Christmas Eve!! Well, Christmas Eve in NZ and Christmas Eve Eve at home :) Shane, Katie and I were going to spend the day hiking Rangitoto, aka "Tuty Tuty". Georgie was going to have her "pampering day" so we were going to be doing the tourist thing on our own for the first time. Here is Georgie and her dad on Christmas Eve morning. I had been telling him all week that he needed to wear this super cool Santa headband thingy to work (he works at a jewelry store) and he had promised me he would wear it on Christmas Eve. When we walked upstairs, sure enough he had it on (I do believe he chickened-out and didn't actually wear it into work :)
Georgie dropped us off downtown at the Ferry. We had about a 20 minute boat ride over to Tuty Tuty.
The Ferry Building....
The Ferry Building....
Our view of the city as we road out to Tuty Tuty...
There she is....
About to start our hike to the top...
Shane sporting Georgie's tiny backpack....he was so proud :)
Beautiful Pohutukawa blooms (the NZ Christmas tree )
Tons of lava rock everywhere....
Almost at the top....here is the crater of the volcano...
Some views from the top.....so pretty...
view of downtown Auckland from the top....
Katie eating her sandwich with jacket and hood in place. Why?? No, not b/c it was cold or raining.....she is deathly afraid of "swarms" of anything....birds, insects, whatever...and there were a few swarming, flying somethings at the top and I guess she was afraid they were gonna latch on to her and take her away or something... :)
Me & the hubby. I was sporting Christmas colors since it was, in fact, Christmas Eve :)
Hiking back down Tuty Tuty....Katie having a good ole time struttin down the VERY slippery gravel decline....
BAHAAAAAHAAA....yes, Katie busted it...completely. It was hilarious.
She did have a boo-boo on her knee....sorry I laughed so hard :)
A couple of cool photo opportunities
We got to explore these really fun lava rock caves....
Obviously this one was too small to enter :)
Really feeling brave going into this totally dark cave with no flashlight on us....
But about halfway into the cave, this really nice guy from England came in with a flashlight and helped us navigate ourselves out. We would have been in trouble if he hadn't have showed up :)
Such pretty flowers....
After we got back from hiking Tuty Tuty, we headed over to Georgie's for a Christmas Eve bash with her and Mark, her Dad, Renata, her brother (Josh), her step-brother (Christian), and Mark's friend from the states, Cooper. It was WAY fun!
Christian, Georgie, and Mark....
Georgie and her brother, Josh
Dave, grilling up the Christmas Eve dinner....yummy!
Shane and Georgie....we were all SO glad Shane was finally there!
3 amigos
Our annual "standing in front of a Christmas tree" Christmas pic :)
Shane's all-time favorite Christmas movie...Christmas Vacation, of course :)
Time to eat!!!
They do this fun Christmas tradition over there....everyone has one of these thingys on there plates then you and your neighbor each take an end and pull to see who gets the middle piece which has a prize in it....
Paper crowns....everyone gets one of these :)
The cheesin bride and groom-to-be :)
Dave and Renata
Opening gifts...Georgie was WAY too excited about their new vacuum cleaner :)
Shane and Cooper showing off their manly body wash....
Renata and I sporting our festive head-gear :)
The super cool underoos that Georgie got for Mark :)
Please take note of Christian's stocking and Georgie's stocking (aka...pillow case) hilarious.
Katie's FAT foot....I mean, seriously, you need to go get that checked out! That's just not normal!
After gifts....DESSERT!! Delicious!
What a fun Christmas Eve!!!
2 comments:
please tell me there was some hokey pokey icecream on that dessert table! hahaha! ohhh the icecream in nz!! so jealous of your trip!
Hahahaha, fat foot be cracking this kiwi up. Oh, such good documentation for the christmas eve celebrations. I am enjoying the NZ blog....but i do wish you were still here.
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