the farm. We drove past the shearing sheds and our first stop was to see the South African Ostrich, which run very fast – 64kmper hour.

We stopped in the Orchard to look at the Kiwi Fruit vines. Our tour guide told us of the health benefits of Olive tree leaves so Mummy and Daddy had a munch on one, they were bitter. We went inside and were allowed to taste the Kiwi Fruit Juice with aloe vera, it is green just like the fruit. Mummy, Daddy and James loved it. Our young James thought it was great, what a treat and had about 4 little cups – “more juice peese” he would say. Jennifer didn’t want to taste the juice while Mummy and Daddy obliged the Kiwi Wine as well but both thought the juice was nicer.

 

 

 

 

We stopped to feed the sheep and Alpaca. We all loved to feed them and feel their soft coats. We then stopped to feed the Bambi and red deer and more sheep, but this time they were white sheep. Jennifer’s favourite animals of the day were the Bambi deer they were so cute and she took a video of them.

 

 

 

 

Our last stop was to see the Angus Beef and Scottish Highland cows. We recognised these ones as we had seen the Scottish cows before at Kingaroy. The Angus Beef cows were huge and one was called Big Mac.

In the gift shop Jennifer chose a working dog for her holiday present and named her Tiny. She is cute, soft and promised to look after her very well.

We ate our picnic lunch outside in the picnic area next to the Tractors. We had to scrub our shoes in the wash bay, they were very dirty.

We visited the nursery and saw all the baby lambs and ducks. As always James loved seeing the lambs.

James enjoyed the visit so much that he waved goodbye, blew kisses and our man of many actions said “Bye” for the first time.

Our trip home was also exciting as we saw the biggest diggers and bull dozers we have ever seen – James was very impressed and called out “Dig Dig” with great excitement.

 

We have the best little holiday home and have loved having a back yard to fly our kites, play ball and run when ever we wanted to.  Tonight we decided to eat dinner in our back yard. 

 

A drive towards Taupo took us to the amazing Huka Falls today. The water was awesome and James loved seeing the bubbling water, if only he could get closer.  We were fortunate to watch the jet boats speed through the water and spin and helicopters flying overhead.

We set off towards Taupo and as we drove into Taupo we were very excited to see snow on the mountain top. We couldn’t believe it, snow in summer time. We stopped at Lake Taupo for a play and a closer look.  James immediately climbed under the fence to get closer –  those fences are only for decoration aren’t they!!!

 

After dinner, we decided to explore another geothermal park in the city of Rotorua.  The park we visited was named Kuirau Park and we walked around the thermal areas and saw mud pools and hot springs.  We were all fascinated by the blobs of splashing mud.

We enjoyed a lovely warm foot bath. James had the other visitors in fits of laughter as he thought it was a great opportunity to have a big splash.

 

We woke up to find that Santa had delivered some wonderful presents to our holiday home in Rotorua. Jennifer was lucky to get 2 Ariel dolls, one that can go in the bath and one that has a beautiful princess dress and James got a James engine Duplo set and Thomas the Tank Engine hooded towel. We worked out that New Zealand is the first country that Santa visits!  The children also got a great kite, New Zealand stationery kit, pyjamas, torches, a new outfit, New Zealand Christmas book, tickets to a sheep show and farm tour, stickers and soap. Jennifer was also excited to get a ballerina outfit for Emily Bear and tickets to see the English Ballet perform Angelina Ballerina’s Star Performance.  James also loves his Thomas train presents.

 

James gave Jennifer a cute ballerina pen and Jennifer gave him a Bob the Builder story book which he was impressed with and knew his mate Bob and Roley were in it.  James had lots of fun driving his Tonka torch and flashing the light in the bedrooms. 

We visited Lake Rotorua, the biggest lake in the region and played in the fabulous Volcanic Playground. Daddy taught Jennifer and James how to fly our new kites and we had such tremendous fun. It was a glorious day with blue sky, pretty swans on the lake and lush green grass to run on. We had an early bbq lunch, some more play and came home to phone all our family and friends to wish them a Happy Christmas.

We decided to have a traditional Christmas dinner with roast turkey, ham, gravy, roast vegetables and plum pudding with custard and vanilla ice cream for dessert. Very yummy!!

We finished Christmas day enjoying a swim in the Blue Lake. We played with the ball that James got for Christmas and splashed about, most splashing of course occuring from James!  It was a great way to end a wonderful Christmas day.

Today we went for a drive to the Blue Lake (Tikitapu). We enjoyed seeing the ducks swimming on the lake.  There were also lots of seagulls and a playground. We all had fun playing in the playground. There was an unusual octoride with four swings off a centre pole – fun for the big people to enjoy as well.  Jennifer always loves the swings and had fun on the spinning disc, James’ favourite was the slippery slide. We found a nice grassy and shady spot for a picnic lunch and fed some bread to the ducks.

