Second week of hols

On Easter Monday Will and I drove out to Makara. It is less than half an hour away from home, but somehow we had never got around to it in the last 2 and a bit years... The beach was pretty busy with loads of people taking advantage of the public holiday, and reasonably good weather. We had a lovely bracing walk up the hill to the gun emplacements. It was pretty windy up on the tops, as you might be able to tell from my rather wild hair in our self-portrait below!

We had good views of the Makara wind farm, and went for a wander to one of the turbines which has good public access.

After we had walked back to the main beach we stopped in the cafe for icecream before heading home. We'll definitely be back.

During the middle weekend I had a road-trip to New Plymouth with Geoff and Richard to play my first ever masters badminton tournament, the Taranaki Masters Open. It was loads of fun. I did OK, coming 3rd in the doubles with a woman from Manawatu whom I had never met before (let alone played with!) and then winning the mixed plate final with Richard. A couple of Geoff's friends from North Harbour also came down to play, and the 5 of us staying in the motel managed to win 9 bottles of wine amongst us, so it was all good! The weather on the Saturday was gorgeous and I had time to wander down to the waterfront and chill out a bit before the badminton started. It had been ages since I was last in New Plymouth, and I was impressed by what I saw. My friends Nicky and Neal who live nearby(ish) in Eltham came to watch me play a couple of games, so it was great catching up with them. Here's a couple of pics, not exactly the type of day you want to spend inside in a badminton hall!

 

During the last week of holidays I managed to fit in a Pilates class every day bar one, so that was good. I also spent a bit of time in the garden. I pulled up the last of the tomatoes in the greenhouse, and am trying some leeks, silverbeet, beetroot and onions in their place. I'll also put in some more lettuce/salad leaves. The best thing about the greenhouse is that the chooks don't tend to go inside, so shouldn't scratch everything up!

I was pleased to grow my first ever red capsicum... We had several of them and they tasted amazing. We've got stacks of carrots we're eating, plus still have a few beetroot left, albeit topless because the chooks have demolished all the leaves...

Another holiday job which was good to cross off the list was booking our flights to the UK this Christmas. We fly to the UK on Sunday 9th December, fly from there to Singapore on 31st December for a few days catching up with the bro and his woman, and hopefully a few days chilling at a beach somewhere (Malaysia?) before arriving back in NZ on the 11th Jan. Am looking forward to the trip already!