Week17 (22-29 October 2018)

We arrived Sunday evening at Auckland New Zealand and left this afternoon (Monday) for Queenstown, New Zealand where the Mission Leadership Seminar is taking place. I had to take a picture of part of the airport.  It is the size of a normal airport but it looked sooo big!  

                                                                         What a view!

  

We just arrived.  It is beautiful out here.  It is great to see some  mountains again.  

A view from our room

Nice welcome basket

Nice accommodations also.

And it is very nice to relax a little and be with other mission presidents and wives and be buoyed up and edified.

Tuesday:  First day of training.  We enjoyed seeing the 5 other mission presidents and wives who started their mission at the same time we did.  We have all survived our first quarter.  We pretty much have the same challenges.  It is kind of reassuring and we can share how we are handling them.  It was good to hear from the more experienced ones and we heard some good ideas from them and the Spirit inspired some ideas also.  The food is very good by the way, and I am afraid I will gain a few pounds.😕😟. We took a water taxi for dinner in Queenstown after the training.  It was nice to walk around this little town.  We saw a version of "Chocolat Favoris"  We even had "poutine" for dinner, we just had to.  It was pretty good, close to the poutine in Quebec where it originated. Unfortunately we were full and did not eat the ice cream.

I am so sad now that I look at this picture that I was not hungry anymore.  I could have one now.

If we go back there before we come back to Montreal, I will start with dessert. 😏

Wednesday we went on an adventure to "Doubtful Sound" which contains one of the ten reserves of the fiordland. The vegetation is absolutely amazing.  With little to no soil on the mountains, trees interlock their roots together and cling to the rock wall, relying on moss and lichen for nutrients.  When the trees have grown to maturity and are big and with the amount of rain (it is one of the wettest places on earth with an average of over 200 days a year of rain) "tree avalanches" occur.
We saw roots petrified in the rock, many waterfalls, rainbows, seals and the boat even went close to one waterfall so the people could fill a cup of refreshing water.  Dad, of course, wanted to go and came back all wet and enjoyed the unique experience thoroughly.  I stayed dry and got a sip of the cool water.😁

Tree roots petrified in rocks.

Hundreds of small waterfalls.

Seals enjoying the wet weather!

No pot of gold at the end of this rainbow!

Driving back to the hotel, I could not help myself taking more pictures of the mountains.  A little reminder of home in Utah.

Thursday, last day of training.  Received a lot of good insights from the scriptures and separate specialized training for Mission Presidents and wives.  Of course, we sisters were treated with chocolate and a little framed spiritual thought.  The presidents got a flash drive with the week's presentation. 😉We concluded with a testimony meeting and another nice meal.  We had to go outside and walk a few of the pounds away.  The weather is cool and intermittent rain.  It was kind of nice to be in cool weather.  It felt like fall back home in Quebec.  

Another gorgeous rainbow.  It always reminds me of the covenant Heavenly father made with Noah.

"I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth."

"And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.  And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon the earth." Genesis 9:13,16-17

I like to think He was looking each time while we were admiring them.

Je trouve que je ressemble a grand-maman sur cette photo.😁

Last meal in New Zealand, so we had lamb for dinner.  Dad had Lamb shank and I had lamb rump.  Delicious!!!

We forgot to take a picture before the meal but we thought we could show you how good it was.

Friday and Saturday flying back to the mission home and "fini" the getaway.

I had a good scare when we were ready to check-in in Auckland, Saturday morning for our last flight to Vanuatu...  I could not find my passport with the visa inside!!!!!!😲😲😲😰😰😰

Fortunately, Dad looked in one of the many compartments of my carry-on bag ( the one I forgot to look at) and FOUND IT! My hero!😅😀💞😍😍😙😙

So we are back to beautiful Vanuatu where the weather reminds us of home in South Carolina.

Lukum yu bakegen mo lavem you tumas famli blo mifala.