We visited the Central Mall and decided to post Jennifer’s letter to Santa as he was busy preparing for his big night.  There was a special postal bag with a red sticker for letters to Santa Claus. Jennifer decided to buy James, a Bob the Builder book called, “Scrambler and the Snowy rescue”.

When we got home Jennifer and Mummy baked scones for afternoon tea and made popcorn for our snacks.

In the afternoon we went to Lake Tarawera, it is a beautiful lake with another great playground. We played and had so much fun and thought we must come back again another day.  James loved running across the bridge

As a special treat we had a family movie and watched, “Mickey Mouse Once upon a Christmas”. There was a little bit of wrapping to do then we asked Ian if we could spread the Reindeer sprinkles that Mrs Trudgian and Mrs Taylor gave Jennifer in her Christmas Pre Prep Party bag.  He said yes so we followed the directions on the packet which said, “On Christmas Eve before you go to bed, sprinkle this magic Reindeer food on your lawn. The glitter sparkling in the moonlight and the smell of the oats will guide Rudolf and the other reindeer right to your door!”  We also put out some carrots for the reindeer to eat (or James whoever can get to them first!”) and a plate of cookies for Santa.

 

We set off to get our bearings in Rotorua and stock up on supplies.  We met a jolly man in red and attempted, twice, to get a photo of him with Jennifer and James but alas to no avail.

 

We decorated our apartment ready for Christmas. We made paper Christmas lanterns and decorated them with Christmas stickers. We set up a Christmas display and hung up our stockings on the window underneath the Christmas lights.

 

Jennifer wrote her very first letter to Santa. She wrote, “Dear Santa, May I please have an Ariel doll for Christmas. Love, Jennifer”.  We got it ready to give to Santa in the Central Mall.

At 8.30am we were ready to start the farm jobs, we noticed the lambs were trying to escape so went over to close the gate. We fed the chooks and piglets and bottle fed the lambs. The most exciting farm job today was rounding up the horses to the yard on the quad bike. We pretended to bark like dogs to help get those horses moving. We did a fine job and Farmer Ngaire was very pleased.

 

 

After we packed the car we went down the the yard to say goodbye to the horses. Belinda said we could sit on the lead horse and brush the horses.  Jennifer was very excited but we all thought this was just terrific.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our farm house

 

 

 

 

After having so much fun, we sadly left the farm for our drive to Rotorua. We needed some petrol so pushed the buttons to ask Tom Tom to take us to a petrol station, we headed off to a Shell at Ngatea.  We started to get a bit concerned when we left the highway and headed inland and when we arrived at the destination we found that there was absolutely nothing there.  Now, short on fuel, we wonder where our next journey will take us, but alas in a round about way we ended up at Paeroa. After we filled up with fuel we stopped for a play in the playground before continuing our journey to Rotorua. We continued an off the highway track route through gorgeous country side to Rotorua.  We thought we would see lots of sheep on the way but we saw lots of dairy cows. James and Jennifer were fascinated at watching the cows at farm after farm after farm, following the leader to the dairy for milking.

As we drove into Rotorua we noticed the smell straight away. We all laughed when Jennifer thought James’ pants needed changing but he wasn’t to blame after all!

We were welcomed to Atsala Apartments by Ian who assured us we would love Rotorua and we think he is probably right.

 

Our children have a genuine love for farms and love doing the farm jobs, they were ready and waiting for Ngaire at 8.15am to feed the chooks, pigs and give the lambs their bottle of milk.

Our outing for today was a visit to The Waterworks. This is the most amazing place, not even Mummy and Daddy have seen anything like it and we had heaps of fun playing with all the water activities.

We all agreed our favourite activity was the boat races, we spent about an hour racing our boats.  The rules said cheating was essential so there was also a bit of creativity in each race. We had to choose a boat to race and Jennifer chose “Whizzy” we think the rest of us chose duds. We took our boats to the start of the water track and put them in the water. Whizzy was the best boat and won every time.

The boats floated along a wooden channel that changed direction, heights and went though obstacles like a washing machine bowl.  If the boat stopped in the water or the boats got jammed you could block the water with little wooden chucks or just pick them up and drop them in again. It was such a neat activity and Mr James enjoyed himself immensely.

Back at the farm, Mummy cooked an omelette and it was delicious to eat the fresh farm eggs with our dinner – Salmon – more amazing New Zealand Salmon!!

Daddy took a picture of the view from our kitchen window.