It might not mean much to you, but you'll have to believe me - this is a big deal to Catholics!
The Cross and Icon (picture of Mary and baby Jesus) have been travelling round the world since about 1983 when Pope John Paul II gifted them to the youth of the world. This is their first visit to NZ and CHB were lucky enough to get some special time with them (even if it was the middle of the night!).
We started with a service and a cuppa at Kopua at 1.30am meeting the Palmy North contingency, then travelled in convoy to Waipuk where we walked with the cross the length of town to the green patch for some "singing in the rain" with a bonfire. Here's Mike keeping the guitar dry...
Lachie's been so excited about this all week. We even made him a little cross he could carry by himself. Of course being the time it is, we are all wearing hundreds of layers! Lily could hardly move, but she was toasty!
We then drove to Waipawa where we again walked the length of the town and had more reflection near the clock tower, then hot soup and snacks before some of us carried on to Havelock for handover. Mike and Lily left us here and went to get some sleep (Mike had just finished nightshift at 1am!)We walked from halfway up Te Mata Peak for a service at the top awaiting sunrise. Here's Lachie and Hamish (youngest of 8 of our "adopted" family, the Grevatt's) about to walk up Te Mata Peak.
And Lachie and Hamish had a go at "carrying" the cross too.
It was very cold up there, running was the best option! Lachie also got a bit of help from Katie.
Down below Lachie is the cross, nearly 4m tall (and very heavy), at least 100 people made the trip up the hill. Not quite sunrise here...
It was freezing (I've said that already!) but the sunrise was truly magical as we started walking down again.
Lachie took the easy way down, picking big kids over his freezing Mum who just wanted to keep moving!
We then went to St. John's College for Mass and breakfast (it's now about 8am). Lachie got to touch the cross again (part of the big deal as it's been touched by hundreds of millions of people throughout the world...)
Breakfast consisted of bacon and egg rolls (minus the egg for me thanks!) before Mike woke up and came and got us about 11.30am. Lachie hadn't slept since 11 the night before, I hadn't slept at all. I did a marathon 39 hours without sleep (been a long time since I did an "all-nighter") and had a great sleep last night to make up for it.
If you're wondering where Eden was in all of this, I decided late Friday night that the weather wasn't going to be good for her cold, so she had a holiday at Nannie and Grand-da's, and kept them awake with her singing throughout the night.The Cross and Icon head to Hamilton today then onto Auckland before heading to Australia to travel around in preparation for World Youth Day in Sydney next July. We're going ("youth" is up to 35 in this instance!). For more info check our NZ website www.worldyouthday.org.nz