.Our NZ holiday - PART 3.

The next week of our holiday was spent travelling around and visiting relatives - many of whom the kids and I had never met and Jaron hadn't seen for 15+ years!  

First stop was Hamilton, where we stayed in the old Church College dorms (where my mother-in-law went to school when she was a teenager!) - was lots of fun to relive her memories and tour around the now closed down school.  We even had a swim in the old pool - felt like we were living in an old 1960's movie!

Church College is situated right next door to the Hamilton, New Zealand temple.  Such a lovely temple - and lots of special memories held there as the place that my parents and grandparents and many aunties and uncles traveled to to be married.

 

 Hamilton is also home to Jaron's grandmother, whom Lil had an absolute fascination with and wouldn't leave her side.  Great-Grandma isn't in the best of health as she suffers from dementia so it was sad to see her and not have her remember as much as she would have liked to.  She still kept us in stitches though, with her blunt comments and witty humour!  We were also lucky to meet up with Aunties, Uncles and cousins in Hamilton (and naughty me didn't take many photos!)

 In the evening we visited the temple again - this time to see the beautiful temple lights.  We were totally enthralled!

Our next stop was New Plymouth, the old family stomping grounds.  Here we visited with Great Uncle Harvey and Great Aunty Jill and enjoyed torrential rain for the two days we were there!

 We also spent some time with Jaron's grandfather and Uncle Grant and Aunty Leigh at their home.

 On our way home, we stopped into the cemetery and visited graves of Grandad Dorman and other family members no longer with us.

On the way home from our roadtrip we had to stop at the famous Pokeno for an ice cream.  This place has been around forever, the town has pretty much nothing in it except for a petrol station and two famous ice cream shops!  Jaron had been dreaming talking about our visit way before our holiday and planned to get the biggest ice cream he could there - 12 scoops later...here he is!  It was disgusting!  But a total bargain - 12 scoops for $12!!!