As you can imagine I was very excited about boarding the plane!
We flew into Christchurch for 4 days where we caught up with as many family and friends as we could. This included a sleepover with my Aunty and Uncle in Church Bay which is where I used to live back in the day. I loved hanging out with my family and it brought back great memories of my time there. I was pretty chuffed when I caught the Diamond Harbour Ferry across from Lyttelton and the driver remembered me from years ago! This is a fun trip to take if you're in Christchurch - you can bus out to Lyttelton which has great art/craft stores and funky cafes and bars and then catch the ferry across to Diamond Harbour to check out the cute wee cafe and bar over there or go for a short walk around the bay.
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| Diamond Harbour Ferry in the Lyttelton Port |
Christchurch hasn't changed much since we were there last unfortunately. There's still a lot of construction and a lot of the city is still yet to be rebuilt. One great thing we found though were shops and cafes that have been started up using big sea containers. I love the innovation of the business owners - it was fun dining alfresco for a coffee and being served from a sea container.
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| Coffee in Christchurch |
We also went out to a friend's farm (Scotty's old boss) while we were there for morning tea one day. It was so nice to see the farm again and our lovely friends that we hadn't seen since our wedding in 2011. It reminded me how much I love being on the farm and away from big city life.
Our time in Christchurch also included a big family brunch, an Italian dinner with friends and two fantastic visits with my grandparents. The whole trip was very much about spending time and creating new memories with some of the most important people in our lives.
From Christchurch we flew to Auckland where we picked up a hire car and met my beautiful Mumma and our friend Tom who had both flown over from Perth that day.
The four of us drove down to Rotorua which is where we were spending the next 5 nights. Rotorua is a fantastic tourist destination in the north island. There are beautiful lakes, waterfalls and forests to explore as well as lots of adventurous activities for all the thriller seekers out there.
Because we were there for the race ( My First Ultra - Tarawera 73km ) most of our activities revolved around that, including an official welcome, race registration and briefing, and a Q & A panel for the elite athletes (Scotty, not me!). The rest of our time was spent looking around Rotorua, checking out the course for the race, playing disc golf and spending time with family and friends.
A must do in Rotorua is visiting Te Puia. We were lucky enough to get free entry and had the official race welcome on the marae there.
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| Official race welcome |
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| Te Puia geysers |
Another must do in Rotorua is a visit to the Fat Dog Cafe. The food is amazing (huge servings) and the service is exceptional. We went there for lunch with about 15 others and there was a line out the door of people ordering food and drinks. Although it took a little while to place our orders the food came out about 10 minutes later!
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| As you can see, the meals are huge! This burger was basically the size of two normal burgers... And I ate it all! |
After a week of race activities and the race on the Saturday, we drove back to Auckland on the Monday and flew down to Nelson. There's something about going on small propeller planes that I love!
The next 3 days were spent with my big brother and his beautiful fiancé (now wife!) looking around their farm, hiking up to the Mt Arthur Hut, spending quality time and relaxing.
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| Group photo on our hike up to the Mt Arthur Hut |
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| Scotty trying to figure out how to convince me to move back to NZ... |
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| Mumma and I on our hike stopping to enjoy a beautiful waterfall |
It was so nice to be out on the farm and away from the hustle and bustle of the city. So nice in fact that Scotty kept collecting real estate brochures... One day!
On the Thursday the rest of the family arrived and we had a busy day of wedding prep before a fantastic night celebrating Amy's 'last night of freedom'!
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| Amy's new in-laws all dressed up and ready to party 80's style |
The next three days were spent up at Lake Rotoiti, a stunning part of New Zealand which is where the wedding was held. Lakes and mountains... what more could you ask for as the backdrop to the most important day of your life.
On the Sunday afternoon we started making our journey home, stopping in Christchurch for the night before continuing on to Melbourne and then Perth early Monday morning.
It was so nice to have spent some time in New Zealand again making amazing memories with family and friends. It definitely made us miss living there... But we'll be back to live once the time is right!
For anyone that hasn't been to New Zealand or hasn't seen much of the beautiful country, I highly recommend going. There is so much to see and do! A fun way to see the country is by campervan - you can head off on a roadtrip, stop whenever you like, wherever you like!
Or if you're short on time, decide which area you'd like to see most and spend as much time as you have exploring there!
My #Take12Trips Challenge - April Edition will see me flying solo to Rarotonga for a week - keep an eye out at the end of April to see what I get up to!
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