Saturday September 16, Lake Tarawera. New Zealand

Vibrant colours of the butterflies at Changi Airport.

A very belated wind up to this year’s travels, and just looked at the photos on the camera, and see that it was starting to wind down too!

The trip home went really well with no hiccups. After a relaxing evening at the Airport Hotel in Heathrow it was an early start for our morning flight. Ian wasn’t up to walking the huge trek through the airport to the boarding gates so utilised their assistance services, and couldn’t fault it. Made life much easier.  We had booked a hotel room in the transit area of Singapore Airport and after the 13 hours flight, the six hour stay was brilliant. Time for a shower and a few hours to be able to lie flat and have a snooze.

Wandered around Changi Airport, and its reputation as one of the best airports in the world is certainly deserved. Such huge open spaces, with lots of shops, trees and even a butterfly house. Time passed quickly before our ten hour flight back to Auckland and a cold wet morning. Didn’t live up to my promise of bringing some sunshine home with us. New Zealand has had the wettest winter on record and everyone is just over it.

Dean picked us up and back to Heatherbelle’s at Pukekohe for a few nights – so good to catch up with the family and the grandies all seemed to have sprouted over the past 4 ½ months. Then it was back to the lake on Monday accompanied by hail storms and 7 degree temperatures.

Our house sitter’s, Jenny and Mark had a warm welcome for us with the fire going and cooked dinner for us. It is certainly good to be home. Slowly getting back into “normal” life. It really has been a great journey this year, have fallen in love with France and know that we will be spending more time there in the future. Time to settle down and look forward to a NZ summer and planning our next trip in Ruakiwi.

New growth - spring is coming.