A Ship Out of Its Harbor: December 2011

I realized in all of the excitement of my Christmas post I never talked about my plans for after the new year. On January 3^rd Brad and I taking about a week to head to a town called Kerikeri in the Bay of Islands at the northernmost part of the NZ:

It’s supposed to be beachy and tropical with gorgeous weather and sunshine. We have been in touch with a few hostels that will connect you with local farms and arrange fruit picking jobs (glamorous, I know), transport, and give you a reduced weekly rate for accommodation. I’ve heard all sorts of things about fruit picking, mostly that it’s super hard, but I figure we can do anything for a few weeks and when we’re sick of it, we’ll leave. The nice thing is we’ll be able to spend our off time on the beach getting tan and gorgeous J

However, after the week of fab weather we’ve been having in Dunedin, I’m a little sorry to go. I’ve spent the last 3 out of 4 days at the beach soaking up the sun and taking pictures of the seals. I have 5 more days in this city and I plan on doing the same until we leave. Here are some pics from mine, Gavin, and Maryann’s trip to Aramoana Beach on the 27^th. Happy New Year!

seal/sea lion tracks

boogie boarding on the sand

Fail!

Needless to say, my first Christmas spent away caused a little bit of anxiety. Nothing beats heading home to be with the family, my parents’ awesome cozy house, Dad’s frosted sugar cookies, and Sophie running amuck trying to keep track of every movement in the house at all times and waiting for the turkey to be unoccupied when I arrive home so she can pull at the skin hanging off the counter and try to make a run for it. While our Dunedin house with its odd, vagrant inhabitants and increasing rolly polly bug population will never hold up, we still tried to spruce the place up a bit and add some holiday cheer.


Lady Gaga tree

As cheery as the digs look, we knew we needed to get out of the house. On Christmas Eve Brad, our fave flatmate Gavin, our friend Maryann and I headed to our friends John and Katie’s house just outside St. Clair beach for dinner. Our other friends Struan and Jake also came out and it was such a great crew. Dunedin’s Christmas gift to us was that it was one of the most beautiful weather days we’ve had since we’ve been here: mid-70’s and sunny. We had drinks and hors d’eouvres on the deck, then had an awesome meal of turkey, quiche, mashed potatoes, stuffing, cranberry and sweet potato pie for dessert; everything was amazing. We were feeling pretty pregnant with food, so we decided to head over to the playground to throw the Frisbee around. We got slightly sidetracked by the spinning ring of death (this has to be its real name) which you will see below provided hours of entertainment and the narrow missing of broken bones. After that we headed back to the house to have dessert, watch “The Nightmare Before Christmas,” and play charades, which was naturally hilarious.

Gav having a Christmas cocktail

Katie and John

Mine and Gav's stuffed mushrooms

Carving the turkey

Katie, John, Jake, Brad, Maryann, Struan and Gavin just before our feast

After dinner drinks with a sweet view of Dunedin

Creeper santa

Death ring showdown

Girls rule!

I skyped with my parents and sister on Christmas morning before Gavin and Maryann came into mine and Brad’s room to open our gifts. Brad got me the shorts of my dreams (see beach pics) and a Smiths CD set and he got a long board and some new board shorts, among other things- great haul! Then we made French toast and had a nice sunny breakfast on the deck with some Coronas.

Real live face wipes... with microbeads (not for the toilet)

Ginger beer in his stocking... someone was good this year!

My Christmas loot!

After we ate, the crew from the night before met at Aramoana beach for some Christmas fun in the sun. I hate to sound rude, but: hahahahah I got to spend Christmas on the beach while you all froze in the snow :) We decided to go hard and dive into the ocean and it was actually much warmer than we thought; our quick dip turned into about a 20 minute swim. At one point we saw a Christmas seal playing in the water about 40 feet away and I’ll admit, when he started jumping over and over again I got a little nervous (“Where there’s seals there’s sharks”) but it was so amazing I just stood there in awe. I won’t name names, but a certain bearded man was seen sprinting across the water a la Jesus as soon as the little guy surfaced. Next the Christmas seal swam over to munch on a school of fish and was only about 8 or 10 feet away gliding under the water. It was so, so cool and now I can say I swam with seals! When we got out of the water we took a little walk down the rocky outcrops and (literally) stumbled upon more seals. I’ve always thought the tourists who talk about nearly tripping over seals and sea lions before noticing them were buffoons, but now I understand; those little buggers blend in like crazy. Gavin, Maryann, and I did some recon around a corner before going to avoid spooking one and thought the coast was clear. Then I noticed a strange trail in the sand and while following it and wondering aloud what it could be I practically poked a seal in the eye. The result was me flailing backwards trying to push my friends out of harms way but being unable to look away from the pissed off beast and looking like a panicked ostrich. Needless to say my plan to put my santa hat on one to take a picture fell though. We saw about 2 or 3 more seals but were afraid they would gang up on us in the small, enclosed area so we headed back with all our fingers in tact.