Happy New Year!

Our days at the coast are numbered. Oh of course there'll be takeaway coffees when I get home, but I won't be able to drink them whilst staring at the sparkling sea. Almost enough to make one give up takeaway coffees. But I think I'll just move near the sea instead. The life change will be far easier to implement with four children and the withdrawals from city life will hardly hurt a bit. 

If it's not too late to talk about New Year's Eve (sorry, the coffee/sparkly sea..) can I tell you that it was great fun with the kids at our coastal town!? 

At 8.30pm we hopped in the car and drove five minutes down the road. Obviously we could have walked it but someone would have inevitably tripped in the dark and grazed a knee or scuffed a toe. The serious injury would probably have forced us to turn back or we'd have been arrested for drowning out the local festivities with the wailing. 

So we drove five minutes then walked five minutes till we got to the park overlooking the harbour. We walked right up the front and sat on a spare patch of grass. There were crowds, but there was also room for everyone. There was also nothing happening and with only about ten minutes to go I wasn't surprised when the man with kids next to us said, " excuse me, but what time is this supposed to start?" Hmph, a cynical city person, obviously. "Nine pm." I answered, matter-of-a-factly. 

I love the fact that in a coastal town the New Year's Eve celebrations start at nine, but at 8.50pm all is quiet.

This is what we could see.

 

There's a light or two on the harbour and a light or three in the town. Otherwise, nothing. Actually there was a boy behind us with a lit up light saber that he was swinging around like Luke Skywalker (yes I remember seeing the original movie at the movies, first time around). So I know what everyone's getting for Christmss next year...

And then, at 9pm, right above us - and I mean RIGHT above us, we saw this:

And this:

And finally, this:

It was fantastic. It was glorious. 

I said WOW about fifty times.

And then it was over. 

Everyone picked up their stuff and quietly walked home, or back to their cars. There was slight traffic congestion, on account of all the people walking up the middle of the road, but we were still home in about seven minutes. And like the rest of the town, as far as I could tell anyway, we were all tucked up in bed by ten.

Happy New Year everyone.