14/2/10 morning out of sorts

My nephew is in hospital. He has been there since Friday at 8am. He needs an abscess draining that is causing him a lot of pain. It is only a ten minute operation but emergencies get priority and he keeps getting pushed down the list. We should hear tomorrow that hopefully it has been done.
Up at 07.20 this morning, but felt it was a bit early. Pottered around opening windows then pottered off back to bed. Got up again at 09.15. Because we have no transport we are stuck here until Fran comes; he said he would pick us up early afternoon. We had toast for breakfast, showered and filled the time with household chores. Had coffee and cake at 11, Mum didn't have cake! Liz popped in from next door, she had bought us a long brush for the floor while we had been away. That will save on the bums up from under the table! It got to lunch time, I made a salad sandwich but Mum just had a cream cracker and a couple of pieces of nougat. Her guts are upset. They are not used to kebab. I was just tucking in when Fran arrived. I thought and so did Mum that we would be going to Kingsley Street for tea, but we were apparently not invited. Fran kindly took us to the supermarket and I asked, after we had the shopping if we would be dropping it back at the unit and was answered in the affirmative, but when we got back he said he might see us later and left. He also said that he thought Liz was having a Scottish Evening and he thought she might invite us. She hadn't said anything although we had seen her twice already today.
Fran also thought it would be a good idea if I walked the 4kms into Cambridge to hire a car, although he had originally said he would check prices on the internet first. He obviously was not going to have us at Kingsley Street. I said to Mum when he went had we done something to upset him? But she couldn't think of anything. So then I got really cross about it. We are his guests and he has abandoned us. We have no phone and no transport. Mother is quite fit, but she is 75. If he was so busy he could have asked if Diane would pick us up, rather than leaving us to walk all that way. I'm still cross about it.

North towards Ruapehu

The voyage lasted three hours, we docked at 16.35 and were off the ship by 16.45. The port at Wellington is so slick we were actually back on the road heading out of town two minutes later. We stopped to fill the car up at Levin and Fran wanted to buy a sandwich and eat as we went but that troubled me when we had such a long drive ahead of us. So I refused and said I wanted to sit down for tea, so we set off again and stopped at Foxton, but there wasn't much there. In fact apart from the video hire store it was like a ghost town. We pushed on, Fran being like every other chap I know, didn't want to stop once he had got going. We got to Bulls, where people like to live; the sweet shop was irrisist-a-bull, the clothes shop fashion-a-bull, the deli delect-a-bull and we even followed a lorry over the desert road that was transport-a-bull. There were lots more including social-a-bull on the local club. We stopped for tea. For one reason or another we decided against most of the few eating houses there were and ended up at a kebab house. I had falafel in pitta with hummus and salad, Fran had a lamb kebab and poor mother who doesn't eat salad, ended up with a chicken kebab iskander that came with rice and chickpeas instead of bread, and we had a side of the hottest chips I've ever had with hummus and mint sauce in a pot to dip in. Fran & I had the usually abysmal NZ tea and Mum had apple tea that transported her back to her Turkish holiday. Feeling refreshed we set off again. Mum treated us to tea; $38 very reasonable. Darkness soon started to fall along with a light rain and the road steadily rose until we hit the desert plateau.
The desert plateau is an upland area comprising of volcanic ash worn away to a black sand by the wind and patches of tussocky vegetation anchoring some of it down, which helps to prevent sand storms. All the ash came out of the volcano Ruapehu and it is a truly vast plateau. As we crossed the expanse the light was such that it was possible to see out of the car and make out features like the mountain range in the distance to the left. To the right in the distance the ground seemed to fall away and a sheet of fog or rain was hanging there looking menacing. Fran said, out of the blue, 'It's a shame you can't see the volcano' then out of the mist a shape appeared and I could see bits of the mountain, then all of a sudden above it the fog parted and the sky was red. I nearly threw a fit. I poked Mum and said 'Look!' She turned round and said '"Red sky at night shepherd's delight", it looks lovely' and turned back round. I stared at the back of her head gob-smacked. Didn't she realise we were about to be blown to smithereens? I continued to watch behind me for puffs of smoke until I could no longer see the mountain. It was raining heavier too but I could still see a red light near it in the sky.
I was glad I wasn't driving because the road conditions were poor. The surface was slippery with atrocious bends and the windscreen wipers were making little difference to the visibility, the road works were unlit with no road markings and loose chippings and the journey just seemed to go on and on. It ended when Fran dropped us back off at the unit at 11.30pm. We pulled our bags out of the car thankful to be back, we waved Fran off, unpacked and sat down with a glass of wine and got to bed about 12.15am.

Off to Picton & North Island

One last photo in Kaikoura, me on yet another beach

The drive up the coast was spectacular but not as rugged as the western seaboard. The beaches seemed to be mainly shingle although we saw one of black sand. We passed a road sign showing sea lions or seals, that said next 4kms so they must come up on to the road. Not today though, nary a one. The coast was rocky with big swathes of sea weed washing about near the shore.
We left the shore as the road turned inland towards Blenheim. We stopped there for lunch and a bitty walk round. It started to rain as we got out of the car, but not hard enough to wear a coat, that is until we had got far enough away from the car to ensure we would be really wet. Fran wasn't really happy wandering around the shops and had his eye on his watch all the time. We had coffee in a little mall with a glass roof and read the paper and listened to the rain that had become very heavy. Fran was wanting to be off. He had swopped our Sunday 2.30pm crossing for one at 1.15 on Saturday afternoon because he had got his days mixed up and thought we were going back on Saturday. Mum and I knew it was Sunday, but hey! whatever. We weren't driving. Arrived at Picton at 11.50pm and drove straight to the port. It wasn't worth going into town as we had to be at the terminal for 12.30. It turned out we ended up sitting in the boarding lane for an hour and a half because there was some sort of unspecified problem. Never did find out what. The ship was much bigger than the one one we had arrived on and we were put on the lower deck with the lorries. Fran spotted an old sign on the wall that said P & O Portsmouth. It was a recycled ferry! It was a lot plusher than Monday's boat, we were hungry and charged off to deck 8 for some lunch. Afterwards Fran headed off to find a recliner, Mum went up on deck and I just crossed to a cumfy seat near the viewing windows and spent the three hours catching up on my diary and gazing at the scenery.

Kaikoura 13/2/10

Obviously after such an early night we were all up at the crack of dawn again. Ablutions performed, off we went for breakfast at the Encounters Cafe. We sat outside in a courtyard. It had netting over to keep the gulls away because they can be very aggressive and will steal food if it's left unattended. One enterprising soul got under the net but we chased it off. I insisted we have a beach walk before setting off again and Mum said she would accompany me. On closer inspection it was almost impossible to walk on. The shingle bank, there was no sand, shelved steeply and the shingle was difficult to walk on with or without footwear, so we settled for a couple more photos. Just look at that sky!

Kaikoura

We arrived at 6pm at the White Morph Motel, the only place Fran could get us in. It was nice on two floors, but no A/C and really, really hot after the lovely afternoon. We opened all the windows to try and get some air in but had to shut them all before we went out as the balcony ran the full length of the building and it wouldn't have been secure.It was a nice evening although a little windy. We looked at the restaurant next door also called the White Morph, but it looked a little expensive so we wandered further along the coastal road to another restaurant, that was equally as expensive. We were getting hungry though so we went and sat down. The menu however had no vegetarian choices that I wanted to eat, so we got up again and went back to the White Morph Restaurant.
In case you are wondering a white morph is a type of large seabird. My treat for dinner. It came to $237 for the meal and Mum chipped in for the coffee and liqueurs. We staggered off into the night for the (luckily) 2 minute walk to the motel. We were all shattered after the huge meal and went straight to bed. It was only 9.30!

12th February 2010

Up at 7.30am, had the remains of my curry for breakfast, heated up in the microwave. Dot picked me up and I swanned off leaving Mum & Fran to pay the bill. First Dot took me to Mona Vale house and gardens in Christchurch. It was the home of a first settler. We spent our time wandering round the rose beds and talking. Prizes were had for the most words per minute, any donkeys would have lost their hind legs. I would include a photo of Dot but she isn't mad keen on having her photo taken never mind posted on a website, so I won't. You'll just have to imagine her as drop dead gorgeous, blonde and fit. After having coffee and cake in the house we went off to the beach to Sumner Rock. This was blow out of the Port Hills when they were still an active volcano; not recently then. We walked on the beach, lovely, I love beaches. We had lunch at the Rock Cafe and Dot treated me. Then we drove over the Port Hills and stopped at the view point where I took these pictures of the wonderful view. This is the deep water port for Christchurch. The early settlers had to anchor here and port all their stuff over the top of the hills. By the time we got back to the car, it was 14.50 and I had said I would meet the terrible twosome at three, so we only just had time to rush over to Dot's via the Lyttleton Tunnel. Each year the tunnel is closed on a Sunday and a walk takes place through it. We just had time for a pot of tea at Dot's and then we left Christchurch. It was too short a stay. The day which had started out wet and miserable was now really hot and sunny, and the drive to Kaikoura was really lovely

11th February 2010 evening.

Decided to go out for tea by the sea-side, drove out to New Brighton. Didn't take long to get there even though we were stuck in rush hour traffic for a few minutes at some road works. There didn't seem to be a town centre where we had arrived so we turned south and headed down the road parallel to the beach. There were plenty of places to park with access to the shore but we needed somewhere to eat as well, so we kept driving back towards the city. Then we saw the pier. It is magnificent.

Its a new pier built to replace one that was demolished around 30 years ago. The townspeople had donated to a fund and saved up $2 million with the help of a lottery grant of $286,000 and Christchurch council had matched this with a further $2 million and the pier was completed in 2002. However the appeal went on and a few years later lighting was installed. The donors are commemorated along the length of the pier, and it is long! 300 metres of pleasurable walking, and the sea is only 2m deep at the very end. What a superb resort for families, with a marvellous soft fine sandy beach. What a pity the town does not live up to the shore. It was run down with not a lot of places to eat. There were only two restaurants one a pizza place and a curry house. I didn't want pizza again and Mum doesn't like spicy food. We ended up with take away, curry for me, pizza for them and took it back to the motel.