Hi everyone!

Sorry we seem to have been a bit slow bloggage wise, but I'm going to write you a proper blog now! So, today Dad and I are slightly going different ways - he is off to explore the South Island from now until Saturday and i am staying here in the Bennett household in the North Island! He is flying from Rotorua to Christchurch today and then back on Saturday when we will all spend the day in Rotorua!

The past few days we have been exploring Tauranga and the area around Mount Maunganui - which are both really nice! New Zealand has some pretty beautiful places and even in the middle of winter they look so pretty! The sea is really clean and blue here too. But yes it is definitely the middle of winter - it is freezing!! I don't think it helped that we came from 35 degrees C heat in Japan, but i think even by English standards it is cold! I have taken to wearing leggings under my trousers and tops under my tops - it is pretty chilly when we go out. We've been to church a couple of times too - it is quite similar to ninth hour in a way, that's City Church by the way. We enjoyed though it was really different to Cullercoats. We're probably going to go to Bethlehem Baptist Church with them at some point too which is the other place they go - so we'll see what that's like!

In between the exploring we have to visit coffee shops, of course, so in my mum's honour we went to Starbucks and Lydia introduced me to a drink which i love! It's called a double choc chip frappuccino and it is divine!! They also do these biscuits here which are like biscuits with pink icing and hundreds and thousands on the top - they are pretty nice too! :)

We had a half power cut last night which was weird - some lights were working, some weren't, some would only come on dim and some kept flickering! It was really odd and when we were eating dinner the power kept coming on for like a second then going back off again. There is no central heating here though so we needed to light the gas fire - which has an electric ignition. So every time the power came on, Jim would leap up to the fire but then it would turn off again too soon! So that was hilarious and by the time we finally got it on, it wouldn't stay on when the power went off - so it was a bit of waste of time, but a funny one.

Today is Monday so Lydia is at school, and Lynne and Emily are at work. Its not strange being here when there's not many people in though because it is just like it always was - it's like going back in time but just in a different house which is nice. We are all just the same as ever! The plan for today is that Jim will take Dad to Rotorua at about lunchtime and i will just get ready and then Lydia will be home, so we'll choose what to do then.

While Dad's away he might write blogs and i might do the same, so sorry if it's a bit confusing!

Hope you're all keeping ok and we will speak soon,

Naomi and Stuart.

P.S. We've just put the pictures on here from our adventures so far so feel free to have a look, but don't laugh TOO much :)