Did I mention we are living on the beach?

So, we are living at Wainui Beach.  Wainui is a small beach community with about 1,500 people, a dairy (corner store), an elementary school, and some amazing surfing.  We are located about 4 miles north of Gisborne on the North Island of New Zealand.  Gisborne is the city where Brett works and Phoebe goes to Kindergarten (preschool).  Gisborne has a population of about 35,000 people, which sounds small, but is actually a pretty good size city in New Zealand.  New Zealand only has a population of 4.3 million people, 1/3 of whom live in Auckland.   And, 76% of the entire population lives on the North Island.  Gisborne is the eastern most city and one of it's claims to fame is that is the first to see the sunrise on Earth each day.  It is also known to be one of the more isolated cities on the North Island - with a very long, winding, slow road as our only option out of here.   It is an 8 hour drive to Auckland and 3 hours to any town bigger than us, with hardly anything else in between.  So, even though we are said to have one of the best climates and we have this spectacular beach, we hardly have any tourists and there are only a couple hotels in Wainui and neither are located directly on the beach.  We have found we can get most anything we need in town (although more expensive than we are used to) and, so far, have not felt too isolated.  I mean, it's hard to want to leave the house, much less the city, when you live on the beach.  I really do look forward to seeing the rest of New Zealand, and when the time comes, I hear the best way out is just to fly.  Did I mention that our airport runway intersects the railroad tracks? Also another Gisborne claim to fame.  (for even more info about Gisborne, see my link to the right)

Otherwise we are getting used to beach life and the endless trail of sand in the house.  We are at the end of summer here and still enjoying some really nice weather.  Most of the time there is a pretty cool ocean breeze and the ocean is actually pretty cool as well. Most of the surfers have wet suits on and it is a bit more chilly than I would prefer, but it is still very swimmable.  A couple of days here have been downright hot and those days the water and surf were fantastic.  You can walk out for quite aways with out it getting very deep and the bottom is alllll sand - no rocks or coral.  The waves are fun, fun, fun.  The locals do tell me there are sharks, but they don't bother anyone.  They also said occasionally you will see dolphins, whales, and sea lions - so far I have seen none.  I did see a fisherman catch a giant stingray the other day, that was pretty cool.  The walk down the beach is my new favorite pastime.   Hopefully I get surfing soon too.  I am still having too much fun boogie boarding and body surfing.