We spent a long weekend in Tairua over the weekend! Thursday afternoon I headed home early from work and we packed up the car ready to go. Sarah was out at work meeting and I forgot to put Beth to bed for her snooze, or feed her. So when we left she was already over tired and a bit hungry. We booted the cat outside with a massive bowl of biscuits and water and headed off! We went via Peter and Mary's, we took Mary and Holly and Adrian took Peter. Off we drove!
Beth wasn't a big fan of the Napier -> Taupo drive, but then again no one is really. We stopped in Taupo and had dinner and Cob 'n' Co, not the flashest of places but one that is very kiddie friendly. We gave Beth some dinner (and fed ourselves) and then kept driving. We stopped again so Sarah could feed Beth and, amazingly after about an hour or so she finally drifted off to sleep. Which was good for her because she was fed up, miserable and crying. And good for us because she'd been fed up, miserable and crying.
After what seemed like an eternity we arrived at our accommodation in Tairua. The place was freezing cold, even though the caretaker had left the heaters on and the wood fire burning for us. Brrrrrr it was so cold. We unloaded all our stuff, put the kiddies to bed and went to bed ourselves. What a day it had been.
Beth didn't have a very good sleep, probably because she'd not had much sleep during the day and her was in her port-a-cot in a strange place. A few upset cries during the night, but she slept in until 7:30am which is pretty good her for really.
Friday we decided to go for a drive to Pauanai, which is where all the rich and beautiful people have a holiday shack. Bach I mean bach. Have a look at this Google Streetview to see how flash the place is. This is The Waterways, where everyone can park their own boat next to their Bach. Yea, it's pretty flash. So we had a look around there, though as a place there's actually not much to see really, apart from flash lodgings. And to laugh at some of the streetnames, "The Dividend" being my favourite ultra-wanky street name.
Friday night Holly and Adrian cooked us a lovely roast, then we Trivial Pursuit, the updated New Zealand version. I got very crabbed off with myself because I couldn't remember Drew Barrymore's name even though I could picture her face in my mind and I knew exactly who the person was. I had to give up on that question, it was for a pie too. Our team lost.
Saturday we mixed things up a bit and went for a drive to Whitianga, stopping in at the local pub for some lunch. By the time we'd finished our meal and went to do some shopping everything had closed at 2pm, so it was a bit of a wasted mission really. On the way back in the car Beth got very upset her in her car seat, the only way in the end I could calm her down was to play Fawlty Towers to her that I've got on my phone. She seemed to enjoy it, a good sign.
Saturday night Sarah and I cooked Risotto. I didn't really help much, just chopped up a few things, Sarah did all the hard work. Then we settled in to watch what is probably one of the stupidest movies we've watched in a long time, called "The Island". It just went on and on and had more holes in it's plot than a block of Swiss Cheese. People kept going to bed and the movie still kept going. Ugh. Anyway it was some entertainment and it was the only DVD in the place.
Sunday we didn't do too much, Sarah, Beth and I went for lunch to a local cafe called The Old Mill, while everyone else went to Thames. Sunday night Peter and Mary cooked Lamb Burgers and then we played a few rounds of Mexican Trains before all heading to bed.
Monday we packed up all our stuff, cleaned the unit and headed off. We timed it so that Beth would hopefully sleep, it took her ages and Sarah to really help sooth and calm her, but she did sleep for 1:20 in the car again! Good little chicken. We were going to stop in Tiaru but because Beth was still asleep we trucked on and drove all the way to Taupo again. Peter knew this nice little French Cafe so we had lunch there, bumping into a neighbour from our street as well!
We finally arrived back on Monday afternoon after a good drive, Beth didn't sleep again but she was mostly happy for the drive. When we got home Tui was nowhere to be seen for a while so we were a bit worried, she didn't look she'd eaten much food either! But there were some bird feathers around the place... Eventually she showed up looking pretty pleased with herself, she even bought in another bird that evening to show us her skills as a hunter. Very good work puss puss. She was pretty pleased to see us again I think, lots of purring and drooling by the fire.
I think Beth had a great time away, she really enjoyed having new people to look at and talk (well, babble) at. She always watched Joseph intently, babies seem to recognise other babies! She really loved crawling around the place and the Bach was really good because it had a little carpeted step down which Beth just loved to find any reason to crawl up. She did a lot more crawling on all fours instead of commando crawling, but she still defaults to the commando crawl for everything. We really noticed her babbling a lot more though, she looked at me a few times and said "Dad!" though I still think she's just happening to make that noise rather than actually calling me Dad.
We were very lucky to get to stay where we did. One of Peter's customers own the bach and let us stay there, which is very kind of him! I'd highly recommend it if anyone else wants to stay, here it is on Book-A-Bach.
Phew! Back to work today, at least it'll be another 4 day week.
Tim