Yesterday, as we were walking back to the park after ice cream, we saw a flyer in a window advertising an Easter Egg hunt at a nearby farm. Say less.

We packed up the house and left just after 10am. The farm was only a few minutes away, on our way out of town. At first it seemed empty and felt like a trap set up by a big bad wolf to attract children, but as we drove in we started to see more cars and families running around. We paid the small entrance fee, bought some animal food, and were given a map for where to find the eggs.

There were pens with different types of adorable and funny animals. Millie immediately honed in on a baby lamb, and a nearby farmer was so taken by her enthusiasm that he pulled the lamb out and let Millie hold it. It was only four days old! I kept thinking about how perfectly Spring-y and Easter-y this was, except it’s deep autumn and freezing here.

The Easter egg hunt had a rule that each kid could take one egg from their three designated zones. They were harder to find and far away from each other, so it took about 20 minutes. It felt very different than the Easter egg hunts that we’re used to at home, which are basically Black Friday stampede practices, where you grab as many eggs for yourself, at any cost. We did witness many kids—and even some parents!—taking more than they were supposed to. I would love an anthropological study on this. Nick hypothesized that cultures in which people depend less on each other would take more.

Three was plenty for Millie and she was ecstatic to get sweets before lunchtime.

We once again ran into the family we saw yesterday and the park and then the grocery store. Millie ran over to them and did an animated jump out and yelled “it’s me again!” Everyone at the farm seemed to know each other so I don’t think this was shocking to them, but for us city dwellers who are halfway around the world from any familiar faces, it felt very serendipitous.

We did the dead corn maze. I have been in more mazes on this trip than in my entire life.

Then we washed the animal saliva off our hands and drove 2 hours to Queenstown. It drizzled the whole time.

We checked into our little Airbnb. It’s in a new subdivision near a bunch of shops and restaurants. Convenient and clean, but otherwise pretty soulless. I have had this song stuck in my head all afternoon. Little boxes on the hillside, little boxes made of ticky-tacky…

We walked over to a pub and had a quick dinner. Nick and Millie walked back and I went solo to Woolies to pick up Easter goodies for the morning. For some reason (one might guess chocolate), Millie has gotten very into the Easter spirit and keeps asking how we’ll celebrate. So I got hot cross buns and a couple of chocolate bunnies to hide for her. She still talks about the Halloween scavenger hunt as one of her favorite memories of this trip.