We woke up in Oceans Resort in Whitianga after Andys restless night, I however slept like a baby. Lots of beauty sleep ready for the day to come.
Our ceremony wasn’t until 5 o’clock so we had a little bit of relaxing to do. We broke all the rules and stayed together the whole day and headed across the road to the beach, we chatted about our future to come and the more trivial matter of lunch. Midday soon came and I headed off to have my hair and makeup done, the clouds were gathering above and the salon talked of nothing else but rain! Even though our wedding wasn’t until later that day the thought of pouring rain encouraged my hair dresser to use an entire can of hairspray to ensure it would stay.
Andy came and picked me up after I was done, looking a little out of place with fancy hair and make up and shorts and t shirt! Andy had not wasted any time and had gone for a run, swam in the sea, accepted a cup of tea from a couple on the beach and been kind to a young girl who was stranded on the beach in the pouring rain. And yes, it rained- so much that Andy couldn’t even see the cliffs opposite.
As Andy picked me up there was no sign that it had even rained, the clouds had gone and the sun was out for our wedding day.
We headed off to Villa Toscana, a stunning, breath taking villa secluded in the mountains above Whitianga and Mercury Bay. For anyone interested Mercury Bay was the place that Captain Cook first properly landed and met locals (without accidentally killing them). We only had 45 minutes to get ready before Mark, Gordon and Diana arrived so Andy went off to have a shower and I wandered around the villa stunned by how amazing it was! Before I knew it Mark and the rest of the gang arrived and I finished getting ready.
I was very impressed with Andy that even though we had been dragging my wedding dress around for the previous 3 weeks, he hadn’t looked and resisted the temptation to look. I had been trying to throw him off the scent by pretending to worry about strap marks and creases but I will never forget how he looked at me when I appeared from our bedroom.
We had a few photos around the Villa, then headed off with Gordon and Diana to Lonely Bay, a winding road around the bay for about an hour. We were expecting a few people on the beach but when we arrived at the top of the path to the beach there were many cars and we started wondering how busy the beach would be. As the path opened up onto the beach people soon realised what we were there to do and as we picked our spot on a rock by the waterside our spectators gave us space (as the ceremony progressed we soon forgot they were there until a little applause broke out as we kissed, lovely).
We stood on our rock and Gordon kicked things off, as it was just the two of us we had worried that we would pick some readings and words and when the day came he would just be reading them back to us, so Gordon had kindly suggested he write the ceremony and that it would be a surprise to us, it was beautiful, we wouldn’t have picked anything better. We’ll tell you more when we get home.
Mark took us off around the beach for a little photo shoot, we wandered around as people congratulated us. We had great fun with Mark and can’t wait to see the photos!
Next it was off back to Villa Toscana for our Wedding Breakfast, a feast of sea food as follows:
- Avocado and Tuna on Ciabatta
- Shrimp Cocktail
- Whitebait with toast
- Tomato pasta with a different kind of fish
- Crayfish with Tomato salad
- Panna cotta with Strawberries
- and a strong Italian Coffee
All fantastic! Lovely, lovely food, a huge thank you to Giorgio and Margherita, not just for the food but their hospitality over that last few days at Villa Toscana.
And then off to bed…
We have a few photos here while we are waiting for Marks.
Mr and Mrs Bateman
We’d left Wellington to head to New Plymouth for new year to spend it with friends. We stayed with Andy and Midla in their lovely new home, very jealous of Andys kitchen and pop up extractor fan! We headed to Butlers to see Supergroove and bring in the new year, in shorts and flip flops, quite a change from the UK. Thanks to Midla for the late night snacks and hospitality! Sorry you weren’t with us Jo but glad you had fun with the Milking 
So what else have we done since then? Well we headed out of New Plymouth after lunch with Jo in her lovely house (they all have lovely houses) and on to Waitomo for an over night stop and swim in a lovely little campsite before continuing to National Park. We went for a walk through the hills, mountains and volcanic scenery (photos to follow) to see a waterfall flowing over a cooled lava flow, very cool.
We spent a couple days in Taupo, watching the bungie jumping and swimming in the lake.
But most importantly, we’ve come back to Auckland ready for 8:30 this morning to queue up on the 6th floor of the AA building to collect our marriage licence! Thats right, as well as Cars, Transport, Insurance, they also seem to do Births, Deaths and Marriages.
We’re staying in the SkyCity hotel which is joined to the Auckland Sky Tower, the pool on the roof looks right up at it, and while up the tower this evening you can see the tiny people swimming.
Tomorrow we’re heading off into the Coromandel to explore a part of New Zealand we’ve never been to and of course, get married.
So we’re all ready for Friday, clothes ironed, documents collated, accommodation booked and weather is looking good!
We pulled up to the traffic lights as we entered Wellington, “oh look a girl on a unicycle is crossing the road”.
Earlier that day we’d left Taupo and our spot in happy valley (between huka corner and lusty flats), with a little stop off to walk up to Huka water falls and the hot water stream (which was like bath water!). The journey had been spectacular coming through National Park and ‘Mount Doom’ which was covered in snow.
We entered the City of Wellington looking for our hotel, thats right, a hotel! With king bed and breakfast included, sometimes I spoil Becky. It was a very quiet evening being the first sunday after christmas, I’d left Becky in the hotel to have a bath and went in search for an open shop. Sadly I came back empty handed so we had a little snack and went out to find a restaurant, what we did find was a couple more unicyclists, obviously a popular sport in Wellington.
Our first nights sleep in a nice hotel and fell asleep watching some christmas movies. Lovely.
I had woken early to move our car, picked up Becky for our breakfast buffet before leaving to explore Wellington. We did a bit of shopping before walking down to the water front for some lunch and to see the Len Lye Water Whirler, the sister to the Len Lye Wind Wand. But then came more unicyclists headed down towards the TSB arena, intrigued we followed but before we got to the arena a precession of 640 more came around the corner and along the harbour. We soon realised this was the unicycling world championships, we waited for the British contingent to pass and followed them into the civic quarter to watch their acrobatics and opening ceremony with traditional Maori welcome.
Obviously that was the highlight but we did also visit the Te Papa museum. When we were here in Feb 07 the big news was that Te Papa was about take possession of a colossus squid so obviously we had to go visit the half tonne creature that is now on display.
Other highlights since then have been Waiohine Gorge where Becky proudly walked across the 100 metre long, 100 metre high rope bridge(!) and the ridiculous road through the mountains out of Wellington, sadly no photos as Becky refused to let go of the dashboard.
Off to New Plymouth now to spend new year with Midla and Jo on the beach!
