It sounded a good idea to spend Christmas in the Bay of Plenty – MoJo certainly wanted to have plenty of presents and plenty of fun!

It was the part of New Zealand where we knew the most people. We had planned a few months earlier to spend Christmas with the Tickelpenny family. Shane, Corina, Boston and Nixon are friends from Dubai, who were traveling back home to New Zealand for the holidays.

We were unsure exactly where they were going to be, Shane grew up in Hamilton and Corina in Te Aroha – in the end it was decided we would meet at the holiday resort of Mount Maunganui, where Shane’s sister and parents have fixed caravan holiday homes.

We took two apartments in the spacious Beaumont complex, ours with a balcony on the first floor, Shane and Corina downstairs with a large garden and easy access to the swimming pool. We spent most time downstairs! As soon as we arrived the girls had a swim whilst the grown-ups cracked open some fizz and had a catch up. It was great to also see Michele who we had stayed with in Sanur, Bali who was back to visit her family down the coast in Whakatane (pronounced with an F which confused us for a while!!) and had driven up to see us – the only friend we saw in two different countries on our travels!

Shane’s parents Dennis and Pam hosted us all for Christmas Eve dinner, for a delicious meal of ham and pavlova.

Christmas morning started earliest for me, waking before sunrise to run up to the summit of Mount Maunganui, an extinct volcano cone. The mount dominates the skyline of the peninsula, ‘maunganui’ translates as ‘big mountain’ – although at 232-m high it isn’t all that big. Its Māori name is ‘mauao’, meaning ‘caught by the dawn’ – so I was there at the right time.

The girls were just waking when I got back, incredibly Father Christmas had found us!

While Tom went for his run we skyped with Gaga and when he was back opened up our presents (favourites were probably Elsa and Anna dolls and a copy of the Hobbit). We had breakfast downstairs all together and then headed out for a walk. There are a few trails around and up the mount, of varying degrees of steepness so with littler legs we decided to walk around it rather than up to the top, all traveling at different speeds.

Lunch was turkey and all the trimmings, as well as New Zealand lamb done on a barbie of course!

Our gifts to Boston and Nixon were kites in the shape of pirate ships purchased in Bali. After lunch we noticed that the wind had picked up, so we headed to the beach to try them out. We had been traveling with a brilliant pop-up kite from Gaga and had bought a rainbow sailing ship kite for the girls, so they came out too. We had underestimated the weather – after twenty minutes the rain was lashing down!

We raced back and it was time to play Secret Santa – us going home with some lotto tickets (fail), a scarf, Kiwi calendar and a puzzle of the world. Tom had tried to tempt the group with mince pies all day to no avail – he was more successful with the After Eight game, played with much hilarity by all generations!

Shane, Corina, Tom and I played another Secret Santa game late into the night – a perfect match – great fun. Kids had loved some festive dress up during the day.

Boxing Day morning was a bit of a shock, we had to check out by 10. We had however had a call from other Dubai friends of ours, so immediately drove to meet them. Kelvin, Katrina and their two boys Dylan and Ashton moved back to Tauranga a couple of years ago. Kelvin has a motor boat so picked us up next to the mount and whizzed us across Pilot Bay to a beach on Matakana Island where the rest of their family were spending a few hours.

Molly loving going out on a fast donut (they called it a ‘cookie’) ride off the back of the boat. Tom had a swim, the rest of us a bit chicken as the water was cold….

We went back to Katrina’s mum’s house in Tauranga for lunch, a beautiful property known as a pole house, spread over several floors with harbour views, a pool and a lift! We travelled back there the following Saturday for a joint 40th and 70th party for Katrina and her mum, Dallas.

On the way to the party we drove down to Whakatane to catch up with our first dragon boat captain Ben Hughes and his wife Elena and daughter Natalie.

They had been living in California for a few years but had just moved back to New Zealand, Ben works for Zespri Kiwi fruit. It was wonderful to see them and meet Ben’s parents. Natalie and Molly were born a few days apart and played together as babies, so it was lovely for them to meet again.

It rounded off a memorable festive week, full of friends, games and discovering a beautiful part of the world.