Wonderful Waiheke!

On Thursday Room 24 went to WAIHEKE and oh, what a day we had! 

It was exciting, action packed and fabulous!

We piled into the buses and left school shortly after 9am. We headed off to Half Moon Bay to catch the ferry. Most of us had never been on a boat let alone a huge ferry. Mele was so excited she giggled the whole way up the gang plank of the ferry. Once we got on board we all sat on the top deck to eat our morning tea and look at the impressive view. Can you find Rangitoto Island and the Sky Tower in the background of our photos.

Once we berthed at Waiheke we jumped back onto the buses and drove through beautiful Waiheke Island to Uncle Bruce’s farm. We were greeted by Uncle Bruce and all his helpers … Joe, Georgie, Baz, Jill, Denise, Gavin, Linda Vagana, Alan Duff as well as the rest of the farm workers and helpers. Sincere and Aiga thanked Uncle Bruce (Aiga in samoan and Sincere in english) The Middle School then presented Uncle Bruce with his presents (a lolly lei, a Pohutakawa tree and a Gardenia/Tiare bush) Uncle Bruce enjoyed our version of the Pohutawaka tree song. We gave him a little slice of NZ and a little slice of the Cooks Islands. Uncle Bruce loved both trees and planned to put the pohutawaka in his bushwalk. He told us that the Gardenia/Tiare is his favourite!

  

 

 

Next we went up into the paddocks to watch Joe round up the sheep with his faithful dog. It was so funny listening to all the children pick their way through the dried cow poo on the way up the hill. Lots of EWWWwwws and yucks! We are definitely city kids! After Joe's amazing display we went through the sheep and cow shed and into the shearing shed to watch Gavin shearing the sheep. 

After the fantastic shearing display we followed Baz through the bushwalk and down to the beach. It was a beautiful bushwalk filled with native trees and birds. Dayton was excited when he found an old cicada shell. As we walked through the bush we could hear the wind in the trees, the birds singing, cicadas chirping and the waves crashing on the beach below us.

Finally we made it to the beach and rushed to get into our togs. We ran down to the water and after a safety talk from Mrs Fulford, we ran screaming into the water. It was awesome! Perfect temperature and ammount of crashing waves. Room 24 dove, jumped, floated and swam.

After our lovely swim we dried off and sat down for a delicious burger or sausage sizzle for lunch. Once we finished, it was time to play. Uncle Bruce had so much set up for us - a tug of war, cricket gear, blind man bluff, gators and much, much more. We had so much fun. Some of the children even came back down to the beach and made sand castles, forts and explored the rock pools. 

  

At about 3.30 it was pack up time and ice cream time! Uncle Bruce had an ice cream for everyone! We sang some more songs including Uncle Bruce's favourite ... the duffy song. Then we jumped back on the bus, waved goodbye to Uncle Bruce and his helpers then headed back to the ferry to go home. After the ferry ride and another bus ride, we made it back to school at 6.45pm! We were sooooooo tired! Mrs Fulford passed us back to our parents and we all went home.

What an amazing day! We can not wait for next year!