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walking pearl at long bay (jane, binky, sarah, esther), new year’s eve breakfast, swimming, bank card activating (esther and me), supermarket/malling, walking at long bay in the drizzle (me), all to biffy’s house for a new year’s eve party.

jane and binky did some exercise then we all went to wenderholm .  this evening we took mum to the airport

jane’s sister Binky and our niece Sarah arrived from the UK today so jane and the girls met them at the airport then took them for a walk down long bay

meanwhile mum and i went on our own adventure.  we started at West Lynn Gardens which has a butterfly house

 

then we had lunch in a turkish restaurant in titirangi

mum had a massive turkish breakfast for lunch

followed by a trip round the new art gallery (the restaurant is in the old art gallery)

then we drove around the waitakere ranges looking at the view

we regrouped back at the house where we observed our new mountain of shreddies

and sarah and kezia had a swim

muriwai for a walk and out to Harbourside for a posh dinner

mum and i went to tiritiri matangi.  we were had a guide to just the two of us which was excellent.  she even joined us for our lunch!

jane and kezia did lots of sorting and cleaning

esther went to watch a film with a chum and ate icecream

 

 

kezia, jane, mum and i went down to the waterfront for some gift shopping and overly-tomato sauced chips.

 

later this afternoon jane and i went for a stomp up and down some cliffs at long bay

then there was some sitting outside, playing exploding kittens (xmas present from brother edd) and kezia and i watched Dr Who.

merry christmas!

the day started with some santa presents

then there was a fancy breakfast followed by a trip to the Auckland cathedral then the Parnell Rosegarden

this evening we went to Janine’s house with Tracey’s family for a meal and our xmas meal and secret santa-ing

i’ll add a few more pictures tomorrow when i’ve got a bit more time

mum and i went to the zoo today

i’ve got a season ticket so we got discounts in the cafe and the gift shop which we took full advantage of

there’s a new australian walkabout section which has just opened last week so we were able to see that

this is a red back spider which is Australian, but they have started to become established in New Zealand (though not in auckland yet as far as i know).  one of the zoo volunteers was talking to mum about how much she disliked spiders.  She particularly disliked the red back spider which she described as ‘evil arseholes’ which was an interesting phrase we weren’t expecting !

there was lots of love in the air, including these lizards holding hands, various animals with eggs and things cuddling up

we went in to the kiwi house but didn’t see any kiwis – i suspect due to the loud kid running around with a torch in the quiet dark area

hide and seek with an elephant is a waste of time

here’s a flamingo on its raised nest with egg

there was both an egg and a hat in the ostrich/giraffe enclosure.

then this afternoon we had church

kezia had a friend over and jane spent the day cooking an amazing meal (subject of another post)

(yes, our christmas tree is a pile of books)