Nelson (belated!)

For our second weekend (Jan 27-28) we headed north to Nelson, the sunniest spot in New Zealand!

(Lucy) Where the car ready for Nelson!

On the road we stopped and did a 3 mile hike!

(meg-the signs had many different listings! 45 min return, 1 hour return...according to j's watch it was about 3 miles. Thus far there's always been at least one child who does not care to hike. Frank's turn. See below)

It was so green and there was a lot of hornets.

mom took a looooot of pictures.

(meg-someday they will be happy about it)

So many flowers so beautiful.

we're here at the top of the mountain.

So cute!

we're the Beatles!

Looked at the weird bug. This is the weird bug that makes a super loud sound in the forest.

(meg-cicadas! i finally saw a live one-they are so many pretty colors. these guys were so, so loud. like heard them in the car with windows closed going 60 miles an hour loud)

(Meg) Lu's done for now. She's had enough of my pictures. The girls were checking out this cute guy. Weka, weka, weka! they are often described as cheeky. Which also is a word that I am working on increasing in my daily vocabulary, cause it's great.

Oh, man, if only this field of sunflowers wasn't fenced off. Isn't is such a happy sight?

Nelson has some great street art!

And the double decker bike rack!! Amazing.

Cable Bay adventure park!

That's Cable Bay (the actual body of water) in the background.

'Skyward experience'-the world's longest flying fox ride, reaching speeds of up to 100km/hr!

Weeeeeeeee!

Giant tree!

Everyone smiling in one picture?!? Note- they were bribed with the upcoming breakfast after church.

Happy hot chocolate drinkers.

Nelson had lots of shopping, where the girls got boogie boards and j found a surfboard.

Tide's out. Waaaaay out.

Such great playgrounds!

On our way home we stopped about halfway at the buller gorge swingbridge-according to the signs, it's the longest swing bridge in New Zealand. The kids didn't really dig it. I tried to get them to pause in the middle where it is so pretty over the river, but they all decided that they were scared. Don't worry, I didn't make fun of them. Much.

So pretty!

Wandering around the bush walks.

Too bad we didn't bring our togs! (swimsuits). There was a sign behind Josh that showed how high the river got when in flooded in different years-taller than Josh's head! (and you can see this is quite a bit higher than the beachy area.)

Love how the rocks are carved out by the water.

The river was CHILLY!

Weeee! We took another flying fox ride over the river.

Then we headed back the rest of the way to Westport!