Christmas at the beach

The next day i got the bus to Paihia, a nice little beach town in the far north of NZ. Staying in another nice hostel near the beach, so spent the rest of the day making the most of the good weather on the beach.

On Christmas Eve I went to Waitangi, where the Maoris and the Brits signed the Treaty which is supposed to be the founding of NZ. Theres a good museum at the Treaty House and its set in nice grounds by the sea. In the afternoon I continued with my plan of not doing much over Christmas and went to the beach again. Probably sounds bad that I feel like a need a holiday from travelling. In the evening there was a carol singing thing down by the beach. Doesn't really seem right having carols outside in the sun, I'm dreaming of a white christmas just didn't seem very appropriate. But it was still better than the hip hop version of Away in a Manger.

Unfortunatly the plan for Christmas day at the beach didn't quite work out because of the weather, it turned into a normal wet Christmas day. Wasn't too bad in the morning so I still went to the beach, went swimming and had lunch at the beach. But in the afternoon it rained hard so I spent the rest of the day at the hostel, which wasn't too bad as it has its bar.

On Boxing Day the waether changed again, was bright and sunny with a good breeze, perfect as I'd booked to go sailing on a tall ship. This was a really good day, helped out a bit with the sails on the ship, sailed out around the bay. Went onto an island for a swim and a BBQ lunch and had good fun jumping into the sea by swinging from a rope attached to the mast. On the way back to the mainland I put on harnesses and climbed out onto the front of the boat which was good fun in the waves as the boat was going quite fast.

So its been a good Christmas, very different from being bck at home. Today I'm heading further north, to a place calld Kaitiai for a few days.