Camping at Whangaparoa

The tent is up!

The main beach about 100metres from our tent.

To start the new year we decided to have our first camping trip in NZ. We headed about an hour's drive north to a campsite on the Whangaparoa peninsula. The weather was great and we were right next to the beach.

Trying out the Kayaks

We managed to go Kayaking and did lots of lazing around on the beach! A nice little break away ready to start the new year.

Boxing day on Whatipu Beach

The lighthouse

Hayley on the beach

We decided to travel up the west coast and check out a few new beaches on Boxing day. It was an absolute scorcher and we found a great beach at a place called Whatipu. The beach was really big but there were hardly any people about. Cool!

The view from the road heading to the beach

Chilling out!

Christmas Day In NZ

Testing the trampoline

Locals told us that just as in England it always rains on Christmas day. We thought they were having a laugh as during the week leading up to the day it had been in the mid twenties celsius with not a hint of any rain.

Anyway, Christmas day arrived and we had decided to have a barbeque instead of the traditional roast dinner. I spent the morning building Charlie's new Trampoline and the weather did not seem too bad, cloudy but still warm. I literally put the last bolt in the trampoline and was walking over to start up the bbq when the heavens opened!

Opening up the Christmas presents

The rain did not stop for the rest of the day and I ended up cooking the bbq in the garage! The weird thing is that it has not rained once since Christmas day to now (14th Jan).

Anyway, we still had a good day and managed to phone or E-mail all of the familyback in Blighty.

Bubbly for breakfast

Nice ears and hat!

Christmas Eve Shift

Life's a Beach!

Christmas eve shift is traditionally very busy, with lots of drunk people to arrest down in the heart of Union Street.

This year has been slightly different! I was crewed with Scottish Jimmy and we were the only two working at Mangere station. It was lovely weather, so we decided to go for a drive around the coast. We had a few pictures around Howick beach and then decided to head back to the station. There were no jobs for us to do, so we shut the station three hours early! Not quite the same as Plymouth!

Pukekohe Swimming club Christmas club night

Charlie in the lead on the backstroke



On Sunday 16th December we went to Charlie's swimming club Christmas party. Charlie competed in four races and won three races and came third in the fourth race.


Charlie at the finish line after the freestyle race

Charlie got PB's in all four races and was rewarded with winners ribbons. The races were followed by a barbeque and cakes.

Charlie with his winners rbbons

Putting up the Christmas tree and Decorations

Yesterday we put up our Christmas tree and decorations. It was a totally bizarre feeling to be decorating the tree in temperatures near 28 degrees celsius!

We have put two mini trees outside, but we can't put the lights on until about 2130 hrs, when it gets dark!

We are planning on having a barbeque on Christmas day. It is just too hot for a traditional roast dinner.

I have managed to get a couple of weeks off work over Christmas and the new year, so we are planning to head north with the camping gear. There is a Police association campsite at a place called Stanmore Bay, about three hours drive north. We can get a good rate and the site is right next to the beach.

All of our photographs are now on http://www.flickr.com/ if you fancy logging on and looking at them. We will still be updating our blog regularly.

Graham's Beach

Graham's Beach

Last weekend we went exploring along the cost and found Graham's beach. It is about a forty minute drive from our house and is a really quiet little beach ( We had the beach to ourselves!) There are barbeques set up and the sea is really traquil. It was really nice to just relax on the beach with no-one else about.