The Great Jaffa Race!

The Cadbury Chocolate Carnival was on this week in Dunedin.  I am not too sure about the history of this event, but it is put on by the Dunedin City Council and the local Cadbury Chocolate Factory to give kids something to do during the winter school holidays/intersession.  Lots of cool things are put on for the kids such as a teddy bear fashion parade of clothes made out of chocolate wrappers, magic shows, and of course the Cadbury Jaffa Race held at Baldwin Street, the steepest street in the world!  What is a Jaffa race?  Well, let me start by explaining what a Jaffa is. In New Zealand there are two, one is an acronym used by all of the 'rest' of NZ to describe Aucklanders (Just Another F*cking Aucklander).  The other is a small candy that has orange flavoured hard candy coated on a ball of chocolate.  Similar to an m&m, but in a small ball the size of a whopper or milk dud. 

So, what happens is every year raffle tickets are sold for a dollar all across nz to raise money for charaties.  Then these candies are made with numbers printed on them.  Each year the jaffas are taken up to the top of Baldwin Street and they are hurdled down the street; 25,000 at a time (candies, not aucklanders).  The jaffas bounce up really high and reach speeds of over 100 km per hour.  The first 5 jaffas to reach the bottom win prizes ($1000 grocery store voucher and $1000 petrol/gasoline voucher).  This year the charities were Make a Wish Foundation, Surf Life Saving NZ, Parents Centre NZ and $25,000 was raised for each one.

This year it was a nice sunny day so we decided to go.  Very crowded.  But it is an amazing site to see a big wall of colored jaffas bounce down a street so fast.  The noise they made was incredible!  This event is definitely one of the quaint little things I love about New Zealand!  Bodie caught a rogue Jaffa and took it home.  No, I did not let him eat it....

I wasn't able to get many photographs, but here are a few and a short video (plus there are heaps online I am sure).  Wait for the large red wave to come down.  :-) 

Newspaper article here.