Easter in New Zealand

It is strange to be celebrating Easter in the fall instead of the spring. But the fall weather here is so nice that it is actually warmer than spring is at home. We started off the four day weekend with Bree having a friend sleepover at our place. I am not really sure why they call it a sleepover or slumber party since there is typically very little sleeping occurring. The girls did crafts, baked a cake and then watched a movie. We had to have pillow fights and play wrestling and by the time I got them to bed and asleep it was 10:30pm. Of course they did not sleep in and were up at 6:45am ready to go!

On the Friday we drove to nearby Sanson to check out one of New Zealand’s Amazing maze’n’maize. These are located across the country and are large corn fields in which elaborate mazes have been made. From the air these mazes are actual pictures and are around 20ha in size or more. The maze had an Easter egg hunt on so Bree, Layrah and I went to check it out. Luckily we arrived early and by the time we had spent 2 hours running through the corn field looking for clues and for the Easter bunny the rest of New Zealand had arrived. When we left there was a line up of 100 people and I am not sure how everyone was going to get around in the maize as it is pretty narrow. It was also muddy so by the end of the day I imagine it was getting a little messy.

On Friday evening I held my first dinner party at my place. We had five kids and three adults and I soon found out that I only have 7 sets of cutlery. Luckily I had my camping gear! I also don’t have a lot of chairs but the girls were happy to sit on the ground and use the coffee table. After dinner the girls had the music going and put on quite a dance show for us.

On Saturday we drove down to Levin, which is about 50km south of Palmy, for the Balloon Festival. Bree and I arrived early and it seemed like a small event with some food booths, a few kids rides and a music stage. We hit all the candy stands, had some hot dogs and then the balloons started arriving. At first there was just one hot air balloon and you could go up and see how it worked. But then 8 more balloons came from a nearby park and landed right in the field where we standing. They also had these large (bigger than me) bowling pins that some of the balloons were attempting to knock over. They called this event “skittles”.

Around 5:30 pm more people arrived and started setting up balloons and by 6pm there were over 15 balloons out in the field. You were able to walk around all the balloons and talk to the owners. Once it was dark they lit up all the balloons at once. It was pretty impressive. Then they had the balloonists all try and light their balloons in time with the beat of the music - which made this huge flickering across the entire park. By the time we went to leave we could not believe the number of people that were there. The cars were parked along the roads for miles and the sidewalks were full of people. I am really glad we went to see it because although the pictures are beautiful the experience of being there with all the large balloons around use was magical.

Sunday was Easter and Bree was a little worried that the Easter Bunny might not find here in New Zealand but she soon discovered that the bunny visits here first (since we are a day ahead of Canada). The bunny did arrive and Bree even got an All Blacks chocolate egg and a World Rugby Cup bag to put her treats in. In the afternoon we headed into town for the Easter Retro Festival which is a weekend celebration of classic toys and memorabilia all from the 50’s. There were events going on all weekend but we only attended a few of the exhibits.

Easter Monday also turned out to be ANZAC day in New Zealand this year. ANZAC stands for Australia and New Zealand Army Corps. Held on April 25 each year it is a national day of remembrance, much like our Remembrance Day, and the date marks the anniversary of the soldiers landing on the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turley in 1915 during World War I.  Now ANZAC day it is used to commemorate all military who served for their countries and services are held all over New Zealand.

So Easter was a busy but fun weekend. I really enjoy all the different festivals that the different towns hold. We could have attended many other events in nearby towns as well but there is only so much you can do. Given all the choices I would definitely recommend the Hot Air Balloon Festival to anyone because it was really spectacular.