Two Videos

Here are two videos that tell the story better than still pictures.

The top video is Leithfield Beach.  We like to stop there after we go to Seminary in Amberley.

The second video is the baby seals at Kaikoura.  Try to count them.  So amazing.  So beautiful.

               

Kaikoura

We played tourist this past week.  Got together with Elder and Sister Smith, they are serving as Member Leadership Support missionaries, in Rangiora.  They, like us, don't have a lot of interaction with other senior couples. They will go back to their home in Tremonton, Utah this December. They are wonderful, sweet people.  They will be greatly missed here.

We went north about 3 hours from Christchurch to a coastal town called Kaikoura.  I will let the pictures do most of the talking.  All up and down the coast, in and around Kaikoura, there are seal colonies full of New Zealand fur seals.

The highlight and main purpose of our trip was to see where the baby seals hang out.  Twenty minutes north of Kaikoura there is a little river that comes off the mountain that empties into the ocean.  You hike maybe 10 minutes up a little trail along the stream until you get to a waterfall.  That is where the babies hang out.  Every 2 or 3 days they go back to the ocean and their mothers nurse them.  So, so cool!

This is where the trail starts, but it is not as bad as it looks.

Nice easy trail

Baby seal just off the trail.

Picture of 3 fat babies heading back to the falls after they have been
down to the ocean after a visit to their mums.

It is really hard to tell how many seals there are in this little
pool, but there are a lot!

Different day.  more flowers.

Mostly Pictures

This is Sister Haua's Seminary class.  We went to Sacrament
meeting in Timaru when they spoke.  Wonderful people!

Newest Mission prep class.  The Stake has 28 young people
that are in various stages of their paper work to serve missions.
This will be all new record number of missionaires.
Does this sound familiar?

Bro. & Sister Pitama.  Stake Mission Prep leaders.

Elder & Sister Webb.  Serving in Dunedin.
This picture was taken right after their Institute class.
They are teaching the Eternal Marriage class.

Dunedin train station.

Inside train station

That is one content sheep.

That is where the shepherd lives.  Poor guy.

Love the beach!

MIA carwash & bake sale.  The Temple trip is coming up in October.
They take their entire familes.  Last year the stake had 450 people go.

Our winter garden.  These are pictures taken in our yard days
ago.  This is not all, there are heaps more.  Sign me up for more
winters just like this one.

Did we mention we like the ocean?
This is Leithfield beach.  We stopped here after Seminary class.

This is the mouth of Dunedin Harbour.
Art?