today was a public holiday for ANZAC day.
Esther took part in an ANZAC day parade in takapuna. Jane and Rachel went along. Rachel left us after lunch although she’s going to be around New Zealand for another week i think.
Kezia and i went to the zoo so here’s a load of pictures
baby giraffe
baby flaming-o
work for me (very quiet day in the office as lots of people took today as leave so they get a long weekend)
jane ferried the girls around to various thing including to their new violin/viola teacher who is quite ‘honest’ with them much to their amusement. kezia also went to the optician.
this evening me and all the young people went to see the lego batman movie which was very funny.
i’m completely tired so although i took lots of pictures today i have none ready to share with you. soz.
actually here’s a picture or two
the girls went cycling all over town today. i took some photos of the graffiti car and the world masters games. jane did school work
our third and final day involved cleaning up the holiday house
then we drove in to whangarei to have breakfast at the place we’d had dinner at the night before
we hired some bikes for an hour and drove round a bike route which takes you round the harbour front from various sides
then before we left we had a quick look in the art gallery where there were some very cool light sculptures made with neon, one sided mirrors and glass.
We stopped briefly to look at Uretiti beach but there wasn’t anywhere shaded to have a picnic so we popped over to Waipu where we found a nice picnic table by the river. After that we drove the last couple of hours back to auckland (and we went out to the violinst concert evening)
we’ll be back to matapouri, i’m sure!
day 2 started with a drive to tutukaka where we had morning tea at the schnappa rock cafe
esther was delighted to see she was running a few sporty classes
we tried to drive to a walk to a lighthouse but failed so instead we carried on to matapouri which was an amazing place
we did a loop walk round the headland which passed various beautiful little bays, one of which was easy to walk down
you can see poor knight’s island from matapouri. it’s world famous for diving
best picnic spot ever
our last beach location of the day was Whananaki which has the longest footbridge in the southern hemisphere
while over the other side i got a call from the bank and spent 20 minutes negotating new mortgage rates and by the time i’d walked back to the other side (being careful not to drop my phone) we were on better rates!
the evening was dinner in a really nice restaurant on the harbour in whangarei
holiday pictures – day 1
our holiday earlier this week was up to Whangarei which is about 2 and half hours north of Auckland . We explored the bit of land stuck out to the right of Whangarei
we set off early and had breakfast in our favourite cafe on the way. in addition to the usual chicken there’s now a cat which likes to sit on people
first proper stop of the day was for the Mt Manaia walking track which pretty much went straight up 420metres to the top of a hill. it was very stairy-y and tiring, especially for the male members of the household (ie me)
then we visited ocean beach
final stop for the day was this little seaside village with a walking bridge to get you to the next bit of the peninsula (save yourself the hour long drive by road to get to the other side)
on the way back from the beach on the other side we saw an amazing rainbow which came really close
so close in fact that esther could stand in it
in the evening we went out for dinner and kezia ate an amazing amount of ribs
and here’s our holiday house
day of editing photos (pictures posted for yesterday’s update) for me
day of school work for jane
kezia came back from her sick friend’s house for a few minutes then went out to the cinema with another friend this afternoon
esther and rachel went out for a day of site seeing in auckland
this evening jane and i went out for dinner with one of jane’s school friends. we thought it was just going to be her and her husband, but in fact it ended up being a big group of 14 people! we sat outside which was a bit cold.
one of my pictures is being used to advertise the World Masters Games thanks to a band i photoed who shared the picture with the organisers. they paid me for it so that’s fine (but not as much as i would have liked if i’d known it was going to be used more widely!). a few examples below from the official website:
esther spent the day with rachel and kezia was still at her friend’s house (though the friend was sick in the evening)
i think jane did school work
i had work then zoomed home to grab my camera gear then spent many hours in the Auckland Arena (now known as the Spark Arena) photoing Bollywood legends who have millions of followers on facebook etc
i finished editing photos at 1.45 so got up at 6 rather than 5 for work 
esther and jane went to the airport to pick up esther’s friend rachel from the UK who is staying with us for a few days (she’s currently living in Australia)
kezia has gone to a friend’s house and should be back on saturday i think
i’ll get round to editing holiday pictures at the weekend as i’m photoing a bollywood spectacular with some other photographers tomorrow night!
here are my photos of Lindsey Stirling
we made it home after a nice day out then went to see a concert this evening. i will get round to updating with pictures!