Lake Taupo

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We just had an awesome two-day getaway to Lake Taupo. They have awesome deals on "holiday homes" here. They call it "book a bach" (baches are houses). Dalton negotiated with an owner and got us an incredible house for a great price. It took us about two hours to get there, which were, by far, the worst 2 hours we've had in the car with the kids. I couldn't believe that we had just driven across the country and back with no problems, and now we couldn't even make it 2 hours...just constant whining and crying and begging. MK started feeling carsick because it was a very windy road through the gorges, so I gave her half a dramamine. I wasn't thinking about the fact that she'd never swallowed a pill before so she started eating it. The constant turning around was making me carsick. It was just no fun. We finally made it to the house and it was wonderful. We had incredible views of Lake Taupo, which is a lake the size of Singapore. Joel did some research and figured that Lake Taupo is about 100km bigger than Tahoe. The cool thing about Taupo is that Mt. Doom (from The Lord of the Rings) is nearby. We could see it from our living room. The first night there, the guys surprised us with a steak dinner...yummy! While they were at the grocery store, the kids and I had fun making blueberry muffins.

The next morning, we headed to Huka Falls...amazing! This is where the Waikato River (which is normally 100 meters wide) is squeezed into a 20 meter wide gorge and goes over a 20 meter drop. About 220,000 liters of water per second is pushed through the gorge (about the amount of water needed to fill 5 Olympic size pools). The water pressure is amazing. And, the color of the water is gorgeous. I've never seen water that color before. The pictures don't do it justice. We went to a playground for a picnic, and then headed back for naps. Joel and I did some Insanity while looking at Mt. Doom in the distance...pretty neat. That afternoon, we went to a hot springs water park...or so we thought. In the brochure, it had pictures of a slide, a kids water playground, and the hot pools. We assumed that it was all hot water...wrong. The only things that were hot were the pools. But, we actually did the dragon slide in the freezing cold water...even the kids. Isaiah was the stud and did is several times. It was super fun. When we were getting ready to leave, I turned around and Ford was completely naked...hilarious. The drama of the night was during bath time when Mary Kate grabbed my razor and tried to shave her face like her daddy. So, we had to deal with a bloody lip for the rest of the night. After the kids went to bed, Anna made some more guac (Mary Kate and I are going to turn into avocados before we leave) and we watched a movie while the guys read. Then, we stayed up way too late talking...well, I took several naps during the conversations.

Saturday morning, we packed up and cleaned up. We did some shopping at Kathmandu and the All Blacks store before we left. Ford and Mary Kate were both playing with some stuffed kiwi birds in the store. When I went to put them up, Mary Kate didn't have hers anymore. She said that she put it in Elisha's stroller, which Dalton had already left with. I caught him outside the store and found the kiwi bird. The people in the store just laughed at us and thanked us for our honesty. We had a peaceful trip back, although it was in the rain. It was freezing cold when we got to the house and all we had was wet wood. Joel finally got a fire going, and we huddled up on the couch and watched a movie.

Today, we got to skype with my mom, sister, and Morgan. Then, we went on an adventure and ate some Turkish food. If you know me, you know that I don't venture out much in the food department, so I was a little nervous, but the food was awesome. The kids loved it too.

I made another attempt at cooking tonight. I'm giving up on cooking over here, unless Anna gives me a recipe and takes me shopping. I made lasagna. Apparently, the tomato sauce in a can that looks just like the American tomato sauce in a can is actually ketchup. So, my lasagna had ketchup in it. It didn't taste that bad, just extra sweet, but when Joel found out what I goofed on he couldn't eat anymore of it. So, I give up.