First morning in New Zealand

I have recounted this story a few times over the past two weeks. And I thought I would post it before the story gets too big by repeat tellings.

Our first morning here Chris and I woke up around 4:30am and Dennis shortly afterwards. There was not much to do in the apartment so early so I talked Dennis into going out for a walk with me. Of course the promise was to find the park he had seen the previous day.

We managed to find the park without any trouble. Wellington is so very small and we were just a few blocks front he waterfront. The Park had a great big slide on it Dennis climbed the various stairs, ladders and ramps to get up to the top of the slide, after some coaxing I got him to slide down, it was very big.

He loved it and went up and down again and again. Dennis made full use of all the play things in the park. Please keep in mind it is 5:00am and no one is out and about. It is just Dennis and me in the park. After I got board I dragged him away down the waterfront. He was not too happy at first but soon got into the walk and the various new sights as we could see them before sunrise. We then found our way to the Wellington rowing club.

The rowing club has a little lagoon of its own with a couple of bridges on either side of it. We went over the seaward bridge first then looped around the club where Dennis found some rocks which we were throwing into the lagoon. We then went up the landward bridge and from the top Dennis through in the last rock he was caring. He enjoyed that so much he ran down to the pile of rocks and grabbed a bunch more for our throwing pleasure. The rock throwing continued for quite a while. Neither of us were able to get a rock accross the lagoon to scare the pigeons over there. It was not for lack of effort! Dennis went back down to get more rocks a half-dozen times or so.

After I got bored with this it was time to go back to the play ground on our way back home. At the play ground Dennis went down the slide again and again. He crawled up the slide, ran around the "normal" way and in general had a blast. I stood next to the slide and let him give me "high-five" on the way down.

One time on the way down he stopped himself right in front of me; leaned over and hugged me tight while he said "Dad thank you this is the best day of my life." I must say that made my morning.

Later on (yes after I got bored once again) I convinced Dennis to head back home with the promise of finding a donut shop. We wandered up and down Lampton Quay and Willis Street (not knowing their names at the time.) Somewhere around 6:30am we found out from the one other person we saw on the street that nothing opens until 7:00am. So we head back to our apartment.

Right across the street from our apartment a Starbucks coffee was opening. I went in with the hope of finding something that would fulfill my promise to Dennis so I could get back inside. I grabbed a bag of coffee and a few muffins of Dennis' choice. Liz (manager) told me that the coffee grinder was not working. She stopped me as I went to put the coffee away and offered me a grinder that Starbucks sells. I told her that I did not have the money to buy one. She said "Not to buy, to borrow. Just bring it back clean." I was shocked and asked her if she was sure, as I did not want her to get in trouble with her manager. She informed me that she was the manager and she was sure and go ahead and take it.

So I took home three muffins, 250grams of coffee (very good coffee I may add) one grinder and some awesome memories of a great first morning in New Zealand.