Theresa comes to visit!

and Darren, and Luke, and Anthony, and Erin (Anthony's fiance)!! Hooray!

We like to to claim the Fredericks family and Treetop as our family, as our kids grew up there since Magda joined Treetop in the infant room 12 (!) years ago. I joke that Theresa was always the first person that ever knew I was pregnant-but it is actually true. Josh may have known before her once or twice. :)

We were so excited for their visit!

Theresa can't even get out of the car.

They brought Mac and cheese for the girls! cause even if I make homemade Mac and cheese, it's never as good as kraft for those crazies....

Frank entertaining Darren.

Poor Anthony.

Now let's make it harder!

Lots of good playtime! The Fredericks had a lovely campervan, so we caravaned it down the west coast for the weekend.

1st stop-off to Punakaiki/pancake rocks where we got to actually see the blow holes blowing! Lots of good wave/mist action.

Hooray!

Lots of Pancake stacks.

Erin and Anthony are so coordinated!!

Monteith's brewery in Greymouth-would have loved to stay for a tour but only tour times were too late in the day--next time! We had a good sampling, though.

National Kiwi Center...where you could feed eels...

and catch crayfish! They did have a couple of kiwi, as well, one that only came out for their food, and another one that was quite active and foraging all over-but since they are nocturnal and in a great big dark enclosure, no photos!

Downtown Hokitika!

Turns out it was the weekend of the wildfoods fest-but we didn't stay for the grubs. Off to the gorge!

Hokitika Gorge is this amazing color-here's my Google lesson:

The water of Hokitika Gorge appears a mesmerising shade of turquoise blue due to the presence of glacial flour in the water.

Glacial flour is a fine, silt-like sediment that is created by the grinding of rocks by glaciers. As glaciers move across the landscape, they pick up rocks and grind them into a fine powder, which then gets carried downstream by glacial meltwater. The glacial flour in Hokitika Gorge is suspended in the water, causing the sunlight to scatter and reflect off the particles, creating a striking blue-green hue that is both stunning and unique.

The water's clarity, combined with the vibrant blue colour, creates an almost surreal atmosphere that is truly awe-inspiring to behold.

It is pretty awesome.

We were (I was) on the lookout for blue mushrooms!! Apparently they are on this trail. Somewhere. We didn't find them, despite my bribe to the children that anyone who found me a blue mushroom got 5 dollars.

Look at this good looking family!!

Aaaaand then there's us....

Rock climbing!

Hi, Anthony! Can you spot him?

More pretty water.

There's always one.

Erin (and Anthony!) got great workouts carrying all of my children everywhere.

Some sort of games on the trail...

Weeeeeeee! Luke and Frank are off!

Stopped in the old gold mining town of Ross for the night-the holiday park that the fredericks stayed at was amazing! Gorgeous beach. And the local corner store/grocery store had an entire room packed to the gills with super fun Asian ingredients.

Had to get a photo of the teapot house. So many cute ones!

Then we drove down to Franz Josef and glacier country. First hike to Peter's Pond-just a little foggy!

Nobody smile, now, ya hear me??

Life sized ranger to warn you not to go past the barriers!

They really mean it. There is a glacier in those clouds back there, promise. You used to be able to walk to the actual glacier-but then it became too dangerous! Now to get onto the glacier you would either need to do an 8 hour hike or a super spendy helicopter tour. We just gazed from afar.

Parking lot picnic! Yum!

Darren was the rock star driver of this beast. Way to keep it (mostly) intact!!

We were literally driving out of the parking lot when we spied just a smidgen of bright white glacier-so we had to go back!

Left the kids at home to eat ramen amd watch a movie with under the expertise of Magda and Luke (both who passed the babysitting course with flying colors last summer), while the older children (Ant and Erin) and the proper grown ups (ha!) went out for grown up dinner. It was so great!

Cuddle up!

Van was quite attached.

Early morning coffee break with Theresa before we had to start driving home/christchurch, respectively.

Quick stop in Hokitika to see some driftwood art.

And a rainbow!

So strong!

Bye Hokitika sign! Bye Fredericks!! See you in August!