For many older New Zealanders decades of memories are flooding back after the death of Queen Elizabeth II.
Former vicar Geoff Hickman recalls the time he sang God Save the Queen while standing just metres away from the Queen herself at Saint Andrew's in Taupō 20 years ago.
Hickman, now a resident at Keith Park Retirement Village in Auckland, says he feels sadness over the Queen's death but that there's also something to celebrate.
At Edmund Hillary Retirement Village, resident Val Murry says learning of the Queen's death was a "really" sad moment.
"She had such a wide range of interests and her patronage, the things that she was involved with."
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Another resident, Joan Swift, says she can clearly remember the Queen's first visit to New Zealand.
"I was on holiday in Orewa and we all lined the streets in our summer clothes."
However Aotea Village Porirua resident Alan Jamieson fondly recalls a much more recent memory of the Queen.
Jamieson says her message to New Zealand during Covid helped him because it was partly spoken in te reo.
"The fact that she was able to talk to us in some of our language and not just English words, I think has helped me quite a lot."
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