From Waitomo we headed to Raglan, a laid back surf town further north on the west coast. We spent a lovely evening on a campsite by the sea getting into the hippy vibe with a bit of baby yoga (Eddie is now a pro at downwards dog, as well as happy baby).
Me having absolutely zero clue how to surf and Ad having forgotten almost all of what he ever knew about it, we went for a lesson. Adam took care of Eddie while I was drilled on various manouveours on the sand, which paid off as for the first time I stood on a surf board for more than a millisecond! It wasn’t even a fluke, I managed to repeat the experience several times! We swapped out and Adam got a few goes, and despite the massive sand-eating-baby-shaped distraction the lesson observation had evidently done him good too as he also hopped straight up and started catching waves! Hats off to Steve, our instructor, who also let us pay for only one lesson, let both of us use boards by turns and put up with us bringing a baby along! In true Raglan style, we ended our lesson 1.5 hours late and bombed off to Auckland….
We spent another night at the no. 1 Auckland experience hosts Pete & Di before a brief trip to the local pretty waterfall, at which point the heavens promptly opened. We ran away to get one last dose of classic NZ pie before dropping the van off and heading to the airport hotel. Bye NZ, it’s been amazing!
Parenting Responsibly 