Caving and Art...

Oh my goodness...it's February! Where has the summer gone?? Lately, we have been pretty busy with TWO public holidays (love it!), BBQs, weekend adventures, and trying to enjoy as much as the sunshine as possible. The cloudy, rainy, cold weather will be here before we know it...sorry to be such a Debbie Downer :(

Ben and I heard from a friend about Friday nights down at Bethells Beach with live music, food, the beach...so we decided to head over after school on Friday and give it a go. Well...as luck would have it, it was raining by the time we got there so everything was cancelled. But, seeing as we'd never been before, we decided to brave the rain and explore! Down the beach there was this HUGE, awesome cave as well as tons of other smaller caves all around. We were also talking to someone last night who told us about another cave down at the other end of the beach we didn't explore. Must go back...when it's sunny!

 View from the inside looking out.

Yep, that's about as far in as I went...you can see Ben wandering a little farther back...I was too scared!

It was really cool! I'd definitely love to go back with my flashlight/torch next time!

On Saturday, I went with a friend to experience the Matakana markets (YUM!) as well as the Brick Bay Sculpture Trail. No pictures from the markets but those would just be of me eating so...no need :) The sculpture trail on the other hand was worth the drive! Here is my favorite:

From what I could understand of the informational leaflet, this sculpture was supposed to represent that art could be anything, so this artist created crumpled paper out of iron. There was another "piece of paper" down the hill a bit but I just loved the colors of all the pieces.

PAUSE My computer must have switched over to British spelling at some point because it is now telling me that I'm spelling favorite and colors wrong!!!!! I definitely did not change that... UNPAUSE

Another cool "sculpture" involved a trek called the Kauri Climb where you climbed up some steps and rang bells along the way. At the top, there were [what I would call] ear trumpets and they magnified all the tiny, detailed sounds of the forest! It was very interesting!

It was a beautiful day to hang out in a vineyard and explore some art! I even tried some of the grapes...SHH...don't tell! They did not taste like wine...

It has been a fun and busy weekend! Can't wait to see what Ben has up his sleeve for Valentine's Day....haha! Good joke Libbi.. 

love,

the webers

Glamping

Glamping is a horrible name! Makes it sound awful and girly and unnecessary...

But anywho, Ben and I went glamping this past weekend as a late anniversary getaway! And it was ah-mazing! I started on Friday when my wonderful hubby sent flowers to me at school!! There's nothing better than getting surprise flowers...and I wasn't even mad at him! :) We stayed at Castaways about an hour south of Auckland and when we first got there, we checked in and loaded our stuff onto a golf cart buggy to make the 10 minute drive out to our secluded campsite!

Complete with outdoor bathtub, two hammocks, and a cliftop view of the ocean (and sunset) below! It could not have been any better!

Saturday, we ventured down to the beach and did a bit of hiking! We found a waterfall that you could hike up right next to this really neat rock formation! 

And below, you can see our teeny tiny little campsite from the beach!

Did you find it??

I would definitely recommend it to anyone who is interested in a little bit of luxurious camping! It was so hard to choose just a few photos (can you tell?) so there are a bunch more of our "tent" as well as the beautiful sunset on Saturday night. You can find them HERE. 

Happy 4th Anniversary to my amazing, thoughtful, loving husband!

love, 

the webers

Four Years

New Year Goals Update:

I finished reading The Hobbit! I have already completed part of one of my goals...woo hoo!

Equally exciting: Ben and I celebrated our four year wedding anniversary! 

(Why do my teeth look so shiny??)

I can't believe that it's been four years...the time has flown by! We had a pretty quiet night. Dinner at home and we watched my new favorite movie: About Time. If you haven't seen it....so good! Get your tissues ready! The next night we went out to dinner at a really good restaurant in town: Ortolana and then we got dessert at the Chocolate Boutique. Yum! We didn't do anything really big because I have planned a weekend trip for us in a couple weeks. Ben doesn't know where we're going and I love planning surprises for other people! You'll have to check back in a couple weeks to see where we went! :) 

Happy 2014!

love,

the webers