Day One. 2019.

1 January 2019

I am ashamed to say that I started the day with a bit of a hangover! Nothing too serious, and nothing that wasn’t quickly resolved with a paracetamol, but it wasn’t quite how I’d pictured my morning! Everyone in our apartment had slept solidly, and we didn’t get up until after 09:00.  We rang Lizzie for a chat – it was 2019 where we were and still 2018 back home!  Then we showered and dressed just in time for the 10:30 deadline for breakfast.  V and Belle were staying in our room to help use up our granola, yoghurt and WeetBix, but as we had our breakfast included in the room rate, we decided to head over to Peppers, the sister hotel around the corner, where breakfast was served.

Hmmm, we weren’t terribly impressed with the rude staff!  We arrived at 10:25, and the woman who “greeted” us said we were too late.  When we pointed out the time, she said “Fine, but we clear away the food at EXACTLY 10:30!”.  We found a table and whizzed around quickly, gathering as much food as we could before it was snatched away from beneath us.  As it happens, the scrambled eggs were delicious, and we took our time enjoying it.  The restaurant wasn’t closing – it was just clearing away the breakfast buffet – so we weren’t in any rush.

After breakfast, we went back up to the apartment where V and Belle had finished their food.  Emma was meeting up with a bloke she’d been seeing, so V, Chelsy and I set off for the beach again, with our three enthusiastic beach-loving girlies.  We set up the beach tent and we all played in the shallow waves together, while Ian went off for his walk for an hour or so.  Cornelia and I joined V and Belle who were sitting on the shoreline, hoping to catch a pipi.  Astonishingly, within about a minute of joining them, I was raking the sand and felt something nudge against my hand as the wave drew back to sea.  It was a pipi!!!  We were all VERY excited! We put him carefully into a bucket which we filled with a bit of sand and plenty of water… and then we waited.  Soon, the little clam poked his body out of his shell, shuffled around a bit, then turned upright and burrowed down into the sand to hide himself!  It was amazing to watch, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen this before!  It was completely mesmerising, and we just stayed on the sand, with the waves washing over us, watching him repeatedly bury himself and shuffle around.

We then took our bucket up to Chelsy and Miela who were up at the tent, digging holes.  We spent the rest of our morning enjoying watching the kids play so beautifully together, and relaxing in the New Year sunshine.  Miela is just such a super little girl – so happy, kind and well-mannered and she is incredibly articulate, just as Cornelia was when she turned three. She is a real joy to be around. What a perfect way to spend the morning!

With the promise after an ice cream after lunch, we herded the gang back to our apartment and enjoyed a lunch of last night’s leftovers.  Chelsy and I were keen to get out for a run together, and as she needed to leave by about 17:00, we set off around 15:30.  It was blazing hot, and I’m embarrassed to say that my lack of rehydration since yesterday made me overheat very quickly.  I normally love running in the heat, but after about 3 miles, I had to stop to soak my head in water under one of the many taps along the boardwalk.  Another mile later, and I could feel one of my funny hearty things was about to happen, so I said to Chelsy that I just need to wait for the feeling to pass, which took about five minutes.  I was very frustrated that I’d had to stop, but a combination of having drunk no water that day (just two cups of tea) and the heat nearly beat me.  We stopped another couple of times during the last two miles just to take a drink from the taps and for me to soak my head, but despite the challenge of a difficult run, I was over the moon that we’d run just over six miles on New Year’s Day, and I’d made a new friend. Chelsy is lovely, and all credit to her that she has such a fantastic daughter.  We shared lots of stories on our way around and I loved chatting to her.

At the pool area, we found V in the water with the three girls, and Ian observing from the side!  They were having a super time, jumping on V and pretending to be mermaids. We cooled off a bit in the shade, then waded into the water up to our shorts to help with the supervision!  They were in the water for nearly an hour, before Chelsy had to take Miela and herself off for a shower, and get ready to leave.  She used our apartment, as she’d already packed up her stuff from Emma’s room (and Emma was still out), and after one final play together, they left for home.  She only lives about half an hour away – how fantastic to have this place so close!

Emma messaged V to say that she was going to the pub with Harry to watch a live band, although she wasn’t sure how long they would be there, as Harry had been vomiting during the night. Poor boy – we’d taken his temperature last night to check that he wasn’t burning up, and although I’d offered a sachet of Calpol (the miracle medicine to mummies back home!) Harry hadn’t taken it, as he didn’t like the taste. Anyway, off to the pub they went, while we fed Cornelia and Belle and got them in the bath to rinse off the excitement of the day.

They were both so exhausted that we managed to get them both to sleep really quickly.  Belle went to her blow up mattress, which I think made it much easier for them both to settle. I took turns stroking each of them, but hurrah, they didn’t take long to drop off at all. Ian went down to the fish ‘n’ chips place, and came back an hour or so later, fully loaded with grilled snapper and chips for me & V, and battered fish and chips for himself.  We spent a wonderful evening together, reminiscing about the “bad good old days” and talking about how our lives have changed so much since having our beautiful girls.  But last night’s celebrations bringing in the new year together soon overwhelmed us, and we headed to bed at a very respectable 23:00.  This time, I was straight to sleep